To quote a line from one of my favorite superhero movies, “With great power comes great responsibility” and nothing typifies that quote any greater than the world of web 2.0. Thinking about starting a corporate blog? Well you better be transparent to your audience. Want to offer some sort of social networking application? Better ensure privacy is a top priority! And finally, in the case of Google, going to offer an application that touts you have a phone number for life? Well better make sure “for life” means “for life” and not “for a few weeks”.

Grand Central is one of Google’s most recent acquisitions. It’s a really neat service that consolidates all of your phone numbers down to one number that they provision for you. So for instance my cell phone area code may be (313), office may be (212) and home may be (732) however Grand Central will provide one consistent number based on an area code of my choosing and I can provide to those who I’d like to call me so that no matter what device I’m in closest proximity to, I’ll be able to make sure I can pick it up. Savvy user controls give me access to route whomever wherever whenever.

In August however the feel good telecom company story got derailed when Grand Central lost its ability to continue to serve approximately 434 users due to provisioning issues with a former number provisioner. No big deal, just re-issue those 434 new numbers.

Right.

Imagine if you’ve printed business cards, stationary, email signatures. Friends, family, etc. What a nightmare! And in true web 2.0 fashion, those 434 went to the blogs to voice their issues almost instantly tainting what I considered at the time a white hot service with unlimited potential.

A few months have passed, and Grand Central is back on track (can I stop with the puns?!). I was recently offered a beta via our very kind Google reps and so far so good - I like the service. I haven’t gone out of my way to evangelize my number however since the memories of the famed 434 remain etched in my mind.

I’ll give it a few months and report back with any updates/take aways from using Grand Central.

I love my BlackBerry to the point of obsession. Honest, I’m not sure what I’d do without it. Concurrently, as most of my colleagues will attest to, I’m very “active” on Facebook. So imagine the gleeful smile on my face when I was informed that RIM and Facebook announced a partnership at CTIA where a new Facebook app will be available for download today.

Apparently the app will allow users to get their news feeds and other notifications pushed directly to their devices. Additionally, users can customize their alerting preferences while Facebook services are also integrated into other parts of the device. For instance, in the camera application, users can tag photos on the device and upload them directly to their Facebook account. T-Mobile will be the first operator to offer the application embedded in the BlackBerry devices it sells, but Moskovitz said it will be available for download to any BlackBerry user later today.

While I applaud Facebook for continuing to expand their reach past their social networking competition, I’m even more excited for RIM as this plays directly into their push strategy. I’ll be following up this post with a UI review once I’ve downloaded the application.

Blogger Danah Boyd wrote an anecdotal piece recently on the growing socio-economical divide between Facebook and MySpace’s audiences. Her point of view is interesting and is just starting to pick up traction.

In layman’s terms she states that Hegemonic American teens (i.e. middle/upper class, college bound teens from upwards mobile or well off families) are all on or switching to Facebook. Marginalized teens, teens from poorer or less educated backgrounds, subculturally-identified teens, and other non-hegemonic teens continue to be drawn to MySpace. A class division has emerged and it is playing out in the aesthetics, the kinds of advertising, and the policy decisions being made.

What I found most interesting was her study on the Military’s stance on banning soldiers from creating MySpace accounts but showing leniency with Facebook.

Viewing Class Divisions Through MySpace & Facebook

It’s hard to go a single day without hearing the word “iPhone”. In fact, a Google search query will illicit 76,300,000 responses. Not bad for a product that’s yet to touch a retail shelf. And while I concede the iPhone will certainly be considered a revolutionary device from the context of form and function, I’m not sold on it being a revolutionary experience ; the purpose of the iPhone, at least in my opinion, and based on Steve Jobs’ transcripts from speaking engagements is more focused on the convergence of technology (iPod, phone, email, web). So while I appreciate the tangible beauty of the device, I ultimately categorize it as a souped up Blackberry. I hear the masses marching towards my office with torches as I type…

My point isn’t to bury the iPhone prior to its commercial release. I obviously welcome innovative thinking when it comes to technology. That’s why today, I’m overly excited at the prospects of AT&T’s most recent innovation: Shoot and Stream.

Shoot and stream is mocoNews marketing lingo for live video streaming from your mobile device. You want to know what true convergence is? Look no further than video streaming, where AT&T’s goal is to make their Video Share (their official name for the service) service accessible over any of the three primary screens that customers use most frequently: the wireless device, the PC and the television.

AT&T is formally offering utilitarian examples of their new offering, focusing on on-the-go deal makers. For example - a real estate broker who can’t meet face to face but wants to showcase a specific property to his/her client.

I think what AT&T wants to say however is Live Streaming will be the key that opens new doors to the world of User Generated Content. Now everybody has the potential to be a paparazzi. Blogging has become more personal with the flick of your phone. Channels will be created and YouTube could be forced to evolve very quickly if Video Share takes off, and I predict it will.

This is an exciting time for content and the mobile industry. The lull over the first wave of mobile content (ringtones, wallpapers, j2me games) is dissipating, and we’re going to have to brace ourselves for a mobile content/services tidal wave of giant proportions - MMS has finally arrived, and now with a Video Share rollout, the possibilities truly are endless.




Every year some of the world’s greatest thinkers and doers come together to discuss and exchange some of the world’s most interesting information. This event is known as the TED conference. Probably never heard of TED I assume? Well if I had to describe the personas who makeup the general audience I’d define them as CEO’s, Physicists, Psychologists, Researchers, Creatives, Architects and Anthropologists to name a few. Sergey Brinn and Larry Page of Google fame are advisors; so is Jeff Bezos of Amazon, along with Dean Kaymen - who invented the Segway.

I’ve tried to follow the annual events at TED through blog posts, press, etc. since something monumental always transpires.

Enter Blaise Aguera y Arcas who wins my award for most amazing technology provider I can apply towards media today.

Blaise is the architect of Microsoft’s Photosynth technology. Think of Photosynth as a new way to display images on the web. Boy that didn’t do Blaise justice. Let me try again:

Think of Photosynth in the same way Steve Jobs approached the iPod or better yet, iTunes. A cleaner more comprehensive way to browse online imagery. Blaise implemented a new methodology for exploring related groups of images using a complex imaging algorithm developed in part by Microsoft Research. This allows a user/viewer to interact with objects of arbituary size - you only load what you need at that very moment. He’s also crafted an absolutely revolutionary way of constructing 3D image mapping through multiple user contributions of the same image- I wont’ get too geeky. Just watch and be amazed when he starts discussing Notre Dame…

Okay back to the relevance of media. Since you’re only loading what you need in an “on demand” environment (similar to Virtual Earth), you can load incredibly high resolution imagery onto one page. So in the contexts of say, an automotive brouchure, you could feasibly drill down to smaller images of very high resolution. Think about it. We have cameras that take 10 megapixel images yet we don’t have the scalibility on our browser to display it. Blaise’s team solves this convincingly. Web browsing becomes a bit more exciting and real estate online will change drastically if Photosynth ever makes a commercial debut.

In the spirit of Discovery Communications announcing the launch of a Green Channel, I decided to scour the web for examples for brilliant tactical executions, raising the awareness of our planet’s health through greener lifestyles. My friend Ramsey sent me the following image:

I’m not sure if it gets much better than the WWF Black Cloud Balloon campaign launched in China. Though the Chinese economy has gone gangbusters, the sky itself is turning black. The culprit? Industrialization has lead to unprecedented growth in the number of cars and exhaust emissions. The Black Cloud balloon was used to kick off their “20 tips for sustainable development” campaign and drive people to their 20to20.org mini-site. WWF expressed one tip in dramatic fashion by inflating a huge black cloud shaped balloon behind a car to illustrate the pollution produced by car emissions.

Along with an increase in new volunteers, WWF recieved international coverage across multiple continents.

NewTeeVee is reporting that Youtube is beginning to test inline ads, showing a text ad at the bottom of its player as a video is playing. If a user clicks on the text, a video ad expands and appears layered on top of the player. The ads are also clickable from a static post-roll. Examples are shown below in screenshot from a My Chemical Romance music video.

To check out the sequence of screen shots, check out the post here

Wireless users will go to serious lengths to avoid having to type in a URL on their WAP capable mobile devices as we all would agree, it’s a cumbersome process. With multiple keys per digit, I’ve made my fair share of mistakes while cursing the T9 Gods for spelling the first four letters of epson instead of ESPN.

Enter the Shotcode, a circular barcode originally used for the purposes of location based tracking. ShotCodes are designed to be read with a regular camera (including those found on mobile phones and webcams) without the need to purchase other specialised hardware. After installing the software needed to read shotcodes on your java enabled phone, you can “read” Shotcodes. Check out the following example below:

So a Shotcode essentially automates the process of pushing a URL and its content to your mobile device. Brilliant! Marketers have begun taking advantage of them - appending them to print and web campaigns.

But the coolest/most disturbing (depending on which side of the fence you sit on) application I’ve seen YET for shotcodes has to be this:

If anyone downloads the Shotcode reader for their mobile phone, please let me know if it scans!

Paul McCloskey of Campus Technology reports that The University of Michigan’s School of Information (SI) announced a graduate-degree specialization in “social computing” through a Master of Science in Information. The university said the program is the first in the country to focus on social computing, the term describing the wave of open technologies that enable masses of people to interact and exchange and sort information.

Judy Lawson, director of academic and career services for the SI, said, “employers want graduates with a deep understanding of how to manage information and at the same time make it easily accessible to users. SI is staying ahead of the curve.”