Digital will serve as the playing field and social media will be how it will be broadcasted, but tech is the game that will be played.

The future is in the applications – both mobile and internet – as well as devices, and what they can do for us. It does not have to be something cute like instagr.am, but more like location-based services, virtual wallets along with their devices, and food-photo-calorie-translators.

Sure we’ll talk about it through social media via digital platforms but the pendulum has already moved.

I equated the title of this talk by asking which came first – the chicken or the egg? What I mean is did technology just show up – the chicken – or was there a thought process from where it hatched – the egg?

To understand where we are going it is imperative to understand how we got there. So are we shaping technology or is technology shaping us? And how did it all start?

I’m a very curious person by nature, so when the question is asked – How is social media impacting technology? – I seek to understand the very question.  I also seek to understand what our attitudes are towards social media and technology.

Let’s start with technology. What is technology?  A broad definition of technology is anything that is used to solve a problem, including a system or methodologies.  By that definition, a hammer at one point was considered advanced technology, so was an arrow head or an oxen driven plow.  These days we think of technology to solely mean computers and processing advanced electronic tools.

What is social media? Social media is any web/mobile based platform that turns communication into an active process (media here is information stored and delivered).  Social media is not Twitter, it is not Facebook.  However, Twitter and Facebook are social media sites.

So, what we are really asking is how are our active digital conversations changing our technological solutions? The question is a little different when you ask it that way.  It delivers a very much focused query rather than an otherwise open ended question susceptible to personal viewpoints and discriminations.

On the cover of the Atlantic (slide 4) we see the question: Is Google making us Stupid? Thankfully most people don’t think so – almost 9/10 thinks that the internet will make us smarter!  How is that possible?  The only thing that has given us the capacity to do things faster and better than humans thousands of years before is our access to information.  We are exposed to massive amounts of information in any single day that would take years, maybe a lifetime of humans thousands of years ago.  Implant anyone from the past in our current time and they will be as smart as us by being exposed to Google.  We are biologically no smarter than any human thousands of years before us; it is only our exposure to vast amounts of information that propels us.

Here are some numbers:

1. 107 trillion emails sent in 2010
2. 255 million websites
3. 152 million blogs
4. 88.8 million .com domain names
5. 1.97 billion internet users

These numbers are staggering.  More amazing are that these numbers are being fueled by regular people.  “Technology” is no longer a term endeared by geeks and IT folk.  Regular people (called “users” in IT departments) are catapulting this lead – and it all started with blogs.

I remember watching the Super Bowl in 2005 (uncensored version), and I said to myself “How come a domain registrar is advertising to the general public?” By the numbers given above the answer was obvious.  Blogs are the entry point to technology for users.  Through blogs they have become familiar with Content Management Systems, coding languages, DNS servers, API’s, software patch management, new technologies that improved their blogs such as Twitter, smart phones, plug-ins and the list goes on and on.

Technology no longer was intimidating – it was friendly, and solved problems.

People now carried their interactions into the enterprise, where traditionally IT dictated a department’s solution now found themselves servicing tailored requests and input from personnel.  The approach to marketing products changed as well.  Freemium models started to appear and put great value in the number of “users” supporting a product instead of the other way around.

If you missed evaluating how important social media don’t worry…social media is changing almost every industry in the world.  Money and finance are on the cutting board right now.  It started with Paypal giving users a little independence from traditional banks and credit cards.  Another step into the virtual wallet is now being heralded by Square.  Square is a little device that plugs into your smart phone and gives “users” the ability to accept credit card payments that deposit into their accounts, thus circumventing the entire banking industry.

Blogs have lowered the entry point to technology and have empowered people to take contributory roles.  Through social media we are making demands on technology to help serve our needs and improve our lives.  We have seen social media impact many fields from journalism, to politics, to the enterprise and now to our money.  Through the power of many we are seeing technology being democratized.  At first glance it may seem that technology has made this all possible, but what makes our technology unique is it being people driven…maybe it has always been that way, but now only more apparent.

The write up of what I said will come sometime next week.

My excitement peeked because this is the first worthy rival – IMO – to Apple’s iPad. The Motorola Xoom is the latest advanced tablets to hit the market and the first to sport the new Android 3.0 Honeycomb OS.

The Motorola Xoom arrives in an unassuming cardboard box. In its powered-down state, the blackened screen intrigues you as you peer into it imagining what capabilities the device holds.

Turning it on was an exercise for the sense as stroked my fingers around the sides of the device to finally discover the power button on the back of the device next to the 5-megapixel camera lens. The darkened screen now flashes a red Motorola logo, then text, then a colorful display of honeycombs flicker across the screen which reminded me of a peacock displaying its tail – was this the Motorola Xoom’s mating ritual to entice techies that it’s a worthy component?

Besides the one power button on the back, there are no other buttons.  No home button, no volume button controls – nothing.  There are a few ports along the sides of the Xoom – headset jack, a SIM slot, micro USB and HDMI port, and a power jack.  And getting back to the power button on the back…it was a little weird to be back there, but knowing that this was hardly a device given minimal consideration by the designers I knew there was good reason…and, I think I get it – this is where my fingers are naturally placed when holding the device and is the perfect location in order to maintain the omnipresent screen experience for the user.  Why bother with buttons?

Getting back to boot up…

When the home screen finally presents itself, the time, date and a lock in the center of a circle glows back at you. I’m not one to look for instructions when trying out a new device, but for that matter I don’t recall seeing any instructions and it took me a few tries to ‘unlock’ the device correctly. My first inclination was to take my finger and follow along the circle where the lock was didn’t work. I happened to accidently drag the lock to touch the circle and – Viola! – an ‘unlocked’ lock.

So I started to explore…

Positives
The overall appearance and usability of the UI is pleasant and appealing.  There is a lot of real estate for organizing your icons and the default widgets work very smoothly.  Once you have settled on an application be it an email, webpage, or program you feel very comfortable in the Xoom world as the presentation of such actions are satisfying.  I gather there was a lot of thought put into the user experience by the designers.

The wireless internet access on the Xoom flies on the Verizon Wireless 3G network. I did not look into data plan structures, as this was a loaner so you make the call there. And while we’re on the topic of speed, I’d say just about everything is fast on the Xoom – viewing photos, animations, web browsing, opening programs. The thing has plenty of horsepower.

You’d think the Xoom’s battery life would suffer from what’s under the hood (NVIDIA® Tegra™ 2: 1GHz dual-core processor/1GB DDR2 RAM) is like no other. Sometimes it felt like I went for days without a charge. During heavy usage and multitasking I have not had a better battery experience…and when you’re mobile, battery life is either King or Queen. Period.

The weight of the thing and overall size is comfortable enough to take with you almost anywhere with no complaints. With some type of cover or carrying case this would just get better.

Negatives
As with other tablets, data entry is always a challenge when typing on a screen. What was not expected were a few keys were in odd places, and learning how to minimize the screen with the arrow set on the bottom corner of the keyboard screen took some practice.  But in defense of Google Honeycomb this should be expected when learning a new OS, and I should of anticipated this.

There were a few hiccups with some sites, namely Facebook. When trying to upload an image or edit a link the screen started to jump up and down very rapidly. I tried the same in different locations and the issue persisted. After another day of this I did very minor updates to Facebook. Other than that browsing was very fast as I stated above.

Another disappointment was that the screen did not look as ‘crisp’ as I thought it should on the 10.1” 1280×800 resolution screen.

The scrolling and pinch-and-zoom did not seem as smooth as it should be by appearing to be delayed by some count of  milliseconds.  I don’t think the problem here stems from hardware, maybe software.

I downloaded a couple of apps – games – and was left disappointed by the graphics, but this may be due to my game selection and I can’t make a good call here.

Conclusion
Overall, the Motorola Xoom is an exciting piece of hardware/software.  I think we will see more features and improvements after the first rendition and is one to watch.  Personally, I always wait at least until the second rollout (or service pack) of hardware or software as bugs and improvements have been identified and addressed.  That being said, I’d be very interested in seeing what happens with a Motorola Xoom2.

NOTE:  There’s a lot of talk about price on the Xoom, but if you compare the price tag of $599 with Verizon to the iPad’s nearest competitor – the iPad2 WiFi + 3G on AT&T then cost is no longer comparable.

One of the highlights of this session was acknowledging the influence of women bloggers over Laitno male bloggers.

Without minimalizing the effort of women I have two thoughts on this:

1) Latino men don’t see blogging as ‘manly’ when I started to blog back in 2003 men ruled the blogosphere, but as more women started to blog maybe the view of blogging being a manly leisure has changed.

2) Related to the above, men are just reading less.  Novel sales for men are down, and men view novels as a feminine past time – think Oprah book club.  In fact, in the 19th century, reading novels were considered a low-status and leisure for women.

Meet the Latino Tech Bloggers

Technology has the potential to make us smarter and faster.  It is the great equalizer.

Latino tech bloggers have used technology to lead a path for their communities to go forward.

Photo courtesy: WiredLatinos

Powerful Insights on How to Use Twitter to Build Followers and Engage with Legions of Latinos

My biggest issue when talking about Twitter is a) not sounding like everyone else b) solidly conveying my ideas in a concrete manner that captures what I do intuitively.

1) Most of my presentation focused on simple SEO techniques that are used to determine the key words people use in their searches.  You better bet that these key words used in search engines are the same terms individuals use in their conversations.  This is how you find your relevant audiences and communities, as well as influencers.

2) I broke down Twitter into it’s simplest aspect.  Twitter mimics conversations in a text format.  If you improve your conversational skills you dually enhance your Twitter relationships.

People often get defensive when asked if technology is changing them – “Technology is not changing us, we are the creators of technology,” is usually snap replied.

I think the case of technology influencing us is more prevalent than we realize. After all, only a few programmers created Twitter and Facebook yet the masses consume it. It’s true that our collaborative behavior can influence some modifications and feature additions, but how many times did we were purposeful in our usage? When using a hashtag (#) on Twitter to stay focused on a conversation do we really do this with the mindset that the hashtag is going to be the next big thing, or did we just languidly follow (but with enthusiastic excitement) what caught on as being cool or useful? With that in mind, can you really believe that we are really driving (read: in control of) change, or are we just another link in the chain?

Most people don’t particularly like the idea that they are merely products of their environment, and I have to admit the thought is unsettling. But, I’m starting to digress and I don’t want to turn this conversation into a behavioral or metaphysical debate. Let’s just say that there’s more in technology today that’s influencing us than we realize, or want to acknowledge – your free to disagree.

Here are a couple of ways I’ve notice my thinking has changed:

• Text Messages – quick communication, segmented and ongoing; feel this to be an synchronous platform and response should be fairly quick

• Phone calls - looked at as asynchronous (voicemail), and need an extended amount of time to properly communicate message

• Email - asynchronous even with mobile phones

• Social media friends – distance no longer separates; they might as well be across the street or the house next door

• Work virtually – commuting to work even more apparent as down-time (smart ways of getting work done vs traditional – but make sure the work is done)

• Books – Digital or print…Print or digital…

It would be great to hear your input (even if your vehemently disagree).

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of going down to Google offices in NYC, to hear a very lively and sometimes funny discussion with Josh Harris, Douglas Rushkoff with Erick Schonfeld on some disturbing (or not) trends in our use of social media.

The take away: Are we being programmed by social media, or being its creator are we programming social media?

(I’ll write more on this later.  I’m very interested to hear any opinions on this topic in the comments.)

From Social Media Week’s event page:

Instead of connecting to one another, we are increasingly connected to and friended by the same old brands and institutions that the Internet once stood a chance of upending. And worst of all, we the people are getting into the act, learning to sell our friends to the highest bidder. Whether it’s a Zynga game inviting us to turn over our address books for points, or an advertiser offering us a chance to win a prize for “friending” them publicly, we are now in the business of marketing our friendships to those who hope to exploit the bonds we have created with others.

In doing so, we reduce the real value of those bonds, as well as the entire potential for peer-to-peer connection. The real opportunity of social networking looks a lot more like Burning Man and WikiLeaks than it does like P&G’s word-of-mouth campaign or whatever Twitter is hatching in its new analytics lab.

We are building the social organism together. That’s all the Internet has been doing from the beginning. But it seems as soon as we develop a new tool or strand of connectivity, it is hijacked by business, robbed of its power, and then replaced by mechanisms that connect us to things, rather than people.

Will social networking finally accomplish the Internet’s real goal? We have yet to see. But in the meantime, how we use it — and what we think it to be — will go a long way toward determining its fate.

We’ve all heard the statements:

• There are more Latinos in social media than non-Hispanic Whites

• Mobile internet access is highest among Latinos

• Hispanics purchase more electronic devices than anyone else:

* Digital cameras: 21% vs. 18 %
* Video gaming system: 21% vs. 12%
* MP3 player: 19% vs. 12%
* Advanced cell phone: 19% vs. 13%
* Digital cameras: 21% vs. 18 %
* Video gaming system: 21% vs. 12%
* MP3 player: 19% vs. 12%
* Advanced cell phone: 19% vs. 13%

Around the time the latest mobile report came out touting Hispanics as the largest mobile internet users, I became wary and began to ask: What’s the difference between Latinos and non-Latinos use of the web? From the above, the majority is entertainment.

More questions:

• Is mobile internet access the great equalizer?

• Are Latinos spending more time in entertainment or activities that they can improve their lives?

• What are the youth doing and how will this impact their adult life?

I hope in 2011 we make a second pass on internet statistics, and consider the above.

Better, what companies or organizations will embrace this conversation and spearhead a long term relationship with the Hispanic community? I think this conversation is already happening in many places.

As netizens connect and grow, so do more unsavory individuals look to take advantage of those communications.

Having a background in technology, I’ve seen many cases of users unknowingly causing computer problems which easily could of been prevented if they new more about the computer environment.

With this in mind, imagine what can happen to an individual who unknowing falls prey to a computer virus or a phishing attempt, that could of been prevented if the knowledge of the characteristics of such attacks could of been recognized.

Social Media Literacy (SML), permits us to identify such threats.

SML goes beyond the knowledge of  pushing your content through different social media channels; it involves the critique of received media.  If media literacy broadly applies to digital media,  then SML would be specific to social media platforms.

Tips

Here are some suggestions for Twitter:

- If you see many of your friends sharing the same strange new Twitter icon, or tweeting the same strange message, it’s probably a hoax, or they’ve already fell victim to one.

- Be weary of tweets that contain news or calls to action, without having links.  This may be a prank/hoax, and the joke may be on you.

Robin Hood airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!!

- If tweet contains all CAPS or multiple symbols, take heed!

- “Think before you click.”  Is this too good to be true?  Do you know the user?

- Mouseover the link and make sure you can verify the link (enable status bar in most web browsers).  If you can’t see it, or the link looks like bad news (IP number, instead of URL), the WYB!

- Does the persons tweets have a lot of links in many of them?  They have an incessant need to get you somewhere.

I can count on one hand how many times I’ve used the ‘block’ feature on Twitter.  This is because, I spend so much time on the internet that I’ve developed a heightened awareness of what looks right and what looks suspect, so I don’t spend too much time blocking people from my feed…I just unfriend them.

If someone is trying to take advantage of others, and you want to take the extra step then, submit their name to Twitter Help for investigation.

Has anyone experienced, or have more suggestions for Twitter or any other site?

Backup

I’ve worked in technology for 10 years, and have witnessed the pain of data loss many times over.  Most common is by mistakenly deleting a file/folder.  Next less often,  is a hard drive crash – oh, the horror!  Then we have the holy grail of data loss, via some local trauma that wipes out your whole system (in this case your backup is no longer called backup, but a ‘disaster recovery plan’).

The modern credo for any IT department is, “Your data is as good as your backups.” Many people (I myself), are guilty of  forgetting this step in our daily computer lives.  Worse, social media providers have wiped their hands from being responsible of backing up your data.  Users who are dependent on the large providers of social media will get a rude awakening if their data is lost forever, or their account has been locked.

Luckily, there is help:

Daily practices
Whatever your working on, get into the habit of saving often.  Most applications have an auto-save feature that can be used.

Twitter Backups
Tweetbackup – Free backup of your tweets.
TweetSaver – Offers more options and more streamlined than Tweetbackup at $20/yr.
LifeStream – In addition to backing up your tweets, LifeStream can do WordPress, Photobucket and more at $30/yr.  Now if your willing to roll up your sleeves and spend some time you can save a few bucks and back up Delicious, WP (see below), Twitter (see above), and PB (order backup CD/DVD or do it yourself).

FaceBook
We don’t usually think of backing up FB, but what if your account became disabled or hacked?  If you thrive off of your network this can be vital.

SocialSafe can make a nice local copy of your FB profile, pics and friends or all.

Blog
Blog Backup works with most blogs and delivers a free offsite backup and runs on auto.  Sweet.

Your computer
Personally, I sync most of my documents and pictures with a USB stick and a Maxtor drive. I also use Mozy to backup some vital documents for off-site retrieval.

Depending on how crazy you want to get, you can backup up your social media work with certain points of failure in mind.  Either you’ll perform basic backup methods or trace out an elaborate disaster recovery plan.

If this helps let me know, or if you feel I missed something feel free to add it in the comments.