Community Mobilization

SXSW Schedule released

SXSW released their schedule recently and I am happy to tell everyone that we will be presenting Monday afternoon at 3:30. I am overly excited about the panel we have put together with speakers from the March of Dimes, National Geographic, and the American Cancer Society. It is going to be exceptionally interesting and entertaining, focusing in on where are we as organizations supposed to go to attract and retain volunteers. The Future of Volunteers; Adapt or Die!

Mashups Move Mainstream

IBM has been working on a Mashup system based on the Lotus notes platform. The idea is to give business people the ability to create web mashups without the need for complex API programming skills. In in sense the tool provides a lot more people the ability to mix together information sources and displays. It will be interesting to see what the display systems are beyond traditional maps, where businesses will look to add physical office locations. On a deeper note, a person could build a mashup that combines weather information with a retail management system to adjust inventories based on project weather patterns. The mashup will help drive business intelligence since it will make viewing and interpolating the data easier.

Value Networks

There is an interesting post on Managing the Value Network that looks at the difference between flat organization structures and value networks (those implicit networks where the work really happens). It is a different perspective than the academic analytics that I went through last week at INSNA.

Teen Communication Modality - A Look Forward

They say you can take a good guess about the future by looking at those who will be in charge then, and if that holds the Pew study on Teens and Social Media is pretty  telling. It focuses on the fact that social media gained a greater foothold in teen life as they embrace the conversational nature of interactive online media. the study found that 39% of online teens share their own artistic creations online such as artwork, photos stories, or videos. They are creating a culture and location of sharing work unlike anything mass media could ever have dreamed.

Even more telling is that girls (who we knew communicated more than boys) are taking it online too. Girls continue to dominate most elements of content creation. Some 35% of all teen girls blog, compared with 20% of online boys, and 54% of wired girls post photos online compared with 40% of online boys. And the most interesting statistic to me is HOW the teens are communicating when they communicate. Social portals and networks WAY out pace face to face (duh - we have global friendships now) but face to face is higher than e-mail. The killer app is dying! Amazing. Asked about the communication they have every day with their friends, the multi-channel teens say:

70% talk daily with friends on a cell phone
60% send text messages daily
54% instant message
47% send messages daily over social network sites
46% talk to friends on a landline phone
35% spend time with friends in person daily
22% send email every day to friends

Video Sharing Website Grow

The Pew Internet & American Life Project has just released findings showing that 48% of internet users have been to video-sharing sites such as YouTube. In 2007 48% of internet users said they had ever visited a video-sharing site such as YouTube. Pew conducted a similar interview and found that in December 2006, 33% of internet users said they had ever visited such sites. 15% of respondents said they had used a video-sharing site "yesterday" - the day before they were contacted for our survey. A year ago, 8% had visited such a site "yesterday."

So from a community perspective this is good news, I think. More people are going to these sites and I hope it is because there is more compelling content. The growth of these sites also points to the need of individuals to share in a media rich way. We are seeing the evolution of a delivery platform of information. Blogs are to news papers as pod casts are to talk radio as video is to TV. Fun question will be what is the internet to the internet?

Area produces Metaplaces

Areae - Raph Koster's relatively new company has launched Metaplaces, a mark up language for the creation of one off virtual communities. The system is exceptionally because it looks to create unique URLs for every item created for the virtual items. Koster envisions users coming to a Metaplace world by clicking on a link in a Web page. That link launches a page where the user finds herself inside a world, perhaps using a default avatar, but no log-in or registration is immediately required. Metaplaces will create a development tool for deeper interactive experiences with ideas, products, or people. The prospects are limited only by the desire for traffic and creativity. My curiosity will be satiated when users begin to experiment with the tool and report back out the stickiness of the experience and their own ability to drive users there.

Major Consoles and The Content of Their Games

Game Developer Magazine in their recent issue put out a neat pie chart that shows the rating of the games that the individual systems support. It is very interesting to look at the three major consoles side by side to get an understanding of the demographic that may be purchasing them.  It has been a long held idea that games move the system, and that having exclusive games helps to sell consoles. If that is the case then There is something very different about the Wii (aside form the wicked new interface). It is not being driven by shoot-em-up games rated Teen and Mature, breaking years of conventional wisdom that boys looking for action adventure games drive the market.

With this in mind questions surrounding the marketing of systems designed for niche demographics arise. Is there potential value in creating a niche specific system to address first person shooters, athletic competitions, vehicle games and the like.

Washington Post Covers Frozen Pea Fund

I will say that I am very impressed with the article in yesterday's Washington Post about the Frozen Pea Fund (login is required but you can use bug-me-not with Fire Fox for access). The article looks at why the Twitter viral event for the Frozen Pea Fund worked and helps to shine some light onto the nature of technology mediated human connectivity. I particularly like the quote from Susan at the end of the article, it is telling about the importance of support throughout the cancer experience. Reality is that support is support no mater who gives it and in what form and this is a great study in support of that assertion. "There's nothing good about getting cancer," Reynolds wrote on her blog. "It helps [to] start conversations, though."

IBM Lists Next 5 Trends

IBM released their take on the next 5 big innovations. They website has a number of report links at the bottom with  research on the trends but what is interesting is that I did not seem to see them tied together in any way. I am real disappointed that they did not take a few of the major issues facing the world and overtly showcase how any one or combination of trends would make an impact on them. Health care, global warming, aging populations, water shortages are all major global concerns that are easily tied into the Next 5 but I believe that IBM did not want to go to far out on the limb to showcase the great impact that these advances could have.

Frozen Peas Fun - Why It Is Working

The concepts surrounding the flash that is Frozen Peas Friday are rooted in the intricate interpersonal web of connectivity and communication. The question I have been asked a number of times in the last week is, "So why is it that this groups of people care so much about frozen peas and cancer?" The answer has many facets and I will try my best to break them down as I see them.

#1. They may 'care' about cancer but they do not CARE about cancer. They care about Susan Reynolds and her personal situation and want to help and support her. As a fund raiser we know the fundamental truth is that people give money to support the causes important to those they care about. I care deeply about cancer, but if my mother asked me to take up a fund raising drive for AIDS awareness I would do so quickly.
#2. The rapid adoption of the project is two fold - one the communication web between the first adopters is dense and fast. Communication today is multi layered via social network spaces blog posts, twitter feeds, profile updates, direct messages, instant messages ... chances are we all got at least three contacts about this project from the same person. Viral word of mouth information distribution followed.
#3. We like to try new things, and trying to raise money and awareness on a micro blogging site like Twitter is a challenge. We like Twitter, and this was a chance to show some real value in the system beyond letting the world know what I am doing right now.
#4. It is fun and it feels good. People spent real time photo-shopping their Pea-based avatars and it required a bit of creativity. It was fun coming up with an image and making it as good as the next guy's or girl's. And it feels good to do good things. Each donation to support the fund deals good to us and we are happy to give and participate.
#5. The American Cancer Society was sharp enough to pick up on the project and support it. Often technological memes such as these are overlooked by other organizations but in this case the positive energy had a place to be focused - the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer program.

So in the spirit of fun here is a frozen pea video from the Social Media Club in Florida here is a very nice video in support of the Frozen Pea Fund.