The entertainment industry was, and still is, the most affected by the march to online.  Whenever a new medium is created, it starts with intellectual curiosity, devolves into the hedonic aspects of human nature, the dust settles, and practical application ensues.  The videogame industry is a perfect example of this evolution. It started with people doing math on computers, then playing tic-tac-toe, and now they are used to train our soldiers.

Today, business people are finally using the internet to learn about other businesses and help grow their own. In this discovery, they are also finding that they aren’t unique.  Someone in China is doing the same thing for a fraction the price.  It’s the same thing Metallica saw with Napster.  Pirates weren’t just stealing their music, they were discovering all the other Metallicas too.  What a humbling experience this must have been.

The internet has helped companies realize that they can’t look like everyone else, even if they act like everyone else.  Designers are being contracted through the roof.  I don’t think creatives could have imagined the demand for an original idea during an economic slump.  Business people are realizing the value in looking different from the rest of the crowd. Great. This is the hedonic part of the curve and practical application is still yet to be seen by most of the businesses out there.

What most people are failing to see is how other companies are using the net beyond aesthetics, simply because the execs don’t use the net for anything practical besides research, purchasing, and e-mail. So when someone tells you to start embracing the net, take heed. The net isn’t about what you do, as much as it is about what you can do. Now, start thinking.

Not everyone is tuned into these channels of communication yet, but you can imagine what it will be like when they do.  The more people tune into this, the more it will enhance the disparities.  The people who are on twitter now are there for all the right reasons.  They want to learn, expand their reach, and give back to the community, and maybe they will become popular in the process.  The problem is that these A-Listers are also much more altruistic than the normal Joe.

In history, every time someone has come to land they have had high hopes.  As society grew, the constitutional government expanded its reach much farther than the authors had ever imagined.  Due to the needs of the masses for protection, infrastructure, and other macrosocietal needs, the individuals gave up parts of their freedom to allow the larger government to run efficiently.  Long story short, the more people involved in a group, the more power a select few who lead the group get.  The leaders gain from the masses and the masses find comfort in having a leader.  This only leads to more and more consolidation of power. The original plan for the Constitution may have been amazing when it was drafted but no one could have imagined then, what the government has developed into now.

We need to be a step ahead of the curve and learn to go it alone online.  Otherwise, your an A-List Cronie contributing to another massive centralization of power. The decentralization of the chatroom through Twitter only served to further centralize, the A-Listers.  This doesn’t have to happen online.  Bloggers need to become more comfortable in their own element, and not cling to these front runners seeking help and advice.

The good news is that everyone is still learning and you can still be a loner and make it to the top, like the guy at the stuffwhitepeoplelike.com blog. But by our involvement with those who already on top, we strengthen the disparity between the centralized and the decentralized.  Who knows where that is going to lead?

Memes, were the first way these bloggers gained steam.  People linked to stories and wrote about the topic themselves at their own blog.  The weakness in this scheme is that their are meme starters and meme followers.  The meme followers don’t get much attention since they are only further centralizing the original post.  If a computer program could piecemeal these memes into a coherent, meaningful essay, it would decentralize the central story and combine it with the weaker memes that ensue. Granted, since they push so much content out onto the web they would still show up, but they would be equally represented with the other authors of less mainstream content.

Currently, there is nothing that can pull together information for seperate sources and compile them relevantly.  The decentralization of information from the bounds of their own original web pages will be what these top bloggers fight.  The search will look something like this: You go to Google, you type a search in and you get back a written result story, videos, and all other relevant information compiled into a cohesive essay, tailored to exactly what you searched for.  The software will automatically formulate a meme to a search query.  Now, it is not just search results (which are exact copies of sites), but a fully customized Wikipedia entry, drawn from the collective knowledge of everyone. Instead of an essay being a meme from an individual, it will be a meme from a software program.  When this happens all of the A-Listers will be up in arms.  It will essentially level the playing field by quoting them along with other much more obscure references, both parts being just as relevant to the query. A-List bloggers do not mind when an individual, creates a meme from their work, but we’ll see if they are as comfortable with computers doing it.

It is the same as a chatroom from a communication standpoint.  There is one difference though, there is no room in the chatroom, it is decentralized conversation.  Instead of communicating by visiting a confined space, you are just saying it into the open.  Whoever is tuned into you, hears it.  Which is why famous bloggers love it so much.  They get to make more noise, and the more people tune in, the more people hear them.  In Twitter, the room is gone and all that is left is an ego, craving popularity. The more people who hear them, the more people link to them.  In turn, many organic inbound links come in from those who have heard, optimizing the A-List Bloggers’ SEO.

So you say ah? Yea, what your saying is obvious.

And my retort, maybe it is now that I said that, but droves of people are drinking the Social Media Kool-Aid.  What is actually happening would better be referred to as social media littering.  These A-List bloggers are leaving such big footprints online, that it tunes out the millions of smaller murmurs.   It is not that they do this from ill motivation, but from surviving off of being heard. (Which is also why they are probably more prone to depression. If you job is being heard, and you aren’t, things can unravel quickly.)

In a tidal wave, to an onlooker, it looks like one solid wall of water coming at them.  But from the standpoint of a humming bird, it could see that each particle of water was creating its own ripples on the wave.  To the humming bird, it wouldn’t be a wave, but instead a whole different ocean.  We are the ripples upon waves, we have an effect, but it is only visible from a certain, probably more personal, perspective.  But the waves are gaining momentum and the ripples are getting dragged along for the ride.  We aren’t being noticed at all anymore.

Part of the beauty of the web is that it is a fringe, separate from normal society, and most of all, democratic.  It is interesting to see how quickly people re-aggregate, work together, and prosper in another world.  It is also interesting to see how quickly, human nature kicks in and people return to casts of normal society.  I’ve heard before, “The more something changes, the more it becomes the same” It applies best to the net.

It was different, it was fringe, it was a democracy.  Now, it is an amplification of normal society.  People are hyper popular, and hyper last week.  You don’t just get to see Britney’s snizz, you see it, when it happens. I have heard before that the Internet levels the playing field of economics and society.  I want to be on record saying it will not level the playing field, it will only further all the disparities that exist in normal society.

Twitter and the hyperpopular bloggers of today, are the best example we have to date of just how quickly we become the same.  We are falling in line with what is popular, the next big trend, and hanging on the words of what the popular say.  I’ve heard this story before.  Where was it? I got it, it is called high school.  You can almost picture which A-listers would have been as a stereotypical high school role.  Now in order to get elevated to their ranks, you have to have an older brother who knew them, or they have to be your friends.

For some reason, it’s easy for me to write about the negative aspects of business.  I almost wrote an article discussing how Microsoft is a monopoly, upon which we are dependant.  Obviously! Negative things stick out in the mind.  They are easy to spot.  Negatives stick out like red flashing lights.  Screw them.  It takes just slightly more thought to see the good beyond.

To this I cheers, and to this I will write about solutions to problems instead.  To get them off of my chest, I will write a list the things I hate, and their solutions:

• Fax – E-mail, E-Fax
• Application dependant data – Open source programs that support open standards
• Microsoft – Linux
• Strange formatting – simple formatting
• Flashy websites – PHP
• People who don’t want to change – instill motivation; instill fear
• Apple – harness strong desire to be different and education on DRM
• Bragging of New York and LA – Liking anywhere else in the world
• Alternative style – wear something truly different
• Business-as-usual – same as people who don’t want to change
• Old hardware – money
• Pop tech – understanding what is really useful and the best way to utilize it

That’s it.  I feel better now.

Though Facebook started off as a social networking site, I don’t think they are really helping me network better than anyone in the past if they don’t have a plan that can last beyond the next fad website. Monetization is turning out to be quite the task for these social networks. In realizing they have a need to generate revenue, social networks that started out with the goal of designing a friendly user interface to allow users to connect and share with other users in new ways, have lost their core value that drove people to their site in the first place. The need to monetize is obvious to anyone who likes to eat, but hoarding information and users doesn’t help social networks achieve this goal better than pushing connectivity further. For example, users have to go to Facebook.com to connect to one another. I put profile information in, for the hundredth time, and start reconnecting with and making new friends, which is what I did on AIM ten years ago and have continued to do for every new social networking site since then.

So how about social networking sites giving us control over our friends, our profile, and they can just HOST MY NETWORK, instead of insisting that it is THEIR network? Facebook and others aren’t helping me connect to anything beyond their website and the widgets that they monetize through monopolizing code. While widgets allow smaller companies to put their stakes in a larger company’s soil, it isn’t opening up new connectivity for users. It is just giving other companies more connectivity to TAKE your information.

I want my friends to be with me everywhere I go online. I want a detailed profile that I can choose to GIVE to various websites I visit. After all, these are my friends, with loyalty to ME, not the likes of Facebook. They go where I go and if Facebook loses me, my friends will follow. Not because I said so, but because Facebook made them believe they were connecting people, not just now, but into the future as well. I’m sick of filling out profiles, I’m sick of making the same friends over and over. All these sites need to do is standardize my friends as a hosted OPML file that acts as a permanent address book, HOST my resume, HOST my RSS OPML file, HOST my personal information. I want to sign onto any service and start communicating with the same friends that I have on LinkedIn and Doostang. I do not want to have to enter my age, address, phone number, and credit card info ever again. It is possible for Facebook to do this with the position they are in, but instead, they are busy conjuring up new ways of taking my information for money. I used to believe Facebook was a pioneer in networking, helping me to find friends, but I learned they don’t help me KEEP them. Until Facebook sets industry standards for HOSTING (not owning) my life, I don’t believe they will be around much longer.

I use Verizon’s VZ Navigator on my phone almost religiously, and it costs roughly $10/month. I assume most people who read blogs are also aware of how GPS navigation systems work and their common features. A feature I use often is category search. For example, if I want to find the nearest café, I can search restaurants -> cafés, and it will list the nearest café. To track how often I search in a category should be an easy piece of programming. Recognized search trends can be databased by Verizon.

With the information of a user’s GPS search preferences, Verizon’s software can create a personal profile and display businesses within their proximity that the GPS users are most likely to use. For instance, a business person is going to see a client and, along their route, in a section on the GPS, advertisement banners show up when the potential customer is within a certain proximity. The person becomes interested, and, by clicking on a picture of a business offer, they receive the quickest directions to that place, phone number included.

Navigation systems can become completely free, paid for by advertisers. The businesses pay Verizon to have their ad appear. A pay scale based on location, relevance to profile, and size of the proximity, would determine the cost of the advertisement. Businesses benefit because their targeted consumers receive an advertisement during critical marketing situations, capitalizing on the consumers location. Consumers benefit because the free navigation allowing them to receive information specific to their lifestyle is available. No longer will GPS systems be simply a navigation tool but a perfect link between consumers and businesses.

Do you think your business is GPS ready?

Facebook still has options for raising revenue other than venture funding. One of these options is product tagging in pictures. Product tagging in Facebook pictures could offer Facebook some financial independence and expand their web 2.0 offerings.

Product Tagging In Facebook Pictures

When users upload a picture on Facebook, they can also add tags to a frame and describe the content within the picture. If a user’s Facebook friend is tagged in a picture, the tag becomes a hyperlink, allowing easy navigation to the tagged friend’s profile. Facebook should expand upon this feature by allowing businesses to create profiles. If a user decides to tag a product, brand, or place, then it can become a hyperlink listed below the pictures. A business could help facilitate the laborious task of picture tagging by giving special promotions and offerings to the Facebook users who tag their products in pictures. By implementing product tagging, your friends’ pictures would become a personal interactive billboard.

Example: A bar that my friend took her picture in looks cool. I click the bar’s tag that was automatically generated by the picture’s GPS metadata (the GPS feature on cameras isn’t yet widespread but it will be soon). By clicking the tag, I’m taken to a bar’s Facebook profile containing it’s GPS location data. The profile also has the link to the bar’s homepage, personal notes its been mentioned in, videos people took there, other people’s pictures who have the location tagged. In turn, I get a much clearer idea of the crowd the place attracts through the friends of the business. Users notes allow me to read peoples’ memories, opinions, and experiences relating to the place. Through pictures, I can see it from almost every angle. These features are all centrally located on the bar’s profile. The same concept applies to products. I can see how people are using a product and what kind of people are attracted to the product, etc.

The implementation of product tagging would give everyone something to gain:

Businesses pay to create a profile receiving a torrent of data allowing them to see how their business is being portrayed by Facebook users. To make information more presentable, they could also add an analytics application, like Google’s Analytics, that allows them to track trends and quantitative data, adding to the richness of the information they receive. A business is also able to position their products amongst the friends of Facebookers in a non-obtrusive way. I can’t even begin to imagine how much more effective a selling tool a friends picture would be as compared to an online banner.

Facebook generates a whole ton of revenue because the marketing is so effective businesses are willing to pay extravagant prices to have a profile.

The users benefit the most. We get deals for tagging things we already use, access to our friends things (example: that shirt looks cute, I wonder where she got it?) and every piece of information becomes subtly incorporated into our lives. Businesses that we have developed a bond with can now be considered our friends. We are allowed a whole new level of connectivity with the businesses that impact our lives.

If this hasn’t been done already, it will be soon. I just hope Facebook is the social network platform that offers it (or re-offers it).

Privacy Concerns

This idea will meet with some resistance by those who yell, “What about privacy?” Times are changing and that should go without saying. My generation has become conditioned to being tracked, and this has made us much more comfortable with divulging things that are revered as private by other people. We have been held more accountable for our actions from a younger age, and we’re viewed through a much more observing lens. After all, my thirteen year old brother has a cellphone that can be traced on a map and connected to a GPS navigator with a Verizon application. He’ll also have taken around 10 standardized tests that have traced his academic progress by the time he reaches college.

As we move into the future, our children will be exposed to even more personal tracking and exposure. Transparency is a trend that is going to accelerate as connectivity becomes easier. I don’t believe in fighting the trend. So, I work with it, and participate in the more positive aspects of growing transparency. If you are still uncomfortable, Facebook offers an extensive list of privacy options that can make you disappear off the Facebook grid.

The Impact

There are obvious downsides to businesses using this approach, as well. A business who uses the product tagging approach is exposing themselves in ways they can’t control. Sometimes, a business’ impact on a consumer is not a positive one. If they screw up, the negative reaction would be amplified under this system. Businesses participating in this system are putting a lot of trust into the hands of their customers, to help maintain a positive image in the public eye. If they don’t think they can develop this trust, or that this trust does not exist, it isn’t a problem with product tagging’s exposure, it’s a problem with the businesses’ image. Everything a business does will become that transparent eventually. Maybe a new criteria will evolve, “Is your business Facebook ready?”