whatleydude

Five things of note for the week ending Friday May 18th, 2012

1. Mother of Dragons Disney T-Shirt
Game of Thrones fan? You’re gonna love this -

Available to buy from Etsy (warning: the model used has seen happier days)

2. The Networked Urban Environment
I have few industry heroes and, ever since I saw his TED Talk on ‘Our Mobile Phones‘, Jan Chipchase has been one of them. His latest post, ‘The Networked Urban Environment‘ is (so far) a great read. I’m about halfway through it at the moment and it’s one of the better future-gazing pieces I’ve read in a while.

Imagine never having to look for a parking space ever again. Imagine that from here on out, this problem is solved. Fast-forward to 2025. You’re driving from Brooklyn to Manhattan…because driving in New York City, and everywhere else, has become much simpler a task than it was a decade or so before… or has it?

Definitely worth a look.

3. The OTHER inbox in Facebook
Look, some of you are going to know about this and have known about it for ages. For the rest of you (like me, about two days ago), this will completely and utterly blow your mind.

A couple of nights ago, the girl casually mentions how useful it is that the ‘other’ inbox is on Facebook’s iPad app.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“The other inbox on Facebook, I’ve just found it on the iPad app. Cool.”

“Hang on, rewind, what is this ‘other’ inbox.”

“The other inbox.”

“No, you’re just repeating the same thing.. what is the other inbox.”

She shows me.
It blows my mind.

It turns out that if someone isn’t your friend on Facebook and then they message you, their messages end up in the other inbox.

This is ridiculous. First off, this is NOT obvious. I’ve missed a whole bunch of messages from people I’ve met from all over the world! Second, this will also explain why a whole bunch of messages I’ve sent to non-friends haven’t responded either (at least, that’s what I’m telling myself).

Admittedly, a fair amount of the stuff in there is spam, but still – I’m into double figures on the amount of messages I’ve missed. I’m gutted. But hey, I know about it now and will check it more regularly.

Every day’s a school day.

You’re in for an amazing year!

5. Howard Stern / Sacha Baron Cohen
An extremely rare out of character interview with Sacha Baron Cohen, (thank you Howard Stern). Cohen says himself this is only the third time he’s ever been interviewed as himself (preferring to turn up to talkshows etc as his creations such as Ali G, Borat or, most recently, The Dictator) and is clearly a fan of Stern’s work.

Engaging and enlightening throughout, I’ve been listening to it while writing this blog post and it really is brilliant. Featuring hilarious anecdotes about the comedy-writing process, the dangers of filming Bruno in Arkansaw and the unforeseen perils of attempting to sneak the ashes of Kim Jong Il into TheAcademy Awards

Listen now, before it gets taken down.

___

Bonuses – This Could Hurt for iOS looks pretty good (I’ll be downloading as soon as I hit publish); this bookcase + chair hybrid just made my ‘want’ list; and these 1950′s takes on the Batman universe from artist Denis Medri are fantastic. Poison Ivy + Bane are definite faves.

Liked this week’s edition? Hit the Tweet button and tell your friends.

Whatley out.

To be honest, I’m not sure. Take a look at this -

@playcom – aka – play.com

Facebook Timeline for brands is brand new and as such, the nuances and intricacies of the new user interface are still being worked out*. However, a good place to start when dealing with a new service structure is the service supplier themselves. In this instance, that’s Facebook.

Their [new] terms of service (specifically to the cover photo) state:

__________________________________

All covers are public. This means that anyone who visits your Page will be able to see your cover. Covers can’t be deceptive, misleading, or infringe on anyone else’s copyright. You may not encourage people to upload your cover to their personal timelines.
Covers may not include:

1. Price or purchase information, such as “40% off” or “Download it on socialmusic.com”;
2. Contact information such as a website address, email, mailing address, or information that should go in your Page’s “About” section;
3. References to Facebook features or actions, such as “Like” or “Share” or an arrow pointing from the cover photo to any of these features; or
4. Calls to action, such as “Get it now” or “Tell your friends.”

__________________________________

I interpret that as ‘Oi! No special offers on your cover photo!‘ 

…but I could be wrong.

Being unsure (and in constant search of a decent debate), I asked Twitter -

The crowd certainly think so – although, funnily enough, Play didn’t respond.

Covers including special offers certainly seem off limits from the Facebook’s terms of service and, in all honesty, that’s what I’ve been advising friends, colleagues and clients when it comes to embracing Facebook’s new Timeline layout…

Either way, Play are sailing pretty close to the wind. Wouldn’t you say?
Friends, readers and peers – what do you think?

Better yet, why don’t we ask Play?

*for example: knowing how many characters you should use in your ‘about’ section.

I had a post scheduled for later on this week talking about my recent love affair with all things Instagram (even though I don’t actually own an iPhone) however, some news is breaking right now that kinda needs covering.

Facebook just bought Instagram, for $1bn.

That’s right: One. Billion. Dollars.

Stefan nailed it -

All you guys tweeting about how sad it is that the instagram guys sold out: shut your face. Do you know how much $1 billion is?

— Stefan Constantine (@WhatTheBit) April 9, 2012

Well, do you? It’s a lot.
But why?

To start us off, here are some numbers* to get your head around taken from the mere 18mths that Instagram has been in existence:

• 1 billion photos uploaded
• 30 million registered users
• 5 million photos uploaded every day
• 575 likes every second
• 81 comments every second
• 1 million downloads of the new Android app in 24hrs

That’s a lotta love for an app that is solely mobile-based. But why is that important to Facebook? Think about it – Facebook is about the data. As the saying goes: if you’re not paying for the product, you are the product – and Instagram just sold a whole ton of data about its users. Not personal data, or contact data but image data and sharing data.

What people snap, what filters they apply when they’ve snapped and where & how they share that snap is all important data for a social network that builds itself around social objects and the relationships that people form around them.

While this kind of purchase is new ground for Facebook, it’s refreshing to see that it has every intention of keeping the service independent and multi-platform friendly. Mark Zuckerberg has already talked about lending Instagram Facebook’s strong engineering team and infrastructure – something that they’ll need when it comes to the building for scale. That sounds like someone who only has the app’s best interests at heart, certainly.

And while a billion dollars is a lot of money, Facebook has just bought itself its own standalone photo-sharing app, with a built-in base of happy users while at the same time cancelling out a potential competitor in the lucrative social networking space. Good things will come of this acquisition, Yahoo + Flickr this ain’t.

As Instagram CEO, Kevin Systrom, blogged earlier today -

It’s important to be clear that Instagram is not going away. We’ll be working with Facebook to evolve Instagram and build the network. We’ll continue to add new features to the product and find new ways to create a better mobile photos experience.

Remember, the future is mobile and Instagram have proven that a mobile-only social network is not only worthwhile but 100% achievable to boot.

Best of luck guys (all 13 of you); your fans, users, industry and investors will be watching.

*since April 3rd, 2012 – source

UPDATE – Other posts of note:

• Instagram’s ride to glory, TechCrunch
• 15 responses to the FB / IG sale, ReadWriteWeb
• Facebook just saved Instagram, TheNextWeb
• What the tech pundits don’t get, Fast Company

This time, from the man himself -

This was recorded around the same time that the film came out (I’m unsure why I’ve only just found it mind but), if it’s of interest, here’s my original review from around the same time.

— a film by David Fincher

I am a fan of David Fincher. I’ve seen everything since Alien3 and loved nearly all of it. When it was announced that he would be lensing ‘the facebook movie’; among the naysayers, I was not.

A few months back, the trailer hit.

Superb. This past Monday I was invited to a preview screening care of Sony Pictures and it left my brain buzzing.

First off; the film on its own is a fantastic watch. Although, and it is an odd comparison to draw, very much like Scott Pilgrim vs The World, the social network I think will only speak to people of a certain age. What is that certain age? I don’t know.

Actually, scratch that. it’s a generational thing. Fact.

Whatever way you look at it, the social network really is a great film; there is Fincher throughout, but quietly. Almost like he’s whispering in the background and steering gently from afar. His custom clean, dark-shaded visuals, of which he is a master, are there but the flights of camera-based fancy are almost non-existent (save for a set of stunning establishing shots at Henley on Thames; tilt-shifting never looked so good).

This is a Fincher film all over but he’s adult enough to step back and let it shine on its own. Good job.

For me, the title ‘the social network‘ itself is an interesting play on words, in that while it’s obvious that it refers to the software platform that our protagonists are squabbling over, it also resonates as a nod to the group of friends who started out on this journey together and furthermore, the ensemble cast that present them to us.

Jesse Eisenberg is perfectly believable as the nerdy but gifted Mark Zuckerberg character (a point to which I’ll come back later) and holds the film together well. For anyone that’s ever watched a single episode of The West Wing, the throwaway remarks and razor sharp dialogue will be distinctly Sorkin and, although the story is boldly told from different perspectives and narratives, it is clear that ‘Zuck’ is our hero; anti-, tragic or otherwise.

Justin Timberlake, as Napster founder ‘the evil Sean Parker’ is surprisingly very good. I’m not sure why I say ‘surprising’, I’ve always thought that he’d be quite a good actor however, there’s always something nudging at you when he’s on screen. That small voice in your head saying ‘Hey… Hey! That’s Justin Timberlake up there!’, but once you get past the first 10mins or so it settles down and you can enjoy his performance which, by the way, is as good as he is dislikeable. You want to punch him in the face. A lot.

Spider-Man-in-waiting, Andrew Garfield, is probably my favourite thing from the whole film. You feel his pain, his hurt, his lack of judgement, his anger.. All of it. He is a very talented actor and, for someone so young, brings immense gravitas to what could’ve quite easily have been just a one note role.

Fincher explains in the production notes that he’d never worked with such a young cast before (Aaron Sorkin also mentioning he’s never written so young either), so he pushed for take after take after take, sometimes up 80 or 90, just to make the language more casual

“If you’re not speaking at speed, then I won’t believe it”.

When Eduardo Saverin arrives late one night looking worn out from flying, it’s because Andrew Garfield had been shooting that scene for five hours and his exasperation shines through. It’s a punishing, yet fantastically rewarding technique. Love it.

Finally, on the casting front at least, a hefty hat tip to Armie Hammer who to plays both the Winklewoss twins with an ease that is almost unnatural. I’ll admit, he’s the only one of the main cast I haven’t seen in anything else before, however if he can play two of himself with ease (I can’t imagine the line learning, shooting technique, SFX etc that were needed for that casting decision), then he definitely deserves some special attention.

Sounding like Xerses from the 300 and towering over Jesse Eisenberg like a pair of Grecian Gods, he embodies the Harvard final final club elites perfectly. Jeremy Irons would be proud.

So what of the film? Well, it’s a tough one. The different times I’ve talked about it with friends and colleagues since viewing have produced multiple responses;

• “It’s an Aaron Sorkin script, with a Fincher wrapping.”
• “It’s a modern day myth”
• “It’s all still so fresh.”

I’ve said it a number of times already, the film is great… BUT you find yourself watching it all with a healthy pinch of salt. I’ve read interviews with Mark Zuckerberg. A lot of interviews. His views on privacy, sociology, business… all of them are there if you look hard enough and there are certain characteristics which don’t come through in the film. Yes, we’re six years on (just six years) and no doubt he’s changed a fair amount but still, some of it didn’t ring true for me.

Which actually, isn’t that surprising given that Zuckerberg was the only one who refused to meet with the film-makers before, during or after production. C’est la vie. When you watch this film, remember you’re watching the characterisation of a real person. One that has been drawn and painted, by others, without any approval from the source. That’s all.

Let’s put it this way; if you’re under 40 and you have a Facebook account, see this film. If you’ve been a part of (or worked within) a start-up culture, see this film. If you’re a fan of Fincher or Sorkin, see this film.

The aforementioned bold decision to not stick to one core narrative will leave you wanting more, reaching for those parts still left untold and somehow feeling that you weren’t given the full story…

But I guess that’s the point.

No matter if you end up seeing the the social network or not, the final word has to go to Zuckerberg himself:

“We build products that 500 million people see…
…

..
…if 5 million people see a movie, it doesn’t really matter that much.”

Perfect.

“It’s good to talk”

As promised in my last post, this next one is a bit of a biggie. Sitting comfortably?
Then I’ll begin…

Towards the end of last year, around the start of December in fact, I found myself having a conversation with fellow Mobile Industry Review contributor, Jonathan Jensen. He and I were discussing that as we move into 2009, brands should be placing a certain level of importance on engaging with their consumers on an increasingly more conversational level.
The exact words that struck such a chord with Jonathan were as follows:

’2007: Content was King. 2008: Context is King. In 2009? Conversation will be King.’

At this point however, I had to dash off to do a presentation for SpinVox and never got the chance to elaborate on that thought any further.

What I mean is; back in the ‘ring tone & wallpaper’ days of 2005-7 (does anyone below the age of 16 actually use those services anymore?), everywhere you went the mystic phrase was uttered; ‘content is king’

The content in this instance is the aforementioned downloadable premium additions to your handset. During my job at Mobizines (and subsequently Mippin), we were still seeing presentation after presentation and report after report, all supporting (or at least purporting to) this concept – as late as this time last year in fact.

And we lapped it up.

2007 came and went, and ‘sharing’ was set to be the theme for 2008 (thus was my prediction anyway) and you could argue that this was proven to be correct in a number of ways.

In the future, people will look back and say that Facebook was instrumental in introducing Social Media to the masses. It unified communications on a consumer level and gradually allowed people to begin sharing.

Of course, the ‘Content is King’ mantra did not just disappear with the twilight of the year. The legacy lived on, rearing its ugly head once again, this time in the form of Facebook Applications. With only a few exceptions, this first swathe of applications; including Werewolves, Ninjas, Sheep Throwing and more, were soon replaced with some contextual goodness.

The adverts soon followed suit; “Your friend ‘x’ likes this, so you will like it too…”

It’s hardly a trusted referral from a non-branded, independent entity, but it’s not far off.

We’ll come back to this point later as, before we look at trusted referrals, we need to return to content for a moment – and how that lineage spreads into Social Media.

Facebook for example, gives you contextual content from your friends. If you give any content just a smidgen of context, suddenly you’ll find you have the potential for engagement. Facebook, by turning content over to its users, allowed context to become king – almost overnight.

Context gives content meaning, and is at the centre of any Location Based Service actually ever becoming successful. Context also adds to the ambient awareness that Facebook has brought upon us all. Knowing where my friends are and what they are doing is not only easy to implement, but also fantastically simple to engage with. Comment on this, write on that, post it here – Facebook makes it so easy. Some people choose to have a constant stream of ‘noise’ flowing through them at all times, but it’s the content from your friends that is important. That is the context.

As I said in Helsinki;

“YOU are the stream, everything else is just the channel you use to publish your content…”

So that’s the consumers sorted. What about advertising?
For that, I’m going to use another quote;

“A trusted referral from a non-branded independent entity is more powerful than any amount of advertising, marketing or PR.”

- Blake Chandlee, MD Facebook Europe.

For me, this can be simply illustrated as follows: You and I are in a pub, posters surround us for Beer X, but everyone around us is drinking Beer Y.
I ask you which one you’d prefer and you say; “I’ll have what you’re having”.

When you use the same example, but add in the context of Facebook, you find that it becomes;
“Your friend likes this, so you should too.”

Alas, the latter is missing context. The pub example outlined above works because both you and I are there together, and we’re there to drink together, (two words: social objects).

The addition of an advertiser – in this case on Facebook – does not work, as there is no human context involved. It has attempted to do what I like to call ‘content wrapping’ – making an advert that has no relevance to me appear meaningful.

There is a massive difference between “I’ve done this, so you must do it too” and “I’ve done this, I loved it and here’s why you’d love it too”. It is the equivalent of me talking to you as an individual, instead of an advertiser using my profile picture to endorse its brand.

You get my meaning…

In 2008, people and brands began to realise that without context, content is rendered meaningless. Now in 2009, the tide is turning and advertisers are beginning to understand that old school games of ‘scattergun marketing’ just don’t work anymore.

This is nothing new, nor is it by any stretch of the imagination, rocket science. I’ve talked about this before numerous times. However, to give this piece context (see – it is important), I need to re-iterate a couple of things.

In 2008 – the year of sharing – context was most definitely king. Any person’s homepage on Facebook (that most people look at daily) was, and still is, very smart. It displays interesting content created by people you know (which immediately provides context), which was specifically created for you.
If that’s not targeted advertising, I don’t know what is.

Funnily, you know what else it is?

SOCIAL MEDIA

But enough of that. Let’s look forward. To 2009. To the year of CONVERSATION.

At this point it should be noted that these opinions are my own and are based on my personal experiences & knowledge of this particular space, in this particular part of the world.
In other markets, I am well aware that content is still reigning king and that context is quietly plotting its imminent downfall.

In the same way traditional marketing and advertising methods are being scrapped in favour of more intelligent niche or hyper-targeted practices, in this coming year brands will realise the benefit of engaging with their consumer on a more conversational level

Don’t get me wrong, some are doing it already, there are MANY forward-thinking brands out there doing just that.

Last year, when I wrote about being human, I talked about how the guys that will do well in this coming year will the ones that want to have genuine conversations with their consumers.

And I stand by it.

Greetings one and all!
I’ve just got back from the States and I am shattered.

UK –> Dallas –> Las Vegas –> San Francisco –> UK

…and breathe…

Had to fly to Las Vegas for a work thing see… via Dallas.

Rather amusingly, it being the first ever flight from LHR (London Heathrow) to DFW (Dallas, Fort Worth) the Boeing we travelled in was given a welcome ‘hose down’ by the airport’s fire trucks…
I didn’t get a picture of that – but I found another example

Anywhoo – Vegas.
Woah…

Nice place to visit and wotnot but I’d never wanna live there. Jeez.

I stayed at The Palms Hotel/Resort/Casino… The one where we held Mobile Geeks of Las Vegas… aka Mobile Geeks of London ON TOUR. What a fantastic night THAT was. Huge props to Mr Jeb Brilliant of Brilliant Expos for making that happen… and for also swinging it so we could just walk straight into the club/bar in the next tower. Nice work.

So yeah – What else did I get up to?

• Took part in the ‘Mobile Web Jam Session’ – That was cool. Good people in the room. Same old same old problems mind…
• Hung out with some cool folk – Namely: Darla, Amir, Jeb, Carlo, Rafe and Ewan. Carlo is actually insane enough to live in Vegas. But you wouldn’t think of it to know him.
• Joined a Blogger round table regarding the future of mobile; thought about a Facbook Phone – I’ve already written up my thoughts on that.
• Broke my shoes. Twice. Fixed the first pair, replaced the second.
• Saw ‘some’ parts of Vegas. Not loads. Well… I saw the outsides of some of the more elaborate hotels.
• And that’s kind of it really…

This was me, on the last day of the show, having just sat down and relaxed for the first time in about five days…

Not soon after this pic was taken I flew to San Francisco…
There’s more to come soon, I just need to get some shuteye…

Night night.

Zzz…

Foreword by Ewan Macloed: Maybe it’s the 24 hour sound of money being well and truly spunked up the wall as you walk through the casinos or the plastic nature of Las Vegas that gets to you after one or two days — whatever the catalyst, James Whatley has found himself undergoing several epiphanies this week, most notably when it comes to S60, Facebook and phone user interfaces. Hit it, James…

- – -

Before you all call “April Fool”, this idea came around when I was invited along by Debi Jones of Mobile Jones to attend a roundtable discussion hosted by Airwide and MobileMessaging2.com entitled:

“Web 2.0 comes to Handsets – New Issues and Upside for Monetizing the Mobile Web”

It started with a brief overview from Steve Bratt, CEO of the W3C about Web 2.0 and the similarities with the Mobile industry etc… And then we broke out into four separate groups to each discuss particular questions.

Our table had the not so easy task of answering the following:

“What are the three capabilities consumers will want in the future and what can the mobile industry do to help enable this?”

So, aside from the obvious “Consumers have NO IDEA what they want!” rant I could’ve launched into, I was sitting there with a few folk chucking around such themes as personalized UI, location-based services and, my personal favourite, passive contextual awareness, (I’ll come back to this one at a later date).

Chatting away, sharing ideas, brain working overload… I had an epiphany:

‘Scrap S60, give me facebook!’

The people at the table looked at me a little dumbfounded and I went onto explain it further…

“Rip out the standard UI in this handset (waving N95) put in facebook!”

The comments came thick and fast:

“Well, I like MySpace. Can’t I have a MySpace phone?”

“Didn’t Helio do that already?”

“Yeah. But you customize the UI couldn’t you? Give users that choice…”

“Ok. Give users the choice to customize their UI…”

“Blah blah blah…”

And that was cool and ok, it answered one of the three things we had to find and stuff… However, I think this is something that bears further thought.

What is Facebook?

By its own definition it is a Social Tool.

(Not a Social Network – You and your friends are the Network, not facebook – remember that one kids).

What is a mobile phone?

Also a Social Tool.

So my question is this: Why not converge the two?

I’ve spoken about facebook in the past and how the users can be segmented in different ways etc. But fundamentally, at the most basic level, facebook is when you think about it an extremely active contacts/address book, right?

Right.

Pour that into a handset and what do you get?

I’ll show you:

Your Contacts? Sync’d with facebook Friends.
But not only do I get numbers I also get pictures, updates, status etc.

Your Calendar? Sync’d with facebook Events.
But you get more detail, who’s coming etc (all linked across the different apps etc)

Your Games? Scrabulous anyone?!

What about SMS/Email/MMS? You’ve all sent a facebook message before right?

Your Camera? No change here. Oh, aside from photos being stored to your facebook gallery.

And Fun apps? If you read this blog I’m going to assume you’ve installed an app onto your phone before. You may well have even installed an app on your facebook too… see the link?

Don’t forget the Internet? Ahh… Here’s the killer see.

Facebook currently has no internet per se. No search. No Google box etc… That would be your link off and out of the facebook garden as it were. But hey, you never know with fb – they may well have Search on their roadmap.

Thinking about mobile search, searching the handset, like the current desktop search on the N95 or ‘Finder’ on any MacBook, would be like facebook!

Searching for “mobile geeks” and i’d be shown the event, the group and also any and all of the contacts in my address book that are part of said party.

What about my favourite app, Jaiku? Build it in.

Status updates on facebook? The mini-feed? That becomes your life-stream right there.

It could work.

Think about it.

The number one thing that people hate about changing handsets is relearning the UI: “Aww man, I’m still getting used to it” etc…

What if the UI was the same?
What if you knew how to use the UI before you took the thing out of the box because it’s the same UI that you use every day on Facebook?
And all that’s before we even begin to talk about the trusted relationship that the consumer already has with facebook as a brand…

…

…

Ok, so – taking a breath – maybe the web UI is not built to work on a phone. Maybe having a “facebook phone” would be almost as bad as Helio’s “MySpace Phone”.

But why not have the facebook engine running underneath a very basic UI. With all the information embedded and layered underneath each contact or event or picture, creating context sensitive content…Makes sense huh?

I guess what I’m getting at is the ideas and principles behind the semantic web, on your mobile.

It doesn’t have to be facebook. It could be anything. Just join the dots.

What do you think?