Fresh Perspective

Work hard, play harder, here is the StreetFire crew behind the scenes. This is what it takes to produce oceans of videos and photos of the big event.

Adam Cleaning Alex’s car.

After a paint shaker flight out of LAX, I just piled into my hotel room at Harrah’s.  I’ll be bumbling around the convention floor tomorrow during Set-Up day, first stop?  Straight to the Continental tire booth to check out my GT-R. GGI outfitted Yoshi with some new shoes for the show, so I can’t wait to see it.

Now on the down side, I know that my blog has gotten a lot more popular in the last month or so, and I think I may be up to 3 people that check it daily….. I truely have to wonder about your browsing habbits if my ramblings are a daily digest for you.  I hate to say I may dissapoint a bit this week as I’m going to be working my ass off and will be very lucky if this isn’t the last post you see from me until I drag back into LAX on Sunday.  So please consider any postings you see between now and Sunday “extras”…..who knows, maybe this year will be different and I’ll actually have time to do more than run around like a mad man.

PS  I will be speaking at the Web 2.0 Panel Thursday at 2:00 PM at room N255-257

PPS On Wednesday at 1:30 I’ll be on Car and Driver radio, so set your dials to however you recieve that. Here is a link to their info page.

Jared Guynes, good friend of StreetFire working at LG Motorsport and RiceKiller.com needs to win this vote.  Please help me out by passing this link around and voting for him.

Vote for Jared! then tell your friends!

Hope she’s okay, but Oh my lord this is a good laugh.  Someone we (StreetFire) work with from time to time got arrested for DUI…. I’ll just quote the TMZ article below.  I’m going to give Ashley such hell for this next time I see her

😉

Some chick named Ashley Van Dyke was busted on suspicion of DUI in Hollywood. Her fame status is considered “barely” at best — but she tried to use it to get out of trouble anyway.

Cops nailed the former one-time SPEED TV host in West Hollywood late Monday night when she refused to cooperate with a deputy who was directing traffic. But after she was pulled over, sources say she felt the need to tell cops, “…but I’m a race car driver!”

Didn’t matter — ’cause we’re told she failed the field sobriety test miserably and blew well over the legal BAC limit.

DUI Bust — “But I’m a Race Car Driver…” – TMZ.com

Big Kudos to the whole StreetFire product and dev teams, today was a huge day and I’m really proud of all their hard work.  I’m sure Chris Hartman is ready to kill me since I’ve been on him for some of these updates since last Spring, but here they are at last and they absolutely rock!

StreetFire Profiles Update!

We completely overhauled profiles, to make them customizable with a simple WYSIWYG interface.  You can add backgrounds, change fonts and colors.  You can move your content boxes around and choose what you want to display on your profile.  With the advanced features, we added the ability to directly access your CSS file, and you can also add boxes with pure HTML if you want to get really crazy.

Most impressive to me?  Finally a public mini feed system!  Looks like we’re finaly caught up to best thinking of 2007 now! ;-)  The cool thing is that Profiles underlies a lot of other media collections in the system (Rides, Groups, Events, Channels), and with the new modular system we should now be able to just make a custom module for each data type and rapidly release new changes!

Profile Page on StreetFire (Shinkaze)

Photos Update!

Ugh, I about went nuts when we rolled out Kudos but didn’t include photos.  Perhaps given the challenges in figuring out the right thinking with Kudos perhaps it’s better we waited until it was full baked…. I don’t know, but at long last, we give all the same viral sharing features on photos that we did on video, including links, favorites and Kudos.  The end goal I want to achieve here is create a way fr auto enthusiast to provide context for photos.  Any search engine can provide a photo of a Porsche, but with our kudos (links and favorites) we should be able to serve a GOOD photo of a Porsche as chosen by auto enthusiasts.

Photo Page on StreetFire

Vidiac Update

So, Vidiac has been the neglected child for a whole year while the team focused on improving StreetFire.  The good news here is we are going to make some improvements to Vidiac.com over the next three months to make it a better service.  Today  we have over a hundred car websites on the Vidiac platform (CamaroZ28.com for example), and over a thousand non automotive sites as well.  Last une we rolled out a new video player for Vidiac and over the past 5 months we’ve seen our unique visitors and page views double.  So there is obviously still a lot of enthusiasm there.  This week we just moved Vidiac to a CDN which will vastly help video serving, next we are looking at upload work flow and customer service.  Good things coming there.

Vidiac.com

Old but worth posting still. I have about a gig worth of video cluttering up my hard drive that is all B-Roll from this shoot.

And of course I took plenty of photos on this shoot as well..

Believe it or not Dodge was pretty happy with this shoot since it was part of a larger “Challenger Week” we ran on the site.  My Favorite video from that week was actually the Top Gear Photo shoot we did.  Andrew from CarPix is an amazing photographer and really did a great job explaining how he composes photos for Top Gear.

“Challenger Week“

A little off topic from my normal blog roll, I know a lot of people are worried about their jobs in today’s economy, and Brandon Gutman laid out his advice on the matter

Connect Your Way to Your Next JobBrandon Gutman 10/07/08

Advertising Week in New York City was, once again, a fantastic meeting ground for hiring managers and job seekers. Every industry assembles together at least once a year, and these gatherings are prime spots to advance your search agenda. Events like IAB MIXX and the Relay Sports Sponsorship Symposium were loaded with some of the industry’s best bosses. Here are some tips on maximizing your networking ability to land your next position.

Brandon took this a little farther than he expanded on here, as he hosting a network event at this conference that I attended. he goes on to expand that the best strategy is to build a plan, engage early, get introduced, follow up and give back.  I think this is all good advice.

I’ve heard others echo this as well….not so much to get a new job, rather to be a bringer of success in rough times.  Last Friday I attended a Smith Barney event in Atlanta representing StreetFire to a panel of Southern entrepreneurs. It was organized by my good friend Michael Louie who told me after the event that when times get tough, he has always found success by reaching out to his client to better understand whats keeping them up at night.  Much like Brandon, this is firming up your network and establishing yourself as someone that provides relief in tough times.

To put a third point on this, (because I like triumvirates) recently I read a book that codifies both of these practices into a way to make yourself successful by attending to the success of those around you.  The book, “The Go-Giver” by Bob Burg and John David Mann, lays out in principle that you will find your greatest success by providing value to as many people as possible, influence by how aggressively you service the needs of others and  the tool you use to do this is yourself.  I highly recommend it, as the principles it advocates are practices the successful people in my life all employee. (book on Amazon)

Networking Ability and Networking Tactics for Your Next Job

Chris and Jonathan spent the week at Formula D last week.  Here is the interview they did with Tanner Faust, Drifter and host of Supercars Exposed and American Top Gear.

Tanner Foust 2008 Formula Drift Champion- Video.

The StreetFire Long Term Test Nissan GT-R
Part 1, Taking Delivery, 0-650 miles

15 years. That’s how long I’ve waited to own Godzilla, and here I find myself on a plane flying into tropical storm Fay pounding Atlanta the day I take delivery.  Even though my wife and I had recently moved with StreetFire from Atlanta to Los Angeles, we chose Nalley Nissan in Atlanta, Georgia to order our car back in February.  I had been smitten with romantic images of taking our new arrival around Road Atlanta shortly after delivery, perhaps even a visit to the Tail of the Dragon.  Now I realize we are going to have to arrange transport back West as I don’t want to break the car in on the never ending monotony that is I40.

Over the past month I have become an avid reader of anything GT-R, and have spent a fair amount of time posting on NAGTROC and the GT-R Register.  I can’t have my morning coffee until I’ve hit the GT-R Blog Sites too! (CBA-R35, 2009 GT-R and GT-R Blog) StreetFire organized a visit to Universal Nissan in North Hollywood to witness delivery of the first GT-R in the United States, and I even got a chance to speak with Steve Millen about his thoughts on the GT-R. But when I walked into the dealership and saw my car for the first time.  Well, I felt like I was 16 again.

My First sight of the GT-R

Nissan is proud of their flagship and it shows with the white glove treatment I received from Nalley.  The paperwork was quick and painless and I quickly found myself in the driver’s seat.  My GT-R sat roped off on the showroom floor for over a week while I was preparing for my trip.  My salesman, Todd deserves a medal for fighting off hordes of admirers. John Clark, the General Manager, had insured that my car was delivered in perfect condition with only 34 delivery miles on the odometer.  (Delivery Checklist from NAGTROC).

I can see why. The GT-R is a car you have to see in person to appreciate.  It’s a very three dimensional vehicle, with a lot of depth and detail in the design.  Photography tends to flatten the car and remove much of the drama the sculpted lines create.  Perhaps I’ll get our friends from Car Pix to elaborate some time as to why some cars look so much better in person than on film.

GT-R Paddle Shifter

Nalley Nissan had sent their head mechanic to GT-R service training, to prepare him for both delivery and service. This is the only car I’m aware of that the manufacturer insists your first ride be with a trained technician for proper orientation.  I think headquarters is concerned that someone might mistakingly buy a GT-R thinking it will behave like a Maxima, only to be surprised that the GR-6 Sequential 6 speed makes clunking noises as you roll to a stop, or that 6 pot Brembos with racing pads tend to squeak a little.

Andy Robinson, Nalley’s master technician, was very knowledgeable about the vehicle, and explained how the side vents create a pressure bubble of hot air down the side of the vehicle to aid in aerodynamics. I had wondered what the hood vents were for, and he showed how they dump cool air right onto the turbos when the car is moving, and allow the turbos to vent hot air back up when stationary.  A neat trick to reduce under hood engine temperatures.

These are the things that impress me the most about the GT-R, the car is so thought out. A small ridge on the side view mirror creates an air vortex that is channeled by a crease in the C-Pillar right into the rear spoiler. In later weeks I would learn that the downside of this great aero, is that the GT-R is a dirt magnet like no other vehicle. A price I’m delighted to pay for a 0.27 Coefficient of Drag!

Wind Tunnel Testing

That first time you push the GT-R’s starter button, is more akin to hitting an adrenaline dump on an IV.  You don’t know what to expect, and there is a slight delay as the computer runs through the pre flight checklist before engaging the motor…. just enough delay to build anticipation, I wonder if some Japanese Zen master measured how soon is too soon and how long is too long?  Andy gives me a brief on the multi function display, but I find myself paying more attention to the sounds of the motor and transmission whirring up in preparation of the first drive.

Previously I have owned a handful of V8s (L81, L98 and LS1) and most recently a BMW M3, (my M3 is now For Sale BTW) each with a distinct aural sound.  The GT-R is a distinctly mechanical symphony with a bit of jet turbine mixed in. It reminds me somewhat of the straight cut gears you hear in a racing transmission, which it may be, the GR-6 sequential manual is worth paying attention to, it’s simply brilliant. As I eased away from the dealership, I was stunned by how smoothly we accelerated from a stop and how transparently the gear changes are.  My only other exposure to “manumatics” had been the E46  BMW SMG system which feels more like a high school driver’s-ed simulator.

Transmission, Suspension and VDC

Left in Automatic mode the GT-R quickly finds 6th gear for maximum economy.  Andy explains that the normal setting for the transmission is to maximize economy.  The Race setting keeps the car a downshift away from maximum acceleration.  It’s not like the other manumatics where you have multiple settings for shift speed, the GT-R is smarter than that.  It looks at the RPM and % throttle application to understand how the driver is driving, and changes shift firmness accordingly.

The GT-R is not the first car with this sort of dual clutch sequential transmission, but when combined with this chassis and driveline, I think it’s found it’s ultimate expression.  I never thought I would give up the clutch pedal, but how can you not love this gear box?

Magic Happens Here

Tropical storm Fay gave me exactly 15 minutes of dry weather to familiarize myself with the GT-R, and then all hell broke loose.  The word for storm in Japanese is “Arashi” but it could just as easily be “GT-R,” because the twin vortexes made by the turbos apply power to all 4 tires with near limitless traction regardless of how violent the weather is.  The storm simply didn’t matter.  The winds glided undisturbed past the body work and the water parted like the red sea before the AWD.

I left Nalley and proceeded to put 500 miles on the GT-R in some of the worst weather this Florida boy has seen in a long time, and the GT-R consistently performed. I found myself doing a sanity check and pulled into a parking deck at Atlantic Station to look at the stock Bridgestones. I simply couldn’t believe that this tread pattern with the mocking suggestion of water channels could provide this sort of traction in wet weather.

GT-R Bridgestone Tires

I horsed the GT-R around some of my favorite Southern switch backs and never once did it lose composure. I hate to say it, but the GT-R is faster and more confidence inspiring in the wet, than my beloved E46 M3 is in the dry.   If you can’t find a GT-R to drive for yourself, then drive a E46 M3 to the limit, and realize that’s what a wet weather warm up lap in a GT-R feels like.

Despite missing a proper Road Atlanta track day, I’m happy Fay gave me a little wet weather exposure.  The GT-R is Los Angeles bound, and doomed to a future of dry desert mountains and eternal sunshine.

Coming soon.
Part 2 How to transport a car cross country.

Photo Resources

• Photos of the First GT-R Delivery
• Photos of Streetfire’s GT-R Delivery
• The StreetFire GT-R with a Ferrari F360 Modena

GT-R Web Sites

• CBA-R35 (blog)
• NAGTROC (forum)
• The GT-R Register (forum)
• GTRBlog.com (blog)
• GT-R World (portal)
• Official GT-R Site (Nissan)

Credits
A special thank you to John Clark, Todd Robinson and Andy Robinson and the rest of the team of Nalley Nissan for a fantastic delivery.

NalleyNissan.com
(888) 919-6677
1625 Church St
Decatur, GA 30033 (map)

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