So I’m casting off the financial and technological shackles, to be a mobile consumer on my own terms. I will never again buy a subsidized phone or sign another long-term carrier contract.

This month I bought an unlocked Nexus 5 smartphone direct from Google, and I’m now switching to my first no-contract plan. Yes, I paid more up front for the phone, Plus I’ll have to pay a hefty “screw you” early termination fee to ditch my Verizon contract. It’s still so worth it.

Why? Here’s the short version: Considering all costs to make this switch, and the savings I’ll get, I’ll see about a 4-month payback plus savings of nearly $70/month thereafter! Plus I’ll have tons more flexibility in devices, carriers and plans from here out.

Hell yeah! Here’s the math behind this choice…

Context: I needed a new phone now anyway. My Samsung Galaxy Nexus, which I bought for $250 subsidized under a Verizon 2-year contract in July 2012, is dogging out to the point of becoming useless for me. (The device is fine; I’m just a power user and have exhausted its capabilities.) So I can’t wait until my current contract ends at the end of this summer to get a new phone.

My average phone bill for the cheapest Verizon plan I can currently get to meet my needs for my Galaxy Nexus is $118/month. Ouch.

I bought my unlocked Nexus 5 from Google for a total of $420, (w/ tax & shipping), with no phone/data plan. I’ve been playing around with it on wifi only to make sure I really like it before I commit. It’s very snappy. I’m happy.

Of course, no smartphone stands alone. For instance, in my experience all smartphone batteries suck. It’s just a limitation of current battery technology. I need a portable backup battery for any phone because I use my phone a lot in places where plugging in isn’t an option, like airplanes. Unlike my Galaxy Nexus, you can’t swap the battery on the Nexus 5. So I got a good deal on a whompous portable backup external battery for the Nexus 5: $40.

I also bought an inexpensive textured case to decrease the chance that I’d drop and break my Nexus 5: $10.

Gross hardware investment for my new Nexus 5: $470.

But there is my old phone: I will wipe and factory reset my Galaxy Nexus and expect to sell it on eBay for about $60-$80. (I’ll throw in my 3 spare batteries, rubberized case and charger for free.) Even if I stuck with Verizon, they’d probably give me $0 credit for my old phone but still require me to trade it in anyway to get a new phone and contract.

So that lowers my net hardware investment for the Nexus 5 to $410 (conservatively).

Currently, Verizon would sell me a comparable new phone, the HTC 1, at the subsidized price of $299, which would require a new 2-year contract. Or, being the generous souls they are, Verizon would sell me the HTC 1 unsubsidized and with no contract — but not unlocked — for just $599. (Yeah, seriously. They should open The Tonight Show with that joke.)

So: Net price premium: $111 for the unlocked Nexus 5, vs. the best I could do by sticking with Verizon. (Remember, I needed a new phone now anyway.)

But wait, there’s more!

“We don’t care, we don’t have to, we’re the phone company!” (Lily Tomlin, as the inimitable Ernestine)

When I cancel my Verizon contract later this month, I’ll get stuck with an ETF of $170-$180. (I’ll fight it, but I expect to lose. As Lily Tomlin said: They don’t care, they don’t have to, they’re the phone company.)

Anyway, the first no-contract carrier I’m trying is Straight Talk, wireless service offered by Wal-Mart, which resells capacity from AT&T, T-Mobile, and Sprint. They do let you bring your own device (some carriers, like Republic Wireless, don’t). I bought an AT&T Micro SIM card from Straight Talk for $15, including shipping.

So: Total cost to get a new unlocked phone and to lose Verizon: $306

Savings and other benefits

This is the fun part.

My plan on Straight Talk will cost $45/month for phone, text, and data service that should more than meet my needs. No contract, it’s strictly month-to-month. With taxes and fees, call my new phone bill: $50/month.

As I mentioned, I’ve been paying an average of $118/month for Verizon under my existing 2-year contract. Switching to Straight Talk will save me $68/month, conservatively.

So: $306/68 = 4.5-month payback

And thereafter I’ll save at least $68 month in the clear, compared to what I would have paid on Verizon. Which, incidentally, would yield nearly a 200% annual return on investment. Of course, I’ll probably only keep any phone 1.5-2 years, so ROI isn’t very relevant to me — but big monthly bill savings certainly are!

Plus I have no contract — so I can switch carriers, plans, and devices anytime I want! This is important, because all wireless carriers suck somehow — spotty coverage, lagging networks, bad customer service, etc. That’s just how it works. Which is why I want the freedom to switch, if conditions become intolerable. That’s one of the greatest benefits of unlocked phones on no-contract plans, especially models that, like the Nexus 5, can be used on a variety of GSM and CDMA carriers, giving me more choice and leverage as a consumer.

I looked around at no-contract, bring-your-own-device plans, and they fall in the range of $45-$60/month for the kind of service I want. I do have several very good options. So even if I switch carriers, my bill savings will probably remain consistent.

Plus, if I travel overseas, I can just buy a local prepaid SIM for my unlocked Nexus 5. I’m hoping to do some international travel (for fun!) in 2014, so this is very appealing to me.

…Anyway, that’s the math behind this excellent deal, and that’s why I will never, ever sign a long-term contract with a wireless carrier. There’s a reason why long-term contracts are a rarity in almost every other part of the world. When it comes to wireless service, welcome to the 3rd World, U.S. — we’re it!

The only time that I see long-term carrier contracts not being a completely egregious rip-off is for family plans — which offer consumers some economy of scale as well as more device upgrade flexibility. Then it might make sense. But for one person with one phone? Forget it!

Why would you want to do business with a company that thinks you’re too lazy to do a little up-front math?

On Thursday, July 26, I’ll be delivering the following presentation at the Social Media for Nonprofits – Silicon Valley conference: 5 affordable ways nonprofits can use mobile technology. (Follow the conference hashtag: #sm4np)

This presentation is meant to be just a quick overview, to let nonprofits know what’s possible today, and where they should focus their attention.

Why the focus on “affordable?” Well, mobile technology isn’t free…

It costs money to get a mobile device, and telephony/data service is an ongoing expense. Also, if an organization wants to offer content or services optimized for delivery to mobile devices, they’ll have to invest time and effort — and often lay out some cash — to make it work.

Most nonprofits, especially those which operate at a community level, don’t have a lot of money or technical expertise. But they can still leverage existing mobile (or mobile-friendly) tools, platforms, and strategies to further their core missions to serve communities or raise awareness.

Earlier this year I co-authored a white paper published by the ZeroDivide Foundation: Funding mobile strategies for social impact. This document is intended to orient grantmakers to the possibilities of mobile — but it’s also pretty useful for nonprofits, too.

Here are the mobile strategies I’ll recommend to nonprofits in my presentation this week:

1. Mobile landing pages.Actually I advocate mobile-optimized websites wherever possible. But as a starting point, nonprofits which offer services or information, or which run campaigns of any kind, can launch some targeted mobile-friendly landing pages as an initial engagement point for mobile users. This is especially important if you’re doing any marketing or advertising that includes a web address — anywhere people see a URL, they should be able to enter that into their phone and get a mobile-friendly webpage.Google Sites offers a basic but pretty good — and free — landing page builder. It’s intended for business, but nonprofits should be able to use the lead generation or custom themes pretty well. And if you’re not sure how well your current site performs via mobile (or even if you think it’s a great mobile site), use Google’s site performance testing toolto see what kind of mobile experience you’re really delivering.
2. Tumblr.This relative social media newcomer is exploding in popularity, especially among people under 25. Tumblr is a hybrid of microblogging and social media. The reason I like Tumblr, and advocate its use, is that it’s perhaps the most mobile-friendly blogging tool out there — both for mobile viewing/interaction, and for posting via mobile.Everything you post to a public Tumblr blog gets indexed by search engines — which beats the hell out of Facebook’s walled garden in the long run. Oh, and Tumblr is completely free. And you can create as many Tumblr blogs as you like off a single account, making it useful for special projects or campaigns.
3. Crowdsourcing via social media. Besides texting and taking pictures, social media is one of the most popular non-voice activities people do on their mobile phones. Anything you do via social media inherently has a considerable mobile audience. This makes mobile social media a valuable tool for crowdsourcing — gathering input or content of any kind from the communities you serve or adjacent or broader audiences. I point to two recent examples conducted on Tumblr: Faces of Black Men and Planned Parenthood Saved Me (both brilliantly executed by Deanna Zandt).Whenever you want to crowdsource, make it easy for people to contribute content via mobile social media. (Read: no complicated webforms!) Also make it easy for people to access, explore, and share that content via mobile social media. Tags, hashtags, and landing pages are your friends here!
4. Teach people how to use their mobile devices, especially their cell phones. Especially their feature phones. For instance, it’s amazing how many people don’t know how to download or share photos that they take with their phone, or how to access e-mail or the web on their phones — even though many feature phones now offer these functions and more.In addition to teaching phone-use skills, nonprofits can help community members understand the carrier and other costs that might be associated with using data, e-mail, or other capabilities of their phones — as well as how to choose a phone or wireless carrier.

   The Mobile Voices community publishing platform (which gives public voice to the Hispanic community of immigrant day laborers and domestic workers in Los Angeles) emphasizes mobile technology as a tool of empowerment. Even cheap mobile technology. In a Knight Digital Media Center article, I explained how the nonprofit behind Mobile Voices, the Institute of Popular Education of Southern California (IDEPSCA), incorporates mobile skills training into many of its community activities and events.

5. SMS text messaging. I put this last because it’s the most complex and costly strategy I’m recommending, but it really should be first — since text messaging (simple messaging service, or SMS) is hands down the most ubiquitous and popular non-voice activity for mobile phone users. And that’s for allmobile users — even people who can afford the fanciest smartphones and fattest data plans text a lot.Before you dive in, understand some of the challenges. First, there’s some fairly toothy US federal and state law in place to keep people from getting text spam, so it’s worthwhile learning how to stay on the right side of these laws. In addition, U.S. wireless carriers charge both the sender and the recipient of text messages — a double-dinging that’s virtually unheard of in most of the rest of the world. This rapacious billing for text messages is a big reason why many of the innovative SMS-based programs and services popular in the developing world haven’t taken off in the U.S.

   Furthermore, carriers are getting more aggressive about blocking “free” (at least for the sender) text messages sent via e-mail-to-SMS gateway technology. So if you want to be sure your messages go through, it’s really best to bite the bullet and pay for a service that lets you send out bulk SMS in the way the carriers prefer.

   So if you offer text alerts, news, or interactive services (and most nonprofits probably should!), it’s best to pony up for a legitimate paid service. One that’s popular with nonprofits and activists is Textmarks.

…Why didn’t I mention mobile apps? Because that’s the most costly and advanced approach to mobile. Apps are software projects that cost money to develop, test, and maintain. Apps also are tied to specific smartphone operating systems (Android, iOS, etc.). And finally, people must find your app, download and install it, and remember to run it. Those are all huge hurdles for nonprofits and the communities they serve.

I’ve seen very few projects from nonprofits which truly warrant the app approach — especially since so much app-like functionality can now be delivered fairly well via the mobile web. For a good example of a fun mobile web app, use your phone to check out Planned Parenthood’s Where Did You Wear It campaign for condom use.

However, for nonprofits that adopt my #4 strategy (provide mobile skills training) it can be useful to find apps that will be especially useful to the community you serve. For instance, people living in “underbanked” communities who have a smartphone (lots of cheap Android models out there now!) might directly benefit from learning how to use their bank’s mobile app.

But Facebook is especially horrendous on mobile. For instance, the Facebook Android app won’t let me share items from other people’s streams, the way the Facebook standard website does.  Also, on the Facebook Android app I can’t tag someone in a status update (like saying “Joe Schmoe loves this kind of sushi.”) — I can only indicate whether I’m “with” someone, which often isn’t the case.

Argh. Gah….

Anyway, today while I’m researching and writing about Facebook’s various mobile problems, I found Kevin C. Tofel’s May 15 GigaOm post: Does your Facebook mobile app suck? here’s why

He summarized findings published in the Mobtest blog. These only looked at problems with Facebook’s iOS app, but they’re interesting even though I’m an Android user. In a nutshell, Facebook’s app relies heavily on web technology (HTML) to deliver content.  There are good reasons for this, but on iOS devices it causes problems.

Here’s how Mobtest summed it up:

Why would Facebook use HTML technology inside a native iOS app?

HTML is easier for displaying fluid content. Objective-C really sucks when it comes to fluid display. An image with text around it, buttons with varying text labels are really hard to create yourself in Objective-C as you have to calculate dimensions and positions of all elements yourself. In particular for a timeline HTML will be much easier.

Creates code that can be shared across different platforms. iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Phone are all different technologies and a developerâ€s nightmare. Sharing some content/functionality in the form of HTML makes sense.

HTML is much more in line with Facebookâ€s continuous deployment process. FB developers are responsible for their own QA, and part of that is to push code out to a limited set of servers, see results and then push it out to more and do this each day if not more often. With Apple taking as least a week of review, rolling back a code change is a nightmare.

They can get away with it. Yes Facebook is not a bank, there are no other iOS FB apps out there and we will still use the service as it has a virtual monopoly on social networking with 900 million users now. We just have to suck it up.

Feature phones is where growth is. A very high percentage of iPhone and Android users already have the Facebook app installed. The next frontier is feature phones, in particular in non-western parts of the world. These new users will first encounter Facebook on their mobile, and it will not be a shining iPhone.

OK, that doesn’t explain the boneheaded lack of key features in Facebook’s Android app that I noted, but it could help explain some of the poor performance I’ve experienced — slow load times, lagging updates and push notifications, and lots and lots of crashes.

Tofel, an iPhone user, closed his GigaOm post with this observation:

…For the time being, Iâ€m going to switch to m.facebook.com in my smartphone browser. I did some testing this afternoon and the experience is far faster, up to date and generally offers the same features as the native mobile app.

That’s a problem: If integrity is supposedly what you have to offer your audience or community, then it’s bad business to shaft your customers (the advertisers).

Then along came the age of digital advertising, and finally some direct evidence of advertising’s impact started creeping in to the picture: clickthroughs, etc. These metrics were flawed and digital advertising mostly sucked (but then again, so did most print and broadcast advertising), but it was a step toward accountability, at least theoretically.

And then there was a development that purported to go even further toward helping advertisers and marketers ensure that they were spending their money usefully across all media, digital and otherwise: the demand-side platform. Wikipedia currently defines this as:

A system that allows digital advertisers to manage multiple ad exchange and data exchange accounts through one interface. Real time bidding for displaying online ads takes place within the ad exchanges, and by utilizing a DSP, marketers can manage their bids for the banners and the pricing for the data that they are layering on to target their audiences.

DSPs are unique because they incorporate many of the facets previously offered by advertising networks, such as wide access to inventory and vertical and lateral targeting, with the ability to serve ads, real-time bid on ads, track the ads, and optimize. This is all kept within one interface which creates a unique opportunity for advertisers to truly control and maximize the impact of their ads. 

Sounds good — except that DSPs can be mostly smoke and mirrors all over again, just with more data attached.

Check out Confessions of a Demand-Side Platform Salesperson, from Digiday this week:

Anyone that has not worked at a DSP or a trading desk, consider yourself lucky. It is the cesspool of our industry, with the DSPs racing towards an acquisition or IPO and the trading desks trying to validate themselves as valuable within the holding companies. It is a sweatshop environment on both sides, with workers who are bludgeoned from the top down.

…I think it is time for the major advertisers to get in and take responsibility for how their dollars are being spent. There is double-dipping within many agency/trading desks, and your advertising dollars are not as impactful as they have been. The tires need to be violently kicked at a trading desk before agreeing to allow your dollars to go through there. 

Also, the big publishers need to man up, regain their integrity and pull out. Madoff pulled off his scheme under the watchful eye of the SEC. You think the same thing isnâ€t happening under the oh-so frightening eye of the IAB?

Temple is my old stomping ground; I graduated from journalism school there in 1990. And I’m rather stunned at all the huge new buildings that have sprung up around the campus. Good to see the school grow!

The reason Temple brought me in to help with these events is because I’m passionate about mobile and about the Philly area. I grew up in South Jersey and still have lots of family and friends in the region. So for me, helping more people in the Greater Philadelphia Area access more useful local information, news, and services via their cell phones is not just important — it’s personal!

…This is especially pressing given the continuing rocky status of Philadelphia Media Network, which publishes the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Daily News, and Philly.com. My grandfather Len McAdams worked on the editorial team of “The Inky” for decades. He’d be furious to hear that earlier this month PMN was sold for the fifth time in six years — at a fire sale price of $55 million. Sheesh.

Here are a few points I’d like participants in tomorrow’s barcamp and hackathon to consider…

1. Mobile is fast becoming the most common way for people to get online.

Last September IDC predicted that by 2015 more people in the U.S. will access the internet from mobile devices than from laptop or desktop computers. So if you want to reach your community at all, you’ll probably need to do it through their phones.

This means it’s becoming not just common, but normal for people to use their cell phones, tablets, and e-readers to do anything that can be done over the internet — search and browse the web, take an online class, send and receive e-mail, use social media, buy stuff, collaborate on documents or projects, stream video and audio, access services (everything from TurboTax and Dropbox to Social Security or your health insurance provider), use instant messaging or video chat, and more.

2. Start considering mobile users FIRST!

The core functionality, navigation, and presentation of everything you offer online must work well enough on a cell phone — in a smartphone web browser, and in any apps you offer.

This means not just designing with a small screen in mind, but also making touch the primary way that people will interact with your online offering, and minimizing how much typing users need to do. This helps for both cell phones and tablets.

Consider what cell phone users want to DO with your content and service. Identify and prioritize the possible activities and interactions. This use case represents an especially activity-focused mindset, more than tablet users.

Just because your full website can load on a smartphone’s web browser doesn’t mean it’s mobile friendly. If mobile users must pinch, zoom, and scroll to see what’s on your page, that’s a big hassle. (Even though some iPhone users stridently prefer this. Fine. Whatever. Give them the option to switch to your full site and set a cookie to remember their preference.)

These core aspects of how your envision, design, and build your online offerings are now more important than designing a site that looks really nice on a big monitor. Yes, you’ll still need a full site — computers will still be an important use case. But consider how to integrate a user’s experience across multiple devices (as they switch from their computer at work, to their phone when out and about, to their tablet at home).

3. The mobile experience is only as good as the wireless access.

Most of the time smartphone users will be on their carriers’ wireless data networks — which means the speed with which they can access your offerings will vary greatly, depending on how strong and congested the carrier network is where they happen to be standing at the moment. Wifi is pretty fast, but it’s far from ubiquitous.

Therefore, plan your smartphone-focused offerings to work well enough (deliver at least the bare minimum of information or functionality) over an unreliable or slow wireless network connection.

Rootmetrics.com gathers detailed independent data on wireless network coverage and performance. That’s generally a more reliable guide to the kind of network performance your local users can expect — compared to the carriers’ own coverage maps, which are mostly theoretical and overly optimistic. Rootmetrics published its report on wireless in Philadelphia in August 2011. Their next Philly report is due out in a couple of weeks. This is a great resource for seeing whether users in specific neighborhoods face specific network challenges or opportunities

Oh, and: Don’t depend on the current rollout of carriers’ faster “4G” networks (LTE, HSPA+, etc.) to solve the problem of your mobile website loading slowly. See my recent post for the Knight Digital Media Center at USC: Why the mobile web is slow, and your mobile site must be FAST!

4. Text messaging is still crucial. Use it!

Yeah, it’s not as glamorous as Instagram, but text messaging remains — by far — the most ubiquitous and popular type of communication people use on their cell phones. And that’s on all kinds of phones, from crappy cheap feature phones to screaming whompous smartphones.

Therefore, I strongly recommend that you augment any mobile offerings with text messaging — either broadcast-style alerts, or user-specific interactivity.

This week the ZeroDivide Foundation published my white paper: Funding Mobile Strategies for Social Impact. It includes a section on why SMS is so important, why it’s been underutilized in U.S. mobile offerings, and how to capitalize on SMS opportunities for your mobile projects.

Tools like Tropo and Twilio can help you add SMS functionality to your service or content — or to create a mobile service that operates purely over SMS. Also, if you can’t or don’t want to build your own SMS solution, you can use fee-based SMS services like Textmarks or Mobile Commons to send out SMS alerts to users.

Text messaging doesn’t travel over the carrier’s data network. It uses the same wireless network channels as voice calls, so it’s most likely to work under the crappiest wireless network conditions or coverage.

Plus, since SMS text messaging is accessible on any phone, it allows you to include all mobile users in your strategy — especially people who can’t afford or don’t want a smartphones. So if poor people or older people matter to your mission, texting is a must! (Even though text messaging is popular with all types of mobile users, even iPhone owners.)

5. Tablets aren’t really “mobile,” but they’re important.

Yes, the iPad is pretty. And slick. And cool. So are Android tablets, from the Kindle Fire up to the Samsung Galaxy Tab and more.

But in terms of how people use and perceive these devices, tablets represent mainly a “lean back” use case. That is, people mostly use them to read, or watch videos, or look at photos.

Yes, people also use tablets to play games, do e-mail and social media, or sometimes write or do work, or interact with online services. But these are relatively minor use cases for tablets.

So if you’re customizing your mobile experience for tablet users vs. smartphone users, your mobile website or app should reflect more of a lean-back access to content (search, reading, etc.); while smartphone users will be more focused on interactivity, bookmarking, and sharing.

If you’re starting a brand new project from scratch, it’s a good idea to incorporate principles of responsive web design from the start. Technically, that will save you work in the long run and make it easier to adapt your mobile strategy to any kind of devices that come up in the future — augmented reality glasses, cortical implants for Borg assimilation, etc.

To really get the “mobile first” mindset, read Luke Wroblewski’s excellent book Mobile First. And listen to anything he says. He’s a genius. I’m not kidding.

I checked out Map of the Dead — a great map mashup that helps you find the closest zombie survival supplies. Just enter your address to find the locations of the closest gun store, liquor store, grocery or convenience store, hardware store, outdoor store, gas station, doctor, pharmacy, military, police, radio tower, harbor, or airport.

They also list the locations of places you’d probably want to avoid during a zombie outbreak: Hospitals and shopping malls (zombies LOVE those places), cemeteries (obviously) and campgrounds (not really defensible).

I checked out the Temescal neighborhood in north Oakland, where I currently live. Here’s what I’ve got to work with, considering running distance — and it’s not looking good. I’m pretty close to several major hospitals, which tend to be ground zero in an outbreak. And not too much in the way of nearby supply locations. And, believe it or not, no nearby gun shops.

My north Oakland neighborhood: Not looking good in case of zombies. (Click to enlarge)

In contrast, downtown Boulder, Colorado seems a smarter bet for waiting out the zombocalypse. Within a few blocks there are several outdoor shops (which is probably also the best place to get survivalist food, water filters, etc.), grocery and liquor stores (if I’m facing zombies, I will need a large supply of good tequila), AND a gun store!

Downtown Boulder, Colorado. Better bet for surviving the zombocalypse. (Click to enlarge)

Also, the closest hospital is over a mile away from downtown Boulder — not even shown on this map. That’s a bonus.

The mobile version of this website isn’t bad, but could stand some further optimization. In fact, this is one of those cases when an app really would be a better option. You’d want to cache this information offline, for when the internet and cell networks go down following mass chaos. And maybe build in an option to use the phone’s antenna as a walkie-talkie, or to listen to radio broadcasts. And, of course, get the latest CDC updates on the status of vaccine development and deployment.

Plus an app could store a library of tutorial videos showing key zombie survival skills, like this:

…And a few are utterly stupid.

Here’s one such e-mail I received today, in its entirety. Name of the PR person, PR firm, and client are removed to protect the guilty:

Iâ€m writing today on behalf of [LINK TO CLIENT] a leader and innovative provider of device-centric, [TECHNOLOGY] solutions. They wanted to offer you the opportunity to receive some news which is under embargo until 9 a.m. CET on Monday, Feb. 27. If you are open to receiving news under embargo and agree to this embargo time, I would be happy to provide you with the news.

Seriously: I never heard of the company, I don’t know what this might be about, and I have no way to gauge whether their news is important or interesting enough for me to check out at all — yet THEY want ME to agree to an embargo in advance, before I have any idea whether they’re potentially relevant?

Folks, you always have to prove your information or news is worth somebody’s time. Just tell me why I should care, why this is relevant to me or my work. Always. There is no point in being coy.

And no, I’m not going to click the link in your e-mail to find out more about the company. I don’t know you. This looks like spam.

So I flagged this message as spam.

Bullshit. Personally, I am far happier on a day-to-day basis thanks to these technological tools. They have added considerable love, meaning, joy, and value to my life. With their help, I’ve been able to offer nurturing and support to far more people I care about than ever would have been possible otherwise.

So I wasn’t surprised when a recent Pew study found that 85% of adult who use social networking sites say that people are mostly kind. Also, 68% reported they’d had a experience on social media that made them feel good about themselves, and 61% had experiences that made them feel closer to another person.

I know I’m not alone in this…

OK, yes: Sometimes Twitter, e-mail, blogs, instant messaging, text messages, and Facebook can be annoying and overwhelming. Sometimes they really piss me off, or bring me heartache. Sometimes I ignore them for days at a time, especially when I’m chilling out at my mountain cabin. But for the most part, they have connected me more closely to the people I love, and to several new communities. They’ve sparked and fostered new friendships, and have brought many amazing people into my world.

These tools have helped me virtually eliminate loneliness from my life. And I know what it feels like to feel acutely lonely.

In 1995, when I relocated from the east coast to Boulder, Colorado, I only knew one person there. I wasn’t sure I wanted to commit to that town or job, so I moved out by myself for a trial run. My then-boyfriend stayed behind in NJ, and I rented a month-to-month furnished apartment. My job quickly drove me crazy, but I fell in love with the town.

The hard part was: While I was there alone, I was starved for regular friendly conversation and connection.

I didn’t immediately strike up any friendships with my new coworkers. I saw my one local friend only rarely. I’d go to bars, coffeeshops, the Pearl St. Mall, and music venues and strike up conversations with strangers — but nothing turned into more than a brief polite exchange of pleasantries.

Yes, I’d talk on the phone to my boyfriend most days, and I did many lovely solo hikes in the Flatirons on the edge of town.

But the vast majority of those five months before my boyfriend joined me in Colorado, I felt deeply, achingly lonely. I actually got depressed. I cried a lot, and felt fragile much of the time. Moving across the country was disorienting enough, but that loneliness was torture for me. Even though I was growing to love Boulder, even though I had lots of cool stuff to do and books to read, even though I never wanted to return to the east coast — not having people to talk to for such a long stretch was unexpectedly stressful.

I didn’t realize how social a person I am until conversation and connection became scarce luxuries.

To be honest, I was motivated to start the e-mail discussion group for the Society of Environmental Journalists during those months mostly because I needed to experience some kind of regular conversation and connection to community. (17 years later, that list is still going strong.) My dialup internet connection became an emotional lifeline.

This was before cell phones became popular — so when I’d go out to places, try to socialize, and usually not succeed, I’d end up feeling more isolated than ever. Often, I’d give up early and flee to my hotel-like apartment. I couldn’t wait to call someone who knew me. My long distance bills were staggering.

As the web became more popular and robust, online forums and sites like LiveJournal provided me with new ways to connect with new communities.

It took me years to build a strong network of friends in Colorado. And now that I’ve been in the Bay Area for three years, I still connect every day with many of my Colorado friends — mainly via social media and e-mail. I know what’s going on in their lives, I know what makes them laugh or grumble, I see their surroundings, I hear their observations and questions. I watch their kids grow up.

And in late 2008 my marriage was ending, I was feeling broken and I really needed to be somewhere else for at least a few months. So one evening while at The Cup in Boulder, I posted a few tweets seeking suggestions for where I could go. That sparked to an immediate response from my friend Susan Mernit, who said “Come to Oakland! I have a room you can stay in!”

That’s how I ended up in the Bay Area — not just for a few troubled months, but for a few wonderful years. Those tweets were the key to rebuilding my life, on my terms.

I also have a very large network of professional colleagues in media and technology, many of whom have become friends to varying degrees. Social media and digital communication have allowed me to foster those connections and make them meaningful and mutually rewarding. I get the opportunity to help and support people every day, and I get to ask for help and support anytime I need it. And I get to laugh. A lot.

And when I’m feeling grumpy or depressed, a usually reliable cure is to hop on social media, see what the people I’m connected with there are saying, and respond to them. It usually doesn’t take long for me to get out of my own head and shake my mood, and then get on with my day refreshed — or sometimes even inspired.

I also get value from people who I don’t know personally. From actor/director George Takei’s pithy, incisive Facebook humor, to people who post to the Salvador Dali tag and more, these missives offer an element of connection that goes beyond mere broadcasting.

Some of the people I’m closest to, like my boyfriend of nearly three years, are an intrinsic part of my ambient digital environment. I leave instant messenger up when I’m online, and we converse off and on throughout the day — in short bursts, no pressure to interrupt our work or commandeer each other’s attention. We each get to do what we need to do, while connecting companionably. It feels good. It feels human. It’s real. And it’s manageable.

Mobile technology has added a new dimension to my sense of personal connection — mostly by sharing text and photo messages with people I know, but also through social media.

For instance, I love to explore my surroundings, and I often take my Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Foursquare and Tumblr connections along with me on photo walks (all at the same time, via PicPlz). Last weekend I went for a lovely walk up and down the staircases of Telegraph Hill in San Francisco. And while I’m out on the walk, people from around the country and sometimes even the world chime in with appreciation, questions, and snark — which all makes it more fun for me.

And when I’m having a hard time, like when I recently had a major disappointment in love (not with my longtime boyfriend, we’re solid; but another friend-turned-lover broke my heart pretty badly last month — yes, I’m poly, deal with it) my friends were really there for me, every day, both in person and via private digital communications.

On this front I had an unexpected happy surprise: I’ve developed a much deeper and mutually rewarding friendship with someone who before was only a casual friend, thanks to private conversations we had about my breakup via Facebook Messenger. I never liked Facebook Messenger before, but this time that particular channel made a huge difference in how I recovered from a wrenching experience. And it also helped my friend heal more from her own breakup, too.

Meanwhile, I found it helpful to mostly disconnect on social media from my fickle former lover. Right after I had to break up with him, seeing him keep popping up casually in my ambient daily digital environment was painful. I hope that eventually he and I may re-establish some sort of friendship — and if so I would re-establish those social media connections. But this breakup experience helped crystallize the key role that digital communication and social media play in my relationships and emotional life. There are definitely tradeoffs. Sometimes you must unfriend.

Currently I’m planning another relocation. I’ve been in the Bay Area for three years, and while I’ve enjoyed it, this just isn’t home to me. So I’ll be moving to another state in spring. Most likely I’ll return to Colorado, which still feels like home — but so many people have told me that Portland would suit me well, I’m traveling there in March to give it a closer look.

Originally I discounted Portland, since I know just a few people there and still have vivid bad memories of moving to a new place and having to start a social network completely from scratch. But today, anywhere I’d move to, the people I care about and get value from would all be coming along with me. They’ll even be right in the palm of my hand. Also, it’s much easier to find and converse with people in other places, which makes it easier to construct new real-world social networks when you move. I’ve gotta say, this really changes the emotional calculus of a major geographical shift.

I realize that for some people, social media and digital communications offer little value or a mostly negative experience. You can leave yourself open to cutting attacks that leave you reeling, sometimes in public. Misunderstandings, drivel, and carelessness abound. Boundaries get transgressed, and feelings get hurt. I’ve experienced all of these, from both sides.

I’ve decided to just roll with it, since the value of these connections outweigh the inevitable bumps, missteps, and occasional overload. And when I need to disconnect, I can — and that’s easy. There’s this thing called the off switch…

My life is better, and my world is richer, on a very human level, thanks to digital technology. Without these tools I couldn’t do the work I do, I probably wouldn’t have been able to be successfully self-employed for nearly 15 years, and I wouldn’t have the breadth and depth of personal connections that I now consider one of the greatest treasures in my life.

And I know I’m not alone in this.

Associated Press opens news bureau in North Korea | World news | guardian.co.uk.

…As if the news business wasn’t already Kafkaesque. Well, AP is an appropriate choice for this. 

Having done some critical coverage of several boneheaded AP strategies in digital media over the last few years, I think they see eye to eye with NK regarding the dangers of criticism, and how to respond to it.

I’m not kidding: See the response from Paul Colford, AP’s director of media relations, to a 2010 KDMC story I wrote about the controversial AP News Registry program