Did you just put the finishing touches on a paradigm-shifting business book? Did you just complete the final paragraph of a presentation that you’ve been working on for years? Are you starting to write your first book, or did you just open a Word document to begin crafting a speech? In either scenario, join us in Dallas for the Marketing With a Book and Speech Summit!

Henry DeVries and Mark LeBlanc will be hosting the event, and are coauthors of the book “Build Your Consulting Practice,” and cofounders of Indie Books International, based in Oceanside, CA.  With combined expertise that includes multiple award-winning business books and a past NSA presidency, DeVries and Leblanc will provide insight and techniques for every step of writing a book that boosts your business.

At the summit you’ll learn how to generate leads with a book, the appropriate fee range for your speeches, and why a book is your best marketing tool and a speech is your best marketing strategy.

Russell will be speaking as well, covering topics ranging from utilizing article placement for PR, and leveraging articles in business, trade and industry publications for a boost in name recognition.

The Marketing With a Book and Speech Summit will be held in Dallas the Friday, July 13^th—before NSA 2018 kicks off—at the Courtyard Dallas Central Expressway from 1-4pm. Bonus: it’s free! If you’d like to reserve your spot, please call 760-445-4181 or email Devin@indiebooksintl.com.

We hope to see you there!

Normally when we activate the PR/PR Roadshow it involves tables, and boxes, and banners, and handouts, and…mints. This week? We’ve trimmed down!

Russell is en route to Atlanta today to attend David Neagle’s Art of Success Summit. While PR/PR won’t be present in its traditional capacity, Russell still would like to speak with you about publicity and the ways that article placement in trade, industry and association publications can boost your career.

If you happen to be attending the Art of Success Summit or find yourself in the Atlanta area this week, make sure you say hello!

Full disclosure: I am a Waffle House man. I like my diners with a bit of grit—its character on full display in the form of well-worn booths from late night sustenance, the loud clatter of skillets on the stove, the sizzle of frozen beef hitting the cook top. It’s a southern staple, and it never lacks for personality—or personalities. Never change, Waffle House.

But change? Well, IHOP certainly did that yesterday. The company has been teasing a rebrand to IHOb for weeks now, and on Monday The International House of Pancakes finally announced its conversion over to the International House of Breakfast Burgers. Burgers?

Burgers. If you feel like you’ve been duped, you’re not alone. Pancakes are the marquee food offering at IHOP, but it’s always offered a wide variety of omelets, waffles, and French toast. The transition over to the International House of Breakfast seemed like a natural extension to feature its other items. But alas: we got burgers.

And we’ve bone to pick, as well. For us serious about our late-night breakfasts, we don’t like surprises. We want our staples, we want them piping hot, and we want familiarity. Waffle House has offered burgers for decades, but they never felt like an interloper or a feature that outshined the company’s namesake. IHO(b) had to know this was going to go poorly, but it may have gone worse than they presumed.

Exhibit A:

Not really afraid of the burgers from a place that decided pancakes were too hard.

— Wendy’s (@Wendys) June 11, 2018

Exhibit B:

👦: Grandpa, do you remember the Great Burger Wars?
👴: lol no I was chillin drinkin milkshakes and trying to make sense of Westworld

— Denny’s (@DennysDiner) June 11, 2018

Exhibit C:

Inspired by the International House of Burgers announcement, we are also changing our name (Please do not ask what it means — we don’t know either.) pic.twitter.com/0HPQtQirHn

— A&W Restaurants (@awrestaurants) June 11, 2018

The inter-brand Twitter roasting continued from there. It’s important to note that this is only a temporary rebrand—essentially a PR stunt to highlight IHOb’s new burgers—but one has to question the damage done to your brand when your new rollout is laughed off the internet. I guess we’ll see. If you’d like to discuss this further, I’ll be up at Waffle House.

How do you feel about organized chaos? Like shouting over people? If so, you really enjoyed Apple’s WWDC 2018 event yesterday where it announced the marquee feature coming to iOS 12: Facetime for up to 32 people.

Sounds like a multimedia mosh pit.

Apple’s WWDC event announced several new improvements and features, but the headline addition was the ability to video chat with an elementary school classroom’s amount of participants. Apple is famous for adding functionalities previously available on other platforms, and this update to Facetime draws a direct parallel to Google’s Hangouts—one of the few remaining facets of the now-defunct Google+.

Organized chaos aside, the ability to add a boatload of participants to Facetime calls does have an immediate benefit for businesses with staff on the go. In a work environment that now features many remote employees, it makes a lot of sense for Apple to adjust its Facetime app so it functions as a conference call client. Staff meetings in Uber rides are about to be a thing.

Looking at the personal side, as much as it sounds like absolute pandemonium, Facetiming multiple people all over the globe at the same time will be a lot of fun. As someone who has made friends through my travels, I appreciate the prospect of getting the whole group together for a digital reunion.

Apple’s annual WWDC event continues to make headlines, and this year is no different. When iOS 12 is released, you can discuss future WWDC announcements over Facetime with 31 others.

In today’s edition of Computers are Creepy: is your smart home device spying on you?

Sounds ripped from a Bradbury novel, right? Well, it appears some “glitches” have affected Amazon’s Echo, and one report details a couple’s private conversation being recorded and sent to contacts in their phones. The conversation was sent without their consent or any notification, mind you.

In this current age of hyper-paranoia (for good reason) with our online activity and security, Alexa capturing conversations and forwarding them along is pretty terrifying. As an Alexa owner who is still trying to find a use for it in my non-smart apartment, it has me debating whether I should pull the plug for good.

I’ve personally experienced my Amazon Echo respond mistakenly to the television and begin spouting off random facts or news stories, which is discomforting, to say the least.

Amazon has placed the blame at the feet of Alexa being activated by words that sound similar to “Alexa” (which doesn’t really ease the paranoia) and has said they will look into the problem. Until then, consider me unplugged.