The Premise / Goal / Timing of This Weekly Feature
Premise. If you like the content in this blog, maybe you'll also like the content I regularly read, study, and curate from the Web.
Goal. On a weekly basis, I'm going to publish links to three (3) articles I find interesting. I'll include a brief explanation why I decided to curate them.
The article describes the trend to move manage, share, and secure more applications / conten within the cloud.
Five (5) Megatrends are driving this phenomenon:
Consumerization — You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet
Visualization — Changing How the Game is Played
"App-ification" — Changing from Appications to Apps
The Ever-Available Self-Service Cloud
The Mobility Shift — Wherever and Whenever You Want
2. For Young Workers, the Future is Here Already (Fortune).Today's young workers, "the digital natives," are driving the aforementioned consumerization megatrend. This younger demographic communicates with multiple devices. They're entering the workforce in droves so enterprises must deal with this demographic's communication needs to maximize their productivity.
This development is driving the phenemomenon of "unified communications" (direct quote from the article):
"One area which enterprises have begun exploring in recent years is the concept of unified communications – the process of turning multiple channels of communication into a single, seamless conversation. Unified communications uses the concept of presence to help assess which way is best for one user to reach another. It then translates messages and directs them to whichever device the end user is most likely to be using at that time."
I checked my laptop's Twitter stream around 10 PM Sunday evening for real-time news feeds. And, that's when Twitter informed me of Osama bin Laden's death in real-time.
Our Consumption and Participating in Real-Time News Drives a Traditional Industry's Transformation. I've reflected on the media activities of the past 48 hours. The picture above symbolizes more than the aftermath of September 11, 2011.
It galvanizes how we are both consumers and participants in the transformation and reinvention of a traditional industry (especially how we interact with news content):
#1: Social Networks are Our Real-Time News Channels
More People Found Out About bin Laden's Death Via Twitter and Facebook.Mashable conducted a poll with 20,000+ respondents. Twitter and Facebook easily outdistanced television. Even broadcast television lacks the real-time impact of online media platforms.
Facebook's News Function Goal– Become "The People's Newspaper." I mentioned earlier how I consult Twitter for real-time news updates. It's no coincidence that Facebook also recognizes real-time news as a competitive differentiator.
Journalists on Facebook Page.The Journalists on Facebook Page is part of the company's strategy to build relationships with journalists. Notice how several status updates pertain to the bin Laden story:
#2: Mobile Devices are the Accepted Real-Time Publishing Platform (Especially the Smartphone)
Urbahn Broadcasted the Tweet From His Smartphone. I'm not surprised Urbahn broadcasted the news on Twitter. But, notice the news broadcasting platform — his smartphone. Maybe, I'm old-fashioned in thinking the publication of a major news event requires a computer keyboard and wireless Internet connection.
Looks Like Page 29 of David Meerman Scott's Real-Time & Marketing PR Book. Here's the graph from the TechCruch article. Notice how the spike in Google search queries correlates with the real-time announcement on Twitter and eventually trails off:
#4 The Real-Time Marketing & PR Law of Normal Distribution
Notice how this graph shares several real-time attributes David Meerman Scott describes in his book (my notes are in red text):
Breaking News
Triggers
Excitement
Peak
Old News
Done
#5: The Blurring of Trusted, Traditional News Sources
Non-Traditional "Hard News" Sources Provide Diverse Points-of-View. Each of these organizations or individuals is a trusted news source pertaining to technology and online media. Their points-of-view blended their niches with this traditional "hard news" story:
An Important Historical Artifact. The TechCrunch article further states this image is probably the fastest viewed photo on Flickr. The image achieved its viewer volume in less than 38 hours.
Conclusion
How Did You Learn About the Osama Bin Laden Announcement? Were you on Twitter, Facebook, or another social network? Did you head right to Google News or did you go straight to a traditional news source (i.e., New York Times, BBC, Wall Street Journal, CNN, Bloomberg, etc.)?
I would love to understand your views on how the news unfolded.
A Historic Moment. This event marks an important time in United States history. Its unfolding in real-time portrays how we choose to publish, search for, and share historical events.
And, our use of social technology during this event reinforces the forever-changing, transformation of all media.