Office Archive for
Traveling last week, I found myself immersed in the busiest travel season of the year – the pre Christmas rush. And while I moved from one line to the next, I found time to catch up on a backlog of recent articles on the incredible growth of tablets. Standing amidst a myriad of travellers had me pausing to think back a few months ago to when my wife and I packed up the kids and headed out for a late summer holiday, and the trials and tribulations of traveling with, in our case, an iPad.
My set and practiced packing of technology routine underwent a fundamental, and I suspect over the last few days oft repeated, change. DSLR Camera—check; iPhone—check; baby monitors—check; laptop… And that’s where I stumbled. For the first time in decades, I (gasp!) left my laptop at home.
Though I still remember the days where dragging my ThinkPad required the shoulders of Superman to carry through the gate-to-gate dash that so much of my travel has comprised of, I looked back and forth between my so-much-lighter MacBook Pro, and the family iPad and asked: do we really need the laptop? Read More
It’s conference season (when isn’t it?) and as the leaves turn to brown and travel budgets get squeezed we all have to carefully consider where we’re going and what we hope to get out of the experience. It’s not all trays of banana bread and drink tickets, so what makes for a good conference experience? For me it’s a focus on emerging trends and creative problem solving shared with your peers.
I was lucky enough to sit on a panel titled Managing, Measuring and Evaluating Distributed Content: Video, Webinars, White Papers and More, where we discussed the challenges and opportunities that distributed content models offer. Joining me was my partner on the client side, Kelly Turner, who is the content strategy lead at AT&T and provided perspective on what a large organization faces when it comes to distributed content and maintaining a strategic vision.
Kelly and I recently discussed what we brought home from the Internet Marketing Conference in Vancouver.
Derek Phillips: So, what did you think of the IMC? Was it what you expected?
Kelly Turner: Let’s see, I expected a big conference room, people with name tags, aroma of coffee and cologne, weird haircuts, hipster glasses…and on that front I certainly wasn’t disappointed. Other than that I had absolutely no idea what to expect. But I will say that overall it was definitely one of the cooler things I’ve gotten to do in my professional career. And remember, in my life as a journalist I saw open heart surgeries and interviewed criminals, many of whom were not elected officials, so I know what I’m talking about.
Derek: Were there any “ah-ha!” moments? Did you learn anything?
My wife posed a question last week that admittedly caught me off guard: “At what age do you think it’s appropriate to get our daughter a smartphone?”
Now the question is legit, and the local media has been furiously raising issues of texting and social media in the classroom, so it wasn’t completely from left field. But two elements beyond the question itself had me pause for thought.
First, my daughter is three.
Second, it wasn’t a cell phone anymore, but a smartphone.
To be clear, my wife was not suggesting we run out and buy an iPhone for a daughter barely out of diapers, but was curious as to my thoughts on when it was appropriate to buy any child a smartphone. A great question for further thought, but one we agreed was not in our personal future – at least not until our kids at least hit school age.
But the context behind the question was revealing. The question of a mobile device is no longer a question of if, but when. And, the smartphone was moving from the category of high-tech device, one that would normally fall into – as the self-confessed techno-gadget geek and purchaser in our household – my domain to initially consider.
And I shouldn’t be surprised. In fact, I should know better.
Though some might picture the stereotypical mom as slightly Luddite in her leanings, a series of reports this year reveal just how wrong that stereotype is. Modern moms are not just using smartphone, but leading their adoption. Moreover, it’s not just young, tech confident new moms purchasing the technology, but mothers in their 30’s and 40’s partaking in this rapidly expanding group of smartphone purchasers (Pew Internet).
CM loves SxSW Interactive!
We always have a crowd attending, but in 2012, we want to find our place on stage. Help us get there by checking out our FIVE topic submissions in the SXSW PanelPicker systems and voting for your favorite (or all 5).
Why you should vote for us?
SxSW may be a mash-up of digital trends, but in these five ideas, we think we’ve got a little something for everyone. You can check ‘em out now, or let us prove it to you. This week, to show you how smart and fun our ideas are, we’re devoting our blog and our twitter stream to our submissions–5 topics, 5 days. Each day we’ll give you the chance to learn more about our POV on one of our submitted topics with a blog post AND get involved by sharing your own thoughts via a twitter chat.
MONDAY
Consumer Goods: The Next Social Channels
Panel, prototyping contest & demo led by CM’s Executive Technology Director, Scott Ross.
>Vote Here
Join our @CriticalMass Twitter chat Mon @ 2pm to discuss #socialgoods
Plus, enter our prototyping contest by emailing your own ‘socially-integrated consumer good’ idea to sxswcontest@criticalmass.com
TUESDAY
Confessions of a Community Moderator
Workshop and interactive “confessional booth” including moderators for Converse, Peanuts, Humana and Aveda.
>Vote Here
Join our @CriticalMass Twitter chat Tues @ 2pm to discuss #communityconfessions
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…Especially when that flying object comes flying out of the screen!
With every recent Hollywood blockbuster available in 3D I ask myself if this is a new technology that makes entertainment better, or if it’s simply a throwback to the cinema experience of the 1920s.
Developments in technology and the film industry might determine if 3D trend here to stay or a technology gimmick that will a be a stamp on the second decade of the 21st century. How will 3D affect our work and devices? Will I have to wear those goofy glasses in order to do my job?
Why is 3D so popular?
For one, it sells. What a great way for the movie industry to offset the audience created by the growing segment of home movie viewers. We all know it is now more economic to wait for that movie to come out on Tivo or Netflix (which are gearing by the way into broadcasting 3D soon) than spending $80 for the family at a theatre (popcorn included). So your nearest movie theatre will charge $3 to $7 more for a 3D movie compared to a regular viewing.
But we’re only talking about movies. What about TV content? Should we get as excited about American Idol in 3D? Maybe not, but TV producers can be as resourceful as movie producers to generate a new audience, and we might see in a near future more TV shows geared for a better showtime for a 3D audience at home.
I still have a puzzling question in the back of my mind: do I need to buy a new 3D TV, when I just bought a new flat screen TV 2 years ago to watch the brand new release of The Bridges of Madison County on Blu-Ray?? Since I shed a tear for that movie every time, my 3D glasses might fog up!
As a consumer, I am confused by the different technologies out there.
Read More
Social media is no longer confined solely to social media websites. Now you can see social plug-ins, such as Facebook’s “Like” button, on many websites you visit. A recent study by CityGridMedia and Harris Interactive has found that Facebook “Likes” are now the most common way consumers provide feedback on local businesses. Two in ten people said they have clicked on the “Like” button to show support for a local business, more than the 13% that wrote a review. After all, it’s easier to click a button than take the time to write a review. However, before you start using Facebook “Likes” on every product page as a customer review system, consider some recent research conducted by Curious. We’ve found that consumers find Facebook “Likes” pretty useless when researching products.
What’s the problem with “Likes” as a product-rating method? Most consumers said they don’t trust them because there is often an ulterior motive for liking a product – some form of reward, such as a coupon or discount. One of our ShopTalk members said he wasn’t sure if he could trust the number of “Likes” for a pair of jeans on the Levi’s website because people could have “Liked” those jeans to get a discount.
