The discussion arose from the recent events centred around Twitter were Ashton Kutcher and CNN where competing against each other to see who could reach the million follower mark first. Supposedly Ashton used some methods that seemed a little low on the morale totem pole to some people in that he offered to donate 20 thousand mosquito nets to Africa if people followed him and helped him win the race.

The point was that using the service in this fashion left a bad taste in some peoples mouths and that it could be considered objectionable that he did this. The other side of the coin and the side that I fall on is that if you didn’t like his approach of leveraging who he is for his own gains, then you can always un-follow and not talk about the incident so as to not give it any air and therefore not help it grow.

The advent of these technologies and the integration of them into how we communicate and the reach they provide, ensures that mediocrity will be exposed and not tolerated at a much faster pace than has ever been seen in our history before. So with greater power comes greater responsibility or does it just expose us sooner?

This got me to thinking about my use of Twitter and my view of its value. When I first heard of Twitter I thought it was brilliant, I thought I got it and immediately signed up. However once I signed up I hit a wall, what the hell do I want to say? So as you can see from my Tweets on the right hand side of the page in the side bar, not a lot by the looks of it. I started to think that as an instant messenger replacement, Twitter certainly isn’t, even though millions of people use it in such a fashion.

To me the value proposition was in the ability to use it as a broadcasting tool. A way of reaching those that have similar interests and are happy to listen to you broadcast your message, whatever it may be. I mean if they don’t like it then they can un-follow you right? Also using it as a broadcasting tool does not equal spamming products and services you want to sell. Doing so will mean you will soon have no one to broadcast too.

Therefore using Twitter to broadcast to your disciples means you need to be judicious in what you put into your Twitter stream. Balancing information of value and blatant advertising will be a skill acquired over time. Also I believe this will force those that are doing the advertising to evolve how they get their message out and ensure it is far more targeted to the audience than we have ever seen. The meta data that we leek and the ability for communities to swarm around things of interest will help shape the way advertising is crafted and delivered in the future. The face of advertising will change.

I myself am thinking about these issues as I have integrated Twitter into a new business I have started. In my previous post I talk about how the ability to gather, correlate and deliver timely valuable information will be a business vertical of the future. As part of that business I have three Twitter accounts so far, that I broadcast information of value into. It is focused information of interest that a segment of the community enjoys. I do blast blatant advertising into those streams in a limited fashion. The advertising is focused and less intrusive because its context aware and relevant to the audience.

Part of the business model is to put together a service of value that helps define the audience, this as I believe and I will be able to speak with more authority about as time goes on, allows me to advertise in a limited yet highly targeted fashion without turning the audience away. The challenge is to ensure the advertising is not SPAM and does not out weigh the value proposition the service provides. As the business model becomes evident and more successful, the tolerance for advertising may diminish as the choices of service providers increases. The winner will have the balance of advertising to content just right.

When that tipping point arrives, the other aspects of the service will need to be highly tuned so they are compelling enough to stop your audience from leaving. This means the value proposition will need to be loud, clear and obvious if the service is to survive. The closer you are to the top, the more accurate that last statement will be.

In the Information Age, access to information, fast and context aware will be one of the essential tools for staying ahead of the curve. Having reliable, accurate and up to date information gathered together in a central place, accessible via any method conceivable and in a format designed for the time starved person of the 21st century and beyond is a business vertical waiting to be born.

I believe that as we plug more into the grid and broadcast our lives in real time we are going to want access to information, quickly and easily. The value proposition will be the speed, accuracy, consistency and reliability in which you deliver such a service. This will also be the yardstick to measure your success by.

To transform to such a society a number of events will need to occur on the way, such as:
1. Digitally Connected Society – We are well on the way in this regard.
2. Digitally Savvy Society – My kids will be more digitally savvy than any generation before them.
3. A desire to improve ones ability to make decisions by having access to such information services. Globalisation and the shrinking world we live in, is driving this event at a rapid rate of knots.

These events are occurring as I write this post and every day they accelerate.
Having that vision in mind I am going to share how I intend to create such a vertical. So sit down, buckle up and hang on, this is going to be one awesome ride.

Work has been extremely busy and IronPort has further integrated into Cisco. This for me personally is a good thing as the career opportunities within Cisco are limitless if you are willing to put your nose to the grind stone. Also Cisco are one of the IT pillars that will be around for a very long time in one fashion or another.

A career highlight for me last year was doing a presentation at Cisco Networkers, which went exceptionally well and I scored one of the highest scores for a none keynote presentation. This is the premier Cisco event in Australia for Cisco and therefore they are extremely keen to ensure an excellent show is put on for all. To the point that all new speakers do a two day public speaking course. Anyone that knows me knows I am not shy about speaking :-)) and therefore public speaking is not an issue for me. The course was excellent and some very valid tips were taken on board to polish my presentation skills.

I keep hearing the economy is slowing down and therefore things are going to get tight. Well so far I have found that if you want the work and are prepared to get off your arse and look for it, then things are just as busy as they were a year ago. However if you need an excuse to sit back and take it easy, then the economy as an excuse will have you covered. Personally I find this situation great, because it removes some of the noise from the market while those willing to work are the only ones left standing. So when people tell me its a shame how the economy is slowing, I nod my head, smile and keep on working flat out.

So that to me looks like an update, I have some things in the pipeline that I would like to talk about, however at this moment I can’t, so hopefully my next post wont be another 10 months in the making

A lot of speculation has been in the IT industry for years about how Microsoft Office is dead or dying and that the Windows era of desktop dominance has an expiry date. This is due to the network being the platform and the desktop OS does not need to provide anywhere near the resources and features we use now due to it being able to be virtualised at an application layer and delivered on demand. Well as you know I work at Cisco and Cisco is certainly not renowned for writing desktop operating systems or desktop environments, but I would watch this space. If you look at some of their acquisitions and look who would benefit the most if the network was the platform then it wouldn’t take to much of a leap to see where Cisco might be going to play one day.

Anyway all this work has slowed down my world domination plans through building an iPhone application development shop.

While I’m talking about the iPhone let me bring you up to date on all the rumors I have heard of late in regards to the famous device:

1. Apple will announce the 3G version at the Apple Developer Conference in June.
2. Telstra wont allow the iPhone on their network and that Optus is already in talks with Apple.
3. Apple are going to release the iPhone in Australia in the last week of June and its not going to be bound to a carrier.

As you can see speculation is rife, I personally like number 3, however don’t see this being true.

On the home front my nearly 2 year old son still isn’t walking on his own. My wife is not happy about it and wishes he would hurry up. I never walked until 2 years and 3 months, so hes got until August to walk and beat me. Personally I think hes smart as people carry him and he has all his life to walk, so whats the rush?

Well thats enough rambling from me, I might go and stir a good friend of mine who works for Microsoft about that crappy WinMobile OS he suggested should be on the iPhone.

The ability for us to communicate with anyone in the world in real time at minimal expense has surely got to be game changing. This age were we can discover, research and to be informed regarding anything that happens publicly on the planet brings new frontiers and washes away old methodologies and business models. The wheels of innovation are running flat out as a new gold rush era is once again upon us.

Most of us are still grasping with how to channel and utilise the tools of the new world. Tools like Twitter on the surface seem so benign and useless to many, however if you stop standing so close to the glass and step back, you can see the whole picture more clearly. The power of a communication network that anyone can join, place information into and is always on has got to be simply one of the most powerful tools we are yet to appreciate or understand.

At an unprecedented rate of change we are discovering that the global village when connected can truly become a powerfully society. The opportunity for someone with an idea and passion to pursue it has not been more right than it is now. Utilising technology to communicate and collaborate in our new found village presents anyone with the stage and the reach to execute their dream. Look at how technology is transforming the music industry. As much as the old music industry tries desperately to cling to old business models, the new age of innovators is providing the momentum to muscle out those that cant adapt to this inevitable change.

The newspaper industry is another that if the dinosaurs don’t adapt and look at the new landscape as it is slowly revealed they too will become fossils in the history books that my grand children will read. Our way of life, our values, the things we treasure and respect are constantly being redefined, however at a rate never witnessed before in history. The permanently connected village encourages the accelerating rate of change. If you don’t keep up you will be swept aside.

The days of empire building and old school monopolies are sliding into history, and rushing full throttle at us is a new generation of business that bends and sways to the demands of the community. These new entities are building communities and taking heed of the noise they generate. Truly this is a skill that is being rapidly learned by any organisation that wants to be relevant in this new age. If you are not able to morph to what the community wants they have an abundance of choice and you will be relegated to obsolete almost immediately.

Its an exciting time if you have ambitions to contribute as the ease at which you can contribute has never been more simpler than now. As the next generation finishes school and starts to enter the work force the rate of change will double again. The adoption of technology will drive the new age and further evolve the landscape into the next era.

Theres gold in them there hills I tell you, can you see the large golden nuggets waiting to be harvested?

Jason is an Internet celebrity that has a brand that is always on. It broadcasts to all those that want to listen, live or on demand 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 362 days a year and even 363 days a year. When Jason is conscious and connected you can often catch him speaking either via twitter, his blog, various Internet talk shows, conferences and any other method the Internet provides us. The brands of Jason and the throngs of other early adopters is growing.

At times Jason can exercise the power of his brand by using his influence to nudge his audience in a particular direction. Considering how small the world is when its connected the power of ones brand can have real influence down to an economic level.

This will scale in that instead of being restricted to your immediate surroundings, if you have something to offer then when connected, the world is your audience. You no longer need to be geographically restricted any more. Obviously depending on what you have to offer will directly bare as to how much more value you will get from the network. Regardless, having a global audience to reach out too is infinitely more beneficial than not.

The next generation who will be the first generation that is permanently connected to the network will accelerate change as our communities reach into a global village. Building a brand and commoditising your time as sell-able chunks of equity allows you to monetize the level of influence you exert on the network with your brand.

Tie this back to the previous post I made in “The Enterprise is Dead” and you can see the flow on effects of a global village. Free yourself of the shackles and start building your brand, embrace the wave of change as you cant stop it from happening.

One of the very clear examples of this funnily enough came about when Apple announced the AppStore for the iPhone. Prior to Apples announcement if I wanted to develop, distribute, market and collect payment for an application I would have to invest more than time and effort. I would possibly need to employ other people to handle the distribution and commercials to collecting payment and providing support for my application.

Some of those functions are not to hard if you follow that sort of thing. Payment gateways and hosting to distribute your application can be a barrier to entry for many developers. Well that all goes away with Apples AppStore model. As a developer all I need to worry about is my application. I need to code the application, think about how I’m going to support it and more than likely set up a blog to provide updates and possibly some simple marketing. The AppStore will take care of the commercials while I sit back and watch the money role in.

Ok so the above example is rather simple and in reality wont be quite as simple as I have defined it, but you get the picture. Take this example and look around and you start to see many examples (publishing of the written word, music and video) of were we as individuals no longer need to seek venture capital or mortgage the house a second time to get started. We are able to develop our own brand and start to build a loyal following as the value we provide become obvious to others.

The network is becoming a platform that things of interest and value can quickly bubble to the surface and get their time in the sun. No longer is the decision of what somethings worth controlled by a few, but now by the masses. The convergence of the network and our daily lives and how we are always on will be irresistible. My oldest child is about to turn 5. She uses a mouse and keyboard more efficiently than my parents and has a natural knack to using a PC. When she finally gets to an age that she can carry a mobile device I’m sure one of the options will be, will you have the device surgically implanted for the life of the contract? Convergence will take on a completely new meaning for generation ON.

Integration of technology and shrinking of the planet we know of as Earth are at break neck speed now, as the next generation starts to finish school the pace is only going to increase and the adoption cycles are only going to get smaller. The time has dawned were our concentric circles of influence are reaching to all corners of the pond in the same day we create the ripples.

Enterprises are not going to go away, however they are going to shrink as we can do more with less and the power of automation slides the mundane into the abyss.

Are you building your brand or looking into the void?

When I went into the details of the bill Telstra has slapped me with a 580.00 dollar WAP bill. No more detail than a single line item that says WAP charges 580.00 dollars. Now the interesting thing is my iPhone keeps track of how much data I download over the Edge network which is what this WAP bill supposedly represents.

So now its time to revisit what my actual contract covers as it was supposed to include X amount of data a month. Considering my iPhone says I only downloaded 29meg of data over that period its sure seems the infamous Telstra billing machine has thrown a cog once again.

The other thing that worries me is that various people in Telstra have stated numerous times that Telstra will never allow iPhones on their network and that Telstra will never support the iPhone. Which to me only highlights the stupidity of a company that has its head shoved so far up its own arse it hasn’t seen daylight in decades. I mean who would denounce the iPhone from their network when the device encourages people to use the network and therefore pull more data, which you make money from?

However most Australians are well aware that Telstra are not the brightest company and they don’t really care what their customers want, they only want to harvest money while providing the bare minimal of service for that hard earned cash. Worse is if you run a business that requires you to deal with Telstra, your better off poking a sharp stick in both eyes and running across the busiest highway. Your more likely to survive that than have Telstra not screw you on that service at some stage or another and cost you boat loads of cash.

In other news the rumors have it that a 3G version of the iPhone is about 60 days from announcement. Considering the previous public stances Telstra has taken it will be interesting to see who Apple partner with in Australia. My bet is it will be Optus who are in the middle of turning on 3G services across various areas of Australia.

I could clearly see and articulate the market, the platform, the convenience it will bring and the savings it can potentially provide. It was with such clarity I could see a complete business plan on how to execute and exploit a golden disruption to how we do things the iPhone represents.

You know the feeling you get in your gut when you go Eureka thats a no brainer, Doh. Thats what this solution is, its a marriage of convenience that will be so simple to implement and so compelling to use that it will seem obvious later.

Now to see if I can execute in getting the funding to execute on a very detailed and calculated plan to build something meaningfully.

First place to look I guess would be a fund specifically to fund the type of business I have envisaged. How do you do that without loosing control of the plan and solution?

I have some other avenues that I will pursue and see how they pan out first I think.