So for the past few months, I’ve been teaching some of the basics of what I do in digital marketing to an “intern” of sorts, Michelle Wolverton, ever since we met up at a Matthew Ebel concert in Second Life. Virtual Hot Wings, our first major project, was sort of like the semester project, and her thesis was a contest called Famecast, for independent musician Natalie Gelman. Chel, as she likes to be called, decided just after VHW to take up a new media career in independent music promotion, and Natalie’s talents fit the bill for new media promotion.

Enter the Famecast contest. With an arduous voting process and an interface that, to put it mildly, blows chunks, it’s amazing anyone uses that thing. The prize, however, for artists is a trip to Austin, TX (expenses paid) to win a shot at $10,000. Chel took it upon herself to help Natalie’s placement in the contest, and thanks to a lot of elbow grease and some guerrilla marketing tactics (legitimate ones, no scripts or anything underhanded, and certainly nothing to disqualify the artist she was representing), Natalie Gelman is headed to Austin, TX as a finalist in the Famecast contest.

I consider that to be a diploma of sorts. No worthless piece of paper to frame and hang on the wall - Chel’s graduation from ninja marketing school is pure result, which is all we care about.

Happy graduation!