A few weeks ago I received a message from a publisher asking for my e-mail address so she could send a Request for Permission form to republish something off my site. I was pretty excited because I thought that someone was finally going to include Tourism Queensland’s Best Job in the World campaign in a marketing textbook as an example of a great idea executed at the right time, and wanted to include screen shots of all the blogs that were created / revamped for it. I replied with my e-mail but didn’t hear back from them for a while. I started to think that maybe it was just a request for the Axolotl photo I took a while back which continues to be very popular (apparently it’s very difficult to get a close up of the little guys).

I got the form today! It turns out that both my guesses were wrong. They’re interested in republishing an entire blog post that I had written after the Best Job in the World campaign about the applications essay Tourism Queensland had asked each of us to write. It’s going to be included as an example in a college textbook on how to write effectively. I think this is even better than both of my guesses. I hope they send me a copy once it’s published!

Chris & Me In Berets (cheesiness intended) at The Narrow

I wonder sometimes what my life would’ve been like if the Internet had never existed. I imagine I’d have a pretty boring job and know very little about the world. I’d probably only have met a fraction of the people I know today too. Of the people I wouldn’t have met, there are a few that I would’ve wished I had and Christine Estima is one of those few.

Chris was a fellow Top 50 candidate for the Best Job in the World and we’ve kept in touch via e-mail, Twitter and Facebook ever since. She decided to venture over to the West coast for some of our world-famous outdoor thrills so we finally had an opportunity to meet in person this week!

If you read Chris’ blog and tweets before meeting her, you’ll feel like you’ve already met because her writing is so true to herself. We gabbed for hours with barely a breather and if the concept of time didn’t exist we’d probably have been able to chatter on for a while longer. This girl has loads of energy, a ‘tude to match, and the worst dating stories ever (LOL)! She’s a hoot and a half and I can’t wait to see her when she returns from her action packed week in Whistler. <3

Sidenote: All skytrain stations should have internet booths! My phone died on my way to meet Chris and I didn’t have her number written down. We had been in the middle of a text chat about where and when to meet so I wasn’t sure where I was supposed to be. I was close to asking someone with a data plan if s/he could send a tweet on my behalf but it all worked out in the end and I spotted her across the street.

Everyone and their pumpkins at the annual Rogers’ Pumpkin Carving Party

I hung out with fellow Best Job candidates Erik Rolfsen and Marcella Moser in Vancouver (Canada), had dinner with James Hill and Greg Reynen in Brisbane (Australia), met up with Mitch Moffit in Townsville (Australia), and now I can tick Steven Rogers off my list too! It’s too bad Cali Lewis wasn’t in Texas at the time.

To be honest, I had forgotten Steven lived in Texas (even though his Twitter account is @Steven_in_Texas ). My bad. The last I remembered through our Best Job e-mail threads (everyone still keeps in touch), he was climbing Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa and roaming the streets of Europe! I received a message from him when we first arrived in Amarillo, Texas asking where we were planning on going in Texas and if we would be passing his way. He invited us to his family’s annual Pumpkin Carving Party, and we happily accepted his invitation!

Steven, his family and friends are all very typical Southerners. And by that I mean that they’re super friendly! I really like the feeling of New Mexico and Texas because everyone is generally nicer down south.

There were heaps of neighbourhood kids and their parents at the party all happily chatting, munching on cookies and candies, and taking part in their 20+ year tradition of carving pumpkins together. The Rogers family have a large dining room table covered in photos from past pumpkin carving parties including one where Steven is sporting an ‘80s mullet (my fav). LOL

Throughout the home, there are pictures of all their travels (and the whole family has travelled a lot). After a little tour, we started carving our pumpkins and mingling over cookies. A great time was had, and the pumpkins turned out fairly well. The only bad part of the afternoon was the attack of the mosquitoes. Both Ang and I get allergic reactions from mosquito bites and I was unfortunately bitten on the forehead. Ugh.

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Thank you to Steven and the Rogers Family for inviting us into your home!

Mitch and me

Yesterday I picked up Mitch in Cairns and we headed down to Townsville where he’s currently going to school. I was really looking forward to having a travel partner even if it was only for an afternoon and it was so nice to have someone to chat with on the road.

On the way down, we were going to go on a canopy walk but the sign took us to farm country and there were no more signs after the first one so we turned around and got back on the Bruce Highway after 10 minutes.

When we got into town, we got lost trying to find his university and my internet connection is so bad in Townsville that Google maps wouldn’t work. You’d think Mitch would know the way to his own university seeing as how he’s been here for a few months already eh? LOL (I’m just teasing you Mitch! ) It was already dark by the time we found it (we stalked a bus to get there), so we had dinner at his dorm kitchen and I spent the night in the Wicked Camper in the parking lot.

Today we were going to go to Magnetic Island courtesy of Townsville Enterprise and Wicked Campers, but poor Mitch is feeling ill. Hopefully he’ll feel better tomorrow. *crosses fingers*

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Toshio and my half eaten breakfast in the background

It’s 9:08am and I’m clicking refresh on the Island Reef Job site every 30 seconds. I wonder how rich I’d be if I got a $1 from every time I refreshed the page this year. I’d probably be able to afford an Island Caretaker lifestyle for a month.

I wonder what Tourism Queensland has up their sleeves for this round of “competitions.” I also wonder whether I wouldn’t be considered if I entered because I’ve already had my 15 minutes with this whole campaign. Fellow candidates and friends Jackie from Singapore and Christine from Canada have been following along and are probably wondering the same thing.

9:20am: Why hasn’t anything changed yet? Did I get the date wrong? *checks date* No, it’s right. It’s August 26. Why are there no tweets about it?

It’s been said that everyone in the world is connected within six degrees of separation. In Brisbane, it’s more like two.  — me.

You know how “social media evangelists” and die-hard twits are always telling people they should be using Twitter because it’s the greatest thing since sliced bread? I don’t always agree with their stats (they usually say something about how there are x million number of users etc. when really only a small fraction of those accounts are in use) nor do I think Twitter is for everyone.

When I tell people I’m a twit, they usually ask what Twitter is and whether I think it’s worth it for them to join. Here are my answers and my Twitter story:

Twitter

Twitter (in the dictionary according to Anny): another medium on the internet that allows people (aka twits, twitterers, tweeps) to communicate with each other using short blurbs of 140 characters or less, known as “tweets”* (singular: “tweet”).

*Tweets are similar to Facebook status updates. However, twits seem to have become increasingly critical of Twitter users who tweet about themselves and their food consumption rather than “hot topics” or cool links.

Do I think it’s worth it for you to join Twitter? Well, that depends. I like to compare Twitter to a telephone. If you’re going to use it on a regular basis and you like communicating with others on it, then it’s a great idea. If you plan on joining simply because you heard it’s the thing to do (*cough* *cough* Sheep! *cough*) and you don’t really like the idea of having all your thoughts out there for the world to criticize, or you don’t plan on using it very often, then joining Twitter is a waste of your time.

Personally, I love Twitter and it loves me right back. <3

My Twitter Story (Alternative title: It’s Two Degrees in Brisbane)

The story begins with a single tweet by @612brisbane about the top condiments Australians like to put on their breakfast toast. 612 ABC Brisbane is a radio station based in Brisbane, Queensland Australia and they do a lot of listener surveys about all sorts of random things. Because ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) is a national publicly funded broadcaster, they can’t mention brand names like Vegemite (which was of course, one of the favourite Australian toast condiments). The tweet described Vegemite as a brown yeast-based spread and it sounded pretty gross to me. I hadn’t discovered Vegemite yet and didn’t know what they were talking about so tweeted back asking what it was. Spencer from the Breakfast show DM’ed me back with the answer. (Note for non-twits: a DM is a “Direct Message” which is only visible to the person you’re messaging)

After the Top 50 candidates for the Best Job in the World were announced, 612 ABC Brisbane was the FIRST media outlet to contact me for an interview. I was impressed. The local Vancouver-based radio and television stations (save CBC) were about 20 minutes behind and they were half a world closer!

Spencer in studio at 612 ABC Brisbane

I kept in contact with Spencer through Twitter, and when I came to Brisbane I asked if I could tour the radio station. Not only did he say yes, but he also invited me down for an interview.

Plain and simple: Spencer is Awesome (or as they say in Australia “Owe-some”)! He knew I was looking for a job so while we were on the air, he asked his listeners to call in if they could offer me any work. The first caller in was Dr. Andrew Laming MP from Cleveland (it’s about an hour South of Central Brisbane) who said he’d like to hire me to do some work as an Events Assistant. How perfect is that? I’ve been working in his office for over a month now and it’s been absolutely fabulous. The people at the office: Matt, Sara, Marty, Louise and of course Andrew are all uber-great and I really couldn’t have asked for a better outcome.

Majella in the control room at 612 ABC Brisbane

But there’s more! A few days later, Spencer and Majella (his Producer) called for me to come in for a follow-up interview. Of course I jumped at the chance! Spencer knew I was also looking for accommodation, so he was going to ask his listeners if they could offer me a place to stay (how nice is that eh?). Before we went on air though, we were chatting in the control room where a girl named Natalie was filling in for someone who was on holiday. When Natalie heard I was looking for a place to stay, she offered me a room! I thought “holy guacamole are Brisbanites ever nice!”

In the end, I didn’t end up staying with Natalie because her home is very far from Cleveland. She’s such a sweetheart though and put out a message to her friends asking if anyone had a spare room. One of her friends happens to be Sarah Moran who was the media guru who travelled the world with Hailey Turner from the Best Job in the World campaign. Sarah happened to also be friends with James Hill from the campaign, who I had met just a couple of weeks before this series of events. Within about the 10 minutes after Natalie put out her message, Sarah responded, we talked on the phone for a couple of minutes (about the same amount of time I had spent with Natalie in the studio) and she said she’d pick me up from the hostel the next morning! I couldn’t believe my luck!

Sarah and Simon at the Powerhouse Theatre

The next day, Sarah picked me up, we dropped off my gear at her place and had tea, went to visit the markets, made a trip to see her sister, watched a comedy show at Powerhouse with her boyfriend, and ate dinner at Sitar’s. She had a spare room at her place for one week and then was going to go to New Zealand for a family ski trip the next week. Knowing that she would only have a spare bed during those two weeks, she phoned around to see if anyone else had a place for me. Her friend Dan happened to have just bought an apartment across the street and was in the area when she phoned. We met up with him, and guess where I’m staying now? LOL I’m renting Dan’s spare room until the end of August.

Now there was a week long gap between Sarah’s return from New Zealand and Dan’s official move-in date where I didn’t have a place to stay. I think I must be one of the luckiest people on earth. My boss (Andrew) had offered to lend me his “apartment” in Mooloolaba on any of the dates in August where there wasn’t already someone staying there. A few of the dates listed were during that week where I would’ve been homeless. So, on the Sunday after Sarah returned, my co-worker Sara let me stay in her spare room. On Monday, Sarah and I left for Mooloolaba and while she had to come back early on Tuesday, I stayed until Thursday morning. Dan’s apartment wouldn’t be ready until Friday afternoon so there was just one night I had to find a bed for: Thursday.

Kelley and me at the Ekka

And the chain of events continues! I would’ve just stayed in the hostel at Mooloolaba for another night, but I had to be back in Brisbane for Friday. Why? Well, Spencer being as fabulous as he is (not only does he do his research for all his interviews — even little ones like me! — but he can edit segments in seconds WHILE carrying on a conversation with you!) has a lot of listeners. A few of those listeners happened to be producers for Mornings with Kerri-Anne (including Kelley Shepherd). Mornings with Kerri-Anne is based in the Australian state of New South Wales, but they were going to be travelling to Queensland for one day (Friday) to film at the Ekka (Brisbane’s annual fair). Because of the interview on Spencer’s show, they invited me to be on Mornings with Kerri-Anne! Very exciting!

So where did I stay on Thursday night? Well, since Sarah and I were going to go to the Ekka together, I crashed on her couch for the night and we left together in the morning. At first she thought that the segment was going to be filmed with Kerri-Anne Kennerley in NSW and me in Brisbane. When she found out that morning that we were going to be meeting Kerri-Anne in person, she just about flipped! LOL She’s a big fan.

So to sum up the story: One tweet turned into a radio interview with the best in the radio biz, that turned into a job, several places to stay, heaps of new friends, and a segment on a huge television show! This is why I love Twitter and Twitter has obviously loved me right back.

A HUGE GIGANTUAN THANK YOU goes out to Spencer Howson for being a twit.

Greg Reynen and Me

Marcella, Erik and I got to spend some quality time in Vancouver and we were able to chat with Mitch and Linda on Skype video a few months ago too. This week I was able to meet two more of the Top 16 candidates for the Best Job in the World (James and Greg), as well as everyone from Tourism Queensland!

James knew I’d be arriving in Brisbane last week so he sent me his number via Twitter. I had a really hard time getting a hold of him though because the pay phone at the hostel takes 50 cents for each connection plus another 50 cents for each 30 seconds. I didn’t know this and kept getting disconnected immediately after connecting and when I finally figured out why, I had run out of 50 cent coins.*

Because I didn’t have a cell phone for a few days and Greg was leaving Brisbane the next day after I arrived, James and Greg surprised me at the hostel the night I arrived while I was getting ready for bed. Me with messy hair, no make-up and in my pjs wasn’t exactly the first impression I wanted to give. LOL We went for dinner at a well-known Vietnamese restaurant near Brisbane’s Chinatown and knocked back a few beers. By the way, restaurants in Australia are commonly “B.Y.O.”, as in you can bring your own alchohol to drink there. Weird eh?

Me and James Hill Drinking Beer

It was really great to meet James and Greg in person! Both guys are really fun and Greg and I were thinking about taking a trip to New Zealand together when he got back from a *Top Secret* Tourism Queensland trip, but I don’t think I can do it until I save up a bit of cash in Oz. I’m hoping he’ll be up for the trip closer to December when the weather gets warmer. *hint hint nudge nudge Greg!*

I’m not sure if I’m allowed to say anything about the *Top Secret* Tourism Queensland trip, but I’m sure you can figure it out for yourselves. James, Greg, Magali, Mirjam, and George are all travelling around Queensland right now having a blast and James has a brand new tan (which by the way, looks really good)!

Me with Chris Chambers at Tourism Queensland’s Headquarters

On Thursday, I was able to take a tour of the Tourism Queensland office with Chris Chambers. Being able to meet everyone behind the Best Job in the World campaign (especially Anthony Hays, Chris Chambers, Shana Pereira, Nicole McNaughton, Amy Newman and the Marketing Team) was like getting to meet your all time favourite hockey players. I don’t know if they could tell, but I was practically gushing at being able to meet the brains behind it all in person!

The Tourism Queensland building has a large neon Tourism Queensland logo on the top and is very easy to find at night (you pass it when your on transit near Roma Street Station). The actual Tourism Queensland team takes up two floors of the building and it looks like your average office building except there are lots of colourful decorations hanging from the ceiling from celebrating the Fourth of July (Shana is from the LA office), and in the aviation department (lots of little planes everywhere). It’s a very open and fun environment where everyone is uber-nice and (for the most part ) very organized. I certainly wouldn’t mind working there!

*Tip for Travellers to Australia:

Each call you make (whether it’s via a cell or pay phone doesn’t matter) has a connection fee (usually between $0.30-$0.50) as well as a per minute or per 30 second charge (it ranges according to your plan / pay phone). It’s much cheaper to either buy a phone card, or a pre-paid cell phone plan than to dial direct from a pay phone.

Picture courtesy of sacred buffalo breath on tribe.net. I think it’s super creepy.

I was hoping that I’d be able to interview Dean Horvath in person sometime this past week. As you can see from the lack of video on this blog post, it didn’t happen.

I phoned Mason Horvath twice this past week asking to speak with Dean, and both times he was “in a meeting.” I left a message on Tuesday asking him to e-mail me with his schedule of availability for the interview. He never did. I find it a bit surprising that he’s suddenly become so busy, especially after a Facebook message I received from an old classmate that I haven’t seen or spoken to in years. This classmate wrote to me asking what my thoughts were on the “next best job” campaign saying that he was curious about the position so he went to the Mason Horvath office and spoke with Dean Horvath in person. Funny how Dean has the time to speak with anyone who walks in off the street but doesn’t have the time to e-mail me a reply. I suspect he’s trying to avoid me.

Some of you might not be surprised that he’s avoiding me, but I am. No PR company in their right mind would advise a client to ignore someone who is presenting a potential public relations problem. I was expecting Dean to write back with the contact information of someone at Curve Communications who would be able to represent Mason Horvath in an interview about the “next best job” campaign. I guess he figured the Q&A posted on the “next best job” blog was sufficient.

Many questions are addressed in this Q&A, but with the new ‘Privacy & Usage’ terms on the website, I cannot republish any of those answers here for comment. And here I was thinking that when Dean said that the fine print and Terms & Conditions would be changed, it meant the company was going to be more transparent. Apparently not.

I guess it doesn’t matter now anyways. The interest in this campaign seems to have taken a nose dive. Even with Vancouver blogger Miss 604 endorsing the campaign (despite having had no interest in covering the original Best Job in the World campaign), it looks like Mason Horvath has only gotten two radio interviews and 68 Facebook fans.

For my blog readers that have told me you’re sick of hearing about the “next best job,” rest assured this is my last post about it.

Questions for Curve Communications

Here are some of the questions and comments that I’ve received about the “next best job” campaign from my blog readers (strict cut and paste). I figured you’d want to address them in your next Q&A.

1. If Mason Horvath didn’t intend The Next Best Job to be a publicity stunt, then why not just hire a TOP 7 Canadian or the perfect TOP 50 candidate?
2. If Dean doesn’t want Mason Horvath to be a part of his contest, then why is the Mason Horvath logo on the emails he sent out to everyone?
3. How is Mason Horvath going to screen the “random draw winner?”  ie: how to screen weirdos from going to the final destination with the last 4 qualified contestants?
4. How will a random 140 character submission be evaluated?
5. How will the “random draw” winner be selected? Out of a hat? Best phrase? Cool supporting blog? Best advertizing for Mason Horvath?
6. How will Virgin Galactic (Sir Richard Branson) react to The Next Best Job campaign after Dean dissed TQ as a cheap means to promote? Virgin was invloved with TQ events throughout The Best Job in the World.
   
   In a press release from theage.com.au Dean Horvath blatantly insults TQ: “Unlike Tourism Queensland’s contest, this is not a publicity stunt,” he said. “This is a contest to win a real job, not just a cheap means to promote our company.”

   http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/booming-job-market-for-overpaid-beach-bums-20090408-a0y6.html

   If Dean Horvath does not intend to promote Mason Horvath by cheap means, then by what means?

7. What does Mason Horvath intend to gain from only allowing the 49 finalists from The Best Job in the World?
8. Does Mason Horvath intend to make money off of the finalists through this publicity stunt? Through online ads or media coverage?
9. Why only 50K for two people when Mason Horvath seems to be an elite luxury tourism company selling Virgin trips to space costing $200,000 per person?
10. All of the finalists are responsible travelers that care about the environment…how does a luxury tourism company fit into this specific demographic?
11. Why does Mason Horvath want to copyright the winner and the “partner” for 6 months after their “luxury experience?” How is that going to work with all the applicants working as professional writers, journalists, reporters, photographers, DJ’s, chefs, etc.?
12. Why do the applicants have to be reimbursed for economy air fare? Wouldn’t a luxury tourism comany provide only the best service to their clients and applicants?
13. What is Mason Horvath’s “reward” for Tourism Queensland?
14. There’s no info about how many places one would have to travel to, how frequently, how far. And the last thing that got to me was, if it’s a luxury vacation thing, why the economy class airfare? What luxury traveller would do that? And especially this job, where it’s apparently all about travel… what a come-down to have to fly in non-luxury. Everybody knows that half of any travel experience, as reported to friends (or in this case to a blog) is about travel arrangements — how screwed up they were, waiting lineups, airport snafu’s, losing luggage, whatever. They HAVE to give this job person at least business class, IMHO.
15. If they already decided the top remaining 50 are qualified — there should be no need to make ANOTHER video about a hometown activity. To me that is just exercising a rerun and playing puppeteer with very tight strings. How about a DIFFERENT idea — the video is already made — test another skill of the contestants = for selection.
16. If the hired person has to research the destinations as part of his job, does that mean Dean is going to fire someone from his research staff? How much does someone in his staff earn per hour for research? It sounds like this campaign was made to find cheap labor and an excuse to fire someone.
17. What guarantee does Mason Horvath provide for the Elite Travel Correspondent and “partner” that if they decide to continue travel blogging after the six-month contract their work won’t be published on the next best job site or any other Mason Horvath site without compensation or permission?
18. Dean’s blog says that the travel correspondent has to make 1 video each week but the Terms and Conditions say 2. Which is it? Did any of the terms and conditions change??
19. One thing you didn’t mention but it stood out to me in my once-only read of their ad for the job. “Reimburse”. It made me wonder “When?” So you get paid bimonthly, presumably 1/12 of the $50K, and from that do you have to pay your airfare hither-and-yon and then apply to get the funds back? A person could go broke, depending on their schedule for reimbursement.

The list could go on and on but I don’t feel like taking up all of my blog space with questions about the “next best job.” I think I’ve already given the “next best job” campaign WAY more coverage than it deserves.

My cell phone bill for this month is going to hurt.

I just got off the phone with Dean Horvath from Mason Horvath, the company that created the “next best job” campaign. It sounds like he’s gotten a lot of flak about this campaign.

I told him that there would be no conflict of interest in doing an interview with me since I have publicly announced that I will not be a participant in the “next best job” campaign, and asked him for his schedule of availability. Understandably, he has to first consult his PR firm, Curve Communications.

I made sure to double check with him that I was allowed to write a blog post about our conversation. According to Dean, the fine print and legal statements in his e-mail and attachments were included by Mason Horvath’s lawyer and are in the process of being changed / eliminated.

I asked him the question that was bothering me most: Why was the “next best job” campaign created?

It didn’t make sense for Mason Horvath to create the “next best job” campaign. They are after all a luxury travel company that prides itself on never advertising, and accommodating only the incredibly wealthy — not exactly the same target market as the adventurous bunch of applicants for the Best Job in the World.

The answer: Mason Horvath does not want to be affiliated with the “next best job” campaign. The purpose of this campaign was to create a separate website where Mason Horvath would post videos about travel experiences and generate advertising revenues from having people visit the website.

I also asked him what he was expecting from the successful applicant and his / her partner, and told him that the requirements set out in his e-mail attachments are unreasonable.

The answer: The videos Dean is expecting from the successful applicant would be nowhere near the quality of the videos created by the Top 50 candidates for the Best Job in the World. They would be more like 30 seconds of single shot footage. Why then would people be interested in watching them? Well, I’m not sure about that one but Dean is hoping that they will. Dean says that the Terms & Conditions, including the “Services” required of the successful applicant and partner are being changed.

Tourism Queensland published a news release today about the “next best job” campaign which reads:

Tourism Queensland has been made aware of another campaign being run named ‘The Next Best Job’.  Some applicants for our Best Job in the World — Island Caretaker position have been approached by this company.  Tourism Queensland would like to confirm that we have no association with this campaign or company and encourage anyone interested in applying to read all terms and conditions and fine print.

I told Dean about this release and how it doesn’t sound like Tourism Queensland thinks it’s a good idea for any Top 50 Best Job in the World candidate to apply for the “next best job.” He had mentioned in his e-mail that Tourism Queensland would “be rewarded” by the “next best job” campaign. I wanted to know if he had actually been in contact with Tourism Queensland about this campaign.

The answer: Dean sent an e-mail to Tourism Queensland telling them that Mason Horvath would be launching the “next best job” campaign before the press release came out on Monday.

In Summary

After reading the comments and blog posts about the “next best job,” Dean admits that “everyone is right” and there are a lot of things that need to be changed about the “next best job.” The requirements of the position will be reduced, the fine print is in the process of being changed / eliminated, and he does not expect great quality videos from the successful applicant. The purpose of this campaign is to generate advertising revenues from a separate website that would feature travel videos and Mason Horvath does not want to be associated with this website.

It sounds like the “next best job” is going to get a lot better and I’m looking forward to seeing what changes will be made. Stay tuned for my future in-person interview with Dean Horvath!

To be absolutely fair, I sent him the following e-mail to give him an idea of what sort of questions I would be asking him:

Hi Dean,

Thank you for taking the time to speak with me today. I hope we can schedule an interview sometime in the next week.

Here are some of the questions I’ve received from Top 50 candidates regarding this next best job, to give you an idea of what questions I would be asking during the interview:

1. Have you considered opening this competition to the general public or the Top 200 shortlisted candidates? Why or why not?
2. How much time do you expect the successful applicant to put in per week?
3. What do you expect to gain from this “next best job” campaign?

Several Top 50 candidates have been very curious to know the details about the campaign and I was also asked by a few followers of the original best job campaign to interview you so that they could find out more as well. I expect the interview to take roughly 30 minutes.

Thanks in advance!

Cheers,

Anny Chih

At 4:12pm I received a reply from Dean and HOORAY, it doesn’t have a disclaimer on the bottom! So, here it is:

Hi Anny,

Thanks for getting in touch with me. I saw your blog and read about some of your concerns. What I would suggest is that you compile a full list of questions and concerns from yourself and the other finalists you have spoken to and send it to me so I can respond to them in full online for everyone to see.

As much as I would like to meet with you, I have to be very careful about any perceived conflict of interest that may arise from meeting with you during the competition, as you are one of the 49 finalists who were offered the opportunity.

Cheers!

Dean

Thanks for reading my blog Dean!

As for the perceived conflict of interest, I think that was already an issue before you sent me this reply. The Best Job in the World was a great opportunity not only in terms of media experience etc, but because I met a lot of great people through the process including several Top 50 candidates whom I consider friends. I received e-mails and messages from four of these candidates telling me that they did not receive a reply to their requests for more information even though we all sent requests around the same time.

But, I can see how a filmed interview with me would be perceived as a conflict of interest to the general public.

The solution to this problem is really quite simple though. I pubicly announce that I will NOT be a participant in the Next Best Job campaign. Problem solved.

I’m going to phone Dean now and give him the good news.