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How to Solve the Information Overload Problem

November 17, 2010 By 2 Comments

There has been a lot of discussion about the Facebook announcement on Monday November 15th. In fact there was a lot of hype leading up to the announcement. I can’t help but think it was sort of like the run up to the Google Buzz announcement and I could imagine the people at Facebook HQ saying amongst themselves:

“Oh boy, there is an awful lot of hype out there. Are we going to be able to live up to it or will we be the Google Buzz of unified communications announcements?”

I don’t think they can live up to the hype and let me explain why. I can really summarize it to a single sentence:

“Facebook is (mostly) a closed system.”

So how does a website that controls everything become a power player in something as open and free as communications? To be the key player in this space I believe there will be several important criteria:

  1. Be a fairly open system with open standards and APIs.
  2. Provide for connections to cutting edge, legacy and strategic systems.
  3. Rich filtering and logic algorithms.

The importance of an open system

The swell of opportunity created through the open source movement has created great opportunity for an evolution of ideas and made many great things possible. Just look at the extreme contribution of some major open source projects from the last 10+ years (my top 10 list):

  1. Wikipedia
  2. Linux
  3. MySQL
  4. PHP
  5. WordPress
  6. Apache
  7. Mozilla
  8. Open Office
  9. Creative Commons
  10. Filezilla

The API issue is really a no brainer, to get a better idea of why read this article “Top 5 Reasons Why Your Startup Needs an API” while written for startups I think it is a great overview of the importance of APIs without getting too technical.

So if you’re going to make the big messaging play, you better be focused on being open and accessible already.

Being cutting edge while walking with the Dinosaurs

There are so many forms of communications that are viable and would be a part of any true unified communications system. Facebook is still a cutting edge platform in 2010 but they lack key strategic and legacy support that would be essential as the player in the next big messaging platform.  Here are a few examples of the different systems:

Cutting Edge (current/bleeding edge tech)

  1. Cloud Technologies (Google Docs, Dropbox)
  2. Social Networking Sites (Facebook, LinkedIn)
  3. Streams (Twitter, Buzz)
  4. Voice over IP (Skype, VOIP carriers)

Strategic (established tech that is likely to be around for a while)

  1. Instant/Text Messaging (AIM, SMS)
  2. Blogs
  3. Email
  4. HTTPS (Encrypted Web Protocol)

Legacy (older technology that will largely fade away in the future)

  1. Internet Relay Chat
  2. FTP
  3. HTTP (Web Protocol – yes, Legacy)*

*HTTP should be on its way out, this is a little bit of writer activism on my part. Many would argue it is a strategic technology.

If you review that list and ask yourself, who understands and communicates effectively with everything on that list (and more importantly all the other important resources not on the list)? I guess at this point the answer is no-one, and that is the “what” in unified communications.

The importance of curation, human or machine.

Information Strainer

The importance of curation, narrow the stream or face information overload.

Photo by verbeeldingskr8.

If I were to combine all the communications I receive and process into one place it would be a big ugly mess. This is where the curation of the content will become essential to a unified communications platforms success. Curation will be the “how” in unified communications. The key will be to adequately search, filter and customize the data so that only the most important information is the most readily available. Allowing different ways to respond, perhaps knowing that for example a certain user prefers and responds better to Email, while another user responds more readily to Twitter, and so on. This will provide value on a number of levels. This will be a delicate balancing act because it must be easy for the end user to achieve high adoption rates, while technically pushing the envelope under the hood.

I think in 2010 many people are feeling over-whelmed by the data that they have to process. If you can cut through that mess, you will have a very satisfied customer. This is the “why” of unified communications.

This is my opinion, what do you think?

Filed Under: Blogging, Business, Facebook, Idea Farm, Productivity, Social Media Strategy, Technology, Twitter, Wordpress Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Striking while the Iron is Hot Gary Vaynerchuk Style

December 29, 2009 By 1 Comment

While watching a video today by @garyvee today I was both validated and also inspired to write this post. Gary’s point was simple – if you want to get anywhere using social media to promote something, you have to grab it. You have to engage the people who can make a difference for whatever it is you’re interested in doing. This could be anything from getting a job at a certain company or getting a certain celebrity to wear a product you are marketing. I want to add to what Gary said in his video. We have to understand as a people that the opportunity to network has never been greater in our lifetimes and it is not only possible but it is likely that this window will diminish in the near future. I believe there are two reasons for this and I will get into both of them a little more in depth.

Reason #1 it’s the Economy
A bad economy gives you access to people in an unprecedented way. Case in point – I formed a business group in early 2009 called 1 Degree, several of the members of this group are simply people that would not have joined a group like this had their businesses been running at the typical brisk pace they had been just about every year prior. When you lose your job or customers to a bad economy, you get creative, you put yourself out there. Networking has never been more prolific than it is today, in a good way.

Reason #2 it’s the Technology
Every “new” technology is given a pass on many issues early on. Think back to the chain letters that seemingly reasonable people would forward in the early days of Email. These same people today would not even think twice about it. Or how about the early success of the Email SPAM industry, had it not worked so well people would not have continued to do it. SPAM has to be facilitated today on a huge scale to have any impact. Social networking is really no different from this. Today many people are using geo-tagging software that in essence tells the world where they are at a given moment in time. At some point in the future there will be high profile events that remind people that some privacy is a good thing and these technologies will be used much more sparingly. Or how about the prolific Facebook application posts that are already a bit of a taboo? I’ve seen a number of people create brand new accounts to avoid annoying their real life friends from the prolific wall posts of the latest Zynga game or similar Facebook application. Or how about the “50 things you don’t know about me” it’s a bit like the Facebook equivalent of a chain letter – tag 10 of your friends and post this on your wall.

Action Plan
So Gary is right, but we need to also encourage people to strike while the iron is hot and be prepared for the next stage of this ever evolving world. 15 years ago I forged relationships on Internet Relay Chat with a bunch of people around the US and the World that were Windows NT administrators. The dealings of this group have included quite a bit of commerce over the years and the core is all still communicating with one another. Today similar relationships are being established on Facebook, Twitter and other Social Networking related sites. There will be winners and losers but the people who do as Gary has suggested will find a way to win regardless of the circumstances. I think we all need to evaluate which technologies fit us best and pursue them for personal or commercial benefit. For me the value of the medium is much greater in terms of personal satisfaction for the friendships and inspiration but it’s nice to know that these efforts will continue to open doors for commerce. Let me know what you think. Share your story, plenty of room for your comments here.

Filed Under: Inspiration Tagged With: , , , , , ,