Exploration
The real-world is … brimming full of people and places that you will never have a chance to meet or see, but this shouldn’t bother you because a lot of these people you would never want to visit or meet anyways due to opposite interests. Similarly, the Internet is a free for all of good site meets bad site, good person meets bad person, and personally relevant meets irrelevant – it’s the world wide web – you’re not expected to see everything, meet everyone, and do everything … it’s simply too big and you’d never have the time, money or attention for everything that’s out there. On the Internet you discover something new every day. Whatever it is that you discover tends to come your way via. targeted search, advertisements or serendipitous exploration. This is true of the real-world also, and so too is the reality that the most powerful drivers of online referrals are personal in nature, from people who you know and trust. In the end, what you end up finding is normally not even what you set out to search for in the first place.

More discussion below.

Forming Relationships
The Internet is … an informal network of both strong and loose interpersonal links. Why you care about who you know online depends on what they bring to the virtual table and the meaningful exchanges that take place between you and another person. In the real-world, the people who you know-of, but tend never to get-to-know, are your loose network. The fact that you see them every day and say “hi” when you walk by, but never anything more, doesn’t mean you’re friends … it just means that you’re capable of being friends… maybe. Casual communications (in-person) and boosting your ‘friend count’ (online) will only get you so far, but action (or lack of) will bring you together, and keep you apart.

Game Playing
The real world is … full of people, and as humans, we are naturally social. One of the ways in which people socialize is through sports or game-playing, which often incorporates elements of physical reflexes and hand-eye co-ordination, constant and long-term training, competition, and of course, teamwork and cooperation. Top sports players are 1 in 100. Once people are online, we’re thirsty consumers of entertainment, and one of the most active and online spaces for this is in the world of multiplayer and massively multiplayer (virtual worlds) games. Online gaming is a flourishing industry and it shares many similar traits to real-world sports, clubs/teams, and the surrounding fan-based community. Popular online games range from first-person shooters, to poker, to text-based games, and an elite core of competitive players emerges in most communities, some playing more than 100 hours a week (“MOM, i’m not playing…i’m training!”). Most games are driven by their competitive spirit, wanting you or your team to win, and the tangible or intangible benefits within the community, from cash prizes, to awards and informal reputation.

Shopping
The real world is … an always-on hub of activity related to commerce and personal purchases. When you see something you want, you carefully compare every item on sale, shopping at multiple stores, and often come back to the one with the best price, user and customer experience. Similar principles apply to an online retail environment. When you see something you want, you search around for the website with the best deals, but you pay just as much attention to the surrounding variables. An unattractive or poorly designed website indicates a potentially shady dealer, just like a cracked and sun-faded sign does for any physical property – it cries “stay away.” Similarly, online dealers that tend to get the best rating feedback, and the most personal referrals, are those that treat their customers fairly, with respect, and deliver goods in a timely fashion. Even more-so than in the real-world, online shoppers are happy to share stories of a good customer experience, and even happier to mass-distribute a story of a customer-experience story gone bad.

One final note – I don’t consider these described actions as any major shock – in truth, many of these examples follow conventions established socially in the real-world. In the end our perceptions are based on the behaviors we see when interacting with others in both the physical and virtual world. On this final note, I’d like to emphasize that since we can’t visually see other people in the virtual world, it’s important to recognize that the people behind the keyboard are changing too. As we discuss in our research, issues of technology, globalization and communication, among others, are strongly tied to the people who play in the global sandbox and the makup of these people across the world are constantly changing (also known as demographics). It’s interesting to think about how the Internet too will change over time as a byproduct of the changing composition of people using it across the world. In what ways? Who knows!

There’s a couple really neat elements to this. First, the majority of all translations in this project are staffed by volunteers…

These volunteers have doubtless, seen a particular video and thought, “I want to help share this with the world.” Currently there are video translations in over 40 languages, and more than 1100 volunteer translators. All translations are peer-reviewed for accuracy, and are expected to follow a style guide for consistency across video translations. From an incentive perspective, volunteers are provided with recognition for their work, and can even create translator profiles in order to build up a TED identity, where their contributions are tracked. This is an entirely sustainable project because the workforce/volunteers benefit from getting involved, and this involvement is made easy using technology that simplifies the process. Benefits include the inherent satisfaction from translating a video discussion you’re interested in, as well as the professional reward of contributing to the well known and esteemed TED community.

What impresses me about this project, is not just the scope, but the way in which it uses technology in a simple and effective way to help so many people across the world. From a technical standpoint, here is what is in TED’s first May release (from the TED website):

Along with subtitles, every talk on TED.com now features a time-coded, interactive transcript, which allows users to select any phrase and have the video play from that point. The transcripts are fully indexable by search engines, exposing previously inaccessible content within the talks themselves. For example, searching on Google for “green roof” will ultimately help you find the moment in architect William McDonough’s talk when he discusses Ford’s River Rouge plant, and also the moment in Majora Carter’s talk when she speaks of her green roof project in the South Bronx. Transcripts will index in all available languages.

The initial launch incorporates:

• Subtitles on every talk (available in English and any translated language)
• Interactive transcript (available in English and any translated language)
• Language-specific index pages featuring all the talks translated in that language
• Translations for headlines and talk descriptions
• The Translator Dashboard, allowing a bird’s-eye view on talks available for translation or review
• My Translations: a personalized page within each translator’s member profiles that shows the translations to which a translator has contributed
• Ability to sync user accounts between TED and dotSUB, allowing seamless transfer of data for translators

Perhaps what I like most about this project, is that TED is only the beginning – this ‘opening up’ of the world’s knowledge can only gain momentum and spread in other applicable settings. My colleague, Daniela Kortan, recently discussed Academic Earth in the context of a discussion on how the model for learning is changing. Academic Earth and other similar offerings can look to what TED is doing here, and say “that is the way, this is the direction for the future, so that we too can more effectively share our knowledge.” As we in society begin to better equip people with the tools to more effectively learn, more and more people will gain access to the same wealth of knowledge, inspiration, and a world-changing resource – information. Because, as we all know, knowledge is power.

Personally I think that Facebook and Twitter have a lot of potential as fee-based services for online entertainment, enterprise productivity, intelligence mining, information distribution, and others applications that would be build upon and expand from the free service offering, while leveraging an incredibly large audience. But for now, ads are the most direct route to a source of revenue…if people pay attention to them. A big IF. One company that is serving ads on these platforms, albeit in a different way, is Magpie, shown below. This pay-per-tweet service utilitizes a Twitter users’ account to broadcast a message to the users’ followers through tweets, and although the same click-through issues still apply, its interesting that this company is using a different approach to generate attention. And yet some questions remain…let’s dive in.

Magpie: Pay-Per-Tweet Advertising

Last summer I introduced Social Spark and its pay-per-blogging platform that matched bloggers with advertisement suppliers. Magpie is similar in that it allows advertisers to leverage someone’s social media audience (Twitter followers) and distribute ‘contextually appropriate’ ads through tweets, in exchange for compensation to the Twitter account holder of the pay-per-sale, pay-per-lead, pay-per-click or pay-per-view variety. The way it works is, a Twitter user signs up to Magpie and provides them with posting privileges to your personal account, specifying the type of compensation, as well as the volume of tweets the company can use for advertising in relation to normal tweets (e.g. 1/20). Advertisers use these accounts to distribute targeted messages based on the content of the twitter user and its respective audience, as if they come from the Twitterer. The amount of money that you make as a user depends on the type of plan you’re on, detailed below, which is taken directly from Magpie’s FAQ.

• Pay-per-Sale: Here you get a cut of the sale price when one of your followers buys something on one of our customer’s sites through one of your tweets. This is perhaps the most lucrative of the compensation models.
• Pay-per-Lead: Every time one of your followers enquires about a service or joins up for a subscription or the like, you get compensated (compensation rates tend to be 15% greater than Pay-per-View, depending on the campaign)
• Pay-per-Click: You get paid every time one of your followers clicks on a link. Currently Magpie’s click rate is double that of any other online advertising.
• Pay-per-View: You get paid a base amount for allowing a tweet to be placed in your stream – this amount depends on the number of your followers and the hotness of your tweets.

While there are upsides and downsides to this model, what’s interesting is that the ads are likely to get more exposure because they’re sandwiched right between authentic tweets, and it’s less easy to actively tune them.  Advertisers are able to reach a large volume of people through this tool, and insert a (theoretically) relevant message into a discussion that people are personally involved in. These are definite pluses for the tool. My breakdown of this platform becomes: a lot of people will see the ads but its success will depend almost entirely on its ability to convert views to click-throughs.

What about Magpie’s disadvantages? As with SocialSpark, there are ethical considerations at play here. Although Magpie allows and encourages people to create a disclaimer to affix to the end of the their Magpie tweets, for transparency, the whole pay-per-tweet activity is in that gray area where people may debate whether it is appropriate to lend your personal voice and relationships to companies for money in this way. Although one might argue that this is nothing other than brand sponsorship at a micro level and online, the flip side of the argument is that the diffusion of a branded message across trusted, personal relationships crosses a boundary. Regardless of one’s philisophical perspective on this debate, I see one possible consequence to a Twitterer who follows this path – where they lead, others may no longer follow – right or wrong, people may not appreciate having a ‘bot’ advertise to them, diluting their feed of real tweets, and may protest by no longer following that Twitter user.

The key factor in this then, becomes whether those tweeted ads have any value. Even though the ads are supposed to be targeted, I remain skeptical that any keyword based tool can understand a conversation to the degree that it’s able to insert textual advertisements that match the context. Twitter seems to be used as a tool to specifically reference events or activities, so a textual ad that has no direct relationship to that tweet is likely to stand out like a sore thumb. Text that is not targetted becomes spam, and the last thing you want to do is annoy your reader base, especially when there are so many other people competing for your attention.

Personally, if I were Magpie I would be interested in exploring how Twitter users could work together with Magpie in self-selecting advertisements from a range of possible topics, which could still be inserted on behalf of Magpie advertisers, yet would benefit from the Twitter account holder’s human touch and knowledge of its readership. I suspect that restructuring the ad placement mechanism in this way, to present you with a list of relevant ads that you can insert into your respective content, would increase relevance and click-through rates, while also decreasing resistance as a result of the bot-generated ad delivery system. Thoughts?

Lots of interesting elements on the table. Would you be bothered by ads like these showing up in your tweet feed? Why?

“Twig. Alwaaaays there when you need it” chants the catchy song in the promo video below. They’re not too far wrong and although I wouldn’t go so far as to say I NEED Ads, Twig IS always there, a floating frame at the top or bottom of your page. Contained in the thin frame is an interactive advertisement or video that becomes activated several seconds after you mouse over it. What I think is so interesting about this ad delivery mechanism is that it combines a number of simple elements, which when taken together, provide an advertisement that I believe will be more effective at getting “eye time” from website consumers, as well as produce better click through rates than ads embedded into specific locations on a page. Often advertisers try to achieve these results through using advertisements that are so big that you can’t help but see, be annoyed by, and raise mental walls to block out. There’s nothing that causes me to shut down and ignore an advertisement faster than when they get blown up and dominate my view of the content I actually went to the website to the consume. I think Twig is more subtle than that and as a result, will be more effective. Below is the promo video, and after the jump, a few reasons why I like Twig as both an advertiser and a media consumer.

1. Plenty of Face Time

Although you have the option of closing the frame, you have no major reason to, and I suspect that a lot of people will find the ads unobtrusive enough that they leave them up. This means that they are likely to get more eye time than traditional Ads that you ignore and scroll past on a page (or close outright). Having the advertisement on your screen does not obscure your vision of a page’s content or create clutter between text and images, but if viewers choose not to close the advertisement, then their subconscious will subtly absorb its presence throughout the entirety of the time someone is viewing the website.

I feel like having the ad always present will also provide viewers with both a constant stimulus AND the constant opportunity to click on the Ad. Further, when you mouse over the Ad, even if you don’t wait to see the larger version, it does create some visual movement on the ad, meaning that even if you’re ignoring it, you’re bound to look directly at the advertisement at least a few times. Here’s why: in order to click on any of the Internet browser controls (back, forward, URL etc.), you need to pass the Ad’s threshold, triggering motion and awareness. Although this Ad shows the motion on the right side of the page, a good redesign of the Ad would put it on the left side, to better expose the motion to the peripheral of a viewer’s vision when they interact with the browser.

2. Simplicity and User Friendly Design

Twig has a simple but elegant solution to online advertising. Rather than push Ads at you that you’ll likely close or ignore, they are attempting to attract your attention and pique your interest so that you’ll get involved with the Ad yourself. The Ad is slim and does not clutter up the website, meaning that there’s more screen real estate to devote to valued content, as well as a more friendly website viewing experience. This Ad format may be particularly well suited to long pages of viewing content, like blogs., and I imagine that it will do well as a launch pad for interactive games and videos. However, Twig also has the capability of providing a full-screen experience IF you’re interested in participating, meaning it is unobtrusive, while also carrying the capabilities of large Ads too. Ads that ‘blow-up’ to be larger when you mouse-over them are typically annoying because they try and get your attention by being unavoidable, a “boulder in the road”which may or may not also create noise. Although Twig blows up in size and has sound, it has one simple difference, a countdown on it to show that the “Ad will expand in…” three seconds. Providing this forewarning positions the ad as ‘opt-in’ rather than ‘opt-out’in my mind, and beyond that, when you do choose to view the Ad, it’s easy to see due to the grayed out background, and is easy to close if you’d like to return to where you were on the website.

So What?

So it’s safe to say that I like the demonstration of Twig. But as with anything, “it all depends” on the application of this tool. When it comes down to it, you’re still going to be stuck with an Ad that ‘follows’ you around the page you’re viewing and when confronted with a choice of ‘unobtrusive advertisement’ or ‘no advertisement,’ i’m sure most people would still rather go with the latter. Consider also that the slim width of the Ad limits what media you can put on it, forcing you to get creative. But personally I think that these types of advertisements will only become more pervasive. When you’re watching TV you don’t mind being interrupted, and broadcast to, because that’s the model that we have become accustomed to. However, with the Internet, people like to be in control, driving their media consumption, and they resist activities that do not add to that consumption in a relevant and valued way. Managing the conflict between broadcast (TV) and engagement (Internet) is a tricky task, but I think that Twig is a good attempt at a system that provides a necessary revenue stream for providing content, but does it in such a way that the viewer’s experience is not greatly sacrified in the process. Win-Win? What do you think?

“Twig is always there when you need it…” Now to get the song out of my head.

In an unusual twist to these traditional stories, Yahoo Sports posted one last week about how NFL teams apply similar practices to scout out new prospects. Their trick? Befriend the players using fake profiles with pictures of attractive women who are … like, total fans!!! The catch is that these women are a baited lure, and once they accept, the unsuspecting NFL prospect has opened the gates, trojan horse style, to a detailed review of an individual’s comments, profile pages, and pictures.

Typically, when organizations review social networking profiles, they use them as a filter, where any ‘inappropriate’ information or media will get players or employees screened out of the application pool, or even a job.  In 2008, a CareerBuilder study indicates that 1/5 employers use social networking sites to screen applicants, and of those using the tool, 1/3 of managers indicated that they had found information about a candidate that caused them to remove them from consideration. According to Computerworld, of particular note was:

• Information about alcohol or drug use (41% of managers said this was a top concern)
• Inappropriate photos or information posted on a candidate’s page (40%)
• Poor communication skills (29%)
• Bad-mouthing of former employers or fellow employees (28%)
• Inaccurate qualifications (27%)
• Unprofessional screen names (22%)
• Notes showing links to criminal behavior (21%)
• Confidential information about past employers (19%)

Back to this story… NFL teams say they benefit from the review of these social networking sites because they allow teams to conduct research on players much faster than before, and with access to a much greater wealth of information. According to Yahoo Sports, Rick Spielman, VP of Player Personnel for the Minnesota Vikings, the Vikings are not unlike most other NFL teams in having someone specifically tasked with reviewing the profiles of player prospects. Their job is to gather as much information as possible that can be used to filter out undesirable candidates, assist in the interview process, and help conduct background checks on players. These are understandable goals, but my concern remains with the process to get to that goal.

How ethical is this practice of using “ghost profiles” – fake profiles that are created to entrap players, and then disappear after the draft – to discover information about potential draft candidates? The issue I have with this practice is that it totally misrepresents the intentions of one party, in what is effectively a lie, in order to place the other party at a disadvantage. Sure the football prospect ought to know better than to have any discriminating information posted on such a loosely private medium, but that does not negate the wrong-doing of the team scout, in using shady practices to unearth that data. And yet, that information was there, in a space that continues to be viewed as gray territory when establishing either a public or private label? Who is right? Who is wrong? Is there even a right or a wrong?

And so I turn to you, what do you think?  What are the issues here and what’s your take? Acceptable? Not?

People like to have fun on the Internet, and there’s no reason why companies can’t share in, and benefit, from acting a little less serious every once and a while – it makes them personable and less robot-like in the eyes of the public. They key factor may be that on April Fools, people in general expect others to joke around, and so are primed towards a positive response when encountering a prank, rather than criticism. In the same way it’s accepted that you can dress up in a silly costume on Halloween and not be ostricized for it, April Fools is a stamp of endorsement for companies to have some fun…and benefit from it. Netizens enjoy a website that has personality, because they often identify to a certain extent with their favourite websites – and when a website has personality, then the internalization is that YOU have personality. Marketing impressions goes up, and I suspect loyalty goes up too because the “entertainment” at your hangout was pretty good – they came through.

So without further adieu, my top 3 favourite April Fools 2009 “Jokevertisements.”

3. Reddigg Redesign – Best Strategic Jokevertisement

This was clever. Popular social aggregator, Reddit.com, redesigned its interface to be a copy of competitor, Digg.com. What’s important to understand here is that the Internet abounds with fanboyism – people like to associate with the websites they frequent and will often disassociate with other sites for the same reason. Ingroup vs Outgroup. Given that Reddit and Digg are competitors it’s pretty funny that they would be willing to cast themselves in the shadow of Digg. However there’s also another effect in my mind, which is that of reinforcing Reddit’s ingroup loyalty among its readers – its funny but it also elicits a “yeah right” response from people.  The Reddit staff also left this note: “Note: If for some reason, you think that this new interface is lame — a result of your poor taste and lack of foresight, you can (for now) head over to http://classic.reddit.com and get the legacy Reddit interface. We cannot make you be less ignorant, philistine.”

2. YouTube Flip – Best Interactive Jokevertisement

Go to any YouTube video and in the URL append the text “&flip=1″ and hit enter. Flip-o-matic. What I really like about this is that it’s both very interesting, and interactive – the combination that you want to generate word of mouth and activity. People will tell or even show their friends this because it’s original, unexpected, entertaining and anyone can do it. “YouTube is cool!”

1. Expedia Flights to Mars – Best Business Related Jokevertisement

This was very well done, with a slick website showcasing flights to Mars for $99, including a Mars themed graphical interface, video and media, as well as a page of fun tourist activities to partake in once you make it over. The fact that Expedia put so much effort into making the site look real and fun, gives the impression that they care about you having fun – an impression that I suspect customers or potential customers might maintain when considering Expedia for their real travel activities. The other aspect of this prank that I like is that it relates to Expedia’s core business activities so it is more memorable, and once you’re viewing the Mars travel page, you can still access the rest of the Expedia website, meaning all that buzz and linking going on around the webosphere is likely to convert to real website clicks and travel bookings – win win.

Honourable mention goes to Flickr’s smellr (above) for making me laugh with the name of Facebook founder’s ‘cologne.’ Those are my favourites – share your own!

And yet, increasingly people use the Internet as an avenue to express themselves and what’s important to them, and when someone, or many someones, tells you what’s important to them, as a person or a business, you normally want to listen. Enter Radian6 – self described as “a complete platform to listen, share, learn, and engage – both inside your company, and with your customers across the entire social web.” From what i’ve seen through their free product demo, this is no empty boast – Radian6 is the most comprehensive package of tools i’ve seen, for detecting, measuring, and responding to the voices of the many Netizens who are talking about your brand and the things that are important to it.

Continue reading below.

Tools for measuring Web activity have been around for a while. Alexa, Compete, Quantcast and a number of other sites provide limited statistics on who is visiting your site. Lexicon measures Facebook, Google Analytics summarizes search trends, and Summize was acquired by Twitter for its tweet searching capabilities. Each of these tools provides some interesting tidbits about what people are interested in and talking about, but in and of themselves, they provide limited value, largely because the information only uncovers a small piece of the puzzle, and the tools provide few opportunities to “talk back” and directly engage with the people who are interested in you or your business.

The Radian6 platform is intriguing because it is a complete package of widgetized tools that can be customized to measure the myriad of voices taking place in the Web 2.0 space, in real-time, involving a specific keyword or topic of interest. The tools are provided in a slick, easy to user interface, that tell you who is saying what, whether they’re communicating via a news site, discussion forum, blog, or a microblog like Twitter, and how influential the speaker is by web traffic and readership. This information is collected in a highly customizable format, and can be interpreted in meaningful ways on both a micro level, where the individual has a name, a face, and a voice, or a macro level, that communicates what people are saying en masse. On a micro level, the speaker may be someone who is saying good things about the brand and could be a potential brand evangelist or sponsorship opportunity, or perhaps someone who had a bad customer experience and who is spreading a tale of misfortune, one that could be resolved through direct contact with the customer, before it snowballs. These “ear to the ground” sensors provide a new solution to the age-old problem of metrics on the Web, and further, the Radian6 tools allow you to directly respond to the source of the message without leaving the site – a centralized portal indeed. You can identify the people who are talking about, and have the most impact on your brand, using a weighted “priority” meter that is based in content volume, readership and influence, and a number of other factors, so you decide who you want to listen and respond to.

I was impressed by the platform and am confident this 2006 startup will continue to grow in sophistication and attention… i’m clearly not the only person who thinks so. Here are but a few of many expressions of amazement that people have Tweeted:

antofc Radian6 software is absolutely earth-shattering.

gsherman saw a demo today of @radian6‘s social media monitoring product. Very slick looking. And it has a boatload of features. Cool stuff.

BrettGreene@AmberCadabra I’m blown away – Radian6 drills down to everything you need to mange a brand easily and thoroughly

lbrynleyjonesHad a great play with Radian6 – the social media monitoring tool. Watch your brand realtime, gauge sentiment and respond. Very neat.

In the world of technology, 10 years is a significant span of time, and generally the ‘end-game’ ideas conceived now will interact with people and other pieces of technology in unknown future processes. This is because technology in its application must be seen as an evolving landscape of interconnected technologies, many of which don’t yet exist. It’s a spider web yet to be woven…

Perhaps this is why we traditionally go through what Gartner refers to as a technology hype cycle – we don’t yet understand know how to get from point A to B, but we’re excited about the idea of B. As a result, people’s expectations are inflated with dreams of a future technology, only to be disillusioned as the limitations become apparent. As time and scientific progress marches on, the actual technological application settles somewhere between the inflated and disillusioned expectations, but by then the world is a far different place then when the technology was thought up.

Now that said, Microsoft clearly has a good idea of how certain technologies are converging, and the applications  they would like to ultimately develop. People were impressed with the possibilities represented by Microsoft Surface, and this is clearly an extension of a specific thought process: how can we exchange and manipulate information in ways that are valuable and increase efficiency.

If you’re interested in ideas on how Government 2.0 might change in the future, head on over to a post Will, Ben and myself over the summer: 2018, A Vision of the Future

There’s a lot of cool technologies shown in the video. Which one excites you the most? A few years ago I remember doing some research on e-ink and thinking that it was only a matter of time before your morning newspaper was beamed to your digital reader (Kindle ‘version 4′) every morning. Or that it’d be great to have RFID enabled shopping carts that give directions to your groceries. Clearly these are just the tip of the iceberg.

SOBCon stands for Successful and Outstanding Bloggers, so it seems fitting that any promotions for the event take advantage of Web 2.0 opportunities. By targetting the core audience of this event, bloggers, and providing a tangible reward for their participation, I am confident that this type of promotion will be a highly cost effective way of advertising for their event. This is especially true when you consider that the prize is a discounted ticket rather than a monetary reward, and therefore the actual cost of the promotion is likely to be negligible in the face of some good publicity. You might also consider what type of blogger might be interested in this reward and my thought is that respondents who self-select are more likely to be well-connected virtually, and hence the audience for their ‘discount-per-blog’ promotion will likely also be larger and = bigger impact.

Here’s the description provided by the founder of SOBCon:

“Blog your thoughts, share it, link it back to this post, and broadcast it on Twitter (hash #blogitearnit).  We’ll also link to you on the SOBCon blog for others to see and learn. And as a thank you for sharing your story, we’ll send you a special code to take $200 off the $795 FULL conference rate - that’s over a 25% savings!

…

We also know that getting to conferences isn’t always easy, especially this year.

So we are announcing today the opportunity for you to significantly reduce your registration cost for the event.

It’s called the “Blog It, Earn It” discount. We’d like to hear from you about what “The ROI of Relationships” means to you. Tell us why relationships matter. How they affect what you do every day and how you do it. Maybe how you see them changing the face of tomorrow’s businesses. We want to know how relationships and personal connections shape your world.

Blog your thoughts, share it, link it back to this post, and broadcast it on Twitter (hash #blogitearnit).  We’ll also link to you on the SOBCon blog for others to see and learn. And as a thank you for sharing your story, we’ll send you a special code to take $200 off the $795 FULL conference rate - that’s over a 25% savings!

Please act quickly because there are only a limited number of these discounted registrations available. All blog entries must be posted no later than March 7, and the discounts must be redeemed by March 14.”

–

What I like about this promotion, beyond it’s impact, is that it’s transparent in the exchange taking place – in fact it’s almost hard to ignore the quid-pro-quo nature of the activity given its name. I suspect that to many people, this information might make the difference between an unethical viral marketing campaign, and one with the public on its side. Thoughts?

My question for you: if you could have an alternate prize that’s more meaningful to you than the one offered, and which is within the range of reason, what would it be? Money? Items? Reputational rewards?

The Telegraph is reporting that Facebook has announced a strategy to monetize the site that has thus far defied monetizing. Generally the standard web start-up business model is, build something unique that people like, and then once it’s got a large enough fan base and web traffic, sell advertisements or subscriptions. After all, somebody’s got to pay for it. The problem Facebook encountered is… it turns out people don’t really like to click on tacky ads when they can rather use the site for its intended purpose and talk to their friends.

There was Facebook’s Beacon of course. But that didn’t last long, with everyone from Facebook users to privacy groups crying foul. This made Facebook rethink it’s ad strategy and the new kid on the block is called Engagements Ads, and is a Facebook initiative to bring targeted polling to Facebooks’ 150 million members. Marketing companies the world over have been salivating and thinking about all that personal, relevant, and valuable information about you that can be used to learn about how best to connect with you and your dollars. Well, rather than just give it to them, which would probably face Beacon-like ethics issues, Facebook has come up with a clever strategy that will allow companies to ask you questions through the use of polls for market research purposes. Should you be within the specific demographic that concerns the poll, as indicated by the information you enter into the system (otherwise known as your profile) … say, male, 25, and you just happen to like movies and electronics … then maybe you’ll be of interest in a Best Buy poll. The poll will automatically show up in your feed and you can choose to engage it or ignore it, your call. It’s a smart move, given how much intimate information exists on Facebook, and which can accurately serve as a screening process to serve polls to more willing candidates. If Facebook is successful in leveraging their members as a mass focus group, then marketers will be eager to exchange that information for dollars.

Where Beacon largely failed by forcing members to be part of an activity they didn’t want to be, and which invaded their privacy, Engagement Ads will be opt-in, presumably with some kind of incentive to participate.  And it’s the incentives themselves that will make or break this new Facebook initiative. There’s several conceivable scenarios. Enough bored Facebook addicts may be interested enough in a certain brand, that should it come knocking, them would be interested enough to spend a few minutes filling out a form. But then, what if (enough) people aren’t that bored. Those polls better be fun, really fun. Maybe even disguised as a game, or a fan club, through smart integration of Facebook applications and tapping into expressed brand-fan goodwill. And last but not least, is the incentive of micropayments in exchange for a few minutes of your time.

Perhaps a combination of the above would work, but one thing is for sure, members will need something in exchange for giving up their time, the question is what. Not just that, but Facebook has clearly found that it is a real challenge to get its members to care about the artificial interruptions in their friend-scape (e.g. advertisements). I think the marketing application is smart but ’m not entirely sure that forcing annoying polls to show up on your screen, in addition to annoying ads, will work. Time will tell.

What are your thoughts? Have you ever clicked a Facebook ad? Here’s a poll. Would you answer a poll?

In this post I would like to share my experiences as a long-standing member of a niche video game community, Uniball, that has been independently run for over 10 years, throughout which there has been an incredible display of leadership, community resilience, social dynamics, and growth in function and prosperity.

Uniball 101
In order to understand the community you need to understand the game, because it is the focus point of all activity and of primary interest to members. Uniball is a simple, 2D game that is played with ships that move around a map, passing, juking, and bouncing a ball with the objective of scoring it into the opposing team’s net. There are typically two teams a side and for almost any major sport conceivable, parallels can be made to this game’s strategy, which is so rich that players will play for years without mastering the game.

The simple in-game controls, physics, and graphics belie a sophisticated and addictive game that has captured the hearts and … fingers of many, so much so that few people ever actually retire from the game. Many community members have played for 5+ years and know each other by name, skill, and reputation in this community population of about 300 active players, and total size of 1000.  Players are represented from all over the world, with major communities and servers in North America and Europe and yet the community is intensely close, and everyone knows who you are. So dedicated to the game are some, that statistics wise, the most active player plays an average of 20 twenty-four days a year (or about 10% of all waking time). There is also an interesting demographics story, which is that because dedicated players rarely quit, the average age of players has changed over time, from teens to early 20s. Few games have the longevity of Uniball, so it is an interesting study in how the community dynamic changes (e.g. general maturity, growth in skills/knowledge) as the people within it age and learn from the real world.

Community Organization
Although the game itself is the attraction, it is complemented by a variety of tools that allow the community to communicate and organize. First among these is a chat program that allows people to create and manage teams (“squads”), as well as discuss things publicly or in private rooms. This central chat tool is the backbone of the community as it allows users to converge and dialogue in a shared meeting space, while not playing, or during times of technical difficulty. Users’ squads compete against each other in sophisticated league competitions with professionally designed, interactive websites, where squads compete intensely for the ‘fame and glory’ of winning (community recognition). These leagues and other discussions are supported by a non-real time communication channel, Internet forums, which are useful for community announcements, and for tying together geographical communities less unified by time.

Community Governance
What is perhaps, most impressive of all, is the degree to which this community has been self sustaining, and independently run for over 10 years. Uniball was originally programmed by an individual who, before disengaging from the game, passed decision making control to a group of administrators. Over time this central government (“Administration” or “Admins”) had the authority to guide the community through turbulence related to user troublemaking, cheating, server outtages, and game development. Although the Admins staff and maintain their elite organization, they are still publicly accountable, and it is critical that users trust their decision making, lest they rebel and cause trouble. Thus, administrative actions are closely monitored by members of the community, as well as by other Admins, who are generally transparent in their dealings.

Community Development
Although the Administration is important from the perspective of authority, and mediating issues, much of the driving force behind the game is its users, who will go to great lengths to develop community or squad initiatives. Examples of these include programming interactive league websites or spin-offs of the game, developing playing manuals, as well as creating new maps, patches, and graphics. These user driven enhancements ensure that Uniball is continually refined.

Community Engagement
And although the administration and user contributions are important, what really drives the game, is competition. The aforementioned squads will compete for brand recognition (some squads are dynasties lasting 2, 3 and 5+ years) by recruiting and training players. These squads require leadership and top squads can have a strict recruitment process to recruit talent, involving sponsoring a new recruit, a voting process using private squad forums, a probationary period, as well as squad practice involving group and 1-on-1 coaching. A number of squads even use voice chat to communicate, for bonding, and for training, and over time many players develop deep ties with each other.

Uniball is a good game but what makes it great is the community element. Although people enjoy video games, it’s important to remember that people play in order to be entertained, and online entertainment is largely a social device. Communities exist in the real world, and online with people from the real world – I hope that this discussion has provided a small peak into that online world.

What about you? Have you considered yourself a member of an online community, video game or otherwise? Which community and what are some of the characteristics that you think speak to the community?

Visitors to the website are provided with a simple and user friendly interface (helpful given that Tim Hortons customers range broadly in demographic and technical familiarity) that allows you to browse through, and vote on, other people’s pictures and stories, and which can be tagged and sorted by category. Anyone who wants to can participate, and in this case, the maximum size of the “available content pool” is large, because it turns out that … a lot of people drink coffee, and many people do interesting things while drinking coffee! Additionally, it’s likely that anyone creating an (indirect) messaged tied to Tim Hortons, is likely to share a positive message about the company (e.g. positive message about  due to the nature of the website, meaning that

There’s your website content. Think of website content like a product, with key variables being cost, availability, production, re-supply logistics, etc. Websites with poor content and a poor business model for developing and sourcing affordable new content, do not succeed, just like bad products.

It can be difficult to influence online behaviour without the right incentives, and one of the most powerful drivers of an individual’s action is that a person is interested in the content, and wants to get involved. Providing social (e.g. reputation) and financial capital are two ways to drive behaviour. Another way to view online behaviour is a a medium where we live out our regular every-day interests, and therefore best satisfying those intrinsic human interests will also drive online behaviour to a website (ignoring for a minute that you can have great content, the right incentive, but poor marketing, resulting in a flop).

Coffee drinking is something that people identify with as a part of their lifestyle (it’s ‘who’ they are), and in addition, many Canadians think of Tim Hortons as the Canadian Aunt Jemima of the coffee world; that is, the Timmies brand is distinctly Canadian, and it feels like your second home – if you didn’t know better you’d think ‘Mom’ made it just for you. She did, right? A byproduct of these strong associated feelings is that people feel a deeper relationship to the campaign’s content, and as a result, are more inclined to investigate the website. Consider also that people have the opportunity to talk about something important to them (their story), and that it’s easy to participate (all you need is a picture and a 1+ paragraph story) and this further facilitates participation, and an active website or community, in turn, fuels more participation.

It’s clear that this type of product AND its specific brand characteristics are well suited for social media. We’ve previously talked about MyStarbucks Idea and Dell’s IdeaStorm as good examples of producer-consumer (‘prosumer’) platforms for innovation; it seems likely that the Tim Hortons style campaign, along with Doritos’ Superbowl Ads and simple Facebook/MySpace-esque fan/group pages, is among the initial wave of online prosumer advertising, where the brand message is in large part shaped by a highly vocal online populace.

What’s interesting is that these social media technologies have typically been levied against a young demographic, but in Tim Hortons’ case, the participants appear largely to be parents who want to share a picture and story about their children. This is perhaps, a reminder that the Web 2.0 rules of engagement do not simply apply to young people – the Internet is increasingly accessed by every segment of the population across every interest; the challenge is, how do you best interact with those people along those lines?

I’d like your thoughts on whether you think this is an effective marketing campaign. What’s the verdict?

As humans, it’s difficult to separate what we see from what we think – it’s in our nature to use every incoming stimulus to interpret our environment, and then use that information in assessing and responding to a situation. Case in point: shopping has long been an exercise in ‘try before you buy’. You pick something up, turn it over on its side, hold it up for observation, and perhaps shake it like a Christmas present. The item’s weight, appearance, texture, and other variables affect the way in which we shape our judgement of that object. How then do you reproduce the real world shopping experience… online?

When the Internet first hit center stage, there was some doubt about its application for shopping – after all, how can you replace the experience of exploring down side streets, window shopping, and of course, flipping through, touching, and trying on clothing. Those concerns have thus far proven largely unfounded; the Internet has become a major battleground for sales, the virtual facing storefront that appeals to traditionalists as well as an entirely different demographic. According to Nielsen, approximately 85% of global Internet users have used the Internet to make a purchase, up 40% from two years ago. The most common Internet purchases are books, apparel, videos/DVDs/Games, airline tickets and electronics. With the exception of apparel (which one might expect to be a brick and mortar purchase only) I would argue that sales in each category are actually supplemented by access to information online, where you can conduct product related research, and where Web 2.0 communities provide strong feedback mechanisms through ratings, reviews, visual demos, and cost comparison shopping.

Enter Amazon Windowshop. In September, Amazon launched the BETA version of this virtual store, which is an initial bridge between physical-world product browsing and online shopping. The store is a fluid, interactive, and user friendly interface that lets you better interact with the items you’re interested in, creating a more sophisticated online shopping experience. Amazon uses Windowshop as a showcase for books, music, movies, TV shows, video games, and by categorizing products by new, bestselling, and editor’s picks items, the company has a good opportunity to put select, enticing, items in front of your face, similar to the supermarket corner aisle. What I like most about this interface is that it is entertaining – customers can approach this tool much in the same way they would a YouTube or a StumbleUpon – it’s a multimedia platform which enables serendipitous exploration and consumption of media … which you can buy. By providing an alternative outlet for people who want to browse and be entertained by the Internet, rather than simply shop, Amazon may be able to attract people to Windowshop simply to browse, which may in turn convert to a purchase – pulling people in rather than pushing content at them.

Where will Amazon and online shopping go from here?
The next step for Amazon Windowshop is to tie-in those aforementioned Web 2.0 community mechanisms that are already integrated into the main site. Internet users prefer to use other users’ experiences as a feedback mechanism that shapes their experience (Do I watch this? No, because 9/10 of previous viewers say it’s not worth it, just like an actual friend might tell me not to). Amazon must find a way to make Windowshop a place that people enjoy going to, to preview the latest hot media (music, movies, etc.), and which is built into their regular web-wanderings.  If the company is unable to integrate Windowshop into Internet users’ regular web-activities then they will not have any exposure, and therefore limited sales. A parallel is iTunes which uses an application platform, rather than Amazon’s web-based one, and which leverages users’ primary interest in music, to get people using the software, and once doing so, provide opportunities to entertain and purchase media from the e-store.

A website called Enjoy3D, despite being tacky, provides an initial look at 3D based shopping experiences. Going a step beyond Windowshop, Enjoy3D allows you to use your keyboard to navigate a three dimensional virtual space with ‘shelves’ full of from books, toys, T-shirts and more. By ‘walking around’ you are exposed to visual stimuli that may lead to further interest – upon clicking on an object, you are shown Amazon’s online store, including the Web 2.0 feedback tools mentioned above, and Amazon’s shopping cart.  Although the experience can never truly replace the physical-one, it doesn’t have to; the goal is not to replace physical-world shopping, it is to best enhance the Internet-based shopping experience, which has a different value proposition. Looking forward, I expect that we will see the integration of the interface shown by both websites, bringing a slick aesthetic, community orientation, and deep visual stimuli.

I have previously talked about SearchMe, the visual search engine that changes the search experience. Increasingly companies are understanding that the real world philosophy of “it’s not just what you sell but how you sell it” also applies to how companies engage with customers online. As Internet based programming, and computer hardware, becomes more sophisticated, a continuous stream of tools will become available to supplement this experience – imagine putting on your 3D web-connected goggles, walking around using brainwave signal-detection, and flipping through racks of clothes with the flip of a finger on a computer touchscreen. A whole virtual world of possibility.

My question for you then is, what would your ultimate virtual shopping experience look like?
What was the last thing you bought online and why?

Mine was a 28 inch monitor, bought last week (it’s awesome!). I did some research, found the best price at newegg.ca, checked to make sure other users and electronics reviewers have had good experiences, and had it shipped to my door 4 days later. Easy on the mind, easy on the legs, and easy on the wallet.

While i’m out with my Oompa-Loompa posse, you could be working on the next presidential speech, entering into a world of fame and fortune, or changing the world!  Well… not really, but you can pretend.

It’s no secret by now, that the Internet has changed the way we interact with the world around us – without leaving our homes, we can shop and talk to people around the world, educate and entertain ourselves, and do many other things. From my perspective, one of the most powerful aspects of the Internet is that it allows us to interact with the world, and express ourselves, in completely new ways. In the past, the average person was only a media consumer, but increasingly the Internet platform provides opportunities to become a part of the media itself; this provides participants with a more interactive and engaging experience.

A number of years ago, when the Internet was still in its mainstream infancy, I remember being linked by a friend to a news clipping involving me. It looked something like this and at first glance was pretty realistic, although relatively transparent after further investigation. However, the fact that it was obviously fake did not detract from the fun, and these easy to create, fake-clippings, made numerous rounds around the Web. This was the first time in my memory when a static Internet was starting to transform into a dynamic, customizable, and entirely different creature.

Since then, a lot has happened in the relam of customizable media. Hallmark e-cards came into existence, where people could send personalized messages and media to friends and family. Websites now allow you to customize user interfaces to optimize your browsing experience, as well as choose how you receive or distribute content. Virtual worlds like Habbo Hotel, Second Life, and World of Warcraft popped up right, left, and center, where you could now create digital avatars of yourself or some fantastical creation. These are just a few examples of a Web that has been transforming to incorporate demand for tailored media consumption, and these examples paint a simple picture for the future of consumer engagement…

The fake news clippings were the first example of this customization, but they involved simple text media. As you can see from my Oompa Loompa picture, created using faceinhole.com (and which, according to Alexa, is growing impressively), the same can now be done for pictures. And as JibJab demonstrates impressively, the same can be done for video as well, right down to the animation of the face. The technology is still developing, but it is not unrealistic to believe that one day, media will be module-like and allow hot-swapping of components, from the protagonist’s appearance to the environmental settings themselves, with a highly detailed level of realism.

Plastic surgery has come to media…and advertising and entertainment is about to become more interesting by far. Doritos ran a contest for the 2008 Superbowl where participants submitted their own Doritos commercials and the top submission would run during the Superbowl – it was a huge success, with top favourites being viewed millions of times on YouTube, generating huge publicity for the company. By now, this example is no longer ‘news,’ but for example’s sake, now imagine that the competition allowed you to go to the website and “live” the advertisement by being in the commercial itself. Take another step, and what if the commercial was no longer just about you? What if you could upload your image, send the link to a friend who did the same, and so forth, until the hypothetical commercial about your friends actually had the realistic faces of all your friends! Movies, television, commercials … just use your imagination.

Companies can engage their customers by providing welcome opportunities for entertainment and involvement rather than simply pushing a message – a participant will absorb the message when interested. This idea is not entirely ‘new’ but the tools are, and I look forward to seeing what the future holds.

Thoughts about other applications? Concerns about the implications? Let me know what you think!

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup: Week in Review, where I capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout the past week.

This week in the roundup:

• Jeff DeChambeau discussed privacy and digital surveillance
• Dan Herman introduced us to ‘vote swapping’ and identified how this Web 2.0 technology now has the potential to influence elections
• Don Tapscott highlighted some new research findings in order address a common misconception about video games and gamers
• Denis Hancock reviewed some of the pitfalls of the traditional crowdsourcing model and introduced us to Poptent

This is Gloucester, a UK based blog, is reporting that the Government Communications Headquarters is pitching a plan that would allow it to monitor all SMS and email messages sent and recieved in the UK. The plan, slated to cost English taxpayers a potential $12bn, would be the country’s largest surveillance program, and adds another data point to the security vs. privacy debate.

As Michael Geist wrote last week, the Internet has become a system that never forgets anything, and there are more and more tools that allow people to mine information from the darkest corners of the Internet.
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So, are email and sms messages, like public discussions, simply part of a technology that is inherently tracable, or given the targeted nature of email and sms, are they granted a special class of privacy from the rest of the bits that float bout the ‘tubes?

Weigh in on the privacy debate @
Hey England, time to learn about PGP!

A few months ago University of Ottawa professor Michael Geist wrote that 27 MP’s across Canada (9% of all MPs) had won their ridings by less than 1000 votes.  The potential impact of vote swap is thus rather significant.

The second example is www.voteforenvironment.ca . Like the former example, it takes aim at the Conservative government, this time for their environmental record. Their strategy is similar to Vote Swap as it highlights closely contested swing ridings and recommends to would-be voters which of the opposition parties in those ridings would be best positioned to win the riding in the Oct. 14 election.

What do you think of vote swapping and the technology behind it? Share your thoughts @
More on voting and technology…

In my new book, Grown up Digital (a sequel to my 1997 intro to the Net Generation: Growing up Digital) I make the argument that this exposure to gaming and technology has helped enable a truly global and inter-connected generation that sees civic action as a part of their regular routine.

Amanda Lenhart, author of a report on the survey and a Senior Research Specialist with the Pew Internet & American Life Project, notes, “The stereotype that gaming is a solitary, violent, anti-social activity just doesn’t hold up. The average teen plays all different kinds of games and generally plays them with friends and family both online and offline.”

The survey certainly supports this view:

• 52% of gamers report playing games where they think about moral and ethical issues.
• 43% report playing games where they help make decisions about how a community, city or nation should be run.

Are you a videogame player, gamer alumni, or know someone who plays games?
Discuss their impact @ Kids, videogames and social activity

What I particularly like about this “modified crowdsourcing” model is that it deals with some of the inequities inherent in more traditional platforms – too much power being given to the buyers, at the expense of the sellers.
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Poptent has at least three elements that help deal with this. they are targeting the creation of a community of top-notch videographers with great skills, not the public at large. In order to participate on the site companies need to pony up $25 K in cash – which should be enough to limit “speculative requests”. Advertisers than pay something in the $5K – $7.5 K range to purchase ads they like. They are also upfront in noting (see Mark Schoneveld’s comment on October 8th at 11:19) that the contest model is not sustainable – they’ll have to evolve it over time, but you have to walk before you run.

Discuss your views, for and against, the Poptent model @
Poptent: A new community for crowdsourced advertising

Check back next week for more original Wikinomics insight. Until next week…

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup: Week in Review, where I capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout the past week.

This week in the roundup:

• Jeff DeChambeau revealed the new beta of the Wikinomics blog
• Ian Da Silva uncovered the power of the social web for consumers
• Patrick Harnett introduced us to Wesabe and money management on the Web
• Andrea Bettello shined the light on a different type of TV experience

In case you missed it, you can catch the last roundup HERE.

On September 15, 2008…Jeff DeChambeau revealed the new beta of the Wikinomics blog:

A pet project of mine for the last little while has been to redesign the Wikinomics blog. Given the topic of the blog, though, it seems hardly fitting to launch it in a non-collaborative way. So, I’m doing a soft-launch and would like to collect feedback from the community about what works and what doesn’t.

To showcase and test the new look, I’ve set up http://wikinomics.com/beta/.

Tell us what you think about the new site @
Presenting the Wikinomics Redesign (beta)

As it turns out, it’s a site that in its own words “provides the world’s largest and most reliable source of information on the health, environmental, and social impacts of the products in your home.”  The site was started by Berkeley professor to help address the concern that most consumers know very little about the products that are brought in to their homes everyday.  Using a team of scientific, technological and academic experts, over 60,000 household products have been rated on three separate metrics: health, environmental, and social performance.

Discuss how your products match up on GoodGuide @
Looking for safe, healthy and green alternatives? Try GoodGuide.

The neat open source aspect of Wesabe is that it has a robust API which allows Wesabe enthusiasts the flexibility to develop whatever their cost-conscious minds can dream up. Wesabe has an articulate stance on how having better information about your spending habits is the first step toward reining them in. There are widgets for Vista, OS X, and even your iPhone.

Get ideas about how Wesabe could be used in interesting ways @
Wesabe: The Frugality of Crowds

Using NanoGaming, LiveHive is essentially creating a new environment for the television viewer. The shift from traditional one-way communication is underway as this Waterloo based firm promises to take viewers (and advertisers) to a place where the viewer can now actively engage with the program, ultimately creating a stronger connection. NanoGaming is more than just a fun way for the viewer to become involved, it also introduces opportunities to create a more effective advertising campaign than traditional television commercials offer. By sponsoring NanoGaming sites, firms can access audiences from some of the highest rated TV shows (such as the Super Bowl and the Academy Awards) and because TV and Internet are combined, consumers’ levels of attention, association and recall are increased.

What else does this mean for the future of TV? Find out @
LiveHive Systems: changing the way we watch TV

Check back next week for more original Wikinomics insight. Until next week…

We’re going to investigate the idea of search and information management with searchme.com, a great search engine that has quietly made its way onto the scene, but which has unique advantages to search.

What’s special about this search engine is that when you query a topic, the websites returned to you are displayed visually (similar to Apple’s cover flow) rather than in list form. A picture is worth 1000 words so they say, so it makes sense that with 1 quick look at the preview pane of a website, you can better filter your results, and roughly gauge the quality of the website (by it’s professionalism and aesthetic, available content, and general message). It’s clear that you receive less information about all items, relative to each other, in one glance than with traditional search engines like Google, however what you do see, you are given more information about – this represents the tradeoff between these two methods of search. The obvious benefit is the handling of media search, such as video and images, which you can view in pane, as opposed to Google’s one page of smaller pictures (which does not handle video search well). The second benefit is not quite as obvious and speaks in large part, to how we interact with the Internet at large…

In order to understand this other value proposition of searchme, we need to go on a tangent, and understand the most basic function of the Internet: it provides people with access to information. Internet users become satisfied with a website when it matches them with (good) information that they are interested in, and the variables that moderate satsifaction are, the breadth of accessible information and its quality.

When people use the Internet they either know where to find something (e.g. a specific address) or they don’t, and need to use tools to help reach that result (e.g. search engines, news aggregators, social media, etc.). These tools range in scope and function – some of them deliver information to you without asking for anything in particular (e.g. digg, stumbleupon, del.icio.us, popurls), while search engines require you to specifically choose a direction (content topic) to initiate your search. Although there is a clear distinction between these two approaches, I want to focus less on how these tools mechanically distribute content and more on how they help us achieve our end goal, which is the information-interest match. Central to this discussion is the idea that it doesn’t matter whether you originally intended to find TopicXYZ on the Internet, as long as the TopicXYZ that finds you is something that you value.

Returning to searchme, the second benefit is that you can ‘dive into’ a website and explore it in a small way without making the time investment of clicking on the link (regardless of how small). This means that you’re getting more exposure to the various websites on the Internet, and their respective content, and as a result, you are more likely to find websites that you otherwise wouldn’t have discovered because you imperfectly filtered them before making contact. There is a lost world of websites to be discovered this way.

What are your thoughts about searchme and it’s applications? What do you like or not like about it?

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup: Week in Review, where I capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout the past week.

In case you missed it, you can catch last week’s roundup HERE.  Friendly reminder: the Wikinomics Roundup has a home on the left side of the page, under Regular Features.

I’m doing some research with Accenture about benefits and challenges of hiring serious gamers (most of our research is based on games like World of Warcraft). There are plenty of upsides to hiring these people such as the ability to lead groups in remote locations, quickly analyze and react to data, create custom interfaces, divide up resources (and share spoils of war) etc. In fact, some people consider the leadership ability required of a successful WoW guild to be similar to that of a CEO of a small company.

What are your thoughts on video games? More @
Should the fact that the candidate knows what an owlbear is be a plus?

I agree with the start of this to a point – while I believe there is certainly a role for “conversations” in journalism, what I’m most interested in from great journalists tends to be their monologue. In short, depending on the topic area, I want great insights, great entertainment, or both. But what I wanted to focus on here was the paper A versus paper B idea – and how the blogosphere is been blamed for a few things it might not be responsible for.

Check out the rest of this great insight @
Surprise: Another journalist hates the blogosphere:

Using the camera and screen, with labels injected, the Android powered mobile device becomes something of a magical lense that can be used to provide us with digital information about the world, overlayed on the world itself, as intermediated by the device. So far the Enkin guys have set this up to work with locations that have been tagged in their map view, but imagine the possibilities if it could integrate with all of the Geodata that’s tagged in Google Earth. You could also integrate this with social mobility services, and set your name to public, then strangers on the street could take a look at you through their phone and see your name floating above your head like in a videogame. Businesses could also geotag deals that they are running, and you’d set your Enkin-enabled device in “deal hunter live mode” where you’d see overlays on businesses including distance and deal. The list goes on and the possibilities are great.

See the video and get the full story @
What a phone is a bridge between worlds

For me, I suppose the question with such full employee “perks” has always been: is it really a “perk”, when I don’t have to leave the office to enjoy some of the luxuries, and even the ennui, of everyday life? While it would be neat to have my dry cleaning left, and picked up, at the office, I’ve got a great place just down the street from my house, where the banter alone is sometimes worth the extra time/money spent.

What kinds of perks really motivate you? Share @
Perk up! It’s only dinner…

Check back next week for more original Wikinomics insight.  Until next week…

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup!  This time around, we’re going to do a two week roundup, where I capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout that period.  There’s some great material so take a look!

In case you missed it, you can catch last week’s roundup HERE.  Friendly reminder: the Wikinomics Roundup has a nice new home on the left side of the page, under Regular Features.

Word of mouth is considered one of the most powerful forms of advertising, so it makes sense that someone would attempt to package and re-sell it.  P&G’s duo of Tremors (for teens), Vocalpoint (for moms), as well as BzzAgent, have been successful in targetting Influencers by putting product samples in their hands, enhancing their user experience, and letting the user talk about the product. I see websites like SocialSpark as being the evolution, or at least the heir, to word-of-mouth marketing: where there are clear financial incentives for bloggers to participate, and advertisers have a direct channel to ‘buy’ authentic sounding opinions that support the product, and which specifically target the desired audience.

Learn more about this evolving advertiser-blogger marketplace @
The netGuide

Last week I spoke with Andrew Mottaz and Blake Johnson, the founders of Portland-based Site9, about their new software as a service offering: ProtoShare. ProtoShare allows web developers to collaboratively create interactive website prototypes, ensuring that everyone is on the same page during the development process. But more importantly, ProtoShare opens the process up to other stakeholder, such as the marketing team, allowing them to follow the project’s progress over time, and provide timely and effective feedback to developers. By improving communication and collaboration within the project team, and between them and their clients, ProtoShare has the potential to revolutionize the process of web design.

Get the inside scoop on this new SaaS offering @
Collaborative Web Design: An Interview with the Creators of ProtoShare

C) Recruiting and retention: Our research shows that the public sector is far from the top-choice of most university graduates. We surveyed over 10,000 youths in 12 countries and outside of Continental Europe, the public sector was dead last when respondants were asked to rank their employer of choice. A large part of the government 2.0 transformation is thus focused on reinventing the public sector workplace so that it does attract the best and brightest, and that when they arrive they have the tools, technologies and organizational cultures to make the impact they desire to. That ability to make an impact is key to Government 2.0. It’s about creating participative cultures that flatten organizational hierarchies and keep talent plugged in and motivated. Some of our partners are looking at replacing upwards of half of their entire workforces over the next 8-10 years. Unless they’re looking for investment bankers that won’t be easy to do. One of the key metrics for Gov 2.0 will be the ability to attract 1a candidates and more importantly the improvement, if any, of retention rates amongst those star employees.

Read the equally insightful parts A and B of the post @
Measuring Gov 2.0

• 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.
• 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 – 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.

Take a look at the more in-depth rationale @
Could Web 2.0 tools be the saving grace for organizations during a recession?

Before he left work for the day, Donald logged on to the central government’s voter platform and reviewed a list of “upcoming votes and issues that may concern you.” One of the big issues of the day was a bill to ban designer genes. It had actually been drafted by the janitor in Donald’s office. Donald gave his votes by proxy to the New World Party. But the party had not made a decision on this bill. Donald voted against the ban, as the voting system had predicted based on his past voting history. This system of tracking voting behavior had previously suggested Donald transfer his proxy vote from the popular Conservative party to the niche New World party, which he had found was much more in line with his views. Donald donated his monthly allowance for political financing to the party so that it could grow, and garner more influence.

Share your vision of 10 years from now @
2018 – A Vision of the Future

On August 14, 2008…Jeff DeChambeau looks into an exciting new technology frontier:

Here is how I see this playing out: Photosynth is able to infer 3d structures from photographs and (should soon be able to) skin these structures dynamically from the very same photographs. If there was a large enough set photos, Photosynth could infer the shapes, sizes and positions of objects all over the world. Then, with Virtual earth, geotagging data, and the relations between photos, these 3d structures could be mapped into their Virtual Earth platform. Essentially, it should be possible to make a virtual copy of the earth, passively, by processing photos that already exist.

See this extraordinary technology in action @
Remember PhotoSynth? Well, it’s old hat now.

On August 15, 2008…Brittany Creamer introduces cutting edge technology – now affordable:

Shapeways, a new internet-based 3-D printing service, offers rapid prototyping at an affordable price. Send in your digital design file and Shapeways will ship your polymer prototype in less than ten days and won’t charge you an arm and a leg. According to Shapeways, most orders cost between $50 and $150. Shapeway’s proprietary software ensures the design can be built and tweaks small errors in the design before production. Amazingly, Shapeway’s advanced printers can build objects with moveable parts and the clincher is that the price isn’t determined by complexity, but rather by the amount of polymer required.

How can this change the invention and prosumption process? Find out @
Attention Prosumers: 3D Printing Now Affordable

Check back next week for more original Wikinomics insight.  Until next week…

In today’s web wanderings we’re going deep into birdy territory with a.viary.com – a comprehensive suite of free online software that promises to be the next generation of media editing. Invites inside.

Website: a.viary.com
Category: Media Editing and Collaboration
Web Traffic: Launched in Oct. 2007, and growing quickly. Currently ranked 41,500 according to Alexa.

As my colleague Alan first talked about HERE, Aviary is a suite of online media editing tools that can be used to edit images, audio and video, as well as accomplish a host of other functions, like font creation and desktop publishing, all accessed through the web browser.  There’s a few things that really distinguish Aviary from its competitors: the scope of the product offering is incredible – the numerous editing tools combine offerings from Photoshop, Illustrator, and a host of other software products that people pay hundreds, even thousands of dollars for. It’s free now but it will be interesting to see how it monitizes the website through ads, corporate licensing fees, etc.  The tools are only accessible online, so for most people with stable internet connections, this means you don’t have to install software that eats up your hard drive and which locks you to only one machine. Additionally, the tools are applied on a collaborative platform that allows people to form relationships and work together in the editing process, which may change the way we develop creative content.

The Aviary suite of media tools promises to reinvent the way people access and edit media, using the Internet, and threatens many well entrenched companies. Although I have only tinkered with the tools, the experience is intuitive and user friendly, while still retaining a large degree of the depth required for sophisticated editing. Currently a.viary is invitation only as it develops, but despite this, or perhaps because of this, web-traffic to the site has skyrocketed as people spread the word about something cool and innovative (‘talk-worthy’) to real world friends, e-friends, and community co-members.

I just received my invite (from weeks ago), which prompted this post, and I have 3 more that I will give out to the first 3 comments requesting one.  I ask that in the sake of community spirit, if you receive an invite, please check back with this post to see if there are others after you who want one too!

Question Period:

This is an example of the first wave of web-based software that is replacing PC-based software. Increasingly we are seeing innovative web-solutions that are built on the Web 2.0 model. What do you think about this?

• What is the argument for, and against, web based software being a convenient solution?
• What are your thoughts on potential Intellectual Property issues related to Aviary’s media storing, peer-collaboration, etc.
• How do you think competing companies like Adobe will respond?

As part of my effort to help you find meaning(ful applications) in your e-life, i’m hoping to start a regular column called The netGuide. In these blog posts I will briefly talk about some of my website findings from across the web and how they help solve old problems in new and creative ways.  The caveat is that although they may be new to me, they may not be to you – but hopefully this is the exception rather than the rule.

Website: SocialSpark
Category: Advertising and Blogging
Web Traffic: From nothing in the fall of 2007 to ranked 5,344 globally according to Alexa.

Why Care: SocialSpark is a website that facilitates the efficient exchange of pay-per-blog advertising. One of the distinguishing features of the website is its ad marketplace, where advertisers outline the word of mouth message they want produced, medium (text or video), and the price they are willing to pay for it (e.g. $9 to say XYZ).

Bloggers review these opportunities and self-select the topics that they want to write about on their personal blog.  Once a listing has been selected, the blogger submits their blog post and website name to SocialSpark, which allows advertisers to review the message, the website (i.e. its nature and web traffic), and the audience demographics for approval.  This provides the advertiser with final control over the message and the audience that it is being distributed to, while also employing a powerful mass-micro broadcast.

Word of mouth is considered one of the most powerful forms of advertising, so it makes sense that someone would attempt to package and re-sell it.  P&G’s duo of Tremors (for teens), Vocalpoint (for moms), as well as BzzAgent, have been successful in targetting Influencers by putting product samples in their hands, enhancing their user experience, and letting the user talk about the product. I see websites like SocialSpark as being the evolution, or at least the heir, to word-of-mouth marketing: where there are clear financial incentives for bloggers to participate, and advertisers have a direct channel to ‘buy’ authentic sounding opinions that support the product, and which specifically target the desired audience.

My questions for you:

• Does this have ethical ramifications?
• Will this impact the way people react to blogger based product opinions?
• Given that the Net Gen values integrity and is willing to scrutinize, could this backfire for advertisers??

Let me know what you think, and if you have a good website for a NetGuide post, please comment!

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup: Week in Review, where I capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout the past week.

In case you missed it, you can catch last week’s roundup HERE.  Friendly reminder: the Wikinomics Roundup has a nice new home on the left side of the page, under Regular Features.

“In the past few weeks I’ve been invited to several legal sessions with different law firms and in-house counsel discussing the potential of Web 2.0 technologies. Many of the concerns addressed are similar: IP, privacy, copyright, trade secrets etc. For the most part, many of these issues are easily addressed. Many organizations already have policies in place to address many of these issues such as simple terms of service, disclaimers and employee blogging, social computing guidelines.”

How are emerging Web 2.0 technologies viewed through the eyes of the legal guardians? Find out @
Is Law 2.0 possible?

“Whenever users are given the freedom to create what ever they want, it is clear that they will do just that. This is always a risk when initiating an open source project. Luckily an open source community is just that: a community. Community members monitor the content, and keep the environment enjoyable for all. This is why Wikipedia and YouTube have been so successful. Administrators are necessary to have the final say in what content stays and what goes, but it is largely a community affair.”

It’s not porn, it’s SPORN. Interesting and work safe discussion @
The Underbelly of Open Source: SPORN

“On the other hand, Wikipedia struggles with the issue of censorship and bias. You just can’t trust Wikipedia because its edited by a bunch of conservatives/liberals/people-I-don’t-agree-with. They aren’t telling the whole story. Of course that argument can be made with the mainstream media as well. But when a major network or newspaper is biased or commits censorship, people complain and/or go somewhere else for their news, they don’t solve the problem. In this case, Wikipedians thoughtfully discussed the issue, reached a compromise, voted democratically, and solved (or at least moved towards a solution for) the problem.”

What makes news trust-worthy?  Join the debate @
Wikipedia: More Reliable and Balanced than the News?

“If each person is their own brand … then your online identity is a large, integral part of that brand. But how do you manage all of the content, yours or otherwise, that becomes attached to your name?”

How do you manage the brand called you?  Take a look @
Brittany Creamer TM

“Seeing this led me to ponder a simple question – what about everyone else? What about that staggeringly large group of people that are neither mavens nor connectors (and particularly those one might call anti–social) – are their social media appetites distinctly different, and if so what are the implications for companies pursuing a social media strategy? More pointedly, will this great mass of people slowly get in line with the adoption curve that mavens and connectors are setting in social media, or might they do something totally different – something that would put some of the prevailing theories regarding cohort behavior into question? To begin looking into this issue, I wanted to start with a particular application where I sense line is being drawn in the sand – Twitter.”

Consider how people of different levels of connectedness fit into the life cycle of emerging technologies @
Social Media for the Anti-Social

Check back next week for more original Wikinomics insight.  Until next week…

The Letture blog provides a comprehensive discussion on open source, prosumption, innovation, and other Wikinomics principles.  Thorough and full of examples.

Oscar Berg over at the Content Economy blog, shares a few of his readings from across the blogosphere.  Included is Stewart Mader’s Wikinomics guest post on Wikis.

Sampad Swain defines the activities of Internet users by a ‘SOS-CAR’ model (Searching, Organizing, Scrutinizing, Collaborating, Authenticating, and Reading) and describes these thoughts as being partly inspired by Wikinomics.  Many familiar themes emerge.

Going back a few weeks we can read Canadian Business’ interview with Don Tapscott, co-author of Wikinomics and chairman of nGenera.  The interview discusses leadership, innovation, and how IT is changing the organization.

We’ll be back next week with more links to Wikinomics in the blogosphere!

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup: Week in Review! In this week’s roundup, I will capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout the past week.

In case you missed it, you can catch last week’s roundup HERE.  From now on the Wikinomics Roundup will have a  nice new home on the left side of the page, under Regular Features. Come visit!

“Governments are already lifting mandatory retirement ages but can do more to encourage employers to provide older workers with flexible options, such as phased retirement, part-time hours, telecommuting and other flexible arrangements, and mentoring opportunities.”

Are you young? Old? Unsure? Join the discussion @
Children of Men: The world in 2053?

“A few months ago my colleague Alan wrote a paper called ‘Social Networks as Operating Systems,’ in which he stated that:

‘Social networks and Web 2.0 technologies herald a new collaborative platform that will be very different from our experience of the Web today. Social networks are destined to become the new “operating systems” (OS) of the collaborative Internet. User identities, attributes, and relationships are all pivotal assets for the networked applications within this new platform. End users, social networks, application providers, and technology vendors will face a looming battle over the ownership and use of these assets and indeed, the question of whether they can be “owned” at all.’

Well, Mark Z. and the Facebook team must have had the same idea…”

Talk about Facebook’s plans for web domination @
Facebook plans for Web domination

“Peering: My colleague David Cameron wrote about My Starbucks Idea on the blog a few months ago. The idea is quite similar to Dell’s Ideastorm, most recently blogged about by Justin Papermaster here. The basic idea is that Starbucks customers submit ideas, and then discuss and vote on them. Starbucks then tries to implement the best ideas, and you can now follow their implementation progress on Twitter. This is a great idea that both generates great feedback and does a great job at engaging customers.”

Did they pass with flying colours or get a sheet full of red ink?  Find out @
Wikinomics Report Card: Starbucks

As I wrote back in January, the rise of the Net and its ability to engage citizens is equally applicable to globalist or nationalist schools of thought. While on one hand it has, and will continue, to break down the barriers of distance and standards that exist between nations and people, it holds an equal ability to reinforce those very walls by those who see what’s beyond them as threatening to the sovereignty and future of their nations.

Get the full story @
China’s net nation

Keep checking back each week, as Wikinomics bloggers keeps their eyes on the web, and their fingers on the keyboard. And as always…if something stood out and interested you, please comment!

Until next week…

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup: Week in Review! Over the next few minutes I will try and capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout the past week.

In case you missed it, you can catch last week’s roundup HERE.

On July 15, 2008… Denis Hancock discussed the value of blog comments:

“The value of comments is a function of topic area and scale.”

Be sure to read on (and comment!) @
Comments: Valuable contributions of ramblings of the inebriated homeless

On July 17, 2008… Brendan Peat sets the stage for a discussion on security:

“In the last 20 some odd years corporate security has made some headway. Companies are now at the point where they are reasonably efficient at keeping ‘hackers’ out and letting employees in. The problem is that to get to this point the enterprise has had to put up walls in the name of safety and security, but at the cost of functionality and logic.”

Read about how empowering and trusting employees fits into the equation @
How Web 2.0, Facebook, and the Net Generation will change corporate security

“[The University of Wisconsin is] using the wiki to help us with all the work it takes to get from concept to real product. We use the wiki for spreadsheets on market development, documents with examples of other airless tires, images of competing products, project progress reports, FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) sheets, and QFD (Quality Function Deployment) documents,” said Frank [Rath]. “All the different variations are stored on the wiki. If we didn’t have the wiki, we’d be emailing those files back and forth all the time.”

Read more about the use of the Wiki in the project development @
War of the Wikis: University of Wisconsin uses wiki collaboration to help troops in Iraq escape attack

“The release [of graphics and data for more than 84,000 3D city buildings] is meant to allow citizens, whether development experts or simply concerned city dwellers, a greater role in conversations and plans about the city’s future. Want to propose a new development? These 3D images should go a long way in allowing all parties a better, and simpler, platform upon which to build.”

See the pictures and the logic behind releasing this information @
3D Cities and Government 2.0

• Wiki scripts
• Feedback mechanisms
• Unified account information and metrics
• Rewards and compensation structures
• Smart call routing that analyzes reps’ actual skills and matches problems with solutions
• Customers helping customers
• Supplement call center activities with other Web 2.0 initiatives

Read this NOW if you run a call center.  Read this now if you’re a regular Joe. Discuss @
Wikinomics in call centers

Keep checking back each week, as Wikinomics bloggers keeps their eyes on the web, and their fingers on the keyboard.  And as always…if something stood out and interested you, please comment!

You may also have noticed that the format for the WR has changed from last week.  This is because i’m experimenting with formatting to try and find the optimum length : insight ratio, and would love to hear your thoughts.