Kin Lane

My thoughts on technology and life

Lifespan of Social Media at a Conference or Event

I was just talking with a colleague over Facebook chat about some great interviews and content she is producing from a conference she is at.

She is wondering when the most opportune moment to release this content.  When its polished and refined in a week or so…or take advantage of it now.

The attention span of users are short.  The opportunity for networking around a conference is best during the conference when everything is still fresh in their minds…they are engaged.  As soon as they leave the event floor their minds start moving back to regular things.

In my opinion you are better off beginning the streaming of your ideas and content as soon as you start gathering and organizing them…while still at the conference.  Of course your ideas won’t be polished and honed, but you will still get value and interest that make carry over and bring value long after the event is over.  Much like my blog….I tend to just throw out random ideas….and rarely edit.

So while at the event stream using your twitter, Facebook, and other life streaming services in as close to real-time as you can.  Each night make sure and upload photos, videos and other social media to your online profiles….and if you have time make a few blog posts that are relevant to the event and your experience.

Then once you get home you can spend time and polish and hone your event social media productions and release in a more organized and meaningful format that will continue the event buzz for quite a while.

Application Program Interfaces (API) are All the Rage…

Was reading a post on Programmable Web today about Sprint opening up a set of REST API to work with the Sprint mobile platform.

Developers can now access location, simple presence, and send SMS messages to Sprint handsets without requiring any software installed to the device.

This is an important business step for the major carrier.  Application Program Interfaces or API is something all small to medium sized business should be considering.

You have spent thousands of hours on your web application or web site that provides access to your tools, products or services to your customers.  You should now extend a wholesale access to these tools, content, products or services to your partners and potential affiliates.

Application Program Interfaces is one of the next major growth areas you will see for all businesses.  Making your products and services available for consumption and delivery beyond your web site is key to your evolution.

Wordpress as a Content Development Platform

I have been using wordpress installations for content development.  I am working on a couple of books and whitepapers.

The white papers should be much shorter than the books.  However the platform seems to work with my way of evolving the content for these papers and books.

Even one book I am making public as I am writing it.  Just because it is a hobby project.  I like the blog format because it organizes things by date as I write them.  I can also categorize them.

Then I can write more linear pages and pull together the different areas.  I also like the linking in between topics and pulling together.  I really makes a non linear book.

We’ll see where I go with this content development.

Social Media Marketers Who Comment on Blog

This is a message to all you social media marketers who comment on my blog.

Thank you so much for your praise of how wonderful I am and how informative my blog is.  However if your comment does not add value to my blog or your link is to relevant content I click SPAM.

So don’t even bother.  Why waste your time and energy?

If you are not working in the technology, IT, events, web development, social media marketing, online marketing or related industry…get lost.

Your wasting your time….I filter all my comments.

Social Media Usage in the Future Quote

Social media will be used as a spin tool in ways we couldn’t even imagine in the near future….by government, entertainment industry, NGO’s, CIA and anyone who is trying to steer public opinion in one direction or another…

–Kin Lane

Beautiful Flowcharts and Diagrams

I always want to visual my projects and ideas in easy to understand diagrams that are beautiful.  I always look to Dion Hinchcliffe as the master of technical diagrams.  I love his work.

Being able to take a complex idea and articulate it in a single visual diagram that is universally understood is gold.

So I want to get over my hump of creating very dull and boring diagrams using Microsoft Visio or other basic tool.

I am research a couple of tools:

• Omniplan - A slick visual planning tool.
• OmniGraffle - A slick diagramming tool by the crew that made Omniplan.
• Lovely Charts - The names says it all.

That is all for now…will keep looking and see what else I find.

Popularity of Internet and Social Media

Listening to Morning Edition on PBS right now and they are talking about the post election in Iran.  All the public dissent and open revolts are largely organized by SMS and Facebook.

With this kind of usage even in Iran, it really shows the importance of SMS and Social Media as a tool in our society.

Freemium Hostage Business Model

I am a big fan of the Fremium Business Model.  Where you offer a base account that is free to get users in the door.  Then you can upsell them on premium features.  It just makes sense.

I am also a big fan of the Free Trial for web based software as well.  I think this is crucial to allow people to test drive your application and see if it will work for them.

However nothing makes me more mad then the Free trial that really isn’t Free.  They make you put in a credit card then start charging you after the trial period.

I dub this the Freemium Hostage model.

In January I was test driving large file sharing solutions out there for a potential project.  I test drove several that seem to meet my needs.  I was going with one called Sharefile, a secure easy file sharing solution.  I had to put my credit card in there to test drive….but on the home page it says Try for Free.

So shortly after test driving the client changed the project and we weren’t going to address again until summer.  So I forget about it until May when I am doing my credit card reconciliation and I see a charge for it.

And of course I’m in the middle of back to back conferences and too busy to make time to address….so here it is June and I now have 3 months of charges for this service I never used.

I log in and cancel the account….in which it quickly asks a reason why….right under “NO Refunds”.

So now it doesn’t matter to me if they have a good tool.  There is no way I’m going to use it, because their business model already rubbed me wrong.  They are making a business model off offering up something Free, bait and switching and then taking advantage of people forgetting to cancel.

That just doesn’t fly in this era of Cloud Computing, SaaS, and pay as you go.

So my review of Share File - Secure File Transfer is DO NOT USE THEM.  Do not support Freemium Hostage Business Model.  Boooooo!!!

I may change my tune if they changed their business model.

Google Wave Federation Protocol

Excited to have started playing with the Google Wave Federation Protocol this evening.  I got my sandbox account today and played with the client available there enough….then after going through the Google Wave API docs and Google Wave Federation Protocol Draft Specs again I am eager start playing with some code.

Going to play with some on my Amazon EC2 R&D instance….then get to work on playing with a client some….see what damage I can do there.

Exciting stuff to see where we can take this for the event industry.

I downloaded TortoiseHG to work with the wave protocol mercurial repository.

Internet and Network at Technology Conference

I’m not being to formal about my posts coming together from the Google I/O conference.  A lot of work this week so I haven’t had time to pull together.

So I am just going to rant about a few items randomly.   One of them is the network and Internet connectivity at conference centers and events.

First put the Registration, Information, Session Speakers, Exhibitors and all non-attendees on a separate network.  There were several important sessions where the presenter was unable to continue for a while because of network latency.  How bad is this?  Build out capacity for them to accomplish this part of conference.

Then build out the appropriate network for attendees.  Make it a great user experience for everyone.  We live in the digital age.  People are using laptops and handheld devices.  Make it possible for them.

Conference centers and show managers need to make sure they hire a competent team to tackle this…and make it so.

It was just unacceptable that at Google I/O developer conference there was any Internet connectivity issues.

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