Feeding the Puppy

Wave hello to Google's new toy

Tristan, our Deputy Head of Search, sent around an email last night, phenomenally excited about the arrival of Google Wave.

In short, Wave is Google's 'real time communication platform'.  What does this actually mean?  Well, this excerpt from Mashable lets us know a little more...

"It combines aspects of email, instant messaging, wikis, web chat, social networking, and project management to build one elegant, in-browser communication client. You can bring a group of friends or business partners together to discuss how your day has been or share files."

...which you understand even better when you have a look at the released screenshot:

There yet?  No?

Well, if you remember your second year physics class, I guess it's kind of like taking the principle of an online group discussion, and moving it from 'series', where one thing happens after the other, to 'parallel', where everything happens at once:

So rather than sending one email at a time, or waiting in turn to answer a group email, you and your friends or colleagues, wherever you are across the world, will be able to share the online communication experience simultaneously, as if you were all in a room. 

And no doubt at that glorious Google price point of 'free'.

I think it sounds amazing in principle, but of course the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and it won't be on general release just yet.

There is one thing that slightly bothers me though... it looks a bit, well, complicated.  Busy.  Cluttered.  Just kind of, well, not very 'Google'.  But we'll see I guess.

And last, but by no means least... it's got a lovely logo.  ahhhh, a lovely logo...

SHIT! Get me Kevin Bacon!

Remember this?

You know, starring Kevin Bacon & Fred Ward (of Remo: Unarmed & Dangerous fame.  I say fame...).  Battling against big underground worms that went around ripping up (or should that be under?) buildings and infrastructure from below...

Well, we were walking down Tottenham Court Road earlier... and I'm beginning to think that the recession is the least of our worries...

Youtube is Unwatchable

Yes, Youtube is Unwatchable.  And not in the way that you think...

Every MINUTE, we now collectively upload 20 HOURS of footage to Youtube. 

The mind boggles... just imagine how much media content is out there now... and just how niche our communities of interest are getting.

(from Mashable)

It's just 'people'. People, People, People.

I was reading this post this morning, (courtesy of David Cushman) by Jamie Burke, called...

Some inconvenient truths about the networked world that could save your asses.

...which let's face it, if nothing else it's a great title for a post.

But rather than just a great title, it's a great list of things that we should either a) be already thinking or b) start thinking about more. 

I'm not going to run them all out here (as you should read it all at Jamie's blog) but my favourite one is this:

Don’t be so afraid of being seen to be real people? I can trust a fallible person far more than an apparently infallible one. Even if they were infallible how could I, a fallible one, ever connect with them? People buy people.

More and more this makes sense to me as a way to approach communications. 

Companies are very simply communities in their own right; a group of people forming relationships around the context of what they create together. 

The 'brand', back at the start of the industrial era, was only created because connecting those people to all the people inside the company to those on the outside wasn't possible.  All of that had to be simplified into one bite-sized snapshot of the complexity of a company and it's products.

But technology increasingly means that actually, yes, you can connecting the people on the outside to the people on the inside, easily, and meaningfully.  Like this diagram from the ol' Communis Manifesto tried to explain:

The great thing about that is by encouraging people to connect to other people, the ensuing conversation is automatically more complex, real, personal, believable, engaging, wonderous... all those words that we used to use when trying to create 'brands'. 

We no longer need to personalise brands.  Because people, well, they're personalised already.

So, tomorrow morning, don't think about 'brands'.  Think about the company; the people who invent things, and the people who make things, and the people who share stories about things.

And don't, whatever you do, think about 'consumers'.  'Consumers' is a bad word.  It makes us think everyone is the same, when really everyone is completely different.

Think about people.  Say it after me:  People, People, People.

Then start thinking how you might connect the two...

Eminem: embracing Twithop

Yes, Eminem is back.  Back again.  Guess who's back?  Tell a frie...

...sorry, I'll stop singing.  Anyway, this via PSFK - to promote a Detroit concert, his team have been using Twitter to direct fans around the city on a digital treasure hunt (yes, very ARG-lite)

I like this a lot; it's a very cheap, simple way to engage a community in something short-lived, spontaneous and fun... but of course the crucial part is that there's a little pot of gold for those who go to those locations to track down the tickets.

Not everyone will go to the bother of getting out into the real world and seeking them down of course; they may be in a different city or country, or be stuck at work, or not motivated enough to go to the concert.

But it's a good example of thinking about the principle of "those who go, and those who know".

When you create an event, however big or small, you can't just think about the people who're actually going to turn up. 

The more motivated people are to go and find tickets for Eminem, drop into your free 'Fruitstock' like festival, go along to your karaoke flashmob in Trafalger Square, the more likely they will be to share their experience through photographs, stories, tweets, status updates and so on...

...so if you make whatever you're doing as shareable as possible for them, the more that 'those who go' will tell 'those who know'.

What you're really doing is telling a story of what you and the people who came along did together.  And people like to pass on stories.

The Finger Touch Arms Race

This is going to be a big summer for the mobile device industry; and by inference, a big step forward for how a growing band of people really start to embrace everything that the mobile device can do for them. 

Every year for the past 5 has been 'the year that mobile takes off', but maybe (just maybe) this is actually that year... so, who's going to be the big winner?

First up, there's the Palm Pre, a device on which the once sector-leading Palm have pretty much staked the farm:

It's due in the US on the 6th June apparently; not only a full month and a half before the rumoured launch date of the 3rd Generation of iPhone, but a cunning two days before there will actually be an announcement by Apple (from WIRED).

4 days before that, acording to CNET, we'll see the Nokia N97.

Both devices offer something the previous iPhones haven't - full qwerty keypads.  That's still a major demand for devices for the time being.

Then through the summer we'll see all sorts of runners and riders jostling for positioning; Sony Ericsson, Samsung, HTC, LG and on and on... everyone's trying to create something that can steal share of the iPhone's success.

Crucially, it's not just a share of the iPhone sales they are after (as of course it's nowhere near being the most popular handset in the world); they would probably be happy being mentioned in the same breath, having a device that's consider a true rival.

But here's where Apple's first-mover advantage may well come into play.

They've had the iPhone out there for two years.  Last summer's update to 3G was, let's face it, pretty much the same phone.

So whilst everyone's chasing around trying to (consciously or unconsciously) imitate a phone that's two years old, Apple have been refining, learning, developing.

The rumours are rife; better camera, more battery life, more memory, smaller device, a range of devices (like an 'iPhone Nano').  But what's certainly true is that if you based everything on Google Insights, there's probably only going to be one winner this summer...

Beautiful #commutebox visualisation

Pete asked me this the other day...

...and at the time, truth was, it hadn't gone that well... I'd played around with a few things, but found nothing much of note. 

For a reminder on what #commutebox is about, click here.

Anyway, I've just seen this courtesy of Neil... it's called Visible Tweets, it's made by the Man In Blue, and it's beautiful...

It basically takes tweets based around a word or hash tag, and animates them together in a variety of ways.  It's very soothing indeed.

Thanks to the people who've been taking part so far, I'll keep looking at interesting stuff to help visualise #commutebox...

in the meantime, click here to watch the #commutebox world go by, courtesy of Visible Tweets.

Us Now: now, or on Thursday

I saw this over on David Cushman's blog on Friday (and saw Will had been watching it too): it's an online documentary by Banyak Films on how the world is changing as a result of how technology is bringing people together...

You should really watch the trailer right now:

The hour long film features great examples (everything from Ebbsfleet Utd, Mumsnet and Zopa) and a fantastic 'who's who' of great thinkers commenting on how it's changing our world (Clay Shirky, Charles Leadbeater, Don Tapscott and so on).

The full thing is here for you to watch whenever you can:

Us Now from Banyak Films on Vimeo.

I'm also going to run a screening here at PHD in our newtube room at 1pm this Thursday (21st) too... depending on demand internally, if you're interested in coming over to Chenies St. to watch it with us, drop me a note.

Nostalgia: not what it used to be

Chris, Matt and I were having a chat the other day about the sheer number of brands who've suddenly started reminding people through their communications just how long they've been around...

...so, M&S above are celebrating their 125th anniversary, then you've got Sainsbury's 140th, Persil's 100th birthday and so on.

In times of uncertainty it's intriguing how companies are using their longevity and heritage to reassure people; 'we've been here for you for ages, and we've gone through countless recessions, so don't worry about it...'

Which is all well and good of course, but it's not just a normal recession, and it's nothing like any company has seen before...

...it's a big economic shock which has arrived at the same time as a massive social shock which is changing the way we come together, as I covered in the first half of this presentation:

The Future of Advertising, APA, 17/02/09

View more presentations from John v Willshire.

No matter what brand you're working on, when you talk about 'brand birthdays' I don't think it's enough to rely on a nostalgic take on heritage... it's not about the past, it's a bout the future.

So it's not about 'we've been around for ages and we'll keep doing the same old thing for you'.  People don't want the 'same old thing'.

I think what people will really connect with is 'We've been around for ages because we can anticipate what you'll want next, embrace change, pioneer in everything we do, and help you out in this brave new world'.

We want to buy things from companies we feel understand the modern world, not ones that are stuck in the past.

View from the trenches

The lovely Katy just tagged me on a wee 'view from the trenches' thing... but it's more like 'news from the front', as I'm working at home in Brighton today...

...as you'll remember from this post, I'm a big believer in working wherever you need to, not in one centralised locale...

Anyway, let's spend ten minutes on it - what's the view like from here?

Well, as ever I'm on the delightful little Toshiba R500 Portege, which after nearly two years of day-in-day-out service has developed it's first fault... the DVD drive has stopped working.  Grrr.  Not annoying enough a fault to hand it over to a repair shop for days, but annoying if you want to rip any CDs or owt. 

Is two years a good lifespan for a faultless laptop?  Thoughts please...

Anyway, onwards...

...round to the left we have the sofa, which hides some of the old school meadja (CDs, Books, Graphic novels etc) that are increasing more ornamental rather than functional.  That's Helen's knitting on the sofa. 

Knitting really has come back in a big way; I kind of think it fits with the whole folk music / allotments / coffee shop conversation thing; the more technology creeps into our lives, the more people feel the need to draw on the things that previous generations did in order to make them feel, well, part of the real world.

Then, a decidely old school phone...

...which I've been using to dial in to various conference calls.  I wonder when (if ever) phone manufacturers will concentrate on making a mobile phone that offers a quality and consistency of phone call that will actually rival a landline?

And yes, I'm sitting on the floor, that's why the phone is down there.  I like sitting on the floor, always have, don't know why.

Finally, the view behind is out the window, overlooking Montpelier Crescent...

...it's not very sunny.  Probably because the Great Escape is on this weekend, and the rain god loves a sodden Indie crowd...

So, let's pass on 'View From The Trenches'... Chris, Matt, Dan, Ted, Mark... take it away...