What content readers mean to paper and books.

With yesterday's announcement of the new Apple Ipad, I could not help but wonder how everything is going digital and the loss of paper products in today's society. Are we totally ready to embrace the concept that we are now a paperless society? We have given up on the Newspaper as a hard copy, in the last few years as more and more people are going to the Internet for their news these days. But with the announcement of the Ipad, as a true "content" driven platform more people will be exploring the use of it and Kindle's book readers. Books are not the only thing losing their value in our society either. Have you tried to fill out a job application these days? If so you might notice a quick difference in the application process from years ago. No longer do you go to a store and simply ask for a job application, instead many company owners and manager's simply direct you to a website where you can file an application or an e-mail address where you can send an application directly to them. Now I could highlight all of the various reason's on why one could choose a book reader over a book, but I am not going to do that. I am hear to make you think about the other alternative. The other view. An electronic book might be more cheaper to make, save us on cutting down trees, and be better to read at night, but does it have the same intimacy as a book? Is it something that can be passed on to your friend? Or left at a gas station for the next passerby? I think not. A file is a file, but a book is a book. It does take up space, but it takes up space in an almost magnificent way. A book can be shared from person to one another or can sit on your coffee table for days at a time without being touched. To a content reader a book is just another file, but to a couch a book is an adventure.

A Beginner's Guide to Foursquare.

Where are you? Where did you go last night? Do you know anything about this place? All of these questions can be answered by a small Social Networking application called Foursquare. If you are unfamiliar with Foursquare and have a smartphone, see this as an introduction to the newest Social Networking application that is grabbing people's attention. Foursquare just released it's latest application for the Blackberry and this will hopefully make it popular as the newest Social networking application continues to gain steam. For those of you unfamiliar with Foursquare you can simply go to Foursquare.com or continue reading for a quick tutorial. Once you have foursquare downloaded on to your mobile device, you simply go to a "venue" and check in, and write a review, or even try and the become mayor of that particular location. Foursquare uses a unique badge system, that user's of the application win under various circumstances. The person who most often visits a particular location becomes the "Mayor." The "Mayor" badge is the most prestigious badge however, there are a variety of other badges to win including Newbie, Local and even Crunked and Bender. But feel free to read the entire list at Foursquare.Com. Foursquare also offers a variety of solutions, for the regular social networker. Feel free to shout to your friends and follow them as you like, as you try and outrace them to become "Mayor" of your favorite hot spot. Now beyond the fact that it's fun to be a "Mayor" Foursquare has a variety of things that make it fun and unique. You can instantly write a tip for any visitors to a particular venue and you can also find the address to help better describe your location to a friend. Though few companies have yet, to truly adapt Foursquare into their marketing campaign many venues here in Raleigh are already experimenting with it by offering their "Mayors" free coffee and other small gifts. Is Foursquare for you? Well unless your a homebody and plan on sitting at home the rest of your life. I definitely recommend getting Foursquare for your next night on the town.

A look at our Splintered Market.

What do your Apps say about you? As our marketplace becomes more and more splintered, more and more websites are popping up in this niche market we now find ourselves in. What do these websites say about us? That we are movie buffs? That we are avid sports fans? That we are avid readers? Everything is becoming about us and getting our attention. We can now customize our phones even. Look at the Iphone and the over one million Applications that are available for it. What do your Apps say about you? The following are the top eight Apps on my Iphone's homescreen: NYTimes ESPN's SportsCenter The Weather Channel Pandora Foursquare Facebook Myspace Tweetdeck What do these top two rows say about me? Obviously one can concur that I am a Social Media user and lover, from the fact that I have four social network accounts on my Iphone. Plus I apparently like to stay on top of news, sports, and the weather from my other apps. Also I probably like to have some down time and listen to music. Our cellphones should tell us something. Our marketplaces are becoming more and more divided, as more and more people are after are after our attention and hard earned dollar. The Apple Itunes store is a prime example of this. It boasts to have over a million applications that are available to download, however that does not mean that every single application is for everybody. It simply means that every app, has a niche in this marketplace. As our marketplace continues to splinter this means a lot, not only for advertising but for the everyday marketplace as well. Obviously Wal-Mart and Target, two retailers who survive as one-stop places for everything will survive on their brand alone. But coming up with a general product is something that is hard to in today's society. One has to target a particular group and do it well. Look at the common Newspaper. One could argue that the many reasons behind it's loss of readership is because more and more people are turning to specialty sites for their information. Tons of companies are trying to capitalize this and trying to find your niche and the best way to expose your money to it. Generality is gone. You can no longer find something, with a broad range appeal in today's marketplace. The marketplace is becoming more and more segregated and it harder than ever before to keep the attention of the common person. Markets will continue to segregate as more and more niches open up, look at Cable TV for example, who would of thought ten years ago we would have such channels as Home and Garden, True TV, Comedy Central, and the Travel Channel. So good-bye general stores and brands that try and cater to everyone. I look forward to seeing things in the future as more and more people are trying to figure out what our lifestyle has to say about us.

How much will you pay for the News? The Life and Death of the Newspaper.

Where do you get your news from? If you are like the typical person, you get your news from a variety of sources. These sources probably involve one or more of the following sources: 1. The Daily Newspaper. No matter what people say, you still find yourself reading the occasional hard copy of the newspaper. 2. The Online Newspaper. Why read the daily when it costs so much money? Simply go online and read this for free. 3. The News? This might seen a bit crazy, but you watch the news for news. 4. Social Media. Have a twitter or Facebook account? Simply read the stories that your friends are talking about through links or various other messages. 5. From a Specialty News Source. Want sports info? Go to ESPN. Want to hear about Paris Hillton? Go to TMZ. Now, no matter who you get your news from, one thing stays the same, where the the news comes from. News comes from Newspapers and News programs, which publishes the hard work of journalists. What happens though when newspapers cease to exist? Or journalists for that matter? What happens to the news? This is all asked because of the decline of not just newspapers but the New York Times, the number one daily in the world. Rupert Murdock, current owner of the New York Times, and owner of TV affiliate Fox, is currently doing whatever it takes to keep his Newspaper alive. He recently took the New York Times out of Google and as of Monday, announced that the New York Times is going to create some new sort of payment system. This system will be surely monitored by other newspapers as to whether it will succeed or fail. The future of news has changed in the last five years and with Murdock's recent announcement I am sure it will change again. We will have to pay for the news. In some form, either through increased online ads or having to pay for the content online. The people who write the stories have to get paid, in some shape or fashion. Publishers around the world are struggling to stay alive in today's marketplace, where everything is free online. Why pay for your news when you can simply go online? This is the question many people have been finding themselves asking the last ten years as more and more people become Internet users. However all of this leads to the point where we are at now. Will we give up news entirely and just rely on Social Media and headlines? If we do not pay for the newspaper now, will we pay for it online? While, I am sure a few Newspapers will survive in some form such as the New York Times and the Wallstreet Journal, but I wonder what will happen to the rest. Will local news combine with local town websites, to offer there news available for all who are interested? Will Kindles take the form of paper as people get news stories beamed directly through their mobile reader? Will even the big guys, continue to be able to publish? Where do you see News going in the future? Because I am sure that with the current moves of Rupert Murdock, whether they are viewed as good or bad will change the News Industry for years to come.

SAVE HAITI, The message heard Around the World.

It's Friday night and I just turned off Tweetdeck(TweetDeck.com). I am sure I will be back on it later tonight, if not the next fifteen minutes, but I need a break from it right now. As I was checking my usual twitter feed, I noticed that my next blog was already writing itself, as I saw the fan outcry for Haiti. If you have been left out of the Social Media world in the last forty-eight hours than you will probably have no idea what I am talking about, but if you have checked your Facebook, Twitter, or even your text messages, you are probably aware of the various ways companies are reaching out to get help to Haiti. "Send a text and donate a dollar," many of them say. Red Cross is currently saying that they have earned up to 10 million dollars in a text campaign to help Haiti. This astonishing number, would not have been reached without Social Media and it should show us just how important Social Media has begun. For starts unless you have been living under a rock, you are probably aware of the Haiti situation. The nation that was hit with an earthquake late Tuesday afternoon. Many Americans immediately felt sorry for this small, Hispanola nation, as the dead and wounded were reported in the 10,000s. Many Americans wondered what they could to do help? This was not 9/11 and a local disaster. They could not simply pack up, and go and help. The American Red Cross though, came up with a wonderful idea. Send a text with the words "Haiti" to 90999 and donate $10. This campaign which started off small became brillant as millions of people spread the word in their social communities, and the donation number reached 10 million dollars. Now this article is not about Haiti, even though that story is a sad one, but I want people to take a look on how that message was spread. Before the day's of Facebook and Twitter, many people had started developing text technology, but how could one get the word across. How could a company such as Snickers, get the users to text a vote and make them want their voices hears? American Idol, was a good example of a company that embraced text voting. Idol allowed online voting for it's show, through it's texts, but unless you watched American Idol, why would you care or know about this? Sending a robotic text to an individual person, seemed like an inferior and ignored way, that annoyed many people. But how could they get people to vote? This was the question. But years later, Social Media has become the ultimate advertising tool. Many people who simply do not watch the news found out about this campaign through their regularly visited Social Media accounts. They may not have watched the news, or seen a commercial, but they are surely listening to what their friends have to say and the messages that they are spreading. Brands and Marketers need to take note on this. Red Cross learned how to use Social Media the right way, let people pass on a message that they feel is important and care about. Do not MAKE THEM force a message, simply give people something they are passionate about and they will pass the message along, all on their own.

Driving down Cell Road, why Lawmakers need to be weary of banning cellphones on the road.

The other day, I spent my afternoon at my local Toyota dealership getting a new tire put on. A quite simple task, that should not have taken more than fifteen minutes. However this simple and easy feat, ended up being done at a snails pace, so I spent all afternoon there. Luckily I brought my laptop. I was able to get my work done freely, with an endless supply of free coffee in my hands and CNN playing in the background. The day could not have been that bad. Well, as I was surfing away, reading the latest on the Mark McGwire debacle, I heard from the corner of my ear "Law Makers want to ban the use of Cell Phones in cars." I took a sip of my coffee and paused for a minute, I knew it was only a matter of time before something like this would be passed. I was still thinking about this later in the day when I pulled out my phone to use it's GPS. I stared down at the phone, as it brought up the directions that I needed. Law makers were going to ban the cell phone in the car, I thought again. I stared at my phone hard, now in shock, as the Epiphany hit me. This cannot happen. Now before you attack me, which you are probably thinking about doing at this point, let me ask you, what do you use your cellphone for? The most standard use of a cell phone is used to communicate to a friend or family member. One does this through either a phone call or a text message. These are all standard features that all cell phone providers provide. Now if these features are going to be banned, I could not totally argue with this. Text messaging is now mostly outlawed in the entire United States, though most people would admit, if pressed, that they have sent a text message in some form recently, despite this new ban. Most people will admit that text messaging, plus the occasional phone call does limit the driver's awareness and leads to increased chances of a car accident. Statistics currently say that 1 in 4 car accidents involves a cell phone in some fashion. So this law that congress wants to give us, does make sense on all of these points. However, if you ban the cellphone entirely are you banning something else altogether? At the end of 2009 15% of people reportedly owned a smart phone. Let me say that again, 15% OF PEOPLE OWN A SMART PHONE, not a regular cellphone. Most smartphones have thousands of other qualities that normal cell phones do not have...including music playback and GPS. Most phones are starting to come standard with these devices, however the smart phone has this application built in from start. So if you ban the cellphone in the car are you banning me from listening to my music? Are you banning me from using my GPS? Lawmakers need to think about this before they throw this bill out. What does it say? What are it's details? A BAN ON CELL PHONES IS A BAN ON TECHNOLOGY. Back in the late 90's people were worried about the distraction of theCD player, when it was first introduced, so this controversy is nothing new. This is not to say that the driving has remained the same in the last 10 years. Car's are now equipped with TVs, DVD players, and Video game systems that can easily distract any driver, not to mention the hassle of unwary passengers in any car. This does not include the addition of CD players, GPS systems, and radar systems that can now be found standard in most cars. Also I would be stupid to not mention the Apps, that many manufacturers are now rolling out in their future vehicles. I am not arguing for the Cellphone use in cars or saying it's okay to text while you drive. I have seen up close and personal, how much damage a cell phone and distracted driver can cause. All I am asking for, is for lawmakers take a step back and really think about what they hope to achieve with this bill. Because this bill will not only affect driving, but technology for years to come.

Phones of the future, what the Nexus One really means.

Now that the holidays are over we can get back into more pressing matters. No more top tens about the future or New Year’s resolutions stories. Now stories on more pressing matters. If you have not been living in a cave the last few months, you may have heard about the Nexus One, Google's new phone. The Nexus One is Google’s new Smart Phone that plans on being launched next week. I am not going to go into the details of what the phone can do, but you can read the New York Times review of it here, http://tinyurl.com/yc7wqcw. But again, this article is not about what the phone can do, instead it is about how this phone will affect you and your life.

As noted in my previous predictions column the Smart phone market is going to boom and that is not only being predicted by me, but other social media/tech experts as well. The main leader in the smart phone market the last few years has been Apple and their defining smart phone the Iphone. The Iphone was generations ahead of any other phone, when it entered the market and it instantly captured the attention of rival smart phone maker Research In Motion, the creator of the blackberry. However this fight has been fairly one-sided in the past year as Apple gains more and more market shares with it’s Iphone device. Apple might currently be the leading smart phone manufacturer, though a challenger is one the way in the form of Google’s Nexus One. Many people are already buying the product which is currently available through it’s website, which comes either supported by the T-Mobile brand or in an unlocked form. What does all of this mean, though? It’s just another cell phone, being dumped in the endless choices that we already have. Well for one thing this means a lot for both Apple and it’s current carrier AT&T. Most of you are probably aware of the fact that Apple’s exclusive contract ends this year with AT&T and that it will be free to sign a contract with any carrier that it chooses. The arrival of the Nexus One, however does limit the choices that Apple believed it once had. Will it Apple really want to go to the Verizon network, in which it will have to fight with market share with the Nexus One? Will Verizon want to sign a lucrative contract to Apple, now that it has it’s Iphone killer? Can AT&T afford to let the Iphone go and still compete in the cell phone market? These question have led me to believe that Apple WILL RESIGN WITH AT&T, to do anything else would be suicide as it now faces it’s greatest competitor yet.

Now what does that mean to you? A lot of people either hate Apple or love them. It’s a brand, more than anything else, and many people have brand loyalty to Apple and their products. So to those people who do have this loyalty this means nothing, but the same can be said about Google. Many people will be picking this phone up because of the Google name attached to it and this will deeply affect the cell phone market. The influx of smart phones will radically change the way of not only how you do surf the web, but how you conduct your personal life and your business life as well. Why own a laptop when you can surf the web with your phone? Why go out and buy a portable DVD player, when you can just download the movie on to your phone? Why own an MP3 player, when your phone can stream music? Simply look how much Apple has not only affected the cell phone market, but technology in general. Did you really imagine two years ago, that the Cell phone could do so many things? Now imagine the limitless potential that the Iphone has, on the number one cell phone carrier in the country.

The sales numbers are going to be astronomical this spring and the places that the Nexus One is going to take us are the same. Competition is good, but it will be interesting to see where both of these companies, Google and Apple, take us in the future.

What to watch for, things that I am sure will happen in the next 10 years.

To compliment last week's article here are some predictions to look forward to in the near future.

1. Paper money will start to lose it's value, as money begins to convert to electronic currency, and checks will cease to exist altogether. -This is not that hard to figure out, is it? First off, one has to wonder, who still uses checks and what are they used for? The people who use checks are usually 45 or older. This age group will continue to get older and as they get older, they will be buying less and less, which will decrease the number of checks in circulation. Now why do we use checks? Mainly to mail our bills, but the amount of bills being paid through the mail will continue to decrease as more and more people discover the benefits of paying their bills online. So with no checks, people will be forced to switch to their debit cards for big transactions, a switch that millions of Americans have already made.

2. Twitter will last longer than both Myspace and Facebook. -Yes, I know that Facebook has 350 million followers which, at the best, is only triple of what Twitter has right now. The technology of Twitter will succeed though, as more and more people adopt this technology to share stories and various other forms of information. Before anybody says it, I also know that the current form of Twitter does not bring in the revenue that both Myspace/Facebook has, but I stand by the fact that Twitter (in some form. Being bought out is a possible option.) will last longer in some form, as people continue to want to reach out the producers of their loved products. What will happen to Myspace/Facebookthough, is up to debate? They will survive in some form, but Myspace is already a shell of it's formal self and it will be interesting what Facebook will do in the future, as it already has the backlash of the changing of the privacy statement.

3. More than 50% of people will own a smart phone. -I do not think I need to argue this one, do I? More and more people are looking to connect to the Internet on the go and the smart phone is just the next branch of the portable computer.

4. Google will be the new Microsoft and have to be split up after succeeding in cloud computing. -Many people are currently predicting the fall of Google for various reasons. It will only be a matter of time before the company is split up for whatever reason, the real question is, when will it happen. I believe in next 3-5 years, as cloud computing catches on Google will reach it's zenith point, however I think that this will ultimately be it's final downfall. Many people will adopt cloud computing and as people do, Google will be the forefront leader in it and we will all hear the chants of "Monopoly!" coming from it's competitors. This chant will be all the government needs in breaking up a company that it has had it's eyes on for awhile.

5. Only a few newspapers will exist in America. -No matter, what Murdock has to say about it, this will happen. The newspaper industry is currently fighting a battle it cannot win and one that it will eventually lose. A few publishers will stay once the fire dies including the New York Post and Wall Street Journal among others, but many others will perish.

6. The kindle will replace the newspaper. -This might be a stretch...but hear me out on it. Imagine a whole newspaper being sent directly to your kindle every morning when you wake up. It will still give you the solid form of "the newspaper" that you want to read, but it will eliminate the cost of paper and ink. The kindle is still a new device to many people, however with the reveal of the Apple kindle this will surely change.

7. Libraries will evolve and offer direct download of their books, among other things. -Go into a library and tell me right now, tell me the ratio of people in there for a book vs. the people in there to use the Internet. Nobody wants to get out any more and despite the law suites that Google is currently suffering through, all of our classics will one day be online in some fashion. The kindle and Apple's rival kindle(which is to be announced this week), are just the start of what will be a very different library experience.

8. Apple will be left scratching it's head, after a handful of defeats. -I love Apple, do not get me wrong. One of my resolutions in my New Years' column was to buy an Mac. But with Google's recent Droid phones and the upcoming Nexus One, they will soon find a true competitor in the cell phone market and in the next few days Apple plans on launching their own version of the Kindle. I do not believe that Apple, will ever lose it's brand prescience in the market, especially with the success of Itunes, but product line...I think Apple is going to start worrying.

9. The Video game market will start to decline as more and more people start to use their smart phone for gaming. -Why own a video game system, when your phone can do the same thing? Apple has said that the next version of the Iphone, will be designed to increase the gaming capacity of the phone and why not? With smart phones becoming more predominate(see prediction no. 3) people are going to start looking at the Iphone has a possible gaming device, with the millions of games available for it. The handheld market has been a successful market and one that video game super-giant Nintendo has made successful in, in the previous years. So why not try and capitalize on it?

10. %50 percent of movies will now be 3d. Regular 2D movies will go straight to the consumer. -Avatar has now topped one billion dollars worldwide and if there is anything Hollywood likes to do, it's it likes to try and recreate success. Avatar will probably not become the biggest grossing movie of all time, but it has showed us the future of movie making. Movie theaters will soon be not just a place to see a new movie, but a place to experience something different altogether. Movies will soon be made and distributed directly through Youtube and Itunes, the vehicles for many modern film makers today.

Dancing in the Rain, a love story to my sons.

The following is a sample of my father’s book that was published in 2005, “Dancing in the Rain, A Love story”. I found a copy of it doing some cleaning, late last night. If interested you can find a copy of it at Amazon.Com for a mere 12.95, or just feel free to contact me. The beginning of the book is addressed to me and my brother, so if anything, I thought I would give it a free plug.

Turning into Angela’s driveway, Charles quickly recapped the last several days. None of them had been anywhere near as heartbreaking as he had originally expected. The day before he left New York he had actually dreaded the trip back to North Carolina. He had thought about the turmoil that would be playing out in his every thought but as the old saying goes, nothing is ever as one expects it to be. Even the drive back up to New York had been much quicker than he originally thought it would be and fortunately, he thought, with fewer thoughts of what he was leaving than he expected. There were times, as he knew there would always be, that he thought of his children but throughout most of the drive his thoughts had been of Angela and how totally at peace with himself she made him feel. He thought back a few days to when he first met her and still could not believe how any one person could make another feel the way she made him feel. And this was only the beginning, he said to himself as he knocked on the door to begin his new life. Only now registering in his mind, Charles noticed the absence of her car as he knocked again. He also saw the dimness of a single light through the living room drapes, something he thought unusual considering it was getting late and the sun had been down for a couple of hours. Maybe he should of called her and told her approximately when he would get back, he thought, as he dug into his pocket for the spare key she had given him. Oh well, she was probably gone to the store, he thought, as he slide the key into the lock and opened the door. “Hello? Angela, Sam?” he said, as he entered the house. Not hearing a sound he walked up the few steps, turned into the kitchen and turned on the light. Now that he could see better he began to walk the short distance to the sink to turn off the small florescent light she had also left on, all the while looking for a possible note from her informing him of where she was. He was looking more out of habit since it had been something he and Charlotte had always done to explain their absences. As he reached for the switch by the sink he saw it, the envelope addressed to him and beside it was a small gift-wrapped box. With a sigh of relief, as well as anticipation, he hurriedly opened the envelope and began reading until his legs began to shake and he had to sit down. Walking the short distance from the kitchen to the table where they had shared their meals, he began at the top of the letter again.

Again you can find it on Amazon.Com or just send me a tweet. It’s a love story, along the lines of Nicholas Sparks(A Walk to Remember) and Robert James Waller(Bridges of Madison County).