So my bicycle sits on my back patio with a sticker saying, “One Less Car”. It hasn’t been ridden for a while and the tire is flat. And with no commute since November there is either too far a distance, or no reason.

Google just announced they are giving their overseas employees a free bike and helmet so they’ll ride to work, be healthier, and to be eco-friendly. They even have a few versions of Google bikes to choose from, including on that folds.

I rode bicycles in Amsterdam on one dream trip (wish I had that image of a small girl standing with a red coat, on a platform in front while her dad pedaled). It’s the funnest place ever to ride a bike. Motorists are used to seeing bicycles and it’s a bit of a game to dodge each other. People are riding their bikes with bug shields, yacking on cell phones, even carrying their kids.

Writing about cool projects like Google bikes, organic locally grown produce in their cafeteria, and solar panels makes me want to work for Google! I had the closest brush when I was talking to Mozilla.

In college my friends and I really got in to riding bicycles and outfitting them with baskets to carry our stuff. I didn’t have a car until my senior year and I only married into one. My friends and I loved to ride our bikes through the hallways at night in the science building. We used to use our bicycles to carry groceries. Hence, I’m known online not just as newspapergrl, but as grocerybike.

To find bike routes, check out bikely.

Just as I was writing and thinking about how Google is a collective memory of your business, I got an IM with this article (I’m going to digg it). In the comments Dave Bascom says that companies can overcome negative search engine publicity. If they have loyalty built with their customers, they will actually trust the company more than what is written. He also says that people already have opinions so it doesn’t matter. I disagree. When I look for a job I look to see what has been said about a company. If it’s negative, I ask why. This is rather ironic for me as I write it.

Walmart, State Farm, Albertson’s, UPS, Kmart, Tyson…the list goes on. People have some rotten things to say.

Well, here it is: 29 Top Brands Trashed in Google.

So if you’ve been trashed, you’re not alone. In fact, I can’t imagine a well-known company that wouldn’t be. Now I wonder, what top brands have really good results? Who is trusted? Google itself? Johnson & Johnson?

Paul approved the comments for the sixth grade class on his blog. They are now live. When I taught sixth graders about blogging this week, we had them all leave comments, just to practice.

Please check them out and leave your own comments (link above) to the students so they can experience the magic of blogs – how anyone anywhere can talk back. There is a great discussion about teaching our kids entrepreneurship and technical skills going on that I just learned about. Check it out.

After teaching the class I thought how the best minds need to teach in elementary schools once in a while. It’s a good exercise in distilling complicated ideas and making them very clear. Paul caught that too, if you read his post about it.

I learned that the last people you can be fake with is a class of sixth graders. They haven’t learned not to trust. They can spot dishonesty in a second. Rather than talk down or at them, I have to commit to empowering them with knowledge. Paul did a great job at that. I have more to learn. It’s easy to see if you’re being effective – they listen and participate. There is one conversation that you are assisting or directing. Otherwise it’s just chaos.

There is also a great article about how Lenn Pryor decided to tell the truth about Microsoft internally and how he almost lost his job over it. Scoble was part of this project called Channel 9.

I can so relate (ah, Tahitian Noni who’s slogan is “Tell the Story” – and I might add, but only our side of it!). The thing is being authentic means that you have to trust people. There is little trust at that company. Suspicious of their distributors, suspicious of their employees, suspicious of each other. I’m bringing this up because I saw a former co-worker last night and we talked about it. She quit not knowing what was next just because she couldn’t stand working there. And yes, they won some award for being best place to work.

When one of my friends left the company he wore a Kelly Olsen t-shirt he made that showed Olsen as Castro (if my memory serves me right). I had some of the closest friends there. But also at times it felt cutthroat (over what? some juice?) and it was as if we were pitted against each other.

I’ve noticed that when I don’t trust people I attract others as bosses or whatever who also don’t trust people. We are suspicious. We like to hide the unpleasant truths. Then we blame someone else when that doesn’t work!

It’s been a big eye opener for me. I stopped trusting at one point and in my profession (or any other) that doesn’t work. It slows everything down and makes it more expensive to do business. That line from the emyth always haunts me – your business is a reflection of you. If you are dishonest, your employees will be dishonest…etc. I feel the responsibility to be seen for what I am and what I am not (including how sometimes I’m lazy like a sloth, how I want to avoid responsibility, etc. Also, my issues with power).

I’m not saying this to be critical. I’m illustrating that anyone can say what they think about you or your company. It’s not making someone wrong, it’s a challenge to them to start committing to something more inspiring than hiding. A challenge to enter the conversation. A conversation that starts right off where all good conversations start, that is, with being honest.

I went to the gym and read Wired magazine while I pedaled. I ate up The See-Through CEO story by Clive Thompson. I go to his blog and read how even thinking of working out can have a placebo effect that helps you actually lose weight.

Ok, one more tangent…he writes about sloths. In high school my group of friends in the apathy club called themselves a bunch of sloths. So I have a fond association with sloths, even though I now don’t like to be one.

That whole exercise was for me to find the story on his blog that helped form the story he wrote in Wired (with comments from his blog). No luck. But here is the punchline. Search engines are collective memories (or as he says, a reputation management system) for your business and your life. Once you’ve entered this large conversation and start telling the truth, you can’t go back. You can’t lie anymore.

A search engine holds your legacy online. If you’re quiet or hide that just means other people will fill the search engines about you or your business. Long after you die you have a record about you. Will it show integrity? What will your great-great granddaughter read about you? He quotes a reader as saying it’s ok to have secrets, but not lies. They will follow you everywhere.

Benefits of transparency online:

• it’s easier for others to enter the conversation – customers become working partners and better products, or articles result
• we can better know our leaders – even our politicians
• just like in real life, when you listen, people are moved…writing a blog is a form of listening
• you have a say in what shows up in search engines about you by how you respond to negative stories

I’ll let you talk about the negatives, they are there too. This is just getting long and I’m ready to write two more posts. Ah, if only I didn’t have to work for a living!

Jeff Barr wrote a post about conferences and it had a reference to a comment on my blog. He’s saying how the best speakers at conferences don’t just drop in, deliver a speech, and leave. They participate and reference conference themes (like submarines!) in their speeches. They forward the conversation. I love when your comments start and forward conversations.

The best way to stifle a conversation is to try to control it or to downplay it. I’ve been guilty of that but it doesn’t work very well. Marketers like me at times have to fight themselves from controlling conversations (hey, look at my product!).

When I’ve listened to any good speaker or read any blog, the ones I resonate with most are ones that I can see myself in. My absolute favorite is when someone makes me laugh and it’s light-hearted and real. It’s all fun and I’m learning without even being aware of it. Then out of the blue they say something profound. It alters me. I’m moved. Stopped in my tracks. This is the punch line. It takes skill to get the timing right. Guy Kawasaki did this at an Affiliate Summit he spoke at. I still remember it. I was getting choked up!

As far as religious talks I love the ones that make me stop and think, wait a second, I have some work to do (I see some lies in my thinking or way of being that now I want to address). I literally am having a conversation about what they are saying within myself, with them, and with God – in real time.

I like the concept of mixing mediums, like artists do in collages. Taken together all these conversations going on and mashups create a rich life. So the conversation on on my blog started from a real life conversation or a blog post, carries to Twitter, MySpace, to a blogger’s dinner and to a class. I like how “Memory” on Twitter uses geek terms for common things. Rather than strip her hair of color, she’s deleting it.

I like how on Paul Allen’s blog today it’s not just family history, it is people getting married and making babies (yes, sex: something so alluring that even on academic Wikipedia it’s one of the most read topics). Suddenly it’s not a dating site, it is the beginning of a conversation about future families. That is something I can resonate with. Jeff Barr just Twittered about holding a Second Life family reunion. There needs to be a Second Life dating service too (there probably is).

This leads me to how the best businesses start and continue important conversations. After all, sex and business, though not at all the same thing, are really about creation. And creation starts with conversations.

I love the Pajama Market blog – the Small Business Blog of the Day. If you are new to business blogging you need to read it. He covers so many aspects of business blogging. He features different small businesses and helps them improve their blogs.

The blog is geared to the beginner but I like to use it to get ideas on how to teach blogging more effectively. If I were a teacher every day it would be on the list of assignments to read it.

What an interesting exchange about blogging tonight. First, I get an email from a friend who is so sick of me talking about Twitter that he is unsubscribing from my blog. I actually take that personally for a minute and feel bad. Since he won’t be reading this I can talk about it, ha ha. Then I remember that it has nothing to do with me.

When I describe Twitter to someone I wiggle all of my fingers together up in the air. It’s my sign language for Twitter. It represents the rhythm of life that Twitter is for me. It’s like a dance. A flit. Of course the real actual tempo of your life, inside the world of your home, friends, etc. that is more real. But sitting at my computer I literally feel connected to what Twitter calls your friends and followers (and they are really that!). When you want to delete someone it uses the term destroy. I get philosophical about it. I enjoy the quick slices of life, even the mundane parts that annoy other people.

Even right now I’m chatting with an artist in Mexico who I met a few days ago from Twitter. He takes abstract technical subjects and gives them form. I appreciate his work and he’s become a good friend.

Back to the email though. Moments later I got a quick IM from one of my mentors. He has influenced so many people’s lives for the better. He is who inspired me to blog almost exactly three years ago. His blog is loved and admired all over the world. He complimented me on my blog. I really appreciate that. I had to just stop and absorb it for a moment.

Different people will come and go and that’s fine. Thank you for reading lately and for your comments. I’ve been expanding what I write about and it’s been attracting different people. I feel honored when people share their dreams with me.

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So now it was my turn to feel like a dinosaur. I may as well roar. I taught a class of 6th graders about blogging. They all had wireless internet and Macbooks. They know how to type. I realized I know almost nothing about 6th graders, what they might be interested in, what music they like, what they are learning. I was reading some of their essays about the earth. There were some great lines, such as: the president should keep all the lady’s hairspray cans so they don’t pollute the air! Pretty funny. My parents were both teachers until they were investors. I have new respect for them.

I found imbee – a safe place for kids and teachers to blog. They require a parent’s permission to sign up. Or, another option is a password protected WordPress blog (thanks to Tris on Twitter – now I ask all my questions there).

For many years I’ve dreamed of being a philanthropist. I want to be sure our kids have music and the arts in their education. We can feed their minds but they need art and music to grow their humanity. I also want to give around housing and environmental issues (like buy a large track of land and set it aside for the benefit of the community).