2012년 12월 22일 토요일

What Is The Next Big Thing In Tech?

glass_photos4-580-75What is the next big thing in tech? I have no idea, but it’s fun to speculate. I like this thread on Quora that attempts to answer this very question and you know what? It has some pretty stellar answers. Particularly deep and insightful is what Vankatesh Rao has to say: “Historically, there’s been a fairly good record of people seeing “the next big thing” (NBT) a respectable fraction of the time, so it CAN be done, without 20/20 hindsight. Here are some successful big-thing anticipations that I am cherry-picking to illustrate when, why and how you can predict NBTs.” On top of this, he actually offers a few reasonable ways to identify the next big thing before it is the next big thing. He’s got me convinced that it might actually be somewhat feasible to predict with a decent amount of accuracy. Anyways, here’s what a few members of the Think Tank had to say on the matter.

Wearable Technology

chrisI think the next big thing may very well be wearable technology such as the Google Glass project. While dorky (yes, incredibly dorky) I think they represent the next stage of connectedness. We already have our phones with us at all times but it is getting inconvenient, sadly, to take them out to interact with them. Oftentimes innovations, even tech innovations, center around making life easier for consumers and that can certainly mean allowing people to get lazier and lazier–but not only. We already have some wearable tech available to consumers now such as fitness devices (like the Nike+ FuelBand). One logical place to innovate is the wrist watch–many companies have developed watches that integrate with your smartphone. To get a little deeper, imagine a contact lens that shows you the latest updates from Twitter or notifies you when you get an email? It’s already in the works. Here’s an interesting infographic from Mashable that talks about wearable tech.
Chris (@DailyTekk) is the founder/editor of DailyTekk. 

The Internet of Things

mattThe next big shift is one we are starting to see now with the internet of things. The main revolutions until now have been really software based or evolution of established devices (phones, computers, PDAs/Tablets) rather than really changing the way that people get the data that exists in the internet. What is changing is that we no longer think about using information on a laptop to set things in the house, rather that thing is itself connected (e.g. Philips Hue or The Nest Thermostat). Where this gets really exciting is when you start to think about inputs because these devices do not have keyboards or pointers so we are having to think more creatively about inputs. Augmented Reality is a particularly exciting example because it allows us to move to a world where technology in eyewear, contact lenses, or other applications we haven’t even thought of yet are controlled not by what we input but rather by what we show an interest in. I think this will be fundamental revolution that changes the way we see and interact with the world around us.
Matt Mills (@mattmills), Global Head of Partnerships and Innovation Aurasma

Computers Will Do More of the Little Things for Us

jonTrying to pick the next big thing is like trying to forecast the stock market – we all think we can do it and 90% of us look like idiots in retrospect for trying. You can’t know what’s big until it’s big. Who would have thought touch-screen-phones/browsers would be it after the Palm and Newton? That said, computers are getting more able every day. Some are waiting for a breakthrough moment when they’re smarter than us – that’s not the right way to think about it. In many ways, they’re already smarter than us. And each year, we add more things that the computers can do better. I think we’ll continue to rely on them for more and more – to drive, to tell us what to eat and when, to plan our finances.

http://dailytekk.com/2012/12/18/what-is-the-next-big-thing-in-tech/

Trying to make sites more trustworthy with users' personal data

Heather Kelly, CNN
A new certification program aims to make websites more transparent about sharing users' personal data.

A new certification program aims to make websites more transparent about sharing users' personal data.

(CNN) -- There's a lack of trust between Internet users and the websites that collect their private data.
These sites aren't going to stop gathering personal information anytime soon, but one company hopes to make the exchange less mysterious when people sign on to a site using a social-media profile.
Logging in to third-party sites or commenting systems with Facebook, Twitter, Yahoo, Google+ and other social profiles is common -- 53% of people have done it, according to a recent study by Gigya, which handles these social logins for major sites such as Pepsi, CBS and Verizon. But Gigya is more interested in the other 47% who don't use social logins and what it can do to change their minds.
In theory, signing in to a third-party site with an existing social-media account should make life a bit easier. There are no forms to fill out, no new passwords and login names to memorize. Just enter two bits of information you're already intimately familiar with from checking Facebook or Twitter a million times. Once logged in, you might even like how easy it is to share content on your profile, or enjoy seeing what your friends bought, read, listened to or watched.
In exchange for these benefits, you give that company access to personal information telling them who you are, such as your age, gender, location, e-mail address, list of friends and what your interests are. That data is extremely valuable, and is used to tailor the site or app experience to individual visitors. People who log in with a social-network profile are better customers. They stick around longer and are more engaged.
The holdouts who avoid signing in with social profiles don't want to give third-parties the keys to their personal data. They believe companies will take their profile information and sell it, spam their friends or post to their social networks without permission, according to the Gigya survey.
"There's a real question of transparency and trusting, and confusion as to what's happening," said Gigya CEO Patrick Salyer. He believes much of it is a "perception issue" and that increased transparency between companies and customers would be mutually beneficial.
That's where the Gigya's new SocialPrivacy Certification program comes in. In exchange for publicly promising to use data responsibly, sites can sport a seal proclaiming that they are certified as trustworthy. The companies must follow these rules: they will not sell your data or your friends' data, spam you with e-mails, post on your social networks or contact your friends without permission.
Gigya is training a team of 35 employees in its client-services department to audit companies to ensure they adhere to the criteria. The companies are vetted when they first request certification and audited regularly after they're signed up to make sure they're still sticking to the rules. Gigya has not settled on a price for the certification yet. Any site can apply for the program, and Gigya plans to develop a similar code of conduct for apps in the future.
In theory the certification will assuage consumers' fears, and in turn boost the usage of social logins across the web. To increase the program's credibility, Gigya consulted privacy experts and collaborated on the final product with the Future of Privacy Forum, a privacy think tank in D.C. supported by companies such as Google, Amazon and Facebook.
Currently there aren't any laws regulating what sites and apps can do with your personal information, and companies are hoping to stave off any government regulation by taking matters into their own hands with initiatives like SocialPrivacy Certification.
"There's no obligation to be a good privacy citizen unless it's health or banking information," said Jules Polonetsky, director and co-chair of the Future of Privacy Forum.
Facebook, Twitter and some other networks have guidelines for developers that prohibit some of these behaviors, including bans on selling data. But by taking it one step further and publicly declaring it won't misuse personal data, a site can suddenly be held accountable for any violations by a group with a bit more power: the Federal Trade Commission.
"The FTC can sue you for making a deceptive statement to users who relied on that when they signed onto your site," said Polonetsky.
The SocialPrivacy Certification program is launching with a handful or partners, including Martha Stewart and the Toronto Globe and Mail. Until it becomes standard across the industry, its usefulness will be limited. But as long as people remain paranoid and hesitant to share their information, sites that want that data will be motivated to be more transparent.

http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/14/tech/social-media/social-login-gigya/index.html

5 Predictions for online video advertising in 2013 | VentureBeat

5 Predictions for online video advertising in 2013 | VentureBeat

Six Tech Trends That Will Rock Enterprise IT In 2013

Six Tech Trends That Will Rock Enterprise IT In 2013
In 2012, IT growth and innovation centered around mobile devices, cloud services, social networking and Big Data. 2013 is likely to see accelerated adoption in all those areas, as many companies move from experimenting and testing to deployment.
What follows are 2013 predictions for some of the fastest growing next-generation technologies in enterprise IT. If 2012 seemed like a tumultuous year, then hold on to your hats. Next year is going to be another bumpy ride.

1. Big Data

First up is Big Data. 2013 will see companies continue to spend much more on databases and business intelligence tools to drive innovation and boost operational efficiency. Big Data technologies will have the most impact in the financial industry as well as medical and scientific research. Corporations wanting to deploy business analytics will look to those industries for guidance.
International Data Corp. defines Big Data as new generation "technologies and architectures, designed to economically extract value from very large volumes of a wide variety of data by enabling high-velocity capture, discovery and/or analysis." In 2010, companies spent $3.2 billion worldwide in Big Data technology.
In 2015, Big Data spending will reach $16.9 billion, representing a compound annual growth rate of 40% or about 7 times the growth rate of the overall information and communications technology market, IDC says. Because growth will outpace the supply of talent, companies are expected to look to vendors for cloud-based services that can offload much of the work from inside IT staff.
While software and services are expected to make up the majority of Big Data spending, companies will be spending on infrastructure at a faster rate. Spending on storage will grow the fastest through 2015 with a CAGR of more than 61%, IDC says.

2. Software-Defined Networking

On the networking side, software-defined networking (SND) will enter the refinement process needed before products are ready for production use, according to Forrester. The maturation process will take roughly five years, as SDN components are tied together and technology added for integration with management systems, orchestration software, hypervisor management products and networking protocols. Forrester recommends that companies prepare for industry adoption of SDN by starting training for IT staff in 2013.

3. In-Memory Computing

While watching carefully developments in SDN, many companies are expected to take in-memory computing to the mainstream, with the help of vendors such as SAP and Oracle, Gartner says. "Numerous vendors will deliver in-memory-based solutions over the next two years driving this approach into mainstream use." As the name implies, in-memory computing brings data sets closer to computational engines, replacing the much slower architecture that involves pulling information from a database in a separate server. This opens up the possibility of real-time or near real-time results from transactional and analytical applications running against the same in-memory dataset. A mouthful to be sure, but the process could mean big advancements in how fast companies can analyze and act up on the data they gather.

4. Social Technologies Drives Enteprise Collaboration

In the front office, employees' use of social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter, is driving companies to build their own enterprise social networks to give workers secure areas for collaboration and sharing data. In 2013, IDC predicts these networks will move beyond the pilot stage and into production.
Gartner sees a similar trend with enterprise app stores for smartphones and tablets. Faced with vendors limiting stores to specific devices, companies will deliver private application stores to workers by 2014. This will avoid the multiple payment processes and licensing terms that would come from using public stores from vendors.

5. Windows 8 Doesn't Get Traction

On the desktop, Microsoft is not expected to win big in the enterprise with Windows 8 until well after 2013 - if ever. Gartner says 90% of corporations will skip large-scale deployment of the latest version of the operating system through 2015. Most enterprises and their PC management vendors are not ready to deal with the touch interface Microsoft has added to its flagship product. As a result, companies will wait until support for the dramatic OS change becomes widespread in the business technology market.

6. Gamification Wins

Finally, techniques used in building addiction to playing online games will get adopted to boost worker productivity. Measurement of performance, feedback and incentives will be used to engage employees and tie their actions more closely to business outcomes, Gartner says. The worldwide market for gamification technology and services will rise from $242 million this year to $2.8 billion in 2016. Within three years, 40% of the Global 1000 companies will use gaming techniques, a process called gamification, to improve performance and efficiency of their business operations.


http://readwrite.com/2012/12/21/six-tech-trends-that-will-rock-enterprise-it-in-2013

2012년 12월 21일 금요일

nfographic: Evolution of Text Messaging on Mobile Phones

http://dailytekk.com/2012/12/18/infographic-evolution-of-text-messaging-on-mobile-phones/

The evolution of text messaging dates back to pictographs and bird delivery systems, but it can be directly related to the Finnish innovator Matti Makkonen. In 1984 Makkonen revolutionized the way communication is realized for human beings with the SMS for cell phones. Find out why texting has become more popular than talking with teens, and how SMS messages have evolved from 1984. This infographic will reveal interesting statistics and facts that few people know.




Facebook plans to add TV-like commercials to News Feed | VentureBeat

Facebook plans to add TV-like commercials to News Feed | VentureBeat

http://venturebeat.com/2012/12/18/facebook-video-ads/

The DeanBeat: The accelerated change of the game industry | VentureBeat

The DeanBeat: The accelerated change of the game industry | VentureBeat

http://venturebeat.com/2012/12/14/the-deanbeat-the-accelerated-change-of-the-game-industry/

Top Holiday Trends Of 2012, According To Social Media [Infographic]

Top Holiday Trends Of 2012, According To Social Media [Infographic]

http://socialtimes.com/holiday-trends-2012-infographic_b113889

Twitter Users Can Finally Download and Save All Their Tweets

Twitter Users Can Finally Download and Save All Their Tweets

http://socialtimes.com/twitter-users-can-finally-download-and-save-all-their-tweets_b113910

What Developers Need to Know About Instagram’s Policy Changes

What Developers Need to Know About Instagram’s Policy Changes

http://socialtimes.com/what-developers-need-to-know-about-instagrams-policy-changes_b113845

Adobe Adds Designer Network Behance to its Portfolio

Adobe Adds Designer Network Behance to its Portfolio

http://socialtimes.com/adobe-snaps-up-designer-network-behance_b114122#.UNSXTNovDGE.blogger

2012년 12월 10일 월요일

Why Facebook will have trouble killing the text message

Facebook's new Messenger app is only available in a few countries but will soon roll out to the United States and elsewhere.
Facebook's new Messenger app is only available in a few countries but will soon roll out to the United States and elsewhere.
 
 
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • Facebook is rolling out a new version of its Messenger app for Android
  • App only requires a name and a phone number, not an actual Facebook account, to sign up
  • Some bloggers see the new Messenger app as an assault on the lowly text message
  • But standard SMS has a lot going for it and will likely weather all kinds of challenges
(Time) -- Facebook has started to roll out a new version of its Messenger app for Android that only requires a name and a phone number, not an actual Facebook account, to sign up.
Although the new Facebook Messenger app is only available in a handful of countries for now--Australia, India, Indonesia, South Africa and Venezuela--it will eventually roll out to the United States and elsewhere, allowing users to chat with their phone contacts even if they're not using Facebook.
This news has set the tech world atwitter with proclamations that the new Messenger is an assault on the lowly text message (including one such proclamation from Facebook itself).
It's a nice thought, at least. Given that a single text to your neighbor can cost more than a data transmission from Mars, who wouldn't relish the idea of wireless carriers getting their comeuppance? In reality, though, standard SMS has a lot going for it, and will likely weather all kinds of assaults, especially one from Facebook.
OMG! Texting turns 20
Facebook's quarter in review
Church: Go forth and tweet
For one thing, Facebook Messenger faces the same adoption hurdle as other Internet-based messaging apps like WhatsApp and Viber: It requires a conscious decision not to use traditional SMS.
With Facebook Messenger, you must first consider whether the recipient has Facebook installed, and is set up to receive notifications for new messages. Then, you must commit to using the Messenger app instead of your phone's built-in SMS functionality. Once you do that, the conversation is locked into Facebook unless you have one of the select Android phones that can integrate regular text messages.
That's a lot to consider compared to the standard SMS, which is guaranteed to reach and alert the recipient as long as you have the right phone number. To truly threaten the text message, Facebook Messenger needs the kind of tight smartphone integration found in Apple's iMessage, which automatically replaces standard text messages between any two iPhone users. That's not really possible unless Facebook starts making its own smartphones.
In lieu of tighter smartphone integration, Facebook simply has to compete with similar services that are already well-established. As Boy Genius Report points out, competitor WhatsApp is already a Top 5 messaging app in 141 countries and handles 10 billion messages per day. (Compare that to 7.8 trillion regular text messages sent in 2011, according to Portio Research, for an average of 21 billion messages per day.) Competition is good, but in this case it means users will be fragmented across multiple services that can't talk to one another.
Ideally, these competing services would somehow find a way to work with each other, so a Facebook user could send a message to someone who uses Whatsapp or Viber. It sounds crazy, but considering that wireless carriers found a way to make it work with SMS, tech companies should be able to figure out a solution.
I acknowledge that the need for SMS alternatives is more desperate outside the United States, where the price per message can be cost-prohibitive. But in the land of all-you-can-eat messaging, if you really need to reach someone, SMS remains the most reliable option, and Facebook Messenger only poses a minor threat.


http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/05/tech/social-media/facebook-messenger/index.html

The Future of Social Media in 2013: Six Points to Consider


As we round the bend to the end of another term of learning and applying the principles of social media marketing, I wonder what 2013 will bring to the social media world. I have spoken to my classes about the history of Marketing, the emergence of social media, and how we utilize social platforms and tools for B2C and B2B.  But, now we need to consider what new tools, processes, trends, and gaps could appear as social media becomes more pervasive, effective, and required in business.
In the future, I think we will see a further evolution of how we produce and consume marketing messages as well an increase in the value of information produced via social (for business and consumers).  Some points to consider:
Tribes
I believe the future of social media can be seen by looking to the past. Humans by nature are social creatures, however we have spent years relying on mass media.  As time has passed, we are now relying less on mass media and more on our peers: we are once again turning to one another.  Consider your friends on Facebook or those you follow on Twitter. Via social,  I have surrounded myself with like minded people that I can have a symbiotic relationship with.   Many of the folks I follow on Twitter I follow because I can learn from them and I value the content they produce.
Relevancy
Relevant connections, content, and communications will remain increasingly important in order to cancel out the “noise”.  As consumers continue to be bombarded with tweets, status updates, mobile marketing messages and the like, it will be paramount for these communications to be relevant, timely, and personalized.  This is true for the business as well.  I see the future of social including smaller more niche social groups organized by brands to further identify consumer needs, research, and for crowdsourcing purposes.
If your business is on a social platform and engaging, good for you. If you are not utilizing it to facilitate customer service, shame on you.  Obviously, this will take some planning on your part to prepare staff and get processes in place for customer service inquiries.  Nevertheless, the benefits far outweigh the costs in this situation.  Consider the company who is “on Twitter” and ignores customer inquiries made via tweets.  This is the equivalent of having a customer at your business, asking you a question (with a store full of other customers and potential customers) while you stand there not listening with your hands covering your ears.  Potentially disastrous in real life; it would be online as well.
SoMo 
By far the biggest and most exciting area of social will most likely be SoMo (social mobile).  Mobile phones have become an every day item that are utilized multiple times throughout the day.  Smartphones hold more information on the user than ever before; we rely on them to remind us of doctors appointments, to take and store photos, to stay in contact with our friends and family, to do searches, and to sometimes even make phone calls.  New and exciting possibilities abound surrounding smart phones and equipping them to better know the user, anticipate needs, and meet those needs.  However, with more people using smart phones as their primary tool for Internet searches, businesses will need to make changes to webpages and more to accommodate slower connections and/or smaller screens.
Integration
Mass media and social media will become more integrated across devices (such as laptop, tablets, smart phones) and platforms (such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn) to offer more relevant and personalized experiences.  Similarly, we will also see further integration with local and SoMo: SoLoMo. Consumers will utilize social media via mobile technology to include point of purchase and point of consumption.
The Future
The future of social media is my students, myself, and you….
Each of my students (and you the reader) have created personal digital brands via blogging, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and/or Pinterest.  As we all leave our digital footprints, we are not only representing ourselves, we are representing the brands we work for and the brands we ‘talk’ about via social.  Likewise, the individuals that make up brands are creating engaged company personas with both personality and transparency.  These folks are the future of social media.
Individuals will shape the future of social media.  What steps are you taking to do the most good with your digital footprint!?
The views expressed are those of the author, and do not represent those of Texas A&M University-Commerce or Southern New Hampshire University unless stated explicitly.

Pocket Change opens up its virtual loyalty currency for Android game devs | VentureBeat

Pocket Change opens up its virtual loyalty currency for Android game devs | VentureBeat

2012년 12월 4일 화요일

Chapter 12. Manage Conflict - Interpersonal Communication

Chapter 12. Manage Conflict
4 December 2012

Conflict is an expressed struggle between at least two interdependent parties. All conflicts possess the same characteristics of perceived incompatible goals, expressed struggle, perceived scarce rewards, interdependence, and inevitability.

Conflicts can be constructive, yet most people view conflict as something to be avoided whenever possible.

Communication scholars usually describe harmful conflicts as dysfunctional and beneficial ones as functional.

In dysfunctional conflicts, outcomes fall short and have damaging effects on the relationship, and functional conflicts achieve the best possible outcomes even possibly strengthening the relationship. This dichotomy forms various sub-dichotomies:

Integration versus polarization, cooperation versus opposition, confirmation versus disconfirmation, agreement versus coercion, de-escalation versus escalation, foresight versus shortsightedness, focusing versus drifting, positive versus negative results.

Default styles of handling conflict are characteristic approaches people take when their needs appear incompatible with what others want.


Conflict styles include avoidance, accommodation, competition, compromise, and collaboration.

Avoidance occurs when people nonassertively ignore or stay away from conflict. Avoidance can be physical or conversational, and reflects a pessimistic attitude about conflict.
Accommodation occurs when we allow others to have their own way rather than asserting our own point-of-view.

Competition is a win-lose approach to conflict that involves high self concern, and low concern for others.

Compromise gives both people at least some of what they want although both sacrifice part of their goals. Some compromises leave everyone satisfied.

Collaboration seeks win-win solutions to conflict in which the goal is to find a solution that satisfies the needs of everyone involved. It is often the ideal outcome.

Passive aggression occurs when a communicator expresses dissatisfaction in a disguised manner, whereas, direct aggressors lash out to attack the source of displeasure.

In determining the best style to use when resolving conflict, consider: the situation, the other person(s) involved, and your own goals.


When two or more people are in a long-term relationship, they develop their own relational conflict style which is a pattern of managing disagreements that repeats itself over a matter of time.

3 styles to manage conflicts include: complimentary conflict style, symmetrical conflict style, and parallel conflict style.

Another way to examine conflict styles is to examine the interaction between emotional closeness and aggression which can include: Nonintimate-aggressive, Intimate-aggressive, Nonintimate-nonaggressive, Intimate-nonagressive.

When people have been in a relationship for some time, their communication often develops into conflict rituals which are unacknowledged, yet real repeating patterns of interlocking behavior.

Conflict management in practice requires that you define your needs, share your needs with the other person(s), listen to the others’ needs, generate possible solutions, evaluate the solution options and choose the best one, implement the solution, and follow-up/reinforce the solution.


Survey: Smartphones are for singles, tablets for couples

A couple in Mumbai, India, checks out the iPad 2 at an Apple reseller in 2011.
A couple in Mumbai, India, checks out the iPad 2 at an Apple reseller in 2011.
 
Doug Gross, CNN
 
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • Survey: Singles are more likely to own smartphones, couples to have tablets
  • Difference may be because married folks are usually older, more financially secure
  • The survey sampled 2,006 adults in the United States
(CNN) -- Maybe a phone's not big enough for you and your spouse to cuddle up with on the sofa. Or single folks need to travel light when they're on the prowl.
Whatever the reasons, a new survey suggests that married couples are more likely to own a tablet, while smartphones are more popular with unhitched folks.
The Search Agency, a digital marketing company, recently released its 2012 Online User Behavior and Engagement Study (PDF), created with the help of market research firm Harris Interactive.
In it, 49% of single respondents said they own a smartphone, compared with only 43% of married people. Meanwhile, 45% of people who have said "I do" reported owning a tablet, compared with 36% of singles.
Search Agency Vice President Mike Solomon said that differences in the ages of single and married respondents may have played a bigger role than specific habits.
"For many of the findings, percentages zigzagged between age groups, rather than plotting a consistent bell curve -- indicating how factors such as generational differences, disposable income, and the influence of children on their parents impact results," Solomon said in a written statement.
"Married people are often older, have more disposable income and can more easily justify superfluous pieces of technology, such as tablets. At the same time, baby boomers are often more tech-literate than their slightly younger counterparts -- likely because their millennial children are pushing them to use new tools and devices."
The survey of 2,006 U.S. adults was conducted online between August 14 and 16.
It provides some other interesting glimpses into what could be called the mobile revolution that has taken over the computing world.
For example, 59% of smartphone owners said they had launched a Web search on their mobile phones when they were sitting within arm's reach of a desktop or laptop -- a number that jumps to 74% for younger users, age 18-34.
And 66% of tablet owners said they've quickly jumped onto their iPad, Kindle Fire, Nexus 7 or other gadget to get more information about products they see on TV.


http://www.cnn.com/2012/11/29/tech/mobile/smartphones-tablets-singles-couples/index.html

Twitter makes nice with developers, with a timeline of upcoming changes | VentureBeat

Twitter makes nice with developers, with a timeline of upcoming changes | VentureBeat

2012년 12월 3일 월요일

Facebook Mobile Use May Be Near Its Saturation Point In The United States

Facebook Mobile Use May Be Near Its Saturation Point In The United States
No doubt about it, mobile is now the primary avenue for growth in social media. If you did not know that already, analytics firm Nielsen released a report today showing that social media use on mobile devices rose 63% between native apps and the mobile Web in the United States in 2012.
Between PCs and mobile devices, Americans spent 121 billion minutes on social media in July 2012, an increase of 37% (88 billion minutes).
More people than ever are using Facebook’s native apps to access the site, including 78.4 million Americans alone. Native-app use for Facebook eclipsed the mobile Web, which had 74.3 million users.
If you add those groups together, the aggregate of mobile users topped those using a PC to access Facebook by almost half a million people. In the United States, 152 million people accessed Facebook from their PCs against 152.7 million through either native apps or the mobile Web.
Granted, there is likely some overlap accessing Facebook on both the mobile Web and native apps, but mobile and PC use of the social network is fairly even in the Unites States. It's also apparent that most people who use Facebook on a PC are also likely to do so on a mobile device.

We have watched all types of mobile use explode in 2012. In the United States, we have hit an inflection point where most people will be accessing the Internet primarily through their smartphones and tablets. The question becomes how much more can social-media companies like Facebook or Twitter grow on mobile?
Mobile-analytics company Flurry reports that there are 181 million iOS and Android smartphones active in the United States. Conservatively, iOS and Android make up 85% of the domestic smartphone market. From there, we can extrapolate that there are about 208 million smartphone owners in the country. Facebook can now claim 73% (at most) of those people as their mobile customers. What that means for Facebook is that it has likely hit near-saturation in the number of moble owners it can acquire.
Member acquisition, on PC or mobile, has never really been a problem for Facebook. Nor has been getting members to spend time on the site. Facebook is built to get people to use it, and they do. A lot. Facebook saw native-app users spend nearly 27 minutes a month on the site, a 61% increase over the same period in 2011.
Facebook’s problem is making money off those mobile people. This became apparent when the company filed its S-1 document with the Securities and Exchange Commission prior to its initial public offering in February.
The biggest risk Facebook owners said they faced in sustaining growth and financial health was their ability to turn mobile members into dollars. As such, Facebook has launched a variety of ads on mobile, such as sponsored stories and ads that appear in member newsfeeds.
Facebook is a very quick and iterative company when it comes to building new products, and it always has dozens of small teams working on projects that can advance both its utility as well as its monetization features. If consumer use trends in 2012 have taught Facebook anything, it is that it should ramp up the output of these teams to take advantage of the shift from PC to mobile devices.
Other social networks have seen a spike in mobile usage in 2012, according to Nielsen. For instance, Twitter sees more users from the mobile Web (42 million) than it does via PC (37 million) in the U.S. Twitter received 22.620 visitors through its native apps. Burgeoning social-network Pinterest saw the biggest growth rate of the year on any platform, with 14 million users through the mobile Web, a 4,225% increase year over year from 2011.
Pinterest had 27 million members on PCs, a 1,047% growth rate. See the Nielsen chart below for overall mobile-Web and native-app use across all social-networking sites in the U.S.

While Facebook may be near its saturation point, there is still a fair amount of room left for companies like Twitter, Pinterest and Foursquare to cultivate mobile members. Facebook has set the standard for the social-mobile industry, now it is up to the competition to match it.


http://readwrite.com/2012/12/03/mobile-social-media-use-is-nearly-saturated-in-the-united-states

3 Trends to Consider for Your 2013 Social Video Strategy

By

Even though the buzz about the effectiveness of online video has continued to increase, the number of companies taking advantage of the opportunities that online video provides is still not as big as I would expect. From what I’ve experience this past year, the main reason seems to be the cost. While Twitter and Facebook can be entered into with little to no cost, online video has a price of admission no matter how you go about creating the content. For instance, the cost could be the price of the camera you buy to do it yourself, or it could be the cost of hiring a production company to create a professional video for you.
Even for those “do it yourself” types who already happen to own a camera, there is still the cost of the time that must be invested to create your video. I have heard from many people who chose to record their own video, but got stuck in the complexities of the editing process and needed help figuring out how to finish it. I also received many calls this year from companies that chose the cheapest route possible for creating a video and were not satisfied with their end result.
Planning Ahead
As you plan for your company’s 2013 online video strategy, whether you intend to do it yourself or hire a production company, the following three noteworthy trends from 2012 are worth considering. 
 Noteworthy Trend #1: Product Video. The challenge of online sales is that customers have to trust the photos that are on the site to get a sense of what they are purchasing. Video can take your product one step further, giving it dimension and providing potential customers an idea of how the product looks and performs in the real world. Online retailers like Amazon, as well as brick-and-mortar retailers with an online presence, continue to add video to their websites to enhance user experience and increase sales. Savvy online retailers know the importance of embedding their videos into the product pages; embedded videos receive a higher view rate than videos that are a link or an icon.
Noteworthy Trend #2: Content Video. While deployment of content videos is on the rise, the cost involved in producing content videos creates a large hurdle for many companies. Goviral.com has developed a list of Top 100 brands  in social video. It is important to note that these 100 companies are not necessarily the companies with the most content; however, they have focused on quality content that is loyal to the brand message and reaches their target audience. (Notice that Red Bull is number one on the list.) What I love about this is it challenges brands to be creative and move beyond the poor flip cam videos we have seen in the past.
Noteworthy Trend #3: Long-Form Video. Long-form video has been gaining in popularity, though there remains some debate as to what actually constitutes long-form content. The widely accepted view, and one I share, is that any video over ten minutes can be considered long-form content. Long-form video is best suited for advertising, and it plays well into YouTube’s new way of ranking videos by the amount of time spent watching the video. What does this mean for companies? Since longer video is best suited for advertising, it is an opportunity to get your company in front of more targeted viewers. Just remember, this isn’t a license to create long, boring content. If anything, it is a call to action to be strategic in the way you advertise and the way you create content.
What is your company’s 2013 online video strategy?

http://windmillnetworking.com/2012/12/03/3-trends-2013-social-video-strategy/

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