Glassboard

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Glassboard – “Private group sharing done right.” (via Daring Fireball).

I think that there’s going to be more like this – better tools that allow us share and connect with only those with whom we want to do so. Even with this tool, it still appears that we are the product (rather than the customer).

At some point, something like this is going to emerge where we are actually the customers and then this whole concept of “social” will really need to begin to focus on the concept of cultivating social capital rather than on media part. When that happens, I think it will be a really good thing.

Post Formats

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Arrgh! Just spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out how to do something to customize my blog and it turns out that it’s already built into the Twenty Eleven theme. #postformats #wordpress #twentyeleven #awesome

A Gentlemen’s Long Bet on the Future of Social Media

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It’s not that often that I get thrown by an email from a colleague.

The subject line was “URGENT need your help” and the gist of the request was that an executive was making a presentation to an important client the next morning and was looking for a perspective on where “Social Media and the Internet” was going to be “five plus” years from now.

I don’t typically shy away from these types of questions. I have what I believe to be a reasonably informed perspective on where things are going and with a fairly well rehearsed set of caveats, I’m more than happy to share it.

That said, five years is a really really long time – especially in Internet time.

If you think about how far we’ve come in the past five years, specifically as it relates to social networking on the web, it seems like the world is completely new. So with all of that, the question sort of threw me.

However, I’ve been pondering the question and I think I have an answer.

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PICU Without Walls at IBM Impact

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If you have twenty minutes and want to see something that I think is pretty awesome, fast forward to about the 31 minute mark in the video above.

The video is of Dr. Jeffrey Burns from Children’s Hospital Boston describing how the team that I work with at IBM Interactive is helping to transform pediatric healthcare. Dr. Burns is a really compelling presenter and the presentation was described as “TED class” by James Governer, Co-founder of RedMonk.

Although I had minimal involvement with this project (I participated in one of the very initial workshops), I am extremely proud of being a part of IBM Interactive in Boston for doing this work. More directly involved were Adam and Jodi Cutler, Dave Martin, Michael Corbridge and Casey Dugan (from IBM Research).

On a more personal note, by sort of a lucky twist, Dr. Burns was Edmund’s doctor just after he was born during our week long stay at Children’s. He is every bit as an amazing doctor as you would expect from watching the video.

Kim and I felt extremely blessed and lucky to have had access to such great care for our son.

Distractions – November 2, 2010

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I just checked and it’s been about nine months since I’ve posted a set of distractions. It’s not like I haven’t had any. That said, here are some things that have caught my interest over the past couple of days.

Media Surfaces: Incidental Media – Probably my favorite this week. Great video by Berg Design exploring the future of media social and otherwise. See also Media Surfaces: The Journey which is part 2 of the series.

Jane McGonigal’s Sunday Sermon at the School of Life – More fantastic stuff from Jane McGonigal on games, happiness and productivity. Very much worth your time if you are a fan of hers.

Heytell iPhone/Android App – Recommended by my buddy Adam Cutler, this app is just as he says “Seriously, this is one of the best apps in a while.” It turns your phone into a combo voice messenger/walkie-talkie. Incredibly useful and already on my iPhone home screen.

Khoi Vinh on the state of Magazines on the iPad – I’ve been meaning to write something about Magazines on the iPad for a little bit now. It’s one of my only disappointments so far with my iPad. More later on this.

Last, but not least, RockMelt. It’s a social network integrated web browser. Make sure to watch the video. This looks pretty interesting and I’m very eager to play with it for a bit. Sort of tangentially relates to the first Berg video. I really think that there is something here.

Oops! One more that I meant to post but forgot in the initial writing.

I’m loving this commercial for Call of Duty: Black Ops. I’m not a big fan of Kobe, but I think his appearance adds to the commercial and if you have played any of the earlier versions of the game, you’ll probably get a laugh at the writing on the side of Jimmy Kimmel’s weapon. At any rate, Gimme Shelter has been in rotation on the iPod as of late and already I’ve pre-ordered my copy of game.

From the “What Do We Do With These Unconnected Dots?” Desk

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Even after a number of years being in front of a room for workshops, small group briefings or larger presentations, sometimes I still get a little bit of nerves. Typically, when this happens, my brain works faster than my mouth (or maybe it is the other way around) and what I want to say doesn’t come out exactly in the way that I wanted to say it.

In hindsight, I think this was a little bit true last night. I think I pretty much shared all of the big picture things that I wanted to say, but I’m not sure that I connected the dots in the way that I had hoped to…so….I thought I might try to do that in a quick blog post…as an addendum to my presentation last night.

But before I try to do that, I wanted to say that I had an absolute blast being one of the panelists and speakers on the Flying cars are here! The futuristic present of marketing panel last night.

Thank you Mike Proulx for inviting me to participate and I really echo all of the other things that were said about the event that you, Hill Holliday and the Social Media Club put on last night. It was absolutely excellent.

Okay, so onto the dots…

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The National Geographic Explorer Catalog

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Not that I have any significant knowledge about the topic, but I am a closet typophile.

National Geographic, known for its beautiful photography, maps and yellow border (among other things), publishes a beautifully designed catalog (especially the typography) of their trips and tours called National Geographic Expeditions (website).

There is not much advertising mail that I receive (and I think we receive our fair share, maybe more now with the baby) that makes it out of our mailbox too much past my home office garbage pail, but I love this catalog.

The layout, photography, maps and yes, the typography, are beautiful. The sight of the new one in the mailbox brings a smile to my face. When it arrives, I thumb through it at least a couple of times and I think I’ve got a pile of about six or seven of them that I’ve saved for no other reason than that they are just absolutely beautiful.

The trips are definitely out of our price range, but if Kim and I won the lottery then taking some of these trips would be near the top of my list of things that I’d like to do simply because of their catalog. (Did I say I like the catalog?)

After searching for a bit, I think they’ve just recently started to publish a digital and PDF version on their site…which is fantastic because I can now thumb through it on my iPad.

There is a probably a side note here on the design of media for the iPad or other tablet devices as they begin to arrive – that if you make beautiful designs, you don’t have to add motion or video to everything to make it compelling or engaging. For me, the National Geographic Explorer catalog is just as joyful (if not even more so) on the iPad as it is in physical print because the design of the document itself is beautiful.

(I think of what Flipboard has done with Twitter and Facebook as another proof point of this idea.)

Jessica Esch’s Social Media Workshop Sketch Notes

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Over the past couple of months, as part of a grant program performed by IBM Citizenship and Corporate Affairs, I’ve had the pleasure to facilitate a series of workshops for a number of nonprofits on the use of social computing and social media. Each one has been just an absolute blast.

Last week, with my friend and colleague Tyrrell Donelan, I had the pleasure to facilitate a workshop for United Ways of New England. United Ways of New England serves as an umbrella organization for many of the individual United Ways here in the local area.

I had no idea at the time, but Jessica Esch (twitter) an artist who was one of the participants in the workshop from the United Way of Greater Portland was taking visual sketch notes that she has shared on Flickr.

I am admittedly a little bit biased (read: understatement), but I think that these are just absolutely excellent. (Okay, I’m also a geek…about a quarter of the image views are probably mine. It makes me smile every time I look at them.)

If you are so inclined and interested, you can view the entire set of Jessica’s notes on Flickr by clicking here.

PS…Jessica…thank you for sharing these. Did I already say they were excellent?