People are good

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. The more people that I deal with, the more that I realize that people are good.

I’ve been running a T-shirt giveaway for The Pet Wiki for the last couple of weeks. The only thing that I ask of people is that they post a picture of themselves wearing the shirt, with their pet, to facebook. I figure it’s a win-win situation. Fans of The Pet Wiki get shirts, and I get a little (hopefully viral) publicity.

The thing that gets me about all this is how amazing people are. Instead of people asking for Ts and not committing to send a picture, people have gone out of their way to tell me about their pets and how they can’t wait for their fur babies to be in the spotlight. I even have someone who is going to make sure to get pictures of landmarks in Australia into her pictures. Wow, The Pet Wiki really gets around :). I am so pysched!

Most of the people that are getting shirts are people with whom I’ve had a relationship on Twitter. I know them. Although we’ve never met in person, we’ve had real conversations. I’ve been able to make great friends all over the world. It’s fun to think that my Ts will be worn in places like London, Sydney and even Croatia (and all over the US and Canada).

Talking about how good people are, another thing that really suprises me is foursquare. Foursquare is a service that allows you to let your friends know where you are. When I originally heard about foursquare, my initial reaction was that if I broadcast where I am all the time, people would be able to know where I am and break into my house. What does that say about me? Not that I’d break into anyone’s house, but it was something that did concern me. I’m cool with it now. Foursquare gives me the opportunity to meet great people, where ever I am.

The same is true of twitter. Have a question? Need an answer? Just ask and there is sure to be someone out there on the web who can help. It’s not just that they can help, they want to help. In the words of Guy Kawasaki “it’s a beautiful thing.”

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure that there will be people that will take advantage of others, but the positive, by far, outweighs the negative.