middledigit.net | jonathan hopkins

I love it when little bits of ‘human’ appear in the midst of all the 1’s and 0’s of the web. For the second time now I just spotted the tiny ‘Get some sleep’ message from Google and it made me smile. It’s so small it looks a bit funny (I put the red thing on), but those little touches are great and more and more ‘human’ is beginning to break out of the sign up pages and 404 messages and into bigger things on the web these days. More to come on this and for now, I’m going to listen to Google and ZZZZ.

I saw this headline, got VERY excited, then clicked on it and was only a little bit excited. You see, I immediately jumped into thinking that all you’d have to do in the near future is make sure you’re near a Chrysler car to be sure of getting a WiFi connection. And not just your own car as it turns out to be - I mean any car. Surely this could be an option though, as a kind of mobile version of Fon using cars to share their WiFi connections?

Anyway, as ever, the future looks pretty cool but one full of questions that are often unanswered. Personally, I just want to pay one amount of money for my data stream and then be free to connect whatever I like to it and use it how I like. Not pay separately for everything and be told how to use it.

More here at USA Today.

Last Saturday in London saw lots of people (including me) head down to Interesting 2008, a truly unique conference (I think just in its second year) ran by Russell Davies.

People like Ged, Roo and Annie Mole have already done some good write-up of the event so as something slightly different, I’ve given each (well nearly, I actually missed loads in my excitement) presentation down to a single word, added a few sneaky ones and ran that through Wordle to create a visual summary of Interesting 2008.

Here are the words, with links to their respective creators or co-creators - Lego. Horses. Authenticity. Generalism. Geography. Music. WOW. Coins. Food. Insomnia. Ukulele. Meditation. Toilets. Alcohol. Hoovers. Animation. Future. Hiraeth. Community. Brains. WW2. Final Countdown. Recorders. Cakes. Tea. Biscuits. Books. Arthur. Um and I forgot Masks, Words, Winston Churchill and Informatics and probably more - it’s all too interesting! Well done everyone for pulling off such a great day packed full of lots of INTERESTING presentations.

A few thoughts I took away from the day.

1 - It all just felt right. Everyone was nice. Nothing was nasty. It was great to have some kids there. Some rough edges. All very real.
2 - Lloyd can really sing. I even saw him run past with a freshly boiled kettle (no lid mind!).
3 - People are up for getting involved in things. People leapt at the chance to play the recorder on stage. At the end everyone packed up rubbish into bin liners, put all the chairs and tables away. Co-created content and all that.
4 - Most conferences are shit. The last one I went to was Internet World. There’s so much that needs to be changed with the old-school conference format.
5 - It was nice not to hear the words “social media’ mentioned all day. The only appearance of Twitter was on someone’s screen as they were setting up. I didn’t Tweet once during the day. (OK I did, before and after, but you know what I mean).
6 - Meeting people offline (or achieving “fleshpoint” as Ian refers to it as) is just the best, especially when you’ve known them for a while online.
7 - Russell Davies is very funny. He tickled me by ending an announcement with ‘now go back to your business’.
8 - Music pretty much rules the whole Earth. It is GLUE.
9 - There’s so much interesting, genuine stuff out there, so why on Earth do some brands insist on creating their own synthetic stuff instead of getting involved with genuinely interesting things that come from somewhere a lot better than a brainstorm.
10 - It’s a bit rubbish when you’re sat at a conference (or in a meeting for that matter) and everyone’s just on their laptops doing something else. There was a noticeable lack of laptops there and instead much more scribbling in notebooks, analogue style.

“To Thine Own Self Be True”

That’s what was written above the stage at the Conway Hall venue and I think that said it all for me. Interesting was basically a coming-out session for geeks and interesting people. That’s why it’s so frickin’ cool and every single person did such a great job. Quite a number of people introduced themselves as geeks and thoughout the day there was a mixture of both proudness and shyness when it came to people opening up and revealing their inner-geekiness. But I think everyone had that in common - be it food, hoovers, music and graphic design, lego or toilets - sharing something you’re so passionate about is always interesting and the best way of connecting with hundreds of other human beings in a room

And finally - here’s an image which I think captures the whole day nicely.

Why? Because someone sitting near me offered me a pack which I though was a really, really nice touch. The whole day was about sharing stuff and it felt so apt that it should be an old school box of Sunmaid Raisins. Something so familiar and nice. Amazing packaging. Free from crap. An icon. Something that evoked so many memories of school lunch boxes and being a kid. Something that I hadn’t had for ages but still love. So thank you Sunmaid Raisin provider. Your little gesture of kindness left me feeling satisfied that Interesting 2008 really was all I hoped it would be and a little bit more.

[Photo Credit ]

Bonus video: Just for the fun of it. Here’s 30 odd people trying to playing recorders (thanks to the Guardian), including Ben who I spent the day with too along with Ged, Will and lots of other people. (captured by Ged on a Flip video recorder thingy)

UPDATE - I’ve created PR Fail as a way to help people face the reality of the perception of PR on the web, be better and stop doing bad things. A ’see what happens’ thing.

UPDATE 2/6 - it’s still going on and this time there’s accusations flying around about the integrity of the PR industry - to which the PRSA responds

UPDATE 31/5 - the debate is still on - spreading to Phreadz

Coming from a background in PR and still very much involved in it on the digital side of things, I keep a close eye on the general feeling from the web community towards PR - and file any examples of really good (and really bad PR) or particularly fruity opinions about it. More often than not though, it’s negative and that’s obviously not a great thing.

Over the last couple of days, I’d be hitting del.icio.us every few minutes, as it’s all kicking off right now with a debate raging about whether or not companies need to do PR and general thoughts and feelings about PR are being thrown out left right and centre.

It started with Brian Solis revelaing his ‘PR Secrets’, then Loic Le Meur replying with his “Not a Secrets’ that pretty much dismissed Brian’s guest post on TechCrunch. Then, as is the case with social media and the web of today, it’s spilled out into Seesmic, Twitter, FriendFeed and a whole lot of other places.

So, rather than wade in fully and add to the noise, I thought I’d just share a few recent quotes from people on Twitter that I’ve been collecting and offer up my thinking that the definition and role of PR has changed to some degree, but people’s perception of it (and in a lot of cases, use and execution of it) hasn’t.

It’s this difference (and the fact there’s still a long way to go for the PR industry) that causes this debate and that the overall perception of PR on the web is a MAJOR FAIL. And that’s why (and I hate to say it), I more often than not cringe when I think about being in PR - as the industry has so much to do to change perception online and this needs to be led by actions and not more (insert expletive) words. This, is where the industry should be focused its efforts as I don’t think it’s ever going to shake off feelings like this, if it doesn’t change for the better and do so fast. As to how, not sure. More thinking needed, I don’t have all the answers. But in the meantime - consumers are just getting on with their lives and filling them with stuff they like. They don’t really care.

(Hope people don’t mind me ‘re-tweeting’ here. I just want to help spread the word. And, on Twitter, you really do have to face the true reality of what people think)

Charles Arthur - a particularly negative tweet, includes the word ‘DIE’

Jemima Kiss - a funny (but negative) tweet, made me really cringe

Mike Butcher - a negative tweet , I can almost hear him shouting this, my personal favourite one that also makes me cringe big time

Neville Hobson - a positive tweet (yay!), that is in fact negative when you think about it.

David Ciccone - a negative tweet

I went to the Chinwag Micro Media Maze event last night to talk about micro media and web stuff. The panel was really good and included Umair Haque (Director, Havas Media Lab / Bubblegeneration), Gerd Leonhard (Media Futurist, Author, Entrepreneur), Mitch McAlister (Product Director (Europe), MySpace), Miles Lewis (SVP, European Advertising Sales, Last FM) and Neil McIntosh (Head of Editorial Development, Guardian Unlimited). Steve Bowbrick also did a great job of chairing the thing and keeping it all ticking over nicely.

We didn’t really talk about micro media that much though. Instead with the heavy music bias to the panel, talk was a lot around music and the future of content on the web - which ultimately boils down to the same old argument of ‘consumers want music free and everywhere, the industry wants to be paid and control distribution’. In particular I thought Miles from Last FM (in the true spirit of transparency, openness etc) gave away some great insight into Last FM and the struggle faced by people pushing boundaries with technology. And, Umair too delivered some fairly strong opinions on what we should be doing with the web, advertising in general and as agencies to make the world a better place.

I was going to write up some notes but Ben Matthews has some good stuff up already, so I’ll just add the following little thoughts:

1> 3% of traffic to Last FM comes via the homepage and more than 40% comes from widgets (with 55% predicted by the end of the year). Evidence of brands being distributed around the web. Setting up home in one place and spending all your money on some nice curtains, a swanky drive and a big impressive hallway might not be the best thing to do now. Time to become micro and distributed - part of the flow of data and value around the web.

2> People look at their mobile screens an average of 25 times a day and 95% of the time their mobile device is less than one metre away. Blimey. We all know that the mobile web is going to blow up this year, but in what other ways is this going to impact on our lives?

3> Gerd said that ‘data is the new advertising’. I like this thought a lot. It reminded me of the concept of spimes and got me thinking about providing value to people though data control, manipulation and enhancement.

4> Everyone agreed that we should be doing more stuff that genuinely makes people’s lives better. I thought to myself about what would happen if advertising disappeared overnight. What would happen? What if all that money spend on advertising was re-channelled simply into making products and services better, in order to make people’s lives better?

5> Twitter or micro blogging wasn’t really talked about. Yes it’s a bit yada, yada but I really do think it’s demonstrating the power of thinking small. Neither were new micro advertising formats (like Pistach.io) even though there were blatently some really smart people in the room (including a guy from Double Click I chatted to before kick-off). Or the fact that the whole world is getting smaller while brands seem to still be thinking big all the time.

There’s so much more to come in this space, it’s incredibly exciting. The fact the event was crammed last night was a definite sign of that. Now we just need to start thinking and acting micro. Because as we all know, being small usually means you can move quicker and with the web, speed is everything.

Update - missed Jemima’s post which contains some great quotes and some rather more succinct analysis.

[Picture thanks to Little People]

Yes, I know . . . another post about Twitter, just like the one before and like so many others right now. But, just wanted to acknowledge this great example of a massive company using Twitter really well as a way of keeping an eye out for customers with problems and doing everything it can to solve them. Enter Frank Eliason from Comcast, who seems to be doing everything he can to help people out. And it hasn’t gone unnoticed either - this post is currently riding high on Techmeme and look what happens if you Google Frank. Also, check out this profile of Frank here. Comcast need a bit of love, given the fact that comcastmustdie.com (blog here) made the front cover of Business Week at the beginning of the year.

Customer service and so-called social media relations/online PR are pretty much inseparable these days don’t you think?

Here’s some of Frank’s latest Tweets, closely followed by a Tweet Cloud giving you an idea of what Frank is tweeting about. Plus a user generated anti-Comcast ‘ad’ just to give you an idea of what Frank is up against.

Just a thought, but if everyone who used Twitter regularly paid £1 per month for the privilege, then Twitter would get get £2.4 million ($4.7 million) a year. And that’s based on the stats from Techcrunch that claim 200,000 active users and 1 million registered users, so if anything that figure is low.
The current growth rate is massive too so six months down the line, who knows what that figure might look like.

Or another way of looking at it is to charge 1p per message sent on Twitter (3 million are sent every day apparently) and rake in £10.95 million ($21.6 million) a year. This would work out to be £4.65 ($9.17) per month though to a user sending 15 tweets a day, which again is apparently the average amongst the 200,000 active users. That feels too much, but really probably isn’t given what you actually get compared to other stuff on the web - think of the costs of the texts alone. £1 mind . . .

So, rather than chuck ads at me or think of another way to monetize the service just ask me up front and I’ll pay. I’m sure others would too.

Anyway, just a quick not very well researched thought initiated by this I think . . . but if I do hand over the money, please Twitter can you make sure it works and pretty please look after my data. Thanks.

Would you pay £12 a year to use Twitter? Vote below or here

[Photo Credit - starring Skipper]

The other day, amidst the global flow of information coming at me via the interwebz, I stumbled upon this little gem that made me smile and feel all content for a second as it fits in 100% with where I’m at. It’s a clip of Noah Brier talking at the PFSK LANY (thanks for pointing out Noah) conference about how brands now have to act like people. Nothing completely radical about that statement, but for me explains in a nutshell what this internet thing is all about for brands.

Brands need to be human in order to participate in the web and social media enables them to do so (as well as lots of other web-based things that don’t get labeled as such). Brands that don’t behave like human beings and do lot’s of nasty things won’t be very popular (just like in the real world) and those that do all the same things as kind, caring, smart, creative, collaborative, honest, transparent, open, considerate people will gain the love, trust and respect of people online. It’s as simple as that. There, I said it. And I feel a whole lot better for it.

Now are you are human or a non-human brand? What was the last way in which you showed people you were human? Did you admit a mistake? Did you say sorry? Did you share something valuable? Did you help make someone’s life a little bit better?

More to come on this. Human brands and beings is something very close to my heart.

Marmite has just launched a Facebook group. Now it’s (nearly) always good to see brands getting stuck into things like Facebook and it’s even better to see it done really well - but today I was left a little bit disappointed.

You see, surely a better thing to have done would have been to have created two groups “We love Marmite’ and “We hate Marmite’? That way the two groups - each fuelled by the passion of the people in them - could have battled it out. As it stands (link to group here, actually it’s a Page but there we go) the love or hate aspect of the call to action gets a bit lost in the action. The official Page for Marmite could have been created for ‘true’ fans and used to fuel and update the battle for love or hate across both groups.

Also - I went to the main Marmite site today and there was no mention of the Facebook group anywhere (obvious) to be seen. Again - little bit sad to see that given the fact that they would have known the online coverage would be appearing.

Anyway, I actually love Marmite and am no hater, I just felt compelled to write this as I assumed that the second I read the headline, that’s what they would have done. Wonder why they didn’t or if anyone else has any other ideas? Or maybe I need to worry about something else.

Oh, disclosure - Facebook is a Bite client but then I think I’ve mentioned that a few times so you probably knew that.

Having worked with Yahoo! at two agencies across pretty much all of its products (including Search with Ged as a client!), I was a bit sad to hear about the job cuts in the pipeline and read some of the more cutting articles that appeared after the financial results. A lot of people have pointed to the fact that Yahoo! lacks any sort of vision and has yet to deliver a solid product roadmap that gets people all excited about its future again.

Now, I know that really recently Yahoo! revealed it is testing Del.icio.us results being incorporated into Yahoo! Search, but I’m still left with that nagging feeling that I’ve had for months that they are failing to make the most out of what is one of the most essential things on the web for me today - Del.icio.us. Now I didn’t get on board with Del.icio.us until 2006, March 18th to be precise - when I saved my first bookmark, a guide to free open source software on Open Source Mac. But, since then I’ve fed it like a beast and have saved over 2000 links to valuable, interesting stuff. If I lost all of those links I would be really rather unhappy indeed. In fact, I regularly back them up. Not that it would be the same but at least I’d have some record of all those amazing things I’ve found on the net.

Anyway, I’ve digressed a bit. My point is that even though I’d consider myself a fairly heavy user, I never really use any of the other features like saving links for other people or using the delicious network to find links from other people. Instead, I either stumble into someone’s bookmarks after they pop up in search results or go on a bit of a bookmark Safari after checking out someone’s blog that includes a link to their del.icio.us profile. I also think that the only person whose delicious master feed I get over RSS is Lynette Webb at Google (more on Lynette here). Surely that’s a bit odd - am I alone in this?

So the big question. Why doesn’t Yahoo! work more closely with Del.icio.us and integrate it FULLY into the Yahoo! Search experience? Surely, it’s sitting on a goldmine of filtered information - hand selected and saved information from human beings across the planet. Even just a custom simplified big search box start page (crude mock-up above!) that defaulted to searching the del.icio.us network and a better UI for the results would be a start. Just like we’ve learnt with Twitter, the Google homepage and countless other examples (very recently Instapaper too) - simple is best when it comes to the tools used to manage information. Sometimes it’s better to strip back features than serve everything up in one go.

Now that’s just one thing that could be done. There’s heaps of other stuff that I’m sure is possible. I just don’t see whay it’s taking Yahoo! so long. Remember - it was December 2005 that Yahoo! bought Del.icio.us - over 2 years ago. That’s ages in web-time, especially at a time when Yahoo! needs to pull a rabbit out the hat more than ever before.