More Digital blog

I was joking with some friends last week about going retro on communication for a week. No mobile phone, no internet. Just the house phone and me. Fortunately for me, my job depends on being connected, and there’s no way I can be on the internet and not do personal stuff (on my own time, of course). This got me and my friends joking about how we never left the house when we were waiting for a phone call back in high school. We’d sweat over sisters and brothers ‘tying up the line’ and making it impossible for us to speak with our boyfriends. Those were the days.

Flash forward 25 years. Communication has changed to the point that we are starting to rely less and less on our phones – even if we can take multiple calls at once from anywhere in the world. Today Mashable.com posted a piece called “What the Web of Tomorrow Will Look Like: 4 Big Trends to Watch’. As someone who loves anything tech, anything futuristic and tech and most things internet related (just not my complete inability to get OFF of it), I thought this would be very interesting for me to check out.

Once I read through it, I got to thinking. The one prediction that got my mind running was number 4. Social Media Will Be Its Largest Component. This lead me to start thinking of cool scifi movies I’ve seen and their predictions and which, if any, ever come true. There’s ‘Minority Report’. I think we’re getting to a point where we will be identified and personally addressed by ads as we walk through train stations, yep. BladeRunner has the video calling. Oh, by the way, I am certain there are many examples that pre-date the movies I’m mentioning, but that’s not the point. From there I got to Videodrome. Virtual/Reality.

Born was a kernel of a thought. What if Second Life had been introduced more recently. Let’s say two years ago. I wonder momentarily if it would have taken off but it was just seconds before its time. Per Wikipedia, the highest number of logged in avatars at the same time was in January ’09 – a paltry 88,200. Comparatively, Facebook states that more than 35,000,000 FB users change their status daily.  Having joined Second Life and logging a total of 3 hours on it, in toto, I can say that I don’t think so. It’s a really cool application and my mind raced at the potential and possibilities. But, in the end it was too hefty for me. Facebook, on the other hand, has got me hook, line and sinker. What I would like to see, and here I am going to make a prediction of my own that this will in fact happen, is a merging of a Second Life type of application with Facebook, or the development of something like it by Facebook. How many hours do your friends (and you, admit it) spend on Gangster Wars, or Farmville, or CafeWorld. To me it seems a natural progression. So, you heard it here first, folks. Too bad I don’t get paid for correct predictions.

What disappointed me about the forecast? That there wasn’t a feature that locks you out of your own devices under certain circumstances. I’m saying that if you are too drunk to be out in public, you are too drunk to be on Skype, IM, or even email. Of course, leave it to Google to have ‘Mail Goggles’. A tiny lab add-on that allows you to indicate after what time of night and on what days you will be required to take a short math test in order to send your mail. You can indicate how difficult the test is meant to be. I found it more annoying than useful, but to be truthful on more than occasion I had to complete the test several times before I could send the email. They should have a ‘maximum attempts’ setting in there, too. These seem like such simple, yet important, features that should be included on any device that can access the web.

There have been a lot of faith-restoring stories coming out of the social media world of late. Last week I wrote about the Facebook campaign that has helped save the life of young British student Philip Pain who fell seven-stories in Mexico and was in desperate need of blood. This week I want to acknowledge the huge effort made by social networking pages to help the people of Haiti.

Only minutes after the devastating earthquake floored the tiny Caribbean nation last Tuesday, the online world was mobilised and ready to help in any way it could.

One of the organisations leading the way was The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) who have now raised over £25 million after their appeal was announced on Twitter on last Wednesday.

The DEC has utilised Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and YouTube over the past week and their Chief Executive, Brendan Gormley, has publicly praised the significant role these social media sites have had in their campaign.

Mr. Gormley said, “Social networking has proven itself as a valuable addition to the fundraising machine. I’m thrilled that we have been able to quickly communicate and engage the UK public, who have in turn responded with tremendous generosity to help the people of Haiti who so urgently need our help.

“Their donations mean our member agencies can continue to source and deliver the emergency supplies needed like safe water, shelter, medicine and food. We hope people will continue to give their support so that more emergency aid can be added to what will be a massive humanitarian effort.”

DEC reported on Facebook that Flickr has been used to host images from the DEC’s member agencies, with 34,000 views of the DEC account on Friday, while a video of the DEC broadcast appeal has attracted nearly 4,000 views on YouTube.

Not only has social media been an outstanding tool to stimulate aid and increase donations, it has also played a vital role in spreading news and remarkably, locating victims.

“This is the first example we’ve seen where that sense of global community has been expressed in action, for example using social media technology to get the story out faster, to locate victims, and to give instantaneous donations,” said James Norrie, a media professor at RTS’s School of IT Management. “That’s an amazing use of a social media tool.”

The events in Haiti, while both shocking and saddening, have reinforced social media’s undoubted ability for social good.

I think Tom Brown, writing for The Burlington Free Press, captured it well when he wrote, “I’ve heard critics of social media say that users of communication tools such as Twitter and Facebook only want to talk to, and about, themselves and their friends. The earthquake in Haiti might help change the minds of some of those critics”.

“When people can respond that quickly and in such numbers to help their fellow man, then there certainly is hope”.

To make a donation to the DEC Haiti Earthquake Appeal visit www.dec.org.uk or call 0370 60 60 900, donate over the counter at any post office or high street bank, send a cheque made payable to ‘DEC Haiti Earthquake Appeal’ to ‘PO Box 999, London, EC3A 3AA’ or text GIVE to 70077 to donate £5. £5 goes to DEC. You pay £5 plus your standard network SMS rate.

The family of a young British student who fell from a seventh-floor balcony in Mexico have praised the Facebook campaign that has kept their son alive.

Philip Pain, 20, was rushed to hospital on New Years Day suffering from two broken legs, a broken lower back and crushed internal organs. With doctors fearing his rare O-negative blood type would leave them without enough blood to save him, Philip’s family and friends at home in Bexleyheath, Kent, launched a Facebook campaign to call on anyone who shared Philip’s blood-type to donate blood.

The Facebook campaign which now has over 13, 000 members has gathered enough blood to stabilise Philip and doctors believe without it he would not have survived. There is a chance a part of Philip’s foot may have to be amputated, but doctors have almost entirely ruled out any brain damage. While there is still some way to go, Philip’s condition is improving and his family have expressed their gratitude to everyone who has helped out.

Philip’s sister Stephanie Pain told KentOnline: “It’s been really overwhelming. People are tracking his progress who have never met him or any of the family. It’s very encouraging.”

“It has been fantastic that complete strangers are walking into hospital to give up their blood but we need it to continue,” she wrote on Facebook. “Without the blood that has reached Phil so far, he would not be alive as we speak. He is still in an induced coma but fingers crossed he can be weaned out of this next week. This is a dangerous time for him I have been warned so please keep praying.”

Philip’s father Neil Pain posted on Facebook: “I would like to thank all of you personally for the kind words and the proactive action that some of you have been able to offer.”

Join the Facebook campaign here.

If you know someone in the Mazatlan area in Mexico with type-O Negative blood ask them to contact the Sharp Hospital in Mazatlan on 66998656(78-84).

Something I came across today on mashable about Facebook and their new privacy settings seemed a good add on to my earlier post ‘P-R-I-V-A-C-E-E’. I’m on the fence about the privacy issue, sort of. But, while there are 6,453 settings already within FB, why not just give people all the options they want for privacy. It seems to me that not being able to hide some of your actions on your wall will only A) force people to work while at work, B) force people to be a lot less friendly (I wish Facebook were actually called ‘Friendster’. It’s too bad the name was already in use) and accept less friend requests to keep their privacy C) Chase away those hold outs who you’ve been trying to convince to join for the last two years. The gap between ‘those who will join one day’ and ‘those who will NEVER, not until hell freezes over’ grows wider when they hear you talking about the last scrap you got into with a friend or at work over something you posted on FB that you thought they couldn’t see.

As for me? Meh. But I purposefully chose the image for this post because I guess you could say that FB is staying true to their slogan. Talk about being ambivalent, eh?

So, Rage Against The Machine has snatched UK’s beloved Christmas number one spot from X-Factor winner Joe McElderry.

When Jon and Tracy Morter organised a Facebook group last month their sole aim was to end the monopoly Simon Cowell and his X-Factor buddies had on the coveted UK Christmas single. What it turned out to be was something slightly bigger.

For those of you who somehow missed this story. Jon and Tracy Morter are a couple from Essex who started a Facebook group called “Rage Against The Machine For Christmas Number 1” because they were “fed up” with X-Factor’s four-year chart dominance during festive season.

“Fed up of Simon Cowell’s latest karaoke act being Christmas No 1? Me too … So who’s up for a mass-purchase of the track ‘KILLING IN THE NAME’ from December 13^th as a protest to the X Factor monotony?”. With these words, the battle began.

The idea was to encourage ‘real music’ fans to buy American rock-rappers Rage Against the Machine’s expletive-filled 1992 single “Killing in the Name Of” in the lead up to Christmas in order to beat McElderry’s “The Climb” to the Christmas number one spot.

So, why did they choose a 17 year-old song with the words “’F— YOU I WON’T DO WHAT YOU TELL ME” repeated 17 times over a more appropriately-angled, perhaps family-friendly, song for the festive period?

“It’s a rallying cry,” Mr Morter told NME.COM. “It’s been taken on by thousands in the group as a defiance to Simon Cowell’s ‘music machine’.”

“We picked a song that was controversial and has a strong message, and it just seems to have captured everyone’s imagination,” Mrs Morter added.

When he first heard of the campaign, Cowell labeled it as “stupid” and “cynical” and claimed it was specifically directed at him. In the end though, Cowell was gracious in defeat and called Jon and Tracy personally to congratulate them on a “well-deserved win” and a “great fight”.

A great fight it was.

In the beginning, no one really expected them to actually pull this thing off. How could two, relatively average, people from the small town of South Woodham Ferrers in Essex possibly defeat the multi-million dollar empire of music mogul Cowell?

The thing is, this little Facebook group struck a cord with people. It was time to make a stand. It was time stick it to ‘the man’.

What this campaign demonstrated was, by using social media as the medium the ‘little guy’ can make a real difference in this world. When enough people get together and are motivated to really give something a shake, anything is possible.

“The campaign behind RATM is interesting in its own right. If only because, once again, it demonstrates the power — if it can be called that — of the emergent internet radicalism,” writes Phil BC at A Very Public Sociologist.

“With very little time and cost, people are able to register their protest/opposition without the rigmarole of standing in the rain, listening to boring speeches, and beating off the desperate efforts of Trot paper sellers.”

Captain Jako at Frank Owen’s Paintbrush has a similar view on the campaign, “It once again points to the democratic potential of the internet. A grassroots effort coordinated over social networking sites and with zilch budget has proved more effective than the largely traditional marketing techniques used by wealthy industry bigwigs like Simon Cowell to get even more money out of UK consumers.”

Just five years ago, a campaign like Jon and Tracy Morter’s was almost impossible to achieve. However, in Facebook, Twitter and other social media websites, society now has a very real vehicle for change.

Forty is the new Twenty, Fifty is the new Thirty, and so on. This year is seeing an unmistakable and much needed change in the perception towards the aged and ageing. Last week in The New York Times Magazine’s 9th Annual Year in Ideas, alongside Massively Collaborative Mathematics (Using a blog and blog comments to solve complicated equations…where was Google Wave when they needed it!), and The Google Algorithm as Extinction Model (Google, saving the world, once again) was a short piece entitled The Myth of the Deficient Older Person.

The tides are finally turning for older employees, perhaps too late for the thousands who have recently found themselves laid off and brushed off in the interview process (ask my father, who spent two years searching for an upper management position in technology. He recently retired instead). One more reason I’m glad the tides are turning? I’m tired of hearing my friends complaining about their parents being on Facebook. I doubt they’ll be part of the set who spends half their day updating their status while their bosses look on. IStrategy Networks reported that the month of August saw a 25% percent jump in users over 55. You can’t help but think that a huge chunk of a valuable workforce is wasting its talents on Facebook (not that mine aren’t)…

So Rupert Murdoch has had enough of Google and intends to slam the door on the search engine’s access to his news websites.

Earlier this week in an interview with Sky News Australia Murdoch finally bellowed the words he has been mumbling for years. When asked by Sky’s political editor David Speers why News Corp has not stopped Google users from accessing his news pages, Mr Murdoch replied: “I think we will.”

Murdoch proclaimed that, “There’s not enough advertising in the world to make all the Web sites profitable. We’d rather have fewer people coming to our Web sites, but paying.”

With these few sentences Murdoch has sparked frenzied debate, as much about his mental state, as the future of online news content.

Has this great man finally lost it? Is ol’ Roop starting to show his age? Or, is this all part of some master plan and a continuation of his genius?

Personally, I’m a little confused on this one. Is there something that I’m missing here? I write this with the utmost respect Mr. Murdoch, but… I can’t see how this could possibly work.

We live in a world where people now expect to consume their daily news for zilch.

We walk into the train station, we get handed a paper, or two, containing all we could possibly need to know about the days news, sports, weather and gossip for free. If that’s not enough, we can then browse through thousands of reputable news sources for free, read through Twitter and Facebook for free, and when the day comes to an end we get handed a freshly printed evening paper for…yep, you guessed it, F.R.E.E!

What does he expect us to do?

Murdoch argues that people will get what they pay for with his websites. He has promised premium reporting for those who choose to subscribe.

“Quality journalism is not cheap, and an industry that gives away its content is simply cannibalising its ability to produce good reporting.”

The way I see it is, sure, people do value quality journalism. But they value free a lot more and, to be honest, the reporting standard isn’t half-bad.

According to reports on Techradar, these pay-walls could be erected as soon as April, 2010.

So, will it be premium or freemium?

On Friday www.AllFacebook.com reported that Facebook has now surpassed 325 million users, in fact, more users than the United States has citizens (304 million as of the 2008 census reports). Facebook itself reports that over 70% of its users are outside the US, not surprising when you consider that only approximately 21% of US citizens have a passport and in my own personal experience I have found travel to be the quickest way to make new friends and Facebook the best way to keep up with those new friends and the ones I have stateside.

The United Kingdom gained the most new users of any European country last month, with 1.98 million new people using the site. It continues to be the single largest country for Facebook on the continent, with 22.6 million monthly active users. Behind the three Scandinavian countries mentioned, it has the fourth-highest-penetration rate, at 36.9%. Meanwhile, France and Italy both grew by more than a million users, with Turkey, Spain and Germany close behind.

Meanwhile Facebook gained more than 2 million new people across Latin America and the Caribbean in September to reach 35.4 million monthly active users.

Facebook also reports that its fastest growing demographic is in users over 35, and Istrategylabs.com reports that in the 6 month period ending July 4th, 2009 Facebook saw a 513% growth in 55+ year old users. Being a hair’s breath away from 38 myself, I’ve found in the last year and a half I have had a decreasing amount of conversations with friends who claim they are ‘too old for Facebook’, and of those who have joined of late, they certainly get their Facebook on in your average day. I suppose the question becomes where’s the ceiling? I guess we’ll see.