Are you Google+ing yet?

Unless you have been living inside your computer rather than right next to it, you no doubt know that Google+, a social networking site by Google, has hit the social media market.

All I want to know is this very simple two-part question:

Have you used it yet and what do you think?

I want honest opinions from consumers, not journalists or social media writers, even like myself.  I want to know the word-of-mouth effect of Google+.

Yes, there are interesting reviews of it, such as Ron Miller's review in Internet Evolution.  But I am most interested in the comments, even if someone says he is nervous about the circles concept where you group friends and interests.  That is feeling, emotion, and most important - honesty.

I keep bringing up the honesty issue because I have noticed there are an overwhelmingly amount of positive reviews about Google+.

Have you noticed this?

Are you asking yourselves, are reviewers being honest or are they trying to get into bed with Google?

If you want to know more about Google+, don't just read - try it....or at least check out a video of it.

The Dark Side of Social Media

Reading through Social Media literature such as Social Media Today, Social Media Explorer and the TopRank blog aren't the only ways you can find about the latest social media tips and occurrences.  In fact, it's important to see how journalists of print, broadcast and online are portraying the world of social media.

To find about the latest news, you can browse through your local or national papers (which is something I like to do) and/or you can have Google Alerts sent to you.  In case you don't know it, Google Alerts is an effective way to have the kind of news you care about sent right to your email's inbox.

In my case, I care about everything social media, so I set up an alert that gives me any news anywhere around the world that has anything to do with social media.

So in my inbox this morning,  I checked the latest social media alert, opened the email and saw at the top was an alert that read, "Social media can harm kids."  My first reaction was objection.  How can any journalist, or better yet, anyone just alert the public and make a statement like that?

A canadian publication called The Province posted an article with that exact title.  The article was written yesterday and talks about a new phenomenon called "Facebook depression."  This is defined by the American Academy of Pediatrics as causing "a risk for social isolation, anxiety or depression."

They cite a report from the American Academy of Pediatrics when saying, "The report says these sites (Facebook, Twitter and virtual worlds such as Sims) and other technology can be useful to kids for staying in touch, socializing, entertainment and even doing homework...They can also lead to cyberbullying, depression and exposure to inappropriate content."


The article also displays this photo in the article:

From The Province in the article, "Social media can harm kids"

The picture above is worth noting.  If you ask ten people on the street if they think this girl looks either depressed or too busy to care about anything else in life, it would not be surprising if all ten said yes to that question.

The point here is that the American Academy of Pediatrics and The Province are trying to make a point: Parents...make sure you watch your kids' daily social media intake.

Though I have read through the report and The Province's article and like the balance it makes between positive and negative aspects of social media for kids and teenagers and I have all the respect in the world for an institution like the American Academy of Pediatrics, I still can't help but overlook the point the report attempts to make.    

Yes, as mentioned, it is a good study and well worth a read (at least download it here first), but it leads to another set of questions:

Is this news?

Or is it something we have heard before?

Mobile Everything!

For those who may have been living under a rock: Your mobile phone can do just about everything for you now except make your life eternal.

Let's start with the basics: internet, GPS, movies, music, live tv.  Yes, yes, that's why they're called "smartphones."

Besides just the mobiles themselves, if you are in the advertising or communications industries, you know just how powerful mobile marketing is becoming.  Why?  Well, ever read Mobile Marketer?

The moral of the story here is that advertising/marketing/PR agencies and all businesses for that matter want to know where the customer is and where the customer is going.  How can you find out?  Creating apps for smartphones!

This is something that has been going on for a while, but it's not going away anytime soon, in fact, it's growing.

Remember my earlier post about social media trends?  What falls among these trends is the location based social networking sites like Gowalla and Foursquare, why?  Because most people on those sites are using their mobiles to log on and tell their friends and family what they're eating and where they're shopping.

Mobile apps are especially on the rise, but they don't always have to tell a company where someone is.  They can be used for referencing and for causal purposes.  I have done a lot of research into this and I must admit there are some really amazing apps out there.  There are apps that teach you languages and teach you math.

The coolest app that is coming out though in my opinion is an app released by the incredible SETI Institute.  They have just  released a beta version of an app that allows you and me to get in on the action of helping search for signs of intelligent life.  The app is called SETIQuest Explorer.  In SETI's words, from the SETIQuest website it's, "a web and mobile application for viewing radio telescope data from SETI targets and helping to identify and categorize patterns. It is a program of the SETI Institute, developed by The Hathersage Group, sponsored by Adobe Systems."


Such a brilliant app, I've always wanted it.  Read news about it.  Or get the app for yourself!

The Power of Social Media and Trends for 2011 and Beyond

Like it or not, social media is here to stay, and no, when I say social media, I am not talking about only Facebook and Twitter, I am talking about all social media sites, from the ones you know about to the ones you may not, like Bebo, Flixter, Flickr and Gowalla.  These four social media sites are different, and it is really important to understand this.   For instance, Flixter is a site for you to share movie reviews, Flickr is a site for you to upload photos, and Gowalla is a site for you to tell your friends where you are and perhaps even what you're eating (if you like).  See a theme here?

The power of social media belongs to you.

Think about that statement for a second, just think...

Back in the 90s, if you wanted to send email (at least in the US), you had to pay America Online (AOL) to use its service that allowed you to send an email so you could send e-letters faster than ever before.  Great concept.  No one had any beef about paying.  Though, you couldn't upload videos, send videos, you didn't have a choice of email services (Google, Hotmail) and it certainly wasn't free.

Fast forward to today.  Email is free, and different websites, like the Flickr's and Gowalla's of the world allow you to share photos and adventures while sending messages to your friends in real-time.  Yes, Facebook allows you to do a lot of things at once, from uploading videos, sending messages and even selling items (i'll get to this in a minute), but it's the growth of social media competition and the varied services offered and the fact that you have the power to choose what website to go to and what content you see that allows me to predict with confidence that social media isn't going anywhere so fast.

Don't believe me?  I didn't expect you to.  Watch the video above (uploaded on YouTube by socialnomics09) for more on what I am talking about.

On Social Media Explorer, Stephanie Schwab posted an extremely informative article that explains where social media is heading in this year and thereafter.

The five trends include:

1. Consumer Content Creation (social media users choosing what content seeps through to their Facebook walls and profiles)
2. Niche Location (sites like Gowalla and Foursquare are examples, and businesses will realize their potential: targeting certain markets based on location while also gaining quick access to potential customer background info?  Sounds like money to be made)
3. Social Gaming (plenty of people play Farmville, but businesses are already integrating their brands into the games themselves, such as Farmer's Insurance being one case)
4. QR Codes (allow you and me to send texts or emails on our phones, but is also called "mobile tagging" with the potential of tracking where you are, similar to GPS devices
5. Social Commerce

No brief explanation for social commerce because I want more than a sentence to talk about this one.

How do sites like Facebook and now certainly Twitter become potentially worth millions, woops, I'm sorry, billions of dollars?  Ads right?  Of course, they make money from you visiting and clicking away on those sponsored ads on the right hand side of the screen.

But now (get ready for that word again...) you get to earn money on sites like Facebook as well, or at least use it directly to sell for your business.  Ever heard of Groupon?  I certainly hope so.  If you have a small to medium sized business, you may find that at times you need to earn more money this month as you are struggling to pay those overhead costs (or you could just want more money, yeah let's stick with that).  You need to sell fast, but how?  Groupon allows you to post a "deal" on their website that first needs to be approved by Groupon.  Say you run a comedy club, you can offer a 30 percent discount from your original price for two tickets at your club, and maybe even throw in a free drink to entice customers even more to buy that deal.  Your comedy club and Groupon split the proceeds from the deal that was bought by customers.

Groupon is a fantastic business idea that is exploding, and fast.  The brilliant and fastest growing website in the world, it helps out those struggling small to medium businesses, and is a revolutionary concept if you ask me.

Facebook is unique at the moment (since they are one of the first) in that businesses are using the popular social networking site to sell their merchandise.  Take the National Basketball Association for example:

    Taken March 6, 2011 From The Next Web


The NBA integrated their store into Facebook.  Why?  Not just for high visibility, but because people like to share and talk about their purchases on social networking sites.  Couple the fact if you're the NBA, a fan can buy your product on one of the most popular websites in the world and even hit the "like" button right after, and you have a tremendous business opportunity.

Interested in this or want to aid your business more? Definitely have a look at the full article and relevant links.

Know what you're clicking on?

You can find almost anything on the internet today, from shepherd's pie recipes to the very farm the food came from to make that delicious meal -- and it's all just one click away.  Many argue that one click is the problem, that it indeed leads to irresponsible web surfing, visiting sites that you shouldn't during work or at home and even promoting ill behavior.

Sometimes this ill behavior and clicking on certain links can lead to computer crashes through viruses and the like.  That is exactly what IT security company McAfee and video-creation specialists Oddcast wanted to learn more about.

Social Media Influence (SMI), a social media news, research and analysis website ran a story about a campaign that McAfee and Oddcast created together called "Who Broke the Internet?"

                       McAfee and Oddcast campaign: theinternetdied.com

In a nutshell, this is a campaign where Facebook users can upload a picture of a "friend" in their Facebook network through the website, theinternetdied.com which intends to blame that friend for the demise of the internet thanks to a whole lot of clicking.

How do people find this website and application?  Through Facebook connect.  That simple.  One click.

Sound crazy?  Farfetched?  Confused?

According to Social Media Influence, McAfee's purpose of creating this campaign was to educate those on the dangers of clicking rogue links, but clearly this is also a campaign that wanted to produce results, maybe an increase in Facebook page views?  Facebook page subscribers?

SMI tells us that results may have fallen below expectations, I won't give you full details of all the results, but I will say that SMI does a fantastic job at analysing and explaining why the results were what they were and how these results could have avoided.

I highly encourage you to learn more about this campaign, especially if you are interested in learning about social media marketing cases and how online and offline tools can support your overall strategy.

The World Today...

It will be vary rare that I will post about an event that is political, but current events is calling for such a post.

The Egyptian protests are heard around the world, and reactions from many different nations are pouring in, not just from leaders but people themselves.

This will be a very short post, especially because the protests have been covered extensively by news media outlets all over the world and I just want to act as a messenger or a middle-man for you to view what they have to say about what is happening.

I do want to point something out: social media is playing a vital role in spreading the word about these events and about giving the Egyptian people a voice on what they think should be done and where they think their country should be going.  Of course, the people speaking up don't always have to be political leaders and other figures of authority.  The words, the voices, the thoughts, and the ideas can come from anyone.

On the brilliant social media/tech news website Mashable, you will see an 8 year girl say to the Egyptian President what should be done from here on out.

Special: Technology Tuesdays (on Wednesday): Defending against the Sun - Both Beautiful and Terrifying

Watch the movies 2012 and Knowing and you may just be thinking, "Haven't I seen this before?"

You're right.  You have.

Whether it's in the year 2012 or through (spoiler alert) advanced knowledge from other worldly beings, both movies say that the earth will perish thanks to the fiery flames of the sun - and this is meant literally.  Both movies say that violent eruptions from the Sun, a.k.a solar flares, will come speeding to Earth at alarming speeds and without warning and will destroy us all.

Rather than "Haven't I seen this before?" the perhaps better question to ask would be "How do we prevent solar flares from wreaking havoc on Earth?"

                                      A gigantic solar flare about to come right to Earth, but Earth's natual magnetic field protects us from the flare's destructive power all the time....we hope.  Image from a Montana State University article

Well, we are technologically sophisticated, but not enough to capture a solar flare when it leaves the sun and redirect to another part of space, but we do have a plan.

There is a space.com article from last month about NASA's new project aptly named "Solar Shield" that is aimed at giving power companies on Earth a warning of when a coronal mass ejection (the solar flare) will come slamming into Earth.  The warning is usually given a day or two in advance of actual impact.

The point of this early warning detection system is to limit the amount of damage done AFTER the solar flare ejects from the surface of the sun.  We cannot stop a solar flare from occurring in the first place, and we cannot stop a huge solar flare from destroying the earth, but we CAN limit the damage done by a certain sized solar flare that isn't big enough to wipe us all out.

This is extremely important and the Solar Shield project should get more praise and attention and media coverage.  This is not to say that a flare will happen any day now, but the more attention that comes the way of this project, the more the project will be pressured to be effective, and the less likely it will be that once a solar flare comes, power companies will be powerless to save power grids around the world that supply power to our cell phones, televisions, gas stations, airports, schools, hospitals, computers, supermarkets and just about every other thing you take for granted in life.  After all, technology and the power to supply it is what our society is literally built on today.

Take that away from us and we will be living the lives of those in 2012 and Knowing after the screen fades to black and the credits start rolling.  What's that?  You don't know what happens to the people after the screen goes dark?  Yeah, me neither.