The semester's best presenter

The Web 2.0 professionals who spoke in class this semester were all very helpful and interesting. They had a broad range of experience, discussing the social web from different angles, and with varying opinions about security, usefulness, and the future. A common thread I drew among most of the speakers was how very new Web 2.0 is. There was a general sense of uncertainty about how quickly technologies will be adopted, and what trends we will see coming down the pike.

There was one speaker who stood out in this group. Erik Van Ommerman seemed to have the most confidence and intuition about how Web 2.0 fits into business and our social world, even across generations. While all of the speakers were very smart and professional, they seemed like newbies compared to Erik.

It may be that the difference I noticed was more due to his experience in speaking about the topic than his relative knowledge. Erik, unlike the rest of our speakers, gives very regular presentations on Web 2.0. Because of this, his main points and slide deck flowed seamlessly. It was the long Q&A that cemented, to me, his genuine understanding of this space.

At first, Erik piqued my optimism (which is normally very high anyway) by discussing some aspects of Web 2.0 that may generate a real improvement in our society. He talked about how online exposure gives consumers some real power over corporations. He used the example of the Kryptonite U-Bar debacle to demonstrate that individuals can “call out a bogus company.” He said the social web is forcing companies to be more genuine in order to appeal to customers; that customers are reacting to customer feedback and asking for even more.

Then, he tempered this optimism. When I asked if these online checks-and-balances could lead to the end of propaganda, he said that it may actually be a better way to spread propaganda. He gave examples of companies who are positioning commercials to look like customers, and paying bloggers to “review” products.

Something else I liked about Erik’s presentation was the way that he said things. His presentation generated sound bites that continue to resonate in my mind. Some of my favorites:
“Employees are people too… we cannot forbid people to do things that are part of normal life.”
“We don’t seek truth – we seek entertainment”

As for the future of web 2.0? Erik agreed that rich content mobile will be big soon. He also said that he sees a trend in backward crossover – bringing virtual experiences into the real world. Some examples are online/real life weddings, and using the virtual world to help treat people with real phobias.
Erik also has some hope for the growth of the social web. He said that, as people spend more time online and less watching television, the amount of information will grow exponentially. Giving the example of wikipedia, he demonstrated what a small percentage of our overall “free” time has been dedicated to creating this powerhouse of information. He said that, if we would all just spend one hour per week updating content online, virtually everything in the world could be documented in Web 2.0.

BIGstage

Yep - that's me as ghost lady



And now, here’s the moment you’ve all been waiting for…

Yes, this is my silver screen debut.. ok, it’s a remake.. I mean.. well, I was basically photo-shopped in.. but it’s cool, right?

Welcome to BIGstage – this company creates an avatar from your picture (Much quicker than setting up Second Life), then puts your face in the movies! Ok, a snippet of the movies, or maybe a video-greeting card (VidiGreet).

The promise is that you might just become famous – if your video is spread virally by all of your friends and theirs. The cost, of course, is FREE.

I think the coolest part is what’s in it for BIGstage! Finally, an internet company has figured out that using Web 2.0 technology to help us interact online with the project will appeal to us MUCH better than a bunch of banner ads. Also, by putting our face in these videos and sharing them with our friends, our friends have a trusted representative pitching products to them. This is what it’s all about.

As far as I could tell, they didn’t have much to advertise yet (C’mon ad groups, there’s a GOLD MINE here). I surmised all of this from their Overview page (more here http://bigstage.com/CMS/company). I couldn’t have said it better myself:

Consumers Enjoy Brand Engagement That Includes Them
Big Stage Entertainment makes advertising and promotional marketing truly personal by offering a brand experience that is as unique and memorable as each individual. Using Big Stage Entertainment’s BackStage™ application and array of integration solutions, clients and partners can create innovative interactive experiences that allow consumers to create @ctors and engage with brands by inserting their @ctors into branded content on the Web, in video games, on mobile devices and out-of-home video via kiosks and connected screens. The company’s integration solutions include an expanding array of free and priced technical resources, including APIs, widgets, design references and instruction sets that power @ctor portability into a diverse and expanding range of digital media environments.
Once consumers place themselves into content offered by a brand, that experience can be shared with friends and family through pass-along links to email, blogs, messaging and social media networks, offering a simple yet powerful way to build emotionally-driven brand relationships, as well as drive both trial and loyalty with consumers.

Indecisive? Try Hunch.

The advent of the internet is called the “information age.” We use the web to help us make decisions by easily finding information about things that would have been out of our reach a generation ago. This is obvious with research material – we are no longer limited to our local libraries’ catalogues, we can find information from books and journals around the globe.

Web 2.0 adds to published information, helping us make decisions based on others’ ratings and comments. If ten people dislike a new restaurant, I probably will too, so I can decide not to go there. If a bridesmaid’s dress gets a 4 ½ star rating from 244 amazon users, but the top 5 ratings state the dress is larger than the size chart suggests, I will buy the dress a size small. Their experience leads to my decision.

But – what about tough decisions, like whether to buy a Mac or a PC if you are looking for a new laptop? There are too many opinions on this one to sort through the user reviews, and there is too much information published by Apple, IBM, CNET, and other experts to determine which is really better for me.

There is now an online tool that helps people make these decisions - Hunch. Hunch quizzes users on their likes and dislikes, then helps them figure how to handle an unknown. Their algorithm is based on other users’ similar responses.

For instance, Hunch has determined that the choice between a Mac and a PC can be based on whether a person likes to dance or not. Dancers prefer the Mac.
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/04/17/people-who-switch-to-macs-like-to-dance-and-other-strange-hunches/

Only problem so far, I haven’t been able to try it - I’m still waiting for the invitation to come through in my email account.

More good information about Hunch from the Hunch fact sheet http://www.hunch.com/fact-sheet/:

“What problem does Hunch solve?
Our long-term goal is for a user to be able to come to Hunch with any decision she is pondering, and after answering a handful of questions, get as good a decision as if she had interviewed a group of knowledgeable people or done hours of careful research online.
“Eventually, when Hunch gets good enough, we hope users will trust it to make an informed decision without having to turn to lots of external time-consuming sources of information.”

“Hunch uses machine learning to get smarter in two ways:
“User contributions train Hunch to be smarter overall. Contributions can take many forms, from correcting a fact that Hunch got wrong, to suggesting new decision topics to feature, follow-up questions to ask or decision results to propose.
“The more Hunch learns about each individual user's personality and preferences, the better Hunch can customize decision results for that user. It's like a friend getting to know someone's taste and preferences over time, so they can provide sound and trusted advice.”

Poor attempt to personalize

I got my “mine.” magazine, which I first discussed in this blog. Wow – seriously disappointing.

I knew they were going to customize Lexus ads to fit me. This was about as personal as junk mail. They even highlighted with a lighter color those sections of the ad that had been obviously mail-merged. I’ve had some experience with mail-merging, so this is what it looked like to me:
“The All-New 2010 RX. Now with more [FName] [LName].”
“It’s easy to locate the best [Destination1]s near [City] with our new voice-activated Navigation System.”

I had high hopes that the money Lexus put into this effort would have been better spent on tools to actually personalize the ads. This was plain key ring-style personalization.

The magazine also disappointed me. They totally got it wrong. Because I had to sign up for 5 out of 8 choices (3 of which I didn’t really want), I couldn’remember which I had signed up for. I think I signed up for Time, Real Simple, In Style, Money, and Travel+Leisure – in THAT order. I was really hoping that at LEAST the order I put my choices in would be considered – like, more articles from Time and fewer from Travel+Leisure. It wasn’t.

I may have signed up for Food & Wine instead of In Style. However, I’m totally positive I didn’t sign up for Sports Illustrated or Golf Magazine. What came in my “mine.” was Travel+Leisure, Real Simple, Time, In Style, and Sports Illustrated. WHAT?

The articles didn’t seem to be “picked” for me either – I think they were picked for this magazine. They were all very short, and had lots of references to stuff you can find online. One whole article (in In Style) was about jeans you can have custom-made online. I understand that a lot of what we do includes using the web, so I am used to articles referring to websites, but these articles seemed to include more “.coms” than most.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was the ridiculous advertising for the magazines I had selected. Before each set of 2 short articles, an entire page was dedicated to pointing out exactly which magazine the articles were from. White space and a bold magazine title. I don’t care about the magazine, I care about the content! That’s why I wanted “mine.” instead of each magazine! What a total waste of money.

This should have been easy. Use my name, location, and survey answers to send me relevant articles from the magazines I chose. Determine whether personalization is successful by asking me if I want to pay to keep subscribing to “mine.”

When I wrote this blog, I thought “mine.” was an attempt by a magazine company to sell more magazines by leveraging some of the lessons online companies have learned, and tools they use for personalization. Now, I think this is just a big ad to sell more of the same magazines – without any customization.

Wow, what a miss.

DIY customer service – GAACK!

Ok, I actually love the fact that companies have reduced their overhead by providing customers with the ability to “help ourselves”. This goes for populating content online – including forums, rating sites and wikis, as well as self-checkout at Home Depot and check-in Kiosks at the airport.

These are all great because, if we run into more trouble than we can handle, it’s no big deal. On a forum, we can simply refrain from posting, or ask our question someplace with a more user-friendly application. In the grocery store, we can press the “Help” light, and (after a short wait) a clerk will override any errors we may have caused (.. normally this is due to the fact that we buy super-clearance, and these items are not normally logged in the inventory system. One checker still rolls her eyes whenever she sees us J)

The point is, we can do it ourselves - until we need help.

This is NOT the case with DIY over the phone, though. I can’t stand hearing Comcast’s recording with “simple step-by-step instructions” about how to reboot my modem and router. I KNOW! REBOOT FIRST! I don’t call Comcast when I need to reboot.

I went down another slippery slope today with a call to Linksys. First, I tried to avoid their “self help, at your own pace setup” by talking to a customer service rep. He took a case number for me and promised someone would call me back, which didn’t happen. Two hours later, I went for the recording. Overall… it worked. But, the first thing it had me do was reset my router. Apparently, this was a bad idea. Then, it didn’t tell me how to add security to it.

I ended up calling over to customer service anyway. After asking me LOTS of aggravating questions that had nothing to do with my SIMPLE problem (what’s your name? Phone number? Email address? Address? Serial number? What time did you call before? And on.. and on..) I said, “Hey – I just want to set my router up like I had it before, with a name I recognize and a password so the security is enabled.”

Then, she asked if I had pressed reset. “Yes, your automated system says that is the first thing to do to set up the router.”
“Maam, you must never press the reset button if you want to keep your Router ID and password.”
Why am I getting in trouble for following their directions? Anyway, that chore is done now (15 minutes of work and 3 hours of hassle), but it made me think – can’t we do this better?

For instance, I love customer service "chat" that is available online. We could have something like this on the phone as well. There could be an "opt out" key - like "if this has nothing to do with your problem, press 9." That way, we wouldn't get stuck in LOOPS of unhelpful audio. Also, if there was an "I don't get it" key - like if the instruction was garbled or didn't make any sense "if you need a better explanation, press 5."

Another thing that would help SO MUCH on the phone would be if you would get the customer service rep first - instead of the maze of select-a-question. Seriously, if they would spend 5 seconds sending us to the right place immediately, people wouldn't be so frustrated after spending 20 minutes pressing buttons to dead end on menus that don't make sense.

The reason this is relevant is because customer service is even MORE important when customers do MOST of the work ourselves. When we need help, we are REALLY in a bind. It's not just because we didn't reboot.

Everybody Stream!!

I love streaming radio.

I know everyone is ga-ga over streaming video, and I agree that it’s great to see TV online for many reasons. However, my television gets great picture and sound. I can put it anywhere I like, and this will be the case.

As many of us experienced as children, though, this was not always the case. Anyone remember the rabbit ears covered with aluminum foil with a hanger sticking out to try to catch a couple of extra signals?

Well, this is STILL how most of us listed to radio. Yes, Satellite radio is available, and HD radio is finding its place. However, when my alarm goes off in the morning, I’m getting fresh radio waves. If I roll over juuusssttt right, I can actually hear what is being said through all the white noise.

This is one of the reasons we have radio streaming over the computer for the rest of the day. We can HEAR it! Better than that, though, is the incredible variety available at our fingertips when we stream radio online. Pretty much every radio station in the US (and many other countries) has an online stream available.

We can catch radio from different places, and in different time zones. This is handy when a syndicated show is on at different times across the nation. Even the best 1980’s short-wave can’t beat this clarity!

A new utility I would love to see would be a tv-guide-like website for streaming radio. This would show the hundreds (thousands?) of different radio stations available online, and their daily show list for a week. You could set it for your time zone and see what is available and when. Then, when you miss a syndicated radio show, you could look up the next time zone it’s in and listen to it from Cincinnati or Seattle or Honolulu. (you wouldn’t need to wait for any pod casts to be posted)

Streaming TV can’t beat streaming radio because there is nowhere near this amount of availability from TV stations. Radio is still a much more free and available form of media!

Google Docs – Spreadsheet.

It’s no secret, I’m a spreadsheet geek; an MSExcel geek to be more accurate. Today, I took the plunge and decided to try out Google’s spreadsheet application.

At first, I was pretty impressed. Not only did it handle all of my normal functions like sumif and vlookup, it even had a little hovering function template. It has lots of formats for numbers, though it is oddly missing the ability to manipulate the number of decimal places to display (you can do all of them, 2, or rounded to 0) unless you add a formula to round to a specific number of decimal places.

Also, there are many tables and charts that excel does not have, which can give a report serious pizzaz, or function as more than a spreadsheet. There are pictorial graphs (worms, chocolate, money all in the size of a bar chart), and there are moving flash graphs. There are also internet-savvy charts, like word-clouds! To function as more than a spreadsheet a Google gadget will produce a Gantt chart, with just task titles and dates. An org chart can also be created by listing manager’s names in one column and subordinates names in another (multiple columns = multiple levels).

However, there is an enormous barrier to using Google Spreadsheet if you are an analyst like me – there are not enough fields. The regular table only has 100 rows and columns to “T” (2003 Excel has 65000 rows and columns to “IV”, and even this is limiting, so I heard 2007 Excel has 100,000 rows). There are not many major trends that can be analyzed in only 100 rows, nor can an analyst find historical data within only 100 rows.

You can add up to 500 more rows, but no more columns. When I added the rows, the spreadsheet crashed.

I may try to use Google Spreadsheet again, in order to finish off a report. Apparently, .xls files can be uploaded into the Google application, so I can use it for my summary findings, and create some nifty charts and graphs for the ooh-la-la factor that execs are always dying for.
Are you catching this, Microsoft?