never ending...

Some responses on a passenge at Knowledge@Wharton Network, "My Space, Facebook and Other Social Networking Sites: Hot Today, Gone Tomorrow? " Errr... not really!! Social networks are the largest portion of the social web, measured in users. Social networks have been around for many years as have basic forums. However, these tools have been used by certain small groups. Social networks of today have a huge spread. Three in four Internet users access social tools to connect with each other.

Social network services include sites such as MySpace, hi5, Facebook, and many more. MySpace is the largest of these categories, closely followed by Facebook. What is characteristic of social network pages is that they include certain broad features. The ability to communicate, congregate in groups, support causes, comment on actions, let friends know what is going on, create events and so on are all examples of available features. Social networking is never ending. They will only becoming bigger and more...

Picture sourced : www.mobilerevolutions.org

Social networks, with certain exceptions, do not focus on video sharing even if most offer the service. YouTube is the single largest source of online video content and hosting. YouTube is a simple service where videos can be uploaded and shared. Some videos are nothing more than vacation reels to be shared with friends. Other users have online debates and conversations though their videos. The levels of engagement, pageviews and sense of community are growing by the day. It’s one of the most excellent media tools of creating a new way for millions of people to entertain, advertise, educate, and grok to one another. That’s why it’s Time’s Invention of the Year of 2006.

Picture sauced : www.youtube.com

a shortcut to social media

Some comments to the post of “What do you need to know about social media?” by Chris Pirillo. Many popular Internet applications and social media networks require a significantly higher user interaction. Interaction occurs on several levels not only between different users, but also between users and content or different applications. Most of what social media is based on the collaboration of users and the individual’s creation, or participation in creation, of new digital content. This is known as user-generated content (UGC) or also as user-created content (UCC). User-generated content is in part the defining essence of the social web.

The point being made is that the social web is a window to a greater distribution and diversity of media when compared to traditional media. Digital media has presented the opportunity not only to interact with other individuals, but also with the content. Texts, images and video files are only being shared, but they are also being manipulated. It’s one of the popular organizational strategies.

blog recipe

I read an interesting blog about “Online Success is About Telling Stories”. (May be a bit late to find this article :P) I believe everyone desire “to peek”. Weblogs allow people seeing others. The key is about the quality of content and how to impress your audience. Do you check how many visitors when you access your blog every time? People are not only desire to peek but also to flaunt him/her through the stories they are telling.

you, me, them

Today when I passed by a big billboard on a street, I turned my head because I saw something attracting me. “Nokia Connecting People”, the logo of Nokia. “Connecting People”, is an overview of Nokia corporate strategy, showing what the industry is like, and where they see their opportunities. Should Nokia PR need to be reinvented dramatically to fit a new digital world?

Picture sourced : www.nokia.com

does people get a bad habit to lie in online communications?

According to the analysis report about the impact of social and other new media on PR Practice by Wright and Hinson 2009, it shown respondents think blogs and social media have a long distance to go before they will be equal to traditional media in these scores in terms of truth telling or advocating transparent and ethical cultures. Moreover, the survey results shown that traditional new media receive higher scores than blogs and social media in terms of accuracy, credibility, telling the truth and being ethical. Fewer than half hold these same expectations for blogs and other social media. The conclusion is what makes people less honest via blogs or other social media? As a PR practitioner, should we maintains honesty or to cover up something to protect personal and organizational interests?

Pictures sourced : http://www.scrapetv.com

"craigslist killer" proves "people are ok"?

Craig Newmark founded Craigslist in 1995. It is a centralize network of online communities, featuring free online classified advertisements including jobs, housing, personal sale, services, community, resumes and discussion forum. Four years ago, Newmark said, “the whole ethos is about self-policing and communal values” (BBC Online news 13-01-2006). Perhaps, that’s why we can found “erotic services” and “causal encounter” from Craigslist since November 2008. 　 Less than one year, a twenty-two “normal” student murdered a woman after answering her Craigslist advert for “masseuse services”. (TIMES ONLINE 22-4-2009 .Thereafter, Craigslist and other similar sites are under new security measurement.

Photo sourced: http://www.exploratorium.edu/

This makes me ask myself questions. What makes this planet so sins? Is bad human behavior and violence which make technology to commit a sin? How many people respect technology with ethics? Well … how much of ethics ?

thanks for your help, technologies!

Do you have hundred of promotions coming to your email box everyday? Apart from the spam, some of my emails are e-flyers, e-newsletters from airlines, hotels, travel agents, banks, associations, clinics and schools for example.

Today I think about how gatekeeper can influence audiences with spreading out persuasive communication. Gatekeeper should make sure that everything is well prepared, by advocating relevant information, screening sources, transmission, encoding and decoding. Is it a complicated process in particular with contemporary technologies to match them up?

Indeed, receivers will decide then if these media messages are useful or spam.
It mostly depends on the quality of message gatekeepers have sent out.
Receivers are not only choosing to consume or not consume, they will pay attention and keep the information in mind or ignore it.

As a matter of fact, technologies contribute to enhance organizational PR reputation to spread messages all over the world easily, faster but also efficiently and at a very low cost.

a mobile phone is cheaper than a meal at Pizza Hut ?

China is in a unique period of development; not only economically, but also socially, culturally, and politically. What helps China to develop so fast? Beside a better leadership of the government, a system constantly improving; advanced technology is among the key element that Chinese government has been using to accelerate the developement of the country.

Photo sourced from www.zanyholidays.com

Internet access market in China continues to grow rapidly. Nowadays, people can get large amounts and various types of products and services through the Internet. According to ClickZ (News and expert advice for the digital marketer) in November 2007, China surpasses the U.S. in looking to content that's been uploaded by individuals and shopping such as Taobao.com. The number of hours spent researching shopping in the U.S. on average is 2.9 hours. A higher percent of Internet users in China use search engines to make purchase decisions, for example Baidu.com. Forty-six percent of Chinese broadband users look to search engines, versus 25 percent of American broadband users, when making purchase decisions. The average age of a broadband Internet user in China is 32 years old, 10 years younger than his U.S. counterpart. Seventy-five percent of the online population accesses the Internet from work, compared to only 41 percent in America. The research firm BDA China Ltd. says China's online population should keep growing by 18% annually, reaching 490 million by 2012 – a number larger than the entire U.S. population (USA Today, July 25, 2008). Is that mean people in China are more aware the importance and neccessity of intra and inter personal communication by the Internet ?

Apart from the Internet, another popular new media in China is using cell phone. Contemporary cell phone is not only applying to inter-personal communication such as conversation, SMS, MMS, camera and video; personal leisure like MP3 and games; but also intra-personal communication, for example accessing to the Internet through WAP, receiving useful info (news, weather forecast), Office applications and instant message of MSN. In metropolitan cities, you can find people using cell phones everywhere like queuing up, walking, waiting and even on the plane. I can see they are just well spending their life times for communication as well as self-entertaining.

Nevertheless, China is the world's largeast mobile market with more than 650 million wireless subscribes and the largest internet market with over 300 million Internet users according to BDA's research. Cell phones continue to be a strong supply in China. Data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology shows that China produced 600 million Cell phones in 2008, equivalent to 50 percent of global supply.

Cell phones prices are so competitive that you can find Nokia mobile (GBP20) at a cheaper price than an online order at Pizza Hut: A big pizza GBP12.99 + a bucket of chicken wings GBP3.49 + a sticky toffee GBP3.99 = GBP20.47. Obviously, technology becomes more and more popular to the developing countries in result of enhancing intra and inters personal communications for one self and between humans. So, when the price of a mobile phone will be cheaper than a meal at McDonald ?

where are the public telephones ?

I don't know how many computers you have at home but I have four for myself. It is interesting to see how people seem to have difficulty now to live without any technology supports.

Think! Farmers used computer system to control the agriculture programme. Kindergarten provides computer lessons to toddlers. Everybody can online with public computers in Singapore Changi International Airport like people also do in the biggest subway station in Hong Kong. Governments might replace public telephones in the future to give wider internet networks available to the citizens.

Can you imagine if one day we all lose ICTs... perhaps for many people it could be the end of the world...