Tag Archives: social

Organize, Display, and Share: Two Start-Ups Take Aim From Different Perspectives

Posted on February 3, 2012 | Leave a comment

Chances are you may have at least heard of Dropbox and Pinterest. Dropbox is web-based file-hosting and sharing service––think your “My Documents” folder synced to a “cloud” and accessible within seconds (if not instantly) to other devices and synced computers. The service also makes it very easy to share documents or folders with anyone via a link or email. Pinterest, on the other hand, is a visual, social photo-sharing website and app. Users can “pin” photos, videos, and discussions onto a board that can represent whatever commonality or association they desire. The end result is a series of visuals linked by an author-determined common theme. The posts can be re-pinned, “liked,” or commented on across public posts or among friends.

Stand back for a moment. Both Dropbox and Pinterest were new functionally to the market. Both applications define a new, compartmentalized function (synchronized online file-sharing/storage and social photo-sharing, respectively). Both applications are based on the sharing of content, whether that content is files or visual content organized on “boards.”

Both Dropbox and Pinterest have simple concepts and are beautifully designed, but they do something that the average user doesn’t seek. They provide an innovative method for sharing files and visual content in an organized and intuitive manner. Innovation! Both are thinking about traditional functions in other mediums or systems and reapplying the concept to an online use. Any social media user, specifically someone familiar with Facebook, knows that with the expansion of the “Like” and “Share” buttons to every website, it has become easier than ever for any user to share content on Facebook. In turn, the content shared on friends’ news feeds has become less and less useful. An application like Pinterest enables you to collect visual content (that you may or may not have shared on Facebook or other social channels already) and curate it on a board conveying some general idea. Single-function, well-designed applications that are built on a social backbone enable users to filter out the noise from the deluge of content plunging down our news-feed waterfalls.

In contrast, Dropbox is a natural progression of cloud-based file storage and sharing, but the cost of the application (free up to 2GB) and desktop/mobile app compatibility make relying on it second nature as we use our mobile devices more and more. Draft a word doc on your iPad on the train on the way to the office, open the same file on your desktop and make final changes, then run to a meeting and send a link to the doc to your colleagues from your iPhone––simpler and more seamless than carrying thumb drives or the email-download routine.

Dropbox and Pinterest––use them, get to know them, try to break them. The apps and their core functions are the future of concentrated, single-purpose content sharing. Learning how to use new applications early on can help you develop a clearer picture of how you will interact and share content in the future as the world becomes more and more mocial (mobile social).

Author: John Carew

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Creating a Public Persona of My Personality for Personal Branding Purposes

Posted on February 1, 2012 | 1 Comment

I started my second personal blog the other day. I won’t shamelessly promote it here, but my friends have been inundated with requests for support. I received an interesting response from my good buddy Joe. After reading a few posts he wrote to me, “Impressed how easily you put yourself out there to the masses. I find it easy to present a character for audiences, but feel less comfortable broadcasting myself. Brave.”

Although brief, I was taken aback by his commentary. Was I really wearing my heart and soul on the sleeve of this blog? Was I laying it all out there for the world to see? Surely I wouldn’t be so stupid as to be one of those people who just say whatever comes to their minds, right? You know the type. The blogger who thinks the world gives a damn about the mundanity of his or her life: “Today I bought shoes and already I have blisters. Wait, hold on a second, need some water. Okay, I’m back. Anyway.” Or someone who shares inappropriate confessions, driven by insecurities and the need for drama: “My boyfriend isn’t romantic and often looks around the room when we kiss.”

Is this who I’ve become but in a less exaggerated sort of way? The answer, I’ve come to discover, is maybe. If some of the things I write about come from a place of truth, then maybe I really am broadcasting myself to the world. The thing is, it doesn’t feel like that. For years now I’ve considered these public displays of personality to be fiction.

I’m talking about personal branding. I’m talking about the line, which has become incredibly blurred, between who we are and who we pretend or act like when we participate online, particularly in social media. When I think about the message I put out there for the world to view, I wonder if it’s really me. And again, the answer is maybe.

Personal branding is not a new topic. In fact, it’s become our way of life. Today, people can obtain or lose jobs based simply on the way they brand themselves online. What I wonder is, are we even aware we’re doing it anymore?

I’m reminded of my Facebook page from 2005 (Ah, the gloriously elitist days when you needed a .edu to get in). The page allowed you to fill in fields about your personality: favorite songs, books, movies, etc. They still exist today, but they’re certainly not as exposed and important as they were back then. I remember all the clever things I’d post: Favorite artist—post-mortem Tupac; Favorite activity—avoiding death; Interests—onesies; Favorite quote—“Sometimes I question your dedication to Sparkle Motion.”

It became a persona—a way for me to make fun while having fun. It was also the loss of my creating-a-personal-brand virginity (and just as experimental). It was me choosing to show the world, “Hey, I want you to think I’m funny!” And this has carried on for years. We all do it. Every time we post a Facebook status update or send out a tweet, we’re communicating something about ourselves. We’re making a choice, cognizant or not, about who we are or who we want people to think we are.

Larry Kimmel of the Direct Marketing Association recently said to our company, “Kids today begin branding themselves at the age of 16.” In fact, he’s right. The millennials today learn very early on how to portray themselves in social media. I think it’s going to become harder and harder for future generations to recognize the difference between this online community and the community of our neighbors.

Thanks to my pal Joe’s insightful observation, it made me realize that maybe we’ve all gotten a little too comfortable with our pen names. We ought to step back and think about the content we’re putting out there for the world to see. Whether it’s for privacy concerns or some other reason, unintended vulnerabilities could come back to hurt us. And if I get hurt, you may end up reading about it in my blog.

Author: Eric Swenson

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Three Mobile and Social Apps That Should Be on Your Radar

Posted on January 13, 2012 | Leave a comment

Our online associations basically represent relationships that exist in real life, relationships that we document by adding people to particular social networks. In today’s world, the act of researching someone’s online presence before (or after) a meeting, date, or social interaction might be a requirement. LinkedIn can give you an idea of a person’s professional résumé, a Twitter profile might reveal his or her publicized interests or influence, and if a Facebook profile exists, well, you can learn possibly far too much about an individual depending on what he or she shares and how open the profile is to an outsider. Putting account settings and user preferences aside, apps that make connections to our physical social networks and marry those networks with our location via a mobile device are very interesting. These apps can show users how their social networks connect with strangers they pass on the street, but they can also teach users the value of real-life networks that are stored, structured, and validated online. Let’s look at three apps and how their features redefine our online social networks, showing the power that mobile, social, and location-based apps can have on our everyday life.

Sonar

Foursquare + Facebook + Twitter = invisible connections around you. Next time you check in on Foursquare to one of the busier spots in your area, an app like Sonar would display a screen indicating how you are linked to people in your immediate location. Sonar can tell you that you share three Twitter interests or two Facebook friends and enable you to see those specific connections and those users’ photos. You can then introduce yourself in person, if you want. Don’t fret about security, either––you opt in, so all Sonar users have chosen to associate their Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn accounts in order to see their relationships.

Path

As Path advertises, Path is “the smart journal that helps you share life with ones you love.” It’s Facebook boiled down your real friends and not the extended network of acquaintances and familiar faces that Facebook has become just to see the friend-count edge higher. The app has a fresh way of displaying important content with a beautiful user interface. Path has the same sharing and “journal” status-type features that are found on the other social networks, but the platform enables smaller circles to interact with pertinent content more easily.

Localmind

As its tagline reads, “Know. Now.” Localmind is seeking to build “a real-time, location-based Q&A platform that sits on top of existing check-in services.” Localmind uses location-based check-in services likes Foursquare to allow users to send a question about a physical location and receive answers from users who are currently checked in to that location. It lets users contact someone outside their network or circles to determine what is happening at a particular check-in spot.

All three apps provide very different services, but all are based on mobile technology and how it can augment our interaction with our traditional, terrestrial social networks and our location on terra firma.

Bottom line: Use these apps, learn what they do, and be aware that these features will be the next thing to come baked in to our mobile devices. Jumping on the edge of the wave can increase the position of your company or application earlier.

Author: John Carew

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Thoughts on Adding New Technology to Your Life or Business

Posted on January 6, 2012 | Leave a comment

Step back for a moment and look at your life or your role within your company. You are a part of a larger system, responsible for input and output and some semblance of order for each. You have either been given or have sought out a set of tools to manage and execute your assigned tasks. You evaluate your existing tools constantly each time you encounter an issue and grumble under your breath or rave about how easy something is to use. Often, we search for better solutions for our personal and professional needs. Based on our knowledge of the tools available and, more important, those that are familiar, we develop procedures to fill these needs and move on, but what should we consider when looking for the best solutions?

In today’s mobile world, the way we determine what solution is best is very different from only a few years ago. Here are a few points to consider as you decide what technology will fill a need in your personal or professional life:

Modern and flexible – Apps that heavily rely on one particular software language may not pose a large risk, but heavy reliance on something like Flash would make iOS consumption difficult.

Mobile-friendly – If the solution is online-based, how does it look on a mobile browser? If the user experience is different, what functions do you lose on the smaller screen?

Appified – Is the solution available in app flavor? Is the functionality limited? Does the original developer maintain the app, or is the function available through a third-party developer? Face it––if the potential solution doesn’t offer a mobile option (and if it seems like this would be useful), smoke is in the air and you should yell fire and run the other way. An app version for most solutions is a given at this point, so if it isn’t available, think again about the ”future-proof” aspect of the solution.

Cross-platform – Not only does the solution have to play nicely with both the Mac and Windows operating systems, the application may also have to play nicely with mobile and tablet versions of Android and iOS, among others.

Backup – Does the solution offer backup? Can you point the application to a cloud storage solution––something easy like Dropbox, for instance––and will the app update its pertinent information (settings, application data, etc.) to the cloud on a routine or on-demand basis? In the day and age of lost and stolen mobile technology, the ability to recover quickly from backed-up data is mission critical.

Exportable – Plan for the future by making sure you can extract all of your data into a format that could be easily imported into a new application.

Offline capabilities – If you lose data connection, does the solution still function? Does it lose any key features or grind to a halt? From natural disaster to being trapped on the A line, we don’t always have the luxury of a data connection, and when it goes down, your level of stress will be determined by how the solution performs when you are off the grid.

Efficient data usage – Is the solution a Hummer or a Prius? In the age of the data meter running virtually everywhere, we have to be cognizant of how much data our solutions guzzle down. Is the solution built with a frugal mentality, or does it require lots of data to be transferred frequently?

Security – Does the solution offer security measures, such as encryption options and password-reset controls? While these measures may not to be required in some instances, in other areas where the transfer of information needs to remain confidential, security needs to be a big consideration. If the solution is for professional use, does it comply with your company’s IT guidelines and requirements?

Plays well with others – Some of the web’s best applications offer application programming interfaces (APIs), which enable other developers to make amazing solutions that tie in nicely to other solutions.

Others want to join in – If the solution offers an API, how many applications are available for the solution? How many unique developers are writing applications for the solution in question? These questions, which may seem like icing on the feature cake, may shine a light on the back operations and health of a solution.

Social – When applicable, the solution should tie in to the social web easily and share content using those channels in a well-formatted manner.

Author: John Carew

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Always Connected: How Shared Experiences Like Sports Games, Concerts, and Theme Parks Are Being Augmented by the Mobile and Social Web

Posted on December 2, 2011 | Leave a comment

In our ever-shrinking leisure time, we want tech to support, enhance, and augment our interaction with traditional analog human experiences, which are often shared. We attend concerts and sporting events in person, rather than watching (less expensively) online, on TV, or via recording, in order to engage in a shared experience among attendees with a common interest (fans of a team or musical group).

Our always-connected, technology-required attitude leaves a rather large hole in many of the modern venues in the US. Between poor cellular reception and lack of engaging, venue-created and supported content, the experience beyond what is occurring on the field or stage leaves a lot to be desired. In our homes, we can order (and pay for) food online from the comfort of our couch, look down the hall to determine the bathroom availability and wait time, guzzle all the data-heavy video and online content we want from our Wi-Fi, and rewind or pause a live (or recorded) broadcast with our DVRs. If we must venture outside for food, we can use contactless payment to buy snacks or drinks from the local convenience store. Why aren’t those same services available when I venture out of the home to major sports and concert venues around the country? Enter geosocial networking, or proximity-based social networks and the “smart stadium.”

In October, the Staples Center in Los Angeles, home to the LA Clippers, Lakers, Kings, and Sparks, announced a new high-definition video solution (supported by a joint partnership with Verizon and Cisco) aimed at giving the spectator the ability to customize his or her multimedia experience. The system is basically a video and content distribution system to terminals in luxury boxes and kiosks around the stadium to enhance the “e-game” experience. As Ben Bergman from NPR reported last week, the video functionality extends the user’s experience, and the joint venture plans to include content streaming to “your phone, on your laptop, everything, like, everywhere” as well as functions allowing you order food from the comfort of your seat, never missing a minute of the game or performance.

The problem with most sports venues is the lack of strong mobile phone coverage, which (based on real-world experience in New York City at the new Yankee Stadium, Citi Field, or Madison Square Garden) can paralyze your smart phone. The planning for the new Meadowlands Stadium, now called MetLife Stadium, focused on the design and deployment of a wired stadium with cellular service. ADC designed a wireless solution that allowed both Verizon and AT&T Mobility to use stadium-supported cellular services. The move to include a wireless plan in the stadium lays the framework for use of mobile phone–based applications that can enhance the spectators’ experience.

Geosocial apps like Foursquare, Gowalla, Lokust, Scvngr, Loopt, Sonar, and Color (to name a few) leverage some combination of GPS location, data connection, social network (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc), and your phone’s camera to provide a rich integration of users based on proximity to a defined location or opt-in status to one event or space. These apps, when deployed in conjunction with a sports team, venue, or musical group, can be used to share limited-edition content, provide instant replay or alternate views of a play, or simply allow people to connect and discuss what zany thing just occurred onstage.

Another angle is the lengthy list of apps associated with real-time sharing of information about guest services and attractions at major theme parks like the Disney resorts. From real-time attraction wait times to recent comments on food or hotel service as well as historical data used for forecasting and planning, the data-driven and social age changes users’ interactions with theme parks as well.

The fun doesn’t stop there. The proximity-based social experience can be extended to venues like malls (think Black Friday pain and plunder) trade shows, or even casinos––heck, even weather events like the Snowpocalypse (version 1-3) which NYC received last winter. A shared experience gives people the incentive to connect with those around them. Our phones––portals to others––coupled with intelligent apps leveraging the fullest potential of our phones, make this interaction possible, ultimately enhancing our engagement with the event or experience.

Proximity-based social networks tied with modern, wired stadiums will change the sports and concert experiences. Dated stadiums of today with their poor lines of sight, uncomfortable seats, and inadequate entrance and egress design will pale in comparison with the stadiums of the future.

One word of warning: Be aware, sports announcers, that your typically muted commentary really isn’t necessary and will be replaced by smart stadiums and dynamic content consumption.

What do you think? Will smart stadiums and geosocial and proximity-based social apps enhance our experience and change expectations for the average event?

Author: John Carew

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Welcome to My Death Space: A Site for the Non-Living

Posted on November 2, 2011 | Leave a comment

It’s the time of year when life as we know it begins to change. Our long, warm, sunny days become short, cold, and gray. Life all around us begins to shrivel up and die. I’m referring, of course, to our never-late-to-the-party season: autumn—elder brother to Father Christmas and Mother Nature’s pimp.

Fall is our reminder that the best part of the year is now over. So suck it up. Life is about to get a lot more difficult. If I were a drug user, I’d have to imagine fall to be the drug user’s final hit before rehab. Enjoy it while it lasts; you’re about to get locked up for six months with nothing but chamomile and reruns of Hawaii Five-O.

This is the time of year when many people in our society celebrate the changing of the seasons. I really don’t see what all the fuss is about. People find fall beautiful and often comment on the changing color of leaves. “Look at the beautiful leaves––they’re changing colors,” one might say. “Isn’t fall beautiful, what, with the color changing on leaves and all?” another might say.

“The leaves are dying!” I might say. When you see a majestic bird recently struck by an 18-wheeler, you don’t comment on its beauty, do you? Would you say “Look at that doe-eyed, little deer lying peacefully on the side of the road. I think it’s taking its last breaths. What a wonderful sight!”?

Sound depressing? It shouldn’t be. At this time of year I’m reminded of an Associated Press article I read that has that Halloween sort of vibe. The article encouraged those with an affinity for the morbid to check out a website called MyDeathSpace.com. At first, I was confused about what MyDeathSpace.com was. My first thought was probably similar to yours: “Here is a website for people who are frustrated with their current social environments and want an online vehicle to acknowledge their discomfort.” I mean, think about it. How many “death spaces” do we all have?

Death Space #1 – You’re waiting in line at Target as the 95-year-old woman uses a debit card for the first time in her existence. You can literally count the minutes until the cashier will inevitably take the card away from the old hag and do it herself. Yet you sit there, impatiently, waiting for the show to unfold.

Death Space #2 – I think we’ve all been here before.

 

(For more relatable situations like this, check out: www.pleaseshutup.com)

Death Space #3 – You’re waiting in line to pick up a new license. It’s not that it expired, it’s that you lost it. Well, you didn’t really lose it. You put it on the table that night when you had your friends over and everyone did that thing where you show each other what’s in your wallets. But then you get drunk and don’t want to drive, and Liz is being her typical self—crazy—and you just want to get her out of there. So you offer to drive, but then Jim—also crazy—is trying to be the responsible one but always ends up getting way too drunk to make any sense. So you just kind of look at him, as he leans, and try to remember why you’re friends. You decide to put both Jim and Liz in a taxi. The next day you find out that Jim accidentally grabbed your ID instead of his, but it doesn’t matter because he left it in the cab.

Maybe I’m alone here. And maybe I spend too much time in lines. The point is I assumed that the site discussed our personal death spaces as a way to create a sense of camaraderie. A way to say, “Hey man, I’ve been there. I think about putting my boss in a Porta-Potty and tipping it over too.” Well, I was wrong. MyDeathSpace is actually a social networking website for the recently deceased members of myspace.com. If someone dies, you submit his or her death and people can chat about the––sometimes grotesque––details. Oh, and there’s a forum section where you can complain about things like the new features of Facebook that really T you off.

What!? Are people really into this? Are we really so voyeuristic? Burning ants with a magnifying glass: okay. Discussing profiles of dead friends: not so okay! Maybe I just have no clue of what it’s like to be this creepy. I think the darkest thing I’ve ever done was get up in the middle of the night and pee without turning on the light.

I suppose we’re all entitled to our own niche likes and dislikes. You’re able to like the changing of leaf colors for example. And I’m entitled to loathe you.

In the meantime, this begs the question: Can a forum like this really be considered a social medium? Hell, these people are dead.

Happy Halloween!

Author: Eric Swenson

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