However, up until this point the ‘youth vote’ has been seen as something that has over promised and under delivered. Last night however the message could not have been more different and their decision more clear. As you can see from the chart below, CNN exit polls show that Obama won a whopping 66% or the Net Generation vote. “(The youth vote) is turning states that (Obama) would’ve lost or barely won into more comfortable margins,” says John Della Volpe, the director of polling for the Harvard University Institute of Politics. “Not only are they voting in higher numbers, they’re voting more Democratic.”

True, this vote was more diverse, building upon the advantage that Obama had with both African American and Latino voters, but that is also indicative of the demographic breakdown of the Net Generation. Obama also went to the mediums and channels that are the stomping ground of Net Generation voters. Obama asked and this Generation stepped up to the plate and took responsibility for the future direction of their country.

As a Net Generation member, albeit one from Canada, I think that we are a generation that was looking for change. Older voters may not realize this, but voters 18-29yrs old don’t know an America that wasn’t governed by a Bush or a Clinton (1989-2009), that is unless they where a very politically aware 9 year old. As youngsters they remember the night vision video of the war in Iraq and as young adults they experienced deja vu.

Obama offered them hope, he offered them change and most importantly he offered to include them and listen to their opinion. This generation has already been a force in the consumer world for almost a decade, forcing companies to rethink how they market to teens and even tweens. Now they have excerted their demographic muscle on one of the most globally watched elections, at least in my time. Corporations and Employers, you are now officially on notice. This generation is coming to the workforce, they have experienced change and it’s your turn next.

Hamlet
(Facebook News Feed Edition)

Horatio thinks he saw a ghost.
Hamlet thinks it’s annoying when your uncle marries your mother right after your dad dies.
The king thinks Hamlet’s annoying.
Laertes thinks Ophelia can do better.
Hamlet’s father is now a zombie.
- – - -
The king poked the queen.
The queen poked the king back.
Hamlet and the queen are no longer friends.
Marcellus is pretty sure something’s rotten around here.
Hamlet became a fan of daggers.

- – - -
Polonius says Hamlet’s crazy … crazy in love!
Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and Hamlet are now friends.
Hamlet wonders if he should continue to exist. Or not.
Hamlet thinks Ophelia might be happier in a convent.
Ophelia removed “moody princes” from her interests.
Hamlet posted an event: A Play That’s Totally Fictional and In No Way About My Family
The king commented on Hamlet’s play: “What is wrong with you?”
Polonius thinks this curtain looks like a good thing to hide behind.
Polonius is no longer online.
- – - -
Hamlet added England to the Places I’ve Been application.
The queen is worried about Ophelia.
Ophelia loves flowers. Flowers flowers flowers flowers flowers. Oh, look, a river.
Ophelia joined the group Maidens Who Don’t Float.
Laertes wonders what the hell happened while he was gone.
- – - -
The king sent Hamlet a goblet of wine.
The queen likes wine!
The king likes … oh crap.
The queen, the king, Laertes, and Hamlet are now zombies.
Horatio says well that was tragic.
Fortinbras, Prince of Norway, says yes, tragic. We’ll take it from here.
Denmark is now Norwegian.

Today openness and transparency are lauded as being not just good for your brand and public relations, but good for business too. (I think Don was just a few years to early with his book The Naked Corporation) The thing is that when companies jumped on the transparency bandwagon a few years ago, openness translated to sharing information on a website. The emergence of Web 2.0 tools changed the landscape overnight and stakeholders not only expect timely access to information, but a channel to engage and interact with the organization. What seemed like a simple task even three or four years ago has now transformed into a more complex exercise.

From the standpoint of the organization the bar has been raised in terms of the resources, policies and diligence they need to undergo in order to successfully engage stakeholders. Organizations aren’t used to committing the effort and resources to these initiatives, and even more troubling for many is the question “once we engage stakeholders, do we have to listen to them?” Organizations are used to functioning in a vacuum, formulate a strategy, develop offerings, communicate with customer, measure success, evaluate and repeat. Being open means that you have to do things like co-create offerings, collaboratively manage your brand and image, engage customers and listen and respond to feedback.

At first glance it seems as if the stakeholder is the only one benefiting from the changes as organizations fumble to get started. However, when an organization thinks about having more channels, detailed information, deep access and the potential for real relationships with stakeholders it sounds like the ideal situation they have always been trying to create.

So what’s the problem? For our clients it’s too much all at once and it’s very easy to get overwhelmed at the seemingly limitless possibilities and countless problems and pitfalls. In order for organizations to succeed the need to approach this new era of stakeholder engagement like they do a product or service rollout. Try a pilot, use a test market. I mean you would launch a new product simultaneously across the globe without running a pilot, so why would you try and engage and satisfy all of your stakeholders in one fell swoop? In this age of openness and transparency your stakeholders are not going to expect perfection or polish, they expect you to be honest and upfront. It’s not if you make a mistake, it’s when you make a mistake, how will you respond.

During recessions company’s start to hunker down, prepare to weather the storm. We have seen this in our clients in terms of budget cuts, hiring freeze’s and even more aggressive staffing cutbacks. Regardless of the how you spin it, downsizing, streamlining or put more transparently ‘layoffs’, the point is that organization are looking to cut costs and do more (or at least the same) with less.

Personally this seems to be a perfect opportunity for Web 2.0 tools and technologies to further penetrate the enterprise. Collaborative tools are a lightweight, low cost technology designed to drive faster communication, more efficient collaboration and greater transparency in organizations. If you are an organization trying to do more with less this would seem to be the ideal solution.

Unfortunately, for most individuals change is scary, and taking a risk with your career or organization during unstable financial times isn’t the most enticing option. However, I think this means that the opportunity to create competitive advantage and differentiation become are even greater. In have highlighted four areas that leading organizations could look to exploit the benefits of collaborative tools.

• Connecting and leveraging internal resources – For large organizations dealing with limited internal resources (or in some cases poorly allocated resources after cutbacks) the ability to connect to and leverage internal knowledge and expertise will be extremely valuable.
• Measure twice and cut once – In organizations many times information is horded and work is duplicated. If organizations can utilize collaborative tools to increase organizations transparency and promote collaboration they should be able to operate in a much more efficient manner. Think of the benefits of being able to complete 10 or 15 percent of your project from preexisting work.
• Marketing in a 2.0 way – I think it will be tempting for many organizations to revert back to their tried and true marketing channels in tough economic times. Investing money where they have established metrics is safe from a job security standpoint, but doesn’t make sense given the direction we see marketing and the customer relationship moving
• Attracting and retaining talent – Yes, I know in a recession and the labour market isn’t exactly tight, but that is today. Look five, or even three years out in your organization and think about how that workforce will change. As the Baby Boomers retire organization will need to be able to attract and retain Net Generation employees. Creating a dynamic and collaborative working environment is one way to accomplish that.

This is by no means meant to be an exhaustive list, rather something to get you thinking about how to proactively deal with the economic environment using Web 2.0 tools. Agree? Disagree? let me know if you have other thoughts and ideas.

The current Jericho model of security (fitting name) is great a putting up impermeable walls to keep to dangers outside at bay, but not so at quickly adapting and reconfiguring them. Even inside the walls of the enterprise security has largely been based on group permission. Which is just a step up from the one size fits all XXXL t-shirts that get blasted out of an air gun at sporting events.

The problem is that organizations today need to be agile, reconfigurable, be able to leverage partners and third party expertise. Unfortunately to operate in this new environment security and permissions need to be dynamic and flexible both internally and externally. To become a next generation enterprise it will be increasingly important to both empower and trust employees when it comes to information and security decisions.

My feeling is that in moving beyond the current model for information security is going to take a little bit of technology and a lot of trust. Web 2.0 tools and the Net Generation will both be additional factors that push the issue to the forefront at leading organizations. Companies will need to move to a model of ‘decentralized security’, which I see as basically allowing users to manage their own security permissions. Organizations will first start experimenting with information inside the firewall, but eventually they will need to evolve and extend beyond the walls of the enterprise.

Take the simple example of sharing a proposal. In a traditional organization that would be done via email, perhaps a networked drive, or more sophisticated reporting tools. The problem is that in all of those cases the permissions for the document have predefined by the system (ok except email, but we all know that is not the best way to share something with and organization). IT predetermined who should see the document even though they have no idea what it contains (nor do they care). A good wiki product will allow an employee to set permissions they decide are appropriate based on the content in the document, not to mention tag it so others can actually find it.

Allowing users to manage their own security permissions may seem like common sense, but in the IT world we are still a ways away. Luckily organizations are currently recruiting a generation of security 2.0 experts. Net Gener’s are constantly granting permissions, blocking harmful people and materials and managing spam filters. Now with Facebook’s feature that enables social graphs, they are controlling the access and permissions of hundreds of their friends, colleagues and family members to their personal information. They decide on who to allow to view various content, use specific applications and access certain areas of their profile. They can define access levels on a group or individual basis. Should I stop? Sounds a lot like they are taking network admin 101 to me? The bottom line is that they will be a generation of employees that has been developing some skills and thought patterns that will be portable to a decentralized security environment.

All of this makes it fitting that the band chose to not only release their latest music video on YouTube, but also to make YouTube an integral part of the video itself. There is an excellent post by Nicholas Carlson that lists and links to all of the now famous YouTubers that appear in the video. Take a minute to watch the music video which is posted below and see how many of the ‘stars’ you spot.

There are, count’em, 21 YouTube cameos in the video, for those of you scoring at home

1. One man band
2. Numa Numa Guy
3. Dramatic Gopher
4. How the Dramatic Prairie Dog was Born
5. Afro Ninga
6. GI Joe Gay, Guinness World Record for most T-Shirts worn at one time
7. Chris Crocker (aka LEAVE BRITNEY ALONE!)
8. All Your Base Are Belong To Us
9. Miss Teen USA 2007 – South Carolina answers a question
10. Star Wars Kid
11. Crank That Soldier Boy
12. Evolution of Dance
13. “Chocolate Rain” Original Song by Tay Zonday
14. K-Fed Popozao
15. Daft Hands – Technologic
16. Daft Bodies – Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger
17. Shoes the Full Version
18. Charlie the Unicorn
19. It’s Peanut Butter Jelly Time!!!

And in the product placement category …

1. Will it blend
2. Diet Coke & Mentos Experiments

The thing is for most of the people/videos I have listed above, this wasn’t the first time they have been pulled into so called ‘mainstream’ media. In fact for most of the YouTube stars you will find a number of talk show, sitcom and news appearances. You only need to check out Tay Zonday aka ‘Chocolate Rain’ to find other links to appearance on South Park, Jimmy Kimmel Live, or even a promotional spot for Dr. Peppers new Cherry Chocolate beverage.

The question now becomes what defines a celebrity or ‘media personality’? A line that I would say is increasingly dwindling away. I hate to use this example and will not link to him, but Perez Hilton has gone from the blogosphere, to YouTube, to mainstream media. I would even argue that it is more that mainstream media is being redefined than internet stars are infiltrating it. The shift to digital content means that channels are becoming homogeneous, only differentiated by medium (print, audio and video) and the end-users device. Video content is available has been traditionally thought of as Movies and Television, but in this digital age how are they any different from YouTube? It will be interesting to see how this plays out as Television, Movies and online media continue to converge. Will video be able to make the transition smoother than the music industry? Perhaps the fact the both have add based business models will make it easier?

In the GTA game players navigate around a ‘fictional’ city (based on NY in the latest edition) and complete a variety of tasks. In the past the one of the challenges of GTA, outside of the traditional story line, has been discovering all of the little tricks and secret missions in the game. For GTA IV however the latter has become infinitely easier. The reason being there has been an an explosion of activity on the GTA IV “google powered wiki mashup” or Grand Theft Auto Hood. IGN has created a site that allows gamers to do a number of things which include navigate Liberty City using google maps, tag points of interest, missions, vehicles, secrets etc…, collaboratively develop a gaming guide in a wiki and interact with other gamers in the forums. Top contributers are identified by the number of edits the make to the site and the number of things they ‘discover’ in the game.

The discoveries range in value and can be anything from critical information you need to complete a mission to my personal favourite, where to find the “Little cart that pulls the luggage carts”. It’s a model that could easily be leveraged by other games in the future and is great way to create both excitement and a sense of community around a video game. Had the game developer come up with the idea (instead of IGN) they probably could have got some great customer feedback and ideas for improvements and future games.

Athlete’s are often idolized and immortalized by their fans. I know that growing up I definitely had images of my hero’s, ideal ways in which I remembered them. Social media sites like YouTube make it possible to relive the highlights and memories. The twist is that now users can rate and rank (by number of views) sports history, choosing the moments that will define how we collectively remember a career.

The sports guy mentioned Mike Tyson and Barry Bonds, both great examples of athletes who have had highs and lows during their careers. I decided to take a look at these two athletes and some of my personal hero’s to see how they are being remembered in the user generated content world that is YouTube.

The results are not in anyway scientific. I am just running a search in YouTube, sorting by the number of views, and then assessing what the top 20 results say about their career. The question I am asked myself is ‘if 20 years from now someone stumbled upon YouTube would the get the same impression of the athletes that I did growing up watching them.”

Barry Bonds – Looking at the top 20 hits on YouTube I am not sure whether he was a famous rapper or a baseball player. What I am sure of is that he was rich and is linked to steriods. (Granted the MLB does remove videos, but still not a flattering legacy)

Nolan Ryan – It’s clear he accomplished a lot, over 300 wins and 7 no-hitters. Interestingly users manged to make Nolan Ryan tribute videos without using MLB content by mashing up pictures and sports memorabilia. (there goes Bonds excuse)

Mike Tyson – It is clear that the society continues to remember two things about Iron Mike, he was as fierce as he was crazy.

Wayne Gretzky – This one was interesting because The Great One has such a calm demeanor, but his YouTube history is mix of legendary tribute videos proclaiming his skill with some fights and hits mixed in.

Wendel Clark – As my childhood hero, I was glad to see the users of YouTube have chosen to remember him exactly as I did. A hard hitting, rough and tumble hockey player with a great wrist shot.

Michael Jordan -Air Jordan is larger than life, and in the world of social media that legend only gets bigger. He couldn’t have created a better memorial for himself.

Tiger Woods – Definitely famous although but not exactly sure why as his videos are a mix of commercials, slow motion swings and amazing shots. In all fairness to Tiger I am sure it will look more ‘Jordanesque’ once he has completed his career.

O.J. Simpson – From the videos its much more likely that he murdered his wife and her friend than played in the NFL.

Emmit Smith – A famous ballroom dancer who also happens to hold the all-time NFL rushing record (no mention of any murders).

It’s fascinating, all of the athletes listed above (expect perhaps Clark) are legends in their respective sports, but on YouTube that is not always apparent. Appropraitely, YouTube seems to remember sports history as a user would. Not in a historically factual way, but rather as a mix of accomplishments, character and impact.

What is the your sports hero’s YouTube legacy? Below is a video that sums up my memories of #17 Wendel Clark

Blogging has been making inroads into the reputable media world for some time now, and it is at the point that in some circles we are seeing traditional media become the underdog. In many of these cases I feel the reason for the shift has more to do with the way in with the message is delivered online than the fact that the content is digital. It makes sense, Web 2.0 is more than just the medium (digital) its how you are able to ‘interact with the message’. It use to be that readers would follow certain authors or reporters because they can share their perspective. Blogs not only allow you to follow the perspective of the author but also become part of a community of like minded readers who you communicate with via comments.

Blogs and other web 2.0 tools also make it easier for you to create that community and around an aggregation of the best content. Bloggers are for the most part not working at creating the news, rather they are aggregating the mass amounts of information and synthesizing it for their readers and providing their opinions. Reporters at newspapers and magazines aren’t allowed to slap together two paragraphs, paste in a great article from another paper and call it a column. If your claim to fame as a reporter was you found the best stories from other newspapers and reposted them in your paper I think that would be the fastest way to get yourself replaced or fired.

Unfortunately now you are left with a dilemma. Who is creating the value? Is the the aggregator or the creator of the content. I think that you can make and the argument for either party. The content creator, who I will stereotype as traditional media, typically provide value by gathering the facts and information from the source and pulling it into a objective report. The aggregator provides value by finding, assessing and framing the content in a way that caters to their audience.

Is this a question of moving up the value chain, or have blogs commoditized the content? As Cuban goes on to point out in his blog, why do so many people need access to the locker room anyway? “The people that complained the loudest about the ban, really didn’t have a good reason to be in the locker room. And from what I can tell, non of their readers complained that their blogs suffered in any way shape or form when they didnt have access to the locker room.” Cuban’s point of allowing all bloggers into the locker room is going to the extreme to get under skin of David Stern. However, I find it interesting that he mentions that this didn’t affect their readers at all. After all I don’t read sports articles to see what the players say (I can get that anywhere) I read sports articles to hear what the author has to say about what the players have said or done.

The real value created in the blogosphere is created not just from aggregating information, but also from providing opinions and insights as to what that content means to them. Perhaps blogs are redefining what is means to be a content creator? It may be that today there is so much information out there and accessible that we now need a layer of people (bloggers) who aggregate and recreate the original message.

This clip below from the The Simpsons provides a humorous view of what I think most people are already noticing. Nelson makes fun of a panelist at a political debate because he is a “print journalist from the Washington Post” and goes on to point out “HAHA, your medium is dying”.

This reminded me of when I was at the gym last week watching some CNN political panel and thinking “this is probably the first election that bloggers have been brought in to sit beside experts form political think tanks and media outlets”. I am still not sure what to make of this change just yet. On one hand it adds a fresh perspective to the media and political scenes which was desperately needed. The concern (which I have heard a number of times) is that blogs promote rapid reporting of current topics and we may lose some of the in-depth investigative reports that are the hallmark of established media outlets. Hopefully we end up with a model that brings the best of both worlds, but only time will tell.

I feel what differentiates visualization from a static graph or a chart is the ability or the users to manipulate and control the inputs and outputs of the tool. The first case I came across was a tool called Liveplasma and it allows users to visualize and expand their music/movie preferences by leveraging the data in the Amazon cloud. Sarah Perez at recently put up a great blog post about ‘The Best Tools for Visualization” that goes over a wide range of different tools and their uses.

If visualization is so powerful and useful, how can you get them into the hands of your employees? It only makes sense to arm them with the with tools that will allow them to make better decisions and exploit all of the information that corporations are now capturing. I was pointed to a tool called ‘TheBrain‘ a few weeks ago and I have included a quick blurb and an example of one of the solutions you could use it for below.

TheBrain software enables helpdesk and IT managers to organize and share all relevant information online quickly and easily. Using TheBrain’s visual interface you can see all related issues and solutions. See a complete mapping of your IT network so you immediately know what server runs what application and the impact of any changes.

While the example above is rather simple (a user defined interactive tag/knowledge cloud), you can see that benefits this would have for IT HelpDesk staff. The key for organizations will be to open up information and databases to these new visualization tools and widgets. There is so much untapped potential residing in most companies and I believe that organizations that figure this out early will see marked improvement.

Looking at The Wire from a purely technical standpoint you notice that over the course of the series the ‘drug dealers’ are always weighing the cost of efficient communication against the criminal liability of having their conversations and interactions recorded. In many cases defaulting to face-to-face meetings in order to assure that the remain free from prosecution.

Unfortunately, I am seeing the same mentality used in organizations when it comes to technology and web 2.0 tools. Enabling employees to communicate, collaborate, efficiently share information and provide value across the business should be seen as a god send by organizations. However, many companies have been operating under the mindset that ‘ignorance is bliss’ especially when it comes to ‘legal liability’.

Take for example a company that produces widgets, and during the development process employees are used to help test the widgets. They use Web 2.0 tools that enable employees to report errors and potential improvements, interacting directly with engineers to help improve design and speed up development cycles. The problem is that from a legal standpoint the information captured from the process could mean that the organization would now be liable for all of the errors and improvements captured, even the ones it deemed ‘acceptable’. Ironically something that would increase value for both the organization and the consumer becomes harder to manage because of legal liability.

This leads to some organizations taking a street inspired approach to communication. Now we have things like ‘information life cycles’ that are aimed more at removing potentially damaging information that saving space on the server (think of it as digital shredding). Basically, the less efficiently you track you communications and expose your flaws the safer you are. Employees shouldn’t feel the need to send Blackberry PIN messages and shy away from documenting information especially when they are acting in what the think is the best interest of the organization.

I think it will be interesting to see how corporations and the legal system adapt in the coming years.

The theme of FASTforward 08 was ‘the user revolution’ and it is the user/employee that is at the center of successful Web 2.0 solutions. The theory is that because employees are now informationalizing your IT systems being a fast follower is more difficult. The reason for this is two fold. First, implementation is no longer a matter of rolling out the tools, but rather convincing employees to adopt a collaborative mindset and way of working. Second, in the past the success of an ERP or CRM rollout revolved around a small team of experts and consultants which could to a certain extent be replicated by another organization. With collaborative tools success hinges on the entire organization contributing and developing the tools.

Look at some of the mainstays in the Web 2.0 suit of technologies – wikis, blogs, social networks, tags, RSS, predictive markets. The collaborative, social, user generated nature of these tools makes it almost impossible to duplicate the value from one organization to another. Sure, technically speaking it’s simple to install and configure Web 2.0 tools, but when you are talking about information technology, getting the information into those tools is an art form. This means that organizations that can leverage Web 2.0 technologies will gain competitive advantage based on the skill in which they use those technologies.

So I would expect most CEOs to have a heart attack at the latest predictions from Ray Kurzweil. Kurzweil predicts that by 2029 “hardware and software will achieve human level artificial intelligence with the broad suppleness of human intelligence including our emotional intelligence”. He goes on to state that we will have “intelligent nanobots go into our brains through the capillaries and interact directly with our biological neurons”.

He makes the point that “We’re already a human machine civilization, we use our technology to expand our physical and mental horizons and this will be a further extension of that”. Fair enough, ABS brakes and traction control can enhance driving ability and prevent you from crashing your car. (granted this is still a ways off from a nanobot in your brain)

If Kurzweil is right this means in 20 years voluntary human to human collaboration could be a thing of the past. Rather than relying on employees to adopt new tools and ways of working after a merger you will simply insert an ‘upgraded nanobot’ and move on. If you want to get the latest customer feedback why not have the nanobot in your product solicit the consumers opinion from his hybrid brain. In this future workplace the focus would no longer be on collaboration among employees, but rather compatibility between nanobots.

While all of this sounds intriguing, for the time being I think I will stick with Web 2.0

It amazes me the creativity, honesty and emotion that individuals are willing to display anonymously via the web. The most recent compilation from PostSecret.com, A Valentine Video, can be seen below.

The key to the success of the PostSecret model is the anonymity of those who are sharing their secrets. However, when we talk about collaboration in the enterprise that same anonymity that drives creative and honest expression is shunned. The truth is that when companies implement Web 2.0 solutions they are afraid of what employees might say or do if they are not held accountable. What if someone blast the CEO in a blog post, post inappropriate content on the social network or vandalizes project information in the wiki?

These are all valid concerns, after all companies have rules and regulations that they must abide by and need to maintain a safe work environment for employees. But what about the creativity, the innovation, and the honesty that comes from the freedom to express your thoughts anonymously. In the enterprise cultural and political reasons often prevent employees from feeling comfortable to share their true opinions, but the good news is there are ways to get the best of both worlds.

Companies could try creating a forum for employees to anonymous submit thoughts and ideas being clear that all content must be work appropriate. If needed, monitor the site and allow users to flag inappropriate content (ala youtube) or if necessary monitor the submissions before they are posted (making it clear to submitters why the have been censored). If that is to radical, start by allowing employees to express themselves by ranking and rating content. The idea is to give employees a voice and the freedom to break free of the hierarchy and danger of group think. I was just talking with my colleague Alan and we discussed how an anonymous forum could be valuable tool on those occasions when everyone is thinking the plan from the top is flawed, but doesn’t feel comfortable voicing their opinion.

I think it’s something worth thinking about if you are moving the way of Web 2.0 in your organization.

Well we now have our first case. CNN is reporting that “Moroccan authorities arrested an engineer Wednesday for allegedly stealing the identity of the king’s younger brother on the social networking Web site, Facebook, the state news agency said.” This should prove to be interesting, as up until this point the web has been the home of virtual identities, which are not necessarily correlated with ones psychical identity . Take Second Life for example, the purpose of the site is to create an avatar that then becomes your identity as you interact in the virtual world. I would be willing to guess that there are more than a few celebrity look-a-like Second Life avatars, so does this mean they are technically stealing someones identity.

“Fouad Mourtada, 26, was arrested in Casablanca for “villainous practices” in connection with the theft of Prince Moulay Rachid’s identity, Maghreb Arabe Presse reported.” The problem seems to be that Fouad was a little to too good (ad perhaps even a little devious) at pretending to be the Prince of Morocco. I did a quick check on facebook for the closest thing to a Canadian prince, Wayne Gretzky, and to my surprise ‘the great one’ has about 30 Facebook profiles (although his choice of profile pictures are sometimes questionable – signed hockey cards and cardboard cut outs). If I were to wager I would bet the over/under on the number of fraudulent Gretzky profiles to be at least 29 maybe 30.

Will this be the start of the rich and famous pro-actively defending their online identities? Perhaps this will help push initiatives such as OpenID forward? I will leave you with a clip called Facebook Off (a spoof on Face-Off), my favorite line “Your just a person, facebook is a website”.

However, With the advent of YouTube, Dailymotion and other video sharing sites over that past few years it has allowed Canadians to enjoy all of the greatness of Super Bowl ads. As I was watching the game this year I was amazed that numerous times during the game Fox was actually promoting the fact that all of the Super Bowl ads would be available after the game at MySpace.com/superbowlads. This is great, you can go and watch all of the ads CTV kindly blocked and they are nicely listed by the quarter in which they aired.

My real problem with the Super Bowl, specifically this year as I am a Pats fan, is that the same social media tools that enabled me to watch all of the ads I missed also will continue to add to my misery for days to come. Let’s just say I am not very happy with the outcome of the game, I didn’t watch the last 10sec, or any Sports Centre this morning in an effort to keep all Super Bowl related news at bay. The problem for a downtrodden fan like myself is that web 2.0 technologies are so pervasive its impossible to escape news these days. Facebook updates, RSS feeds, YouTube, Digg, SMS messages from friends who may have won copious amounts of money on the outcome, everywhere I turn I am reminded of the terrible tragedy that took place yesterday.

Thankfully cars.com created some great ads for the Super Bowl that helped take a little bit of the sting away (my favorite ad is below).

Perhaps in time social media also will provide me with some therapy, like this YouTube video that was created to help Cowboys fans overcome their disappointing season.

The reality is that for both new and veteran users alike it is easy to become overwhelmed by the amount of information that flows into your RSS reader. The great advantage of RSS is supposed to be that unlike email, users can control what information is delivered to them by selecting feeds. So really you can only blame yourself for becoming buried in 1,000s of blog posts, but it’s a trap that many of us fall into.

I have highlighted his 8 points below, but you should definitely read the post as he goes into more detail.

1. Develop a Triage Mentality
2. Scan First for Low Hanging Fruit
3. Relegate Whole Categories to Low Hanging Fruit
4. Create a Few Tags for Your Major Interests
5. Zap The Oldies
6. Learn to Quickly Triage the Biggest Posters
7. Dump Your Least Favorite Bloggers - note: this rule does not apply to the Wikinomics Blog
8. Put a Time Limit on Your Blog Reading

The website has since been taken down but you can view the winning video here. Quiznos take on the whole thing seems simple enough “We’re just facilitating consumers who go out and create their own expression in the form of a commercial,” said Ronald Y. Rothstein, a partner at Winston & Strawn, on behalf Quiznos.
Now, I don’t pretend to grasp the legal intricacies of corporate advertising but from what I have understand ads that contain ‘slanderous statements and false claims’ are supposed to be off limits. However, from what I have observed as a consumer doesn’t seem to be that cut and dry. Coke and Pepsi used to run blind taste test about which was better, Bud and Miller Lite continuously state they taste better than the each other, and what about the Mac ads? They are hilarious but I would think they have to be pushing the boundaries with the whole Vista sucks by a Mac angle in their latest campaign.

Personally it would make more sense to me if the lawsuit was aimed only at the ads Quiznos created and maybe the way the instructed customers to portray their subs as being better, but to sue over user generated content seems a little odd. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out. Hopefully it won’t kill this type of engaging and entertaining advertising that allows companies to connect with their customers and spice up the marketing industry.

HBO announced earlier this week that the company is now going to offer it’s programming ‘free’ online. The following excerpt from BusinessWeek outlines the new service “HBO describes HBO on Broadband as free. But to get the service, a cable subscriber will need to have already paid not only the $12 or so a month to get the pay channel, but also the $30 or $40 a month to get a cable operator’s broadband service.” Of course the service has some big conditions, but it’s refreshing to see that some content providers appear to be getting it, users want choice. To get access to the ‘free’ HBO on Broadband service you have to be an HBO customer. You know what, this makes sense. HBO has great programming and I believe that many users would be more willing to pay for the channel if they are able to have control over how the consume media (traditional TV, streaming, download, time shifting, etc…).

True HBO has inserted the sleazy stipulation that users must also subscribe to their broadband service to access the new technology, but at least they are trying. For the first movers in this case, especially a well established content provider such as HBO ‘strong armed bundling tactics’ may actually garner them market share while at the same time handicapping others who follow from copying their model (what are the odds a similar Showcase bundle would work now?). The model is far from perfect but at this point getting some innovation out of the archaic entertainment industry is better than nothing.

Technology and old business models have collided and by most accounts the media giants have responded poorly. In many cases still refusing to accept that the world is changing and business models needs to change and adapt along with it. Does this mean we should ignore copyright and condone piracy, no, but it doesn’t mean that we should continue down the path we have been on either.

Unfortunately over the past decade the same companies that want you to purchase their products have been treating their customers like the enemy. It is to the point that you can’t escape it, I mean before you watch a movie at the theater you are reminded that downloading movies is illegal. The message to the ‘valued customer’ “Thanks for coming to and paying 14 dollars to watch our new film, but we know that you might steal it in the future and that your a thief, now sit back and get ready for our feature presentation”. It is this type of behavior and confrontational attitude that has shaped the opinion of the largest consumer generation in history.

Last month the founders of the Pirate Bay, a large torrent search site based out of Sweden, were interviewed by the BBC. You can read the entire article here, and I have pulled out a few quotes that outline the logic and justification that some people use to justify piracy.

As a generation we notice that the business model for media is changing, at least when it come to corporate sponsorship and product placement. “Take the latest Bond movie. What car was it? Oh, it’s a BMW. His phone is a Sony Ericsson. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. I think they got a load of money for having those products in the movie”.

Peter Sunde also points out that for this generation there is a justification for piracy, they feel like while the do pirate some things the also contribute their share to these companies. “I still go to the movies, I still spend money on the movies. Everybody does it so everybody wants to download movies. The public opinion is it should be legal. He has a similar logic when it comes to music, “I do pay for it by listening to music, by bringing the music to my friends, they bring it to their friends and they go to concerts, I go to concerts,” he says. “The actual product doesn’t have to cost anything in order to make money.”

As member of the Net Generation I can attest to the fact that there seems to be an informal hierarchy of piracy that has developed and some actions are deemed ‘worse’ than others. The generation seems to rationalize piracy in terms of the time, effort and perceived ‘illegal nature’ of the activity. Below I have listed some of the most commonly pirated media in order of what is considered socially ‘acceptable’ copyright infringement to what N-Geners see as outright piracy. (For fun I also tried to come up with what would be the ‘perceived’ criminal equivalent Net Generation members would associate with each of the activities)

TV Shows-
Perceived Criminal Equivalent – A Little White Lie
Rationale – I have already paid for it
- Time shifting and TiVo lead this generation to find little wrong with downloading their favorite TV show. Personally I love watching The Office, but the problem is that I am very rarely home at 9pm on Thursday night. I already pay for cable and have access to the show, I just prefer to watch the show at a time that is more convenient to me (U.S. viewers can watch it free online).

Computer Software
Perceived Criminal Equivalent – An ill intentioned IOU
Rationale – It’s to expensive and I will pay for it later (when I actually have an income)
- Outside of the OEM software that comes installed on their laptops the reality is that students tend to pirate a lot of computer software, mainly because they can’t afford to spend $500 on MS Office or Adobe Photoshop. When they enter into the workplace they continue to use the programs they have become accustom to, but the idea is that now they are paying customers. Sort of like borrowing money from a friend that you know you can’t pay back right away, but some day you plan to set it right.

Music
Perceived Criminal Equivalent – Under age smoking or drinking
Rationale – I support my favorite artists by going to concerts, I only download what I would have never bought before and the music industry really just doesn’t get it
- This is something that most young people know is illegal and they will eventually grow out of, but there is still a lot of bitterness and resentment against the system. Exhibit A – Sony has just launched a new DRM free downloading service. To download the 37 DRM free albums users have to first go to a Sony store and buy a scratch card with a code on it, then go home and use that code to access the site and then finally you can download the music you wanted in the first place. I mean what could be simpler. Wait, why not just pay online and download directly over a high-speed connection?

Movies
Perceived Criminal Equivalent – Vandalism of an abandon warehouse
Rationale – I still go to the movies or I only download movies I would never pay to see
- Movies rank higher in the piracy hierarchy for two reasons. First it takes a concerted effort and time to download a movie (the files are huge). Second, unlike music which N-Geners support through going to concerts, after you download a movie you are not likley to rent it or watch it in a theatre.

Video Games
Perceived Criminal Equivalent – Shoplifting
Rationale – I don’t want to pay for it and I know how to get away with stealing it
- Pirating games for video game systems (Nintendo, XBox or Playstation) is at the top of the list. It not only involves a blatant disregard for digital copyright laws, but users have to physically alter their machines in order for the games to work. While they do by the system from the company, they don’t spend another dime on the game revenue and there is very little incentive to spend 60 dollars to buy a game that you already own.

This post is not meant to condone piracy or peg Net Generation members as hooligans who have no respect for intellectual property, but rather to shed light on some of the less discussed issues around piracy in a light hearted manor.

I look forward to the discussion the will hopefully follow.

More recently we have been looking at how playing WoW may be a valuable skill that employers will start looking for. There is even a group of CEO’s and venture capitalists that get together and play, they are apart of the We Know WoW guild. Ross Mayfield, founder of SocialText, and long time collaborator of New Paradigm is a member of the guild. He explains in an interview with ZDnet how he has even connected with a new client while playing the game. The clip goes on to mention that in the within the tech community WoW is becoming the new golf.

However, if hobnobbing with executives, fighting disease and building up your resume aren’t persuading you to play WoW, then this commercial just might push you over the edge.

Mr T. WoW Commercial – Watch more free videos

“I am Mr T and I’m a Knight-Elf-Mohawk”, how can you say no to Mr T?

However, unlike most IT roll-outs, Web 2.0 brings an interesting dilemma to organizations. They are moving to a set of agile, lightweight, open, collaborative applications and must decide whether to build their own solution in house, buy a solution, or venture into the world of open source. With all of the options there are pros and cons, and I take a quick look at some of them below.

Build – In the early stages companies are often looking to pilot a number of solutions to find what works best for the organization. Even though most of the technologies are very light weight, building can be lofty goal for most company’s right out of the gate. Building is a tempting option for large organizations looking to implement customized functionality into their solutions. However, companies also need to be wary of creating their own legacy nightmare down the road. Once an organization has had time to figure out how their internal culture and corporate strategy fits in with their vision for an Enterprise 2.0 solution there very well may be some advantages for very customized solutions.

Buy – If you decide to buy a solution you need to decide if you are going to buy a suite that has integrated Web 2.0 tools and applications or whether you want to create your own mix of best-in-breed applications (e.g. the best wiki, search, blog, etc) which ultimately will lead to some integration. When making the decision to buy software companies will also have to decide whether to go with their existing large vendors, or experiment with a smaller startup. This forces an organization to weigh the value of having a stable solution they know will be supported 5 years down the road, against using best-in-breed solutions from young, innovative, agile companies. The question is will small vendors be able to offer the level of support a global organization needs and still remain innovative? If you integrate and base your collaborative strategy around a specific product, will they still be around in two years? On the other hand, can large vendors innovate fast enough to make their solutions relevant?

Open Source – There are a number of open source Web 2.0 solutions available to organizations such as TWiki, Drupal, bBlog, etc. For companies considering open source solutions they will need to think about intellectual property, integration and upgrades. Using an open source solution gives you access to not just a software product, but a community of users who are constantly innovating and improving upon the solution. For companies choosing to go this route the will need to carefully examine how IP rights are managed, if they are going to benefit from a community they will also need to give back. Is the organization willing to share their innovative changes and modifications with the community, especially on that could include competitors. There is also a considerable amount of integration needed with an open source solution and managing all of the connections as versions are continually updated could be challenging.

In case you have been living in a closet for the past few years, World of Warcraft (WoW) is a massive multiplayer online game that has not only become hugely successful, but managed to make its way into the main stream. In fact the controversial show South Park won an emmy for the episode “Make Love, Not Warcraft”. The show starts off with the following exchange.

Randy (Stan’s Dad) – “You’ve been on your computer all weekend, shouldn’t you go out and socialize with your friends?”

Stan – “I am socializing r-tard, I am logged onto an MMORPG, with people from all over the world and getting XP with party using team speak”

(Thanks to the wonders of the web you can view the episode below if you like)

South Park-World of Warcraft

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As the exchange above highlights, new collaborative media (and yes MMOGs enable collaboration) present different way of thinking about social interaction and collaboration. However, when you talk about ‘mass collaboration’ it doesn’t get any bigger or sophisticated than WoW. Players work together using complex dashboards to track in game stats along with messaging and voice communication to orchestrate their quests.

While it’s easy to write off video games as young and juvenile, perhaps the may be a little more important. As Doctorow points out “Next time President Bush tells you he’s going to Crawford to be with “real Americans,” remind him that there are more World of Warcraft players in the USA than there are farmers (though of course the two aren’t mutually exclusive).”

The good news for all the bloggers out there is that I have found something even better than ‘daily blogging for dummies’, it’s Eric Knitz 9 reasons why blogging everyday doesn’t matter, in his mind it’s very Web 1.0 (he actually lists 10, but the last one is personal so I left it off). Below you will find the abridged version of his list; to read the entire post checkout his blog.

1. Traffic is generated by participating in the community; not daily posting
2. Traffic is irrelevant to your blog’s success anyway
3. Loyal readers coming back daily to check your posts is so Web 1.0
4. Frequent posting is actually starting to have a negative impact on loyalty
5. Frequent posting keeps key senior executives and thought leaders out of the blogosphere
6. Frequent posting drives poor content quality
7. Frequent posting threatens the credibility of the blogosphere
8. Frequent posting will push corporate bloggers into the hands of PR agencies
9. Frequent posting creates the equivalent of a blogging landfill

Unfortunately for me he doesn’t list being too tired to type up the idea you had for a post, or being to busy to spend time keeping your blog updated as reasons not to post on a daily basis.

Now, the list isn’t an excuse for being lazy, but rather a plea for bloggers to make more thoughtful and strategic posts. You don’t need to post everyday, rather post everyday you have something worth posting and see where things go from there.
And next time I promise to do a better job and take my own advice

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