Recently a debate has been sparked about the impact of personalized filtering algorithms on the search results different individuals will get from seemingly universal search engines such as Google, Bing etc. The argument made is that these personalized algorithms learn from our online search behaviour and will increasingly modify results to better cater to our preferences, significantly changing overall search results per individual. If all search engines do this, the argument goes, then in the end, all of us are each trapped in a particular information bubble determined by what the filter algorithms perceive as our preferences. What if we add the effects of social and local to those of personalized algorithms to search? Read more…
Recent surveys by Forrester and ComScore can teach us interesting things about the usage and worldwide distribution of social media. Forrester has mapped age, country and gender across seven types of social media users they’ve defined. ComScore has mapped social media penetration in world wide markets. Find out more: what social media user type are you? What types are dominant in your market or demographic?
New economic opportunities are often associated with technological innovation and market deregulation, at least in the last few decades. But how does one compete in these markets without large funds or unique technological capabilities, as most small business owners must? Understanding the fundamental risks and opportunities beneath market deregulatory models and accessing lowcost technological means such as open source software and social media, could be the start of your own unique answer to those questions. Learn more…
Are social media revolutionary engines? Are the Egyptian protests a Facebook Revolution? Is this why the internet was shut down in Egypt? I decided to investigate this claim by the mass media and gather some statistics on social media usage by Egyptians on the topic of the protests from within Egypt in the last week.
One way of approaching product- and business development is watching technological trends such as: Social Media, Green Technology, Tablet PC’s, Mobile Apps and “The Internet of Things” that offer the promise of new markets opening up. How do you integrate these technology trends…
Why limit your use of Skype to the time you spend behind your PC? With these simple steps you can enjoy access to your contactlists, calls and chat on your desktop phone and mobile with your PC turned off. If you use Skype for business networking, you’ll find some suggestions as well. Learn more…
Google’s Agenda is to push cloud-computing and make their Chrome browser a platform from which you use all your productivity and other apps. In this article you will find a way to build a communications and office dashboard in less then 10 minutes by simply adding a number of powerful free apps form the Google Chrome App Store. Are you ready to embrace Google’s vision? Find out by giving it a try..
The new technologies emerging everyday from the world of web 2.0 markets are placing new demands on governments, businesses and individuals. Great opportunities and potential threats require new skills to deal with the constantly increasing “Openness”. Freedoms and responsibilities closely associated with an ever increasing transparency force people from all walks of life including business to come to grips with a new ethos as the accomplishments of the winner and runner up of Time Magazine’s Person Of The Year in 2010 illustrate.Are you ready for the new “Openness”?
Professionals create a lot of specialized information that is locked within the organization and inaccesible to others. This could be much more of an asset then is currently the case for many organizations. Some suggestions and practical guidelines on unlocking the power of this knowledge for commercial purposes.
Android is a popular and fast-growing platform for web 2.0 enabled smartphones. Surprisingly: different smartphones and devices have different versions of Android pre-installed.Want to know which version is on your smartphone or want to install Android on your old Windows Mobile 6 phone? Learn more…
Is Mark Zuckerberg an evil genius? Is Facebook the defining entity of our times? There has been much talk about “The Facebook Generation” and the evil mastermind behind it. If the movie “The Social Network” is a true story then we can all rest easy: Facebook was just a mediocre idea executed to perfection and backed by the right people at the right time and initiated by a driven perfectionist.
Skype 5.0 is out of Beta and offers some great new functionality to manage your contacts, make (video) conference calls, group chats and keep abreast of your friend’s activity on Facebook. Where the Beta seemed somewhat unstable, the full version works like a charm. Learn more…
New Digg keeps annoying. Where we earlier reported they deleted your content with the transition to new Digg, we now find them auto-posting in your name. Determining for you which stories you Digg.
One of the more innovative new features at Xing is called “The Mobile Handshake”. They also added powerful search and sort functionality, outlook integration, more (advanced) mobile features, share buttons and a toolbar. It is a thorough overhaul and offers great value for money if compared to some of the other larger social networks. But apart from the “Mobile Handshake” it seems Xing is not taking any big risks as in trying to be on the forefront of technology.
You probably have a Skype subscription or use some other VoiP (Voice Over IP) service. Now you have another alternative:Google Voice For GMail and Google Chat!It may very well be that this step by Google is a sign that the VoiP market for consumers is now maturing and will replace the landline and mobile infrastructures in the next few years. More cheap VoiP devices will be developed and cost of usage may be lowered even more dramatically. This will give home users and small businesses similar opportunities as have been around in the corporate market for years.Is it time to ditch your landline? Maybe (not). Learn more…
The problem with Google Wave is not so much on the technological side as it is in the distribution model.This month Google said it will drop the experimental service Google Wave.”Wave has not seen the user adoption we would have liked,” said Google senior vice president Urs Holzle in a blog post.Clearly Google Wave offers a promising combination of technologies, allowing you to chat, share, bookmark and collaborate in all kinds of other ways in a single stream of activity.Had Google taken a more open approach to the product’s introduction with many more third party plugins and options, more along the lines of Twitter’s business model, I think the product might have been a success.
Yoono offers some great tools to stay upto date and know what your friends are upto on several social sites and IM’s. It also gives you a powerful capability to multi-post updates to these platforms. There is a desktop app, a browser addon and an IPhone app available. It’s a free service so give it a try.
Digg have recently updated their site with some great new functionality, making it a more complete platform. All of this is great ofcourse but unfortunately it seems they have discontinued the Diggs/History of Digg members.
With so many Social Media out there: create accounts for the right reasons. These twelve ultra short reviews give you the main capabilities and drawbacks of each site in a few sentences each and links to an instant network and relevant tools.Part III in a series.
With so many Social Media out there: create accounts for the right reasons. These twelve ultra short reviews give you the main capabilities and drawbacks of each site in a few sentences each and links to an instant network and relevant tools.
Widgets can be an excellent way to create some attention online for yourself, your site, your products or your services. Even if you’re not a skilled programmer or otherwise gifted nerd or guru of the web, widgets can help you get your message across because they are spread by others creating a viral distribution. But where can you find easy and effective tools to create and distribute them? Here are some examples we made with a great service that could have you create effective widgets in no time at all. Not inspired? Check out the hundreds of widgets on our free network…
Internet in general and Social Media in particular hold the promise of a sense of frictionless and effortless movement through a world without obstacles between you and your success: but are they? Here are some easy shortcuts to avoid financial, social and technological obstacles and turn them to your advantage.
Every sales person could tell you that a client gives of signals and that those who know how to play into them could sell a refrigerator to an eskimo. But: do you really want to sell fridges to eskimos? Wouldn’t you rather control which precise audiences you target? A well defined target audience could be the solid basis of your organization’s success. But it doesn’t stop there…What about Social Media?
What are decisive factors in the success or failure of an unknown brand? All of us have had to make the decision wether or not to buy a service by an unknown brand: what are our motives in doing so or not? What causes the sudden rise of an unknown brand such as easyjet? If you’re wondering how to successfully launch an unknown brand yourself or want to look more explicitly at your own buying behaviour as a consumer of services: read the Unknown Brand Poll. Our small panel of highly trained professionals might give you some insight in your own (sub)conscious decisionmaking and in the ever changing commercial landscape around us.
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