broadstuff

Where is the News?

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 23:57:30 +0000

In other words, its All Quiet on the Digital Front.

Of course, there were the standard corporate barrages of [Company A] pimping [Product B] by paying bloggers to PR across the blogosphere, a few sniping [Ludicrous Claim C] aimed at [Well know Target D] to linkbait, there were advances as [Tinpot Company E] breathlessly announces [Deal F], and retreats as [Mr or Ms G] throws PR smoke over [failed effort H]. And of course the consolidation of long running skirmishes into new battle lines as [Douchebag I] settles a dispute with [Dumbass J]. And of course there is always leaflet dropping of pinups over the troops in the trenches

Its all on the cover of Techmeme.

The Twittersphere was the standard fare of "Look at Meeee - I'm doing" [Insert latest Project / Thing to Be Seen Doing / Place to Do Lunch] plus Retweet the [Person I worship / Cause I support].

So, its not to say that there was "no" news, just it was all same old same old - the "official" news curating organs for the "New" media are increasingly trumpeting "mainstream" news that they looked to be so samey that I really couldn't get excited about anything to write about.

For a bit I thought about commenting on the rather limp claim that Microsoft is the New General Motors (rather than the New IBM) but it just fits into [C/D] category I noted above, and, well....yawn.

Or, I could comment on the session on Privacy vs Datamining at Telco 2.0, but its Old News, its just the standard sordid story of the commercially interested trying to scrape the dumb punter's data for nowt while trying to stop the powers that be restricting their activity. That's been going for years and merely falls into the Douchebag/Dumbass camp.

So where is the real stuff going on, where are the next big fronts going to be opened up, I wondered? The main curating organs tend to be increasingly taking news from the Big Battalions, the Twitterstream is increasingly filled with people pimping.

So I went back to Doing it Myself. I did this in three ways:

Firstly, I set up some Twitter Lists (private only) of people who say or point to interesting things, and started to read what they were saying

Secondly, I went back to some of the bloggers who used to hit Techmeme often c 2 years ago, and rejigged an RSS feed just for them (Don't stop blogging, Don Dodge)

Thirdly, I researched the conversations I had in Tuttle this morning - its an idea exchange, memes in the aether were:

- Shifts in the Enterprise 2.0 marketplace
- Is there a tectonic shift in politics - not just digital media, but signs that the last tectonic shift - organised labour as a force - is coming to an end
- Identity as a backing for digital currency
- Not for profits are the new For Profits
- Twitterpimping and the Empty Vessel rule - the less you have to say, the more often you say it

There is, of course, a whole wellspring of new ideas - but the New Media runs the risk of increasingly looking like the Old Media by repeating mainstream News. Its what brands and advertisers want (volume) but its not what I want (variety and value). The whole point of teh blogosphere was that it was not a broadcast media, and it increasingly seems to be turning into one, which begs the question....

But of course, this being the InterWebs, I can configure them to get what I want. The New news is I've felt the need to do it for the first time in about 3 years.

The Game Theory of the Media future

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:21:10 +0000

Prof David Touve's Game Theory of Media Futures

The Telco 2.0 Brainstorm conference today witnessed a very rare talk - it used Game Theory to explain the options for the future of the media mediums (Music, TV etc). Professor David Touve of the Williams School of Commerce asked the 100+ assembled people there 5 pithy questions:

1. Is Media a Product or a Service?
The results - 90% thought it was a service, 10% a product. David said it was both, an also an experience, a cultural artifact and a social penomenon - and as it changes so the "money" vein shifts.

2. Do you believe the "3 strikes and you're out" policy will (i) decrease, (ii) increase, or (iii) give no change in Piracy?.
- 20% thought it would decrease, 10% increase, 70% no change

In other words, given that most of the techs know it won't work why would you do this? This goes back to my"Things White People Don't Like - Real Geeks" post. Telco people by and large are real geeks - digerati not chatterati, and as I pointed out in my post, "White" vpeopl tend to ignore their know-how and thus get things wrong. Like 3 strikes and out policies.

But the big picture absurdity of the Meedja was beautifully pinpointed by his next 3 questions:

3. Will a policy of filtering/disconnecting give a better economic outcome than licencing for Media?
result - 20% filtering, 80% licencing

4. Will a policy of filtering/disconnecting give a better economic outcome than licencing for ISPs?
result - 25% filtering, 75% licencing

5. Will a policy of filtering/disconnecting give a better economic outcome than licencing for Telco
result - 25% filtering, 75% licencing

The result is the "prisoners dilemma" game table you see on top, which shows clearly that the "optimal" box for Media rightsholder and ISP is licencing, yet the sad thing is a combination of self-optimisation and sheer pig headedness is driving the industry to a defect "disconnect/filter/net neutrality" fight as both tries to maintain its advantage and wants the other side to cave in.

QED.

Are we more innovative now than 100 years ago?

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 23:37:00 +0000

First Cut Innovation Index 1.0 - from Broasight

Last week I shared a podium with Bill Thompson and Peter Cochrane following a preview of the new BBC series on the emergence of the 'Net at Nico macDonald's Innovation Forum event on "The Internet - Next 40 Years" event. We have been doing some background research on the issue of Innovation in 2009 following a piece done for NESTA earlier this year on how Innovation was impacted by the Great Depression (answer: it flourished, and companies started then - Texas Instruments, Hewlett Packard etc - kept on being innovative until In Search Of Excellence was written).

At any rate, another thing I looked at was the history of innovation over the last 100 years, from 1909 to 2009. If I had a hypothesis before starting it would be that there was an accelerating pace of innovation. The results - so far - tell me that is not the case, and it is probably cyclical. In fact, one could argue that innovation in 1909, 1949 and 1969 was greater than 2009.

Heresy? Well, here's some thoughts for you. I looked at Innovation along a number of areas that "move the needle" as far as changing things is concerned, and here is a quick summary of the more detailed research:

1. Transport:

The period 1899 - 1909 went from Zero to Bleriot in powered flight, from horseless carriages to model T Fords and saw the launch of HMS Dreadnought in 1906, that was the culmination of a massive period of innovation as shipping went from wooden sailing ships to steam and steel, and from average speeds of 6 to 30 knots.

The period 1999-2009 saw the withdrawal of Concorde and the height of aerospace design being making ever bigger air buses. Land transport has seen very little significant advances since 1989 (Did you know there were probably more electric cars in 1909 as a % of cars than today) and shipping hasn't moved forward since containerisation. The speed of an omnibus through Central London has hardly changed in 100 years.

2. Communications

In the decade to 1909 moving pictures and radio were developed and telephony was the "Internet" of the era, expanding rapidly at the telegraph's expense and the first "wireless" telephony was tested.

In 2009 we are looking back at the rapid rise of broadband as high speed moved from 128kb/sec to (up to) 50 Mb/sec in the UK, faster elsewhere. A huge increase to be sure, but still roughly on a par with the jump in speed from telegraph to telephone.

3. Public Health

The 20 years to 1909 sees a concerted push on clean drinking water and elimination of major diseases via the biotechnology of the time in the "OECD". Child mortality rates halve nearly very decade going forward, average life expectancy starts to rise

The period to 2009 arguably sees a return in the "OECD" of diseases tat were being cleared up in 1909, and the major pharmaceutical companies have arguably shifted gear from solving the diseases of the many to solving the diseases of the rich, driving an increasing market in generic drugs and alternative medicines. Biotechnology and DNA based innovation continues apace, but whether it is more transformative than the work being done from the breakthroughs in chemistry and microbiology 100 years ago is debatable.

4.Utilities

In 1909, in the "OECD" Electricity is moving "into the Cloud" as generation becomes more industrialised, and is moving into the home. As noted above, water and sewage are increasingly being operated at citywide level or greater, and the consolidation of railways is nigh complete and the start of the consolidation of 6,000 telephone companies in the US is about to start.

In 2009 we see the energy focus is on "Green Energy" - but all the technologies are at least 30 years old with (arguably) little major advance in that period apart from solar energy - Wind and BioFuels in fact are still net negative energy generation technologies, and it is highly likely that much of the OECD's short term energy needs will be met from nuclear energy (a 1949 technology) or rebuilding coal based generation. Railroads are on the increase, via fast trains (first used in 1969), and water supplies in the OECD are not much advanced on 1909, but are better diffused - but in cities like London its getting worse as many of the pipes are still from the previous era.

5. Information Technology

The period around 1909 sees the formation of IBM, NCR and various manufacturers of mechanical computers (mainly for money handling).

In 2009 IT is still under the impact of Moore's Law, the integration with the internet allows it to benefit from Metcalfe's Law, and the emergence of Robotics as a seriously shape changing industry owing to the above shifts. This is the one area I looked at where the 1909 period is not showing material shift in capability.

6. The Smart Home

The period around 1909 sees the invention of electric versions of most of the domestic appliances we use today, the electric light bulb and early fluorescent lighting. The period around 2009 is seeing the first intelligent, networked domestic appliances in "smart homes" and the (legislated and not very popular) introduction of the first major step forward in light bulbs in decades. The growth in networked home security would make little sense in 1909 as security was not nearly as much an issue in the first place. In 1909 home delivery was fairly common from the butchers; bakers and candlestick makers' "boys", in 2009 online ordering/physical delivery is reversing a mid century trend towards "consumer carries".

7. Media

In 1909, Radio and Film are starting to impact the traditional media, censorship is emerging in movies due to the rise in "adult" content (all new media see major innovation from porn in their early days), and are the first big hits on the hegemony of Print media. In 2009 Web based Video and Audio is starting to impact TV and Radio, and the Internet is starting to impact Print media. In 1909 music was largely user generated round the family piano, in 2009 it is far more "user generated" than for the previous 60 years

8. Human Freedom

The 1909 period sees the organisation of labour as a pressure group and it becoming a political force, and the emergence of female emancipation as a campaign issue (the Suffragettes ring a bell?). 2009 sees Environmentalism and a form of Anti-Capitalist/Globalisation movement as the main campaigning causes. Arguably the Environment could be a bigger issue, but labour and female emancipation is a pretty impressive ticket for 1909.

We also looked at 1929 (more a period of consolidation of the turn of the century), 1949 (massive innovation during and immediately after WW2), 1969 (huge innovation spilling out from space race and Cold War (including the DARPANet) and large R&D labs like Bell, BT etc are in their heyday. 1989 again looks like a period of consolidation. I've put up above 4 of the 6 decades in an early-day "Innovation Index" slide I did for the event (1969 being a key year to look at), and I put in 1929 due to the Crunch connotations). The Index is showing innovation in each sector relative to the others decades, so green = high, red = not high. Using a simple green = 3, red =1 scale allows a rough numerical index that argues - across all the areas - we are relatively less innovative today.

Now, you can argue that in 2009 we are seeing Nano and a host of technologies, but you can also fairly easily find similar very significant breakthroughs in the similar 1889 - 1909 period (X rays anyone?). You can also argue that diffusion of innovation is far faster today, but that is - arguably - not an acceleration of innovation in itself.

So in conclusion, although we think of ourselves as the most innovative generation, Evah!, the truth is that we are not as far ahead as we would like to think, and in fact, given the comms advances we have today, it is arguable we should be a lot better at it - in fact, one could argue that some things are going backwards, and to an extent we are actually resting on the laurels of work done in the last 100 years.

Looking at why innovation may be less than it could be, we see 3 potential major trends emergent in the last 20 years:

- Risk aversion - a lot of innovation today is more about making things safer, more reliable (the positives of risk aversion) but arguably we also have far lower ambitions. Today any major scientific program inevitably hits the "we could spend this on [choose your short term cause here]" (The day I did my talk this was exactly the complaint aired on the BBC about the new Aries 5 rocket NASA launched).

- Short Termism - National and Corporate R&D has largely been racked back and there is an increasing short termist view on how money is used. In fact, in may sectors there has been more innovation in the financial side than the product side, which has often used "globalisation" as a way of avoiding unionised and minimum wage labour in "OECD" countries and outsourced work to much lower wage countries.

- IPR/Patent blockages in OECD countries slows down cycles. In the decades before 1909 the USA wilfully ignored British and European Patent rules for "Pirate Innovation", and arguably China and a few other countries are doing the same today.

Being a bit more sanguine, we see a number of social trends kicking off now, driven by the IT/Net and other drivers (the crunch, shifts in global power, economics of energy. various philosophical/religious fundamentalisms) promise to be significant in the future, so we suspect that the 2009 - 2029 period will - as the Depression did - drive major innovation

How the revolting Twittermobs are devaluing Whuffie

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 00:08:00 +0000

The Twitter Lynchmob kicked off when a UK Twitterer dared to find Stephen Fry "a bit boring" has made the New York Times. That is an astounding occurrence for what is still a tiny social network. But to me the more interesting thing about this is its another lesson (after quite a few in recent weeks) of the way Whuffie (Social Capital) really works in Social Networks, despite the best intentions of the optimists.

In a nutshell, the lessons are that:

- All Social Networks seem to follow a strong power law effect, with top status people having a lot more Whuffie than the majority in the Long Tail. It is also an increasing returns dynamic, ie the rich get even richer over time (exacerbated by things like "suggested user lists" of high whuffie individuals)

- If you are even slightly unpleasant to someone with a very large number of followers, a non-trivial % will prove to be rabid acolytes, and you will be hounded by those people with virtual torches and pitchforks.

- Even if the high whuffie person probably had no real desire to cause such damage in the first place, the acolytes will still egg each other on.

- A Low Whuffie person who is hammered online by the acolytes of a high Whuffie person will have very little redress, at least initially, as....

- It takes time for some form of "fairness grouping" to emerge, in which time a lot of damage can potentially be done (addresses and phone numbers are given out online for example)

What this implies is twofold:

(i) Without some form of internal system moderation, whether manual or automatic, a social network will by its structure tend to mob lynch rule.

(ii) To any external party that the mob rule is trying to influence, Whuffie will be massively devalued. Taking the episodes of the last few weeks, Trafigura was high impact, but who is realistically going to take a Twitter campaign as seriously after this weekend. And after 10 more such occurrences (and there will be 10 more, probably by New Year). And 100?

I was trying to put some numbers to this latter point today and used the concept of "weak" vs "strong" tells to define one's committment to The Cause (whatever it is).

On Twitter, all I need do is Re-Tweet a call to action, or (slightly more time) press a Vote button on some online poll set up, install a twibbon or paint my avatar some colour. A matter of a few seconds. These are very weak tells, take virtually no effort.

Now imagine if I tried to complain in "real life" - probably the least effort is to send an email to some politician or body responsible - its probably several minutes to write, lets say about 2 - so thats c 120 seconds to say 1-2 for a retweet. So an email is 2 orders of magnitude stronger as a "tell".

Using real goods, the easiest is probably a postcard to said politician or body responsible - I'd argue that its probably 10 times more effort than an email to write, post, deliver and read at the other side, never mind the price of a stamp. This is starting to become a strong tell.

And by the time its a march of protestors giving up a whole day, that's several thousand orders of magnitude stronger as a tell.

Thus, many more of these sort of "24 hour witch burnings" on Twitter and most people will shrug off a Twitter Mob as you would an attack by a horde of storm flies - some will irritate your eyes and ears, some will get up your nose and in your hair, but they will be easily brushed off.

In other words, the correct response to the cry "The peasants on Twitter are revolting" (again) is, Yes, they are, aren't they

Which is a pity, because sometimes the wolves being bayed at are real, like in the Trafigura case.

iPhone as e-Reader? I get the picture...

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 09:23:41 +0000

Dr Seuss - his early political satire cartoons prove remarkably timely today

An Article in GigaOm arguing that the iPhone is the Next e-Reader:

Yesterday at the urging of a friend, I ordered “Your Brain at Work” by David Rock on my iPod touch via the Amazon Kindle app. In doing so, I became one of many people who are helping the iPhone become more than just a phone. It’s latest role: e-reader....

Apparently this is because "Book-related apps saw an upsurge in launches in September, according to a survey conducted by Flurry, a San Francisco-based mobile application analytics company. So much so, that book-related applications overtook games in the App Store as a percentage of all released apps. The trend isn’t an aberration. In October, one out of every five new applications launching on the iPhone was a book, Flurry said". Furthermore:

The sharp rise in e-book activity on the iPhone indicates that Apple is positioned to take market share from the Amazon Kindle as it did from the Nintendo DS. Despite the smaller form factor of the display, we predict that the iPhone will be a significant player in the book category of the media and entertainment space. Further, with Apple working on a larger tablet form factor, running on the iPhone OS, we believe Jeff Bezos and team will face significant competition.

As with all pronouncement from Planet Mobile, it is best to divide by 2 and only then take a long, hard, sceptical look. I have an iPhone. I read webpages on it, and that does (it is true) replace time reading books on shorter train journeys.

Now maybe its just me, but I find the ergonomics of reading long text on a c 2" x 3" screen quite hard (and I have very good eyesight, still). Twitter is ok, email is ok, and I can even read Powerpoint slides - in fact slides work quite well because the writing is big and they have pictures. So I'd make a guess that the books that will read well on iPhones will be books with big letters and pictures on them, like cartoons (or Graphic Novels if you are an adult) and kids books (rolling them together, I have a - timely - cartoon above by Dr Seuss, who was also a fairly satrical cartoonist in his youth), and of course Manga, which is read on mobiles in Japan.

But War and Peace? No way, unless, of course, it is in pictures.....actually, this means there may be a space for Classics Illustrated, a feature of my not entirely mis-spent youth

But realistically? I suspect e-Reading will be for devices with screens of at least double the length and breadth, and this will be a "good enough" for short form text for a short time, as it is with video.

Beyond Freeconomics?

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 07:21:13 +0000

I read this article on the development of Google's own global mapping service with increasing incredulity and sad amusement. It's called "Google Redefines Disruption: The “Less Than Free” Business Model".

Less than Free, eh - how does that work?

The article is about Google building its own global mapping data, and then no longer buying data from the existing 2 players (NavTeq and TeleAtlas) and then sticking it in Android and giving it away for free:

As we noted in our take on the free business model, “if a disruptive competitor can offer a product or service similar to yours for ‘free,’ and if they can make enough money to keep the lights on, then you likely have a problem.” It would be one thing if this were merely a mean-spirited play by Google to put an end to the GPS data duopoly. But it is not. There are multiple facets to this remarkably disruptive move.

While it is obvious that this maneuver creates a problem for the multi-billion dollar GPS market, it also poses real challenges for the leading smart phone players – RIM’s Blackberry and Apple’s iPhone. Without access to their own mapping data, these vendors now face an interesting dilemma. Do you risk flying naked without free navigation or do you suck it up and swallow the above average royalty fee for each and every handset? Neither option is stellar. This problem isn’t nearly as daunting as the one now faced by the Windows Mobile and Symbian teams. As software providers, they are lucky to get a per unit royalty equal to that extracted by the GPS data guys. If they are now forced to integrate this data merely to keep their product competitive, their gross margin just went negative. Ouch!

Yup, it is usually upsetting to players in a sector when a huge behemoth enters by giving away a product. In the Old Days this was called a cross subsidy, and when Microsoft used to do it people called them Evil etc for using their vast revenues in Sector A to drive competitors out of Sub Sector B or C. In fact, in the Old Days it even used to be frowned on, and people reached for the Anti Trust guns. But this is Google, so it is of course Radical New Economics. What really had me chortling morbidly was tying Google's activity to that of a nimble startup:

I like to think of myself as an aficionado of business disruption. After all, as a venture capitalist it is imperative to understand ways in which a smaller private company can gain the upper hand on a large incumbent. One of the most successful ways to do this is to change the rules of the game in such a way that the incumbent would need to abandon or destroy its core business in order to lay chase to your strategy....

.....when I read this week that Google was including free turn-by-turn navigation directions with each and every Android mobile OS, I had an immediate feeling that I was witnessing a disruptive play of a magnitude heretofore unseen.

What is it about Google that makes people look at the basic exercise of monopoly power and write pages of paean of New Economic claptrap? Or, as one of the commentators put it:

Seems like a high-minded analysis of the simple fact that while Google is swimming in cash compared to its closest-thing-to-competitors, it can easily afford gargantuan investments that shareholders would normally balk at. Could you, for example, compare the mobile ad revenue over the next five years with the cost of developing Android and digitizing every street on earth? Likely below the ROI threshold of a normal company with short-term focus. In my opinion, simply a benefit of Google’s cingular, lucrative Ads business and rather than a proactive attack on competition. Btw, I am a Google shareholder.

But because its Web 2.0 and its Google it is of course a Radical Thing That No one Has Thought Of And Will Change The World.

Bah Humbug!

Jousting in the Twitter Lists

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 21:22:20 +0000

Twitter has released the ability to make lists of people, ie group 'em in convenient monotypes:

We’re putting the finishing touches on our new Lists feature and we're really excited about the folks who have already taken a lot of time creating awesome lists. From the @time list of funny people to your own list of people who make you laugh—it's easy to see how this feature increases discovery and adds value in lots of ways.

Lists also make it easier to curate tweets into meaningful real-time experiences on your own sites via the Lists API. Media companies are already taking advantage: for example, check out @huffingtonpost's use of the Lists API in their World Series coverage.

@Bettydraper/rolodex: A collection of fan-created Mad Men characters
@NYTimes/staff: The colorful people behind The Gray Lady
@BBC/radio1-1xtra: Turns out BBC radio hosts are a chatty bunch
@Joesebok/poker: A list of professional poker players by a professional poker player
@jayrosen/mindcasters: A list of the some of the best new media thinkers by an NYU professor
@Stocktwits/suggested: A list of traders for stock market fanatics

We’ve been taking our time rolling out the lists feature to make sure things go smoothly and developers have a chance to begin experimenting with our Lists API. For example, TLISTS will provide tools to efficiently build, measure and distribute Lists, while Listorious hosts a directory of 'awesome lists' on Twitter.

The really, really interesting thing is that you can have Public lists. Anyone can curate and publish these lists, and put anyone else on it. So if you have an idea for one, just click "New list" in the sidebar of your Twitter account and you're on your way. However. the above options don't go far enough - I see the opportunity not just for extending one's egosystem, but for more radical waggish fun and mayhem - so the suggestions below probably go too far :

@Hotornot/Twittergals - the jolly grouping of all those Ladies (or men, we ain't sexist here) and the opportunity to decide who are not a perfect "10"
@Bastardswhof*ckedmeover - just as it says on the tin. Build your own antisocial network, hours of entertainment for the whole extended digifamily
@Jerkswhotalkaboutlunch - for people who like talking about what they had for lunch on Twitter.
@CoffeeteableTwitterList - Your List of People you Should Be Following so other people think you are UberCool
@PeopleI'msuckingupto - Would be even better if you could auto-retweet them all
@Peoplewhoowememoney - put your debtor list online (hat tip Steve Lawson)
@Iwouldn'tfollowthesewankersifmylifedependedonit - "unlists" (hat tip JP Rangaswami)

Blimey, that was quick.......

Now, apparently you can exeunt yourself from being on these sorts of lists by blocking them yourself, but that seems time consuming for the poor listee, so no doubt some more sophisticated controls will have to emerge.

Ah - I see the List Facility is also on my account.......... I may be gone some time, I have some listbots to write

Stuff White People Don't Like #2 - Real Geeks (#CabinetForum Redux)

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 20:57:00 +0000

There is a post on the marvellously satirical blog Stuff White People Like, on White (White in the sense of US slang for the Lefty Liberal Intelligentsia) people's view of people who Know About Technology

When white people go away to college, they tend to study what are knowns as the Arts. This includes actual Art, English, History, Classics, and Philosophy. These can of course be broken down further into Film, Womyn’s Studies (yes the spelling is correct), Communications, Gender Studies, and so forth. It is important to note that a high percentage of white people also get degrees in Political Science, which is pretty much like arts, and only seems to have the word “science” in it to make white people feel better about themselves.

........

But what about the white people who study Science, Engineering or Business? Unless they become doctors, they essentially lose white person status (and can only be regained by working at a non-profit).

Now, I was reminded of this over the last few days because I was listening to the debates on the C&binet Forum Conference sessions over the Internet whilst working. This was an invite only session, and it became increasingly clear to me over the 2 days I was listening in, that this discussion about the future of digital media was being essentially run by White people, talking to White people, for the benefit White people. I doubt there was the merest smattering of a Tech Major present. (OK, I exaggerate - but just look at the forum's blogroll - nary a techie blogger in the whole roll, its MSM tech journos all except for TechCrunch - who, of course, were not actually invited to the event, being, well, Tech Crunchies )

One can argue that this is fine, after all heaven forbid the critical Affairs of State be decided by people who are not White! (I mean, if we had a Real democracy we'd be doing weird things like not invading random Mid-Asian countries, for example - imagine that!) The big problem with technology is that, by and large, mainstream Meedja, Journos and Politicians - the "White" people mainly invited to these sorts of bashes - actually don't by and large know how all this stuff actually works (Sorry good people, but being on Twitter and/or Facebook and even having an instapundit blog on Wordpress doesn't quite qualify). This means that when the Dark People who run theEvil Corporations appear and talk smoothly about how the Digital Landscape works, then the White people get totally bamboozled and either lap it up (if its a "Good" Evil Corporation - Google Neutrality anyone?) or tend to run around jousting at various largely irrelevant windmills, muddying the Ether nets.

Its the (smoothly) bland leading the blind. (By the way, JP Rangaswami has written a great fiskpost on Dark Lord Mandelson's nefarious scheme over here......)

Which is why, of course, the UK is in the Digital Shi....Situation it is in. 'Nuff said........

I had written the above last night and was going to spike it under the "This Would Seem Like Sour Grapes Because You Weren't Invited* " heading (that, and this article probably is as close to a perfect 10 on the Paul Carr Scale of How to Lose Friends and Piss People Off that I've ever come) , but then I read about an Unconference that was held at the above Cabinet Forum by some of the attendees, and was run for roughly the same reasons that I raised as issues above. It is written up here on the Pervasive Media Blog. Here is a synopsis of the conclusions.

University is broken. Education is way behind industry. Our education system needs to change - places like RCA, ITP, University of South California are brilliant at fostering creative entrepreneurialism by getting artists, writers, programmers etc to work together on one project. We need to teach teamwork and interdisciplinary, entrepreneurial skills through an embedded cross-cutting logic.

There is a need for more computer scientists coming into the creative industries in order to create innovative products, but this often causes a disjunct in language and understanding.

We need a new generation of producers with more diverse skills and an overview of the industry - 'super-producers'

We need to support the brokers, the people who bring together the creatives with businesses, brands, finance etc. At present there is no core support for this kind of role, though there is general acknowledgment it has financial, cultural and social impact. We need to invest time in our own businesses to make connections.

Collaboration isn't just about money its about making things happen and learning from each other.

May I emphasize "There is a need for more computer scientists coming into the creative industries in order to create innovative products" and "We need a new generation of producers with more diverse skills and an overview of the industry"

They are right of course, but lets just go down another level on the implications:

- Firstly, it is fascinating that in 2009 the "Creative Industries" by and large still do not, it would appear, automatically include Digital Media at their heart - you cannot apparently, you see, be Creative if you are not White and are a Geek.

- Secondly, there is technology all over and under the Creative Industries already - its just that, because the Real Geeks are not White, the IT is Crowded in basements, Morlock-like and kept from sight (and under-utilised).

Once upon a time, the White people of the Media-Political complex were called the "Chattering Classes" and had Dinner Parties in Islington, but now some are paddling in the shallower waters of technology and thus label themselves as Geeks, or even "Digerati". This is of course inaccurate, the correct term is Chatterati, obviously. Digerati by and large know how this stuff actually works, and work in - or even run real businesses in - the space. Unfortunately, many Digerati are inarticulate, wear unfashionable glasses and look like the IT Crowd, so they are best left Unseen and Unheard. (This of course is what Quangos are for - Quangos allow White people to draw large salaries for performing the unpleasant job of managing Real Geeks, so that other White People don't have to see them at conferences like this...... )

So, next C&binet Forum, I would like to see some of the people there who do actually know how this sh*t all works rebutting some of the claims made. Some positive discrimination for people who actually did some Maths in their university degrees, for example, would be helpful. People with unfashionable glasses and haircuts. Maybe even people who studied IT. (OK, OK, thats probably going too far.....)

Oh, and as for the the Blogroll....c'mon guys, you need to read a bit wider than that. You could even read this 'ere Broadstuff blog, after all, we've been shortlisted for the BIMAS so we must be some cop......

*The tongue is , I hope, firmly in the cheek - and what cheek - They did, after all, streamcast the sessions and put it all up on Twitter for comment. I'm thus now awaiting the Grapes of Wrath

(Update - In the interests of journalistic balance, there is a far more sanguine post by Anthony Mayfield, on TechCrunch EU oddly enough . Anthony imho doesn't go far enough on the Tech lack - this post, on the other hand, goes too far )

(Update 2 - To explain a bit of my frustration here - we do a lot of work in this space, and I will shortly post up some research we have done on the pace of innovation over the last 100 years or so that I presented at the "Internet: Next 40 Years" session last night. In essence, the changes that are coming to the media have been predictable - and have been predicted - for at least 15 years to my certain knowledge and have happened more than once before over the last 100 years, and are not quick - its a 20 - 30 year repetitive cycle, from novel technology driving economic shift to screams for industry protection to social takeup to regulatory shift to it all happening again. (see here for some of our previous analysis on the situation). It just makes me very frustrated that, because the answers aren't "under the Creative Media lampost" as it were, they are deemed not to exist, or at least don't get airtime.)

(Update 3 - a friend pointed me to this 2006 post from Tom Coates saying much the same as I said above. I love the analogy of the Old Order wailing for assistance because it can't run away from the snail)

(Update 4 - in response to some comments below, and several emails and DM's from people. I was not so much shooting at the people in the room or Arts majors per se, as I wrote in the Comments:

"I was more aiming at the weird - and unique to UK thing I think - of the wide separation of Arts and Tech in the culture, so the governing class (the media-political and to an extent financial set) by and large have a very small amount of tech in their "DNA". And in a world that is increasingly driven by its technology, this to my mind opens 2 major risks:

(i) Misunderstanding - of how the technology works, which leaves the policymakers - and media overall - very vulnerable to misconceptions, bamboozlement and snake oil salesmen.

(ii) Missed opportunities - not understanding what is going on , and even worse being misled by the vested interests, leads to a lot of wasted time, resource and effort.

I feel extremely strongly about this (as the above post shows, methinks) - we are a small niche strategy consultancy in this space, we study the UK vis a vis other countries, we study this technology age vs previous ones and do future projections - and the things that stare out at you when you do are:

(i) This era of change is not unique - for those that can be bothered to do so, there are plenty of lessons from previous technology waves that can be instructive. And the Old Order always reaches for the protectionist lever.

(ii) Britain as a country is losing out competitively by a failure to optimise its takeup of these industries. It has actually done well despite the best efforts of its vested interests and many policy decisions, a testament to the creativity of its arts and technology establishments, but things are accelerating and there needs to be a co-ordinated approach if it is to carry on batting at its weight, never mind above it

So it is frustrating to see the (smoothly) bland leading the blind in 2009. There is no need, and little excuse for it. That the "Stuff White people like" blog is written in the USA proves they have the same ideological issues, but the fact they also have held the technology lead since the 1950's shows they are able to overcome it too.

Three strikes and you're......

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:03:00 +0000

Peter Mandelson today said that the UK will get a "3 strikes and you're off the Internet" rule by April 2010. The BBC notes that:

Lord Mandelson emphasised that cutting off internet connections would be a "last resort".

"I have no expectation of mass suspensions. People will receive two notifications and if it reaches the point [of cutting them off] they will have the opportunity to appeal," Lord Mandelson told the audience at the C&binet Forum, a talking shop set up by government to debate the issues facing the creative industries (of which more, later). The pay-off for tough penalties against persistent file-sharers would be a more relaxed copyright regime, Lord Mandelson said. The details of it would need to be hammered out at European level but it would take account of the use of copyright material "at home and between friends", he said.

It would mean that, for example, someone who has bought a CD would be able to copy it to their iPod or share it with family members without acting unlawfully.

Well, that's akin to giving people what they already have with one hand while extracting something with the other hand - I don't know anyone who has ever been prosecuted for taping their own CD's or loading music onto their spouse's iPod. Still, there are some delicious turns of phrase:

....he emphasised that "legislation and enforcement can only ever be part of the solution".

The long-term answer was for the industry to educate users and to offer new and cheaper ways to download content, he said. In addition, new copyright laws were needed to lift restrictions on how people moved content on to the various different devices that they owned.

(Italics are mine.) There's a subtle knife twist in there, around those words "cheaper", "lift" and "restrictions". Its the music rightsholders that are behind this, they are trying to get the ISP's to police it - and bear some of the costs. They are not going to like those 3 words. The ISP's have also hit back where it hurts - in the wallet:

The Internet Service Providers' Association thinks rightsholders should shoulder the burden for all costs, including the reimbursement of ISPs.

"This approach is consistent with the principle of beneficiary pays and would serve to incentivise rightsholders to develop new business models and ensure an effective and efficient use of notifications and targeted legal action," read a statement from ISPA.

Which is a sound principle in most sensible legal systems. Another sound principle is that any law that criminalises the majority of its citizens will be made an ass of. The issue, of course, is the one the industry doesn't really want to adress - ie overcharging, What no-one who looks at this "gets" is why this industry feels the Apple model - decent quality at reasonable prices - isn't acceptable.

Now Lord Mandelson, of all people, knows all this. He also knows the Labour party has near zero chance of getting this law through before the next election anyway. Plus there are far bigger fish to fry, so why cause a storm in a teacup full of bloggers, music fans, open rights activists etc who like nothing better than a nice righteous campaign to get off on?

Part of the answer is the size of the industry, c £16bn annually, which the Government needs to ensure (i) keeps its revenue going and people employed and (ii) that they can tax, especially now the City's golden egg is broken.

Another part, suggested by some scurrilous wags, is that some of that £16bn turnover is used to fund lobbying activity, and....well, what with all the other parliamentary expenses being curtailed these days.........but frankly, thats too obvious a ploy, and if you need petty cash go float a bank or two.

Must admit I'm stumped on this at the moment.

A Sale of Two Twitters

nospam@example.com (Alan Patrick) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:57:21 +0000

Dave McCandless's stunning data diagrams

On Monday I attended the Media 140 Conference. Owing to a confluence of adverse railway related issues, I arrived late (Am reconsidering my opposition to fascism, I think Focussed Fascism - on the trains - would be a Good Thing) so missed the first morning session (but Adam Tinworth has blogged the whole day starting here). The aim of the day was to explore how microblog systems (ie Twitter) work in a more commercial arena for brands, ie "Everything a brand needs to know about twitter & real-time social media". This meant, on the day, focus was mainly on sales, marketing, PR and the occasional dive into customer service rather than any more operational uses.

At any rate, these are the notes I took on the day.:

Quirk's Nic Ray and Unilever's Noam Buchalter on Crowdsourcing

Crowdsourcing is not new, but new technology helps - cheaper, more people, faster, do more things. It attacks the traditional Ad agency model's economics as:

- there are more creatives outside
- it is lower cost and risk plus faster turnaround
- potentially gives better consumer insight, and often earlier
- drives better consumer exposure
- has high PR exposure at moment (buzz)

However, its not without its challenges:

- sifting ideas takes up a lot of time and effort
- manage the contributing community expectation so they remain "customers" (and prevent backlash etc if they feel they are ignored)
- these, and other production issues still need paying of skilled people
- IP issues with 3rd party ideas
- old agency sour grapes - got a lot of negative press from people who have access to presses

Also, Crowdsourcing is not appropriate for everything, works best with:

-fairly well defined brand
-something the target market would have a view on

They went through a case study for Peperami, who changed to this model, in essence because:

- wanted new ideas from new sources as brand was getting old
- economics of outsourcing to (less expensive) users were very attractive

After the users generated the ideas, they were sifted and scored by:

- fitted client brief
- was actionable
- "wow" factor
-was produceable

What was fairly radical apparently was that the client was fully involved in the process (I must say, coming from the consulting/design side of the service industries that point amazed me - seems like there area few other issues "Olde Advertising" has to deal with still).

There was then a Panel I missed owing to Real Work Issues, but Adam Tinworth has it covered (All panellists are listed in the Media140 link above in Para 1).

Ciaran Norris of Mindshare on Listening skills....

Ciaran addressed the economics of "Social media" marketing - he noted that points not often grasped up front are that:

- Listening is very labour intensive
- Shirky - transaction cost and the creator effort is much lower - but this means there is a lot more stuff, much of which is dross (my words)
- Search is the biggest social tool still
- Buzz metric tools are not cheap - search, viral tracking etc - once you scale up.

Also today one needs to track video not just text, and there is a proliferation of listening posts

- Delicious is a good listening tool, has RSS feeds
- Tweetdeck good for listening too
-Tweetfunnel - allows multiple people to manage Twitter
-Tweetmeme tracks links spread around Twitter (Ciaran hypothesis 90% of content shared on Twitted is professional, not amateur)
-Twitterfall searches a hashtag
-Trendistic etc etc - all seem to be point tools

He also made the point that the brand may have its online personality hijacked - For example, Weight Watchers on Twitter is not expressing it's personality, its just a recipe feed - so "Tweet what you eat" has hijacked the brand personality on Twitter by being far more about peopel commnicating to lose weight

Lunch and another Real Work Break so I missed Mr Red Bull, John Beasley, and then we had.....

The Great Twitterwall Hijack

There was then quite a useful panel with real experience - or at least it could have been except for The Twitterwall. As far as I can see, the dynamic went something like this:

- Panelists stop talking when Twitterwall goes up and start reading Twitterwall and responding to it
- This encourages twitterwalling audience to become more strident in their twts, trying to be seen by panellists
- Result is random, diverted panel with not a lot of useful stuff.

That at least was my view, I'm coming to the conclusion that Twitterwalls should be shut off (or at least curated) while panels are talking and only switched on at question time, or there is little point in having the panellists. Anyway, Adam Tinworth covered this panel well (and disagrees with me re Twitterwalls....).

The Last Panel of the Day

This was quite useful as (i) it had a real user - Virgin Trains and (ii) it had Will McInness and Drew Benvie on, who I think know their stuff (as in fact did the others, I just didn't know them).

Richard Baker from Virgin Train made some interesting observations (see his blog post over here)

- brand is in hands of the people in the company. Some customers want a conversation, others just want info/answers
- to start up: no strategy, started on Twitter, just listening. People very positive - but after a while it's not enough - the service actually needs to work
- issue with the instant gratification of real time media - why should a brand respond instantly? There is a penalty if you don't, but its lousy economics sometimes
- but people are ruder to Virgin trains than to his own persona

By the way, the Grauniad's Mercedes Bunz (yes, really) covered this panel over here.

The Real Time Web & Show me money - Bernard Desarnauts, Glam Media

The Real Time Web and how to make money - two topics dear to my heart! Here is the Problem:

-Fragmenting content
- fragmenting audience long and mid tail
- fragmenting traffic
- classic web less important (I love the idea of the Classic Web)
- brand engagement higher in distributed media

The Solution - analysis tools, in this case Tinker, a sort of Real Time Walled Garden which allows brands to see in real time stuff but gives them a safe place. The main issue though is the same as with any Real Time system, ie stopping clutter. The solution - blending algorithm and curator via real time categorisation of type of source, aggregation and filter plus metadata curation eg of hashtags.

Other things coming down the road in Real Time are:

- Event ads and real time ads
- Integrate real time web data - for example real time location targeting
- Where was the money and how does it flow? Provided metrics will be key in future
- Data send to user on various sites eg Twitter depending on what they are on, will see integration to Twitter, Friendfeed, YouTube.

Why will these approaches work? Money. Early indications are that it works 5x better than other Ad systems

- 17 vs 2.7 % interaction rate
- 15 vs 2 seconds engagement times
- 28 average tweets into Ad unit

As to how they are filtering, for eg how do you screen and remove noisy inanity - you can't yet, so they are scrubbing repetition

Dave McCandless - InformationIsBeautiful

Dave's view is that information visualization was "a new trend" (consternation in the back row as we all tried to work out if it was 10 or 15 years ago that it was a hot new trend). Anyway, Dave's view is that to to sell on social media, you need to give something - and "interestingness" is great currency (if you are not a sleb, that is?). At any rate, Dave provided some brilliant graphs and data visualizations, one of which I've put up. (By the way, the brevity of this precis is more than made up by the graphics he showed. You can get (more here)- a picture, as they say, is worth a 1,000 words)

Utku Can Akyuz - MintDigital

Utku put up the Hemlock Open Source middleware applications, which seems mainly optimised for making game type environments. Applicatios mentioned were:

- Games: Real time open source tools for eg bamzooki as game
- Filtering and graphics
- 2 Screen behaviour TV plus Lsptop integration - made as game
- Data from the ads to interact with, or for eg pulling data from shows for Ad placement next to TV

Mark Rock - AudioBoo

As the last speaker, Mark did the sensible thing and made his talk short and sharp. Key points were:

- Twitter made SMS social, trying to do same with audio at audioboo (and video in future maybe?)
- Podcasting was too complex, turned people off
- AudioBoo cannot be edited, deliberately trying to keep it fresh and simple

So what's with the headline - a sale of two Twitters - I hear you ask?. Well, the interesting stuff is often what is said in the discussion at lunch etc, and there were two strands of polarisation I picked up - firstly, the view that not a lot new was being said, but what was being said was to new people (In this respect I thought that it varied, the individual speakers were quite perceptive but sometimes the panels struggled to get insights out, as it were).

The second polarisation was a philosophical difference about how Twitter is used by Brands, 2 "tribes" in this space as it were. These tribes are:

(i) The "Sell, Sell, Sell" fraternity - the view is that some people see this as just another channel to flog stuff on, and stuff the other users' experience. The channel has a higher response rate still, so make hay while the sun shines and the devil takes the hindmost. (The "Tragedy of the Commoners" approach)

(ii) The "Social Sell" fraternity who believe that you do actually have to act differently on this medium, be part of a conversation (ie the "Its a Sewer" fraternity - what you get out of it depends on what you put into it)

There was also a feeling that the "newbies" are predominantly of the former persuasion, the old hands of the latter.

Thoughts of Which Twitter will win out?

(Update - as always, kudos to the organisers, I know how much work is involved in things like this)