Tuesday, August 05, 2008

Monday, August 04, 2008

Testing qik live from a glider!

I've been playing with qik recently as anyone who has caught any videos from me will know.
Qik allows you to broadcast live streaming video from your mobile phone. There's usually a small delay before it'll appear in my live channel (see latest from the channel below) but it's close to live.

This evening from 6.30pm (UK, BST) I'm going gliding - and I'm taking my mobile and qik with me. I managed to broadcast on just a couple of bars of 2G signal recently from a forest in Norfolk. I reckon hundreds of feet above the Cambridgeshire countryside should offer an even tougher challenge! Here's what I've written about qik before.

UPDATE The rather disappointing outcome appears below:

UK's top 20 Marketing Blogs

A new month and a new top-of-the-pops moment for marketing (kinda) blogs - and this time FasterFuture is officially listed in the top 20 UK marketing blogs. Hurray for us! (that means you.)
Listings show (from left) UK ranking (movement), Global ranking (movement), link to blog.
Big thanks to the guys at spinning around (no14 on your list) for compiling this from the Adage Power 150 list.

1 (-) 41 (-4) russell davies
2 (+2) 51 (11) Blogstorm
3 (-1) 53 (-5) David Airey
4 (-1) 58 (-2) NevilleHobson.com
5 (-) 76 (+1) adliterate
6 (-) 85 (+11) Only Dead Fish
7 (-) 97 (+5) Crackunit
8 (-) 109 (-6) PR Blogger
9 (-) 128 (-9) The Engaging Brand
10 (-) 144 (+13) Welcome to Optimism
11 (-) 176 (+4) HERD
12 (+1) 184 (+10) Make Marketing History
13 (-1) 214 (-23) A PR Guy's Musings
14 (+4) 216 (+11) Spinning Around
15 (+1) 220 (-) Blog Till You Drop
16 (+1) 221 (+1) Modern Marketing
17 (-3) 226 (-27) PPC Blog
18 (+1) 232 (+10) Fraser's Affiliate Marketing Blog
19 (-4) 243 (-35) Crenk
20 (+2) 261 (+44) Faster Future
21 (+2) 267 (+51) SEOCO Blog
22 (-2) 280 (-2) greenormal
23 (-2) 286 (+9) Hobo SEO UK
24 (+4) 312 (+38) Drew B's take on tech PR
25 (NEW) 315 (NEW) The Ad Pit
26 (-1) 316 (+8) Wadds' tech pr blog
27 (NEW) 318 (NEW) Collective Conversation
28 (-2) 322 (+7) Beyond PR
29 (-5) 323 (-2) Life Moves Pretty Fast
30 (+3) 325 (+98) Nick Burcher
31 (-) 338 (+44) Simonsays
32 (NEW) 339 (NEW) Brendan Cooper
33 (+5) 341 (+115) Living in a digital world
34 (-5) 346 (+13) Interactive Marketing Trends
35 (-5) 366 (+9) 50-Plus Marketing
36 (-9) 368 (-19) livingbrands
37 (-3) 381 (+45) Brand Strategy Magazine Blog
38 (+1) 386 (+88) The Way of the Web
39 (-7) 389 (+10) mediations
40 (NEW) 399 (NEW) Direct response marketing observations
41 (NEW) 403 (NEW) General Marketing Blog
42 (+4) 404 (+135) London Calling
43 (-6) 425 (+29) Raw Stylus
44 (NEW) 432 (NEW) Get International Clients
45 (NEW) 439 (NEW) This Is HERD
46 (-11) 451 (-12) rubbishcorp®
47 (-11) 453 (-) Simon Wakeman
48 (NEW) 466 (NEW) Blendingthemix
49 (NEW) 478 (NEW) renaissance chambara
50 (-9) 495 (-) Pudding Relations
51 (NEW) 502 (NEW) Shiny Red
52 (-8) 508 (+13) A Mountain Dweller in the Thames Valley
53 (NEW) 511 (NEW) Event Manager Blog
54 (NEW) 531 (NEW) Nicola Davies
55 (-10) 532 (-6) Vincent Thome's Blog
56 (-9) 535 (+22) Unleashed on Marketing
57 (-17) 548 (-71) (Almost) Always Thinking
58 (NEW) 560 (NEW) FreshNetworks Blog
59 (-10) 564 (+4) All Things PR
60 (-12) 579 (-16) Brandgym Blog
61 (-18) 581 (-78) [Bluurb] stuff and things
62 (-20) 585 (-83) The New Marketing
63 (NEW) 598 (NEW) Measurement Matters
64 (-12) 602 (+4) Indolent.com
65 (-14) 611 (-17) PR Voice
66 (NEW) 617 (NEW) 25 letters in the alphabet
67 (-17) 650 (-58) In the Cowshed
68 (-15) 655 (-42) Offer and Acceptance
69 (-15) 666 (-24) Creative in London
70 (-13) 673 (+15) From PR to Eternity
71 (NEW) 678 (NEW) 10 Yetis PR Blog
72 (-16) 685 (-5) Yet Another Planning Blog
73 (NEW) 689 (NEW) Digital Examples
74 (-19) 716 (-50) PRwordSmith
75 (NEW) 731 (NEW) CarbonGraffiti
76 (NEW) 745 (NEW) noticing
77 (NEW) 746 (NEW) From the Cowshed

I was not looking for Linda, Linda found me...

Delicious serendipity, the cocaine of discovery.

I was taking tea with Herd author Mark Earls in Camden on Friday (yes, we are in England, folks) when Mark spotted someone he knows. He called out and they had a brief conversation.
Turns out it was Pat Kane, lead singer of 80s pop sensation (I think that's the right phrase pop pickers!) Hue and Cry.
The delicious discovery? Pat is rather more than an ex-pop star. He, I discovered thanks to Mark, is a brilliant thinker and the author of the Play Ethic.

A quote from the blurb:
"The Play Ethic shows how play is fundamental to both society and to the individual, and how the work ethic that has dominated the last three centuries is ill-equipped to deal with the modern world."
Not a million miles from Stowe's high valuation of playfulness that he's been describing recently here at Reboot and here at WidgetWebExpo.

My takeaway so far (and I'm off to order The Play Ethic, by the way) is that people enjoy changing things, taking the mickey out of things, passing things around, playing with ideas, tools etc with a sense of joy. Being 'business serious' can be quite enough to kill ideas.

The gladiatorial my-idea-is-bigger-than-your-idea stuff that goes on in too many meetings is a fight to the death. The surviving idea doesn't come through better - it comes through with bits chopped off and toughened up so much that its now harder than ever to get it to trust a friendly hand when it reaches out (to collaborate, build on, share, co-create).

If the ideas were played with rather than fought over we'd find ways of making the game better, together. And this of course applies to the better digital tool sets groups are using to form with.

I like this very much. At least, I like the direction this chance encounter has prodded me in.

I was not looking for Linda, Linda found me? It's a Hue and Cry lyric. And a great description of how the Play Ethic discovered me...

Friday, August 01, 2008

Putting Context Collapse into Context...

If you watched this from Michael Wesch, you might be interested in the further explanation of the Context Collapse he describes.
The context here is the moment the vlogger faces the webcam to record something (for youtube for example) and realises that they are about to share with whoever may ever discover it on the web, for all time.

Daunting.

Some pause for thought to try to let that sink in...
Most just crash on without thought for the ever-more or the endless variety of audience for their piece-to-camera.

Rather helpfully the prof has penned this.
Here's an illuminating excerpt:
"Context collapse: an infinite number of contexts collapsing upon one another into that single moment of recording. The images, actions, and words captured by the lens at any moment can be transported to anywhere on the planet and preserved (the performer must assume) for all time. The little glass lens becomes the gateway to a blackhole sucking all of time and space – virtually all possible contexts – in upon itself."

The same weight of history applies to our blog posts (even these words as I write them...), your comments, forums, the pictures you share on flickr, the relationships you share on social networks...

As I asked Mike in the comments on his post: "Assume you make the distinction for video (as compared to our words and pictures in blogs, forums and social networks) because of the lack of ‘face-work’* in those contexts?
Mike Wesch: "*Face-work is a complex collaborative dance in which all participants and their every word, wink, gesture, posture, stance, glance, and grunt take part. In short, how we present ourselves (and by extension, who we “are”) depends a great deal on context; where we are, who we are with, and what we are doing, among many other factors.

I guess the weight of history rests upon the very words I type now. But the process of writing has been one we are used to performing without direct and real-time feedback.

Out of interest, I wonder if Mike has done a comparison with how people reacted to home video when it first emerged (ie video that was never likely to be shared with history?)

Do you remember the first time someone shoved a video camera in your face? Could you guess who you were presenting yourself for?

The webcam, I think Mike is saying, puts us in a place where we can no longer make that guess.

A MESSAGE TO THE FUTURE

POST SCRIPT: This inspired me to record a message to the future on qik. If you have one, post it where-ever you like (youtube, seesmic, qik, whatever) and, please, post a link to it in the comments on this blog?
I'll add it to our list.


Alan Moore's message to the future:


Rebecca Caroe's message to the future:

FasterFuture.blogspot.com

The rate of change is so rapid it's difficult for one person to keep up to speed. Let's pool our thoughts, share our reactions and, who knows, even reach some shared conclusions worth arriving at?