Yet another thing that caught my eye this morning – Sony’s Flexible OLED is Thinner Than a Strand of Hair. Very cool. Below is a video that was linked on Gizmodo’s post. It shows the screen being rolled while showing video clips. What’s even more interesting about the post is the comments… some ideas that commenters are posting that seem pretty crazy, but will probably be very possible some day.
I had to pass this on. Popular Science just finished posting 137 years worth of their magazines online. Not only are they online – the archives are free and can easily be viewed via browser or mobile.
The gadget geek in me is jumping up and down, but so is the designer side of me. It’s very cool to read about and look at photos of past technology, crazy inventions, and (what were) futuristic ideas. At the same time, it is amazing to compare the designs from various dates such as 1874, 1940, 1972, and 2010. Design and the technology printing those designs was constantly changing as well. People were creating new ways to share ideas and information. Layouts changed from plain, standard column text to full page ads and articles with lots of photos and flexible regions of text.
I’m having mixed feelings about the recent Warner Brothers/Netflix agreement. The more articles I read, the more the opinions vary. In case you haven’t come across this news yet, Warner Brothers recently signed an agreement with Netflix which holds Netflix from releasing DVDs of Warner Brothers movies for rent until 28 days after the movie has been released. In return, Warner Brothers will be selling discs to Netflix at a discount and will allow Netflix to post a wider selection of older titles for its Watch Instantly section.
This could be good. It would be nice to have more mainstream titles added to the Watch Instantly catalog. I doubt however, that this will boost the sale of Warner Brothers DVDs at the time of release. People are turning to Netflix because they don’t want to have to buy DVDs either because they don’t want to own the DVD, don’t want to venture out to rental stores, or because they are trying to cut costs. There are a number of other methods that people can turn to in order to see the new releases, the biggest being the iTunes Store, RedBox, Blockbuster, XBox Live/Playstation Network, Amazon On Demand, video rental stores, and as Gizmodo suggests, peer-to-peer sharing via torrents. I’m guessing the latter of the list will gain some momentum, especially as other companies join in.
In the past week, there have been several articles on both ReadWriteWeb and TechCrunch suggesting that Twitter Japan might start charging for access to tweets. TechCrunch posted a piece, 6 Reasons Why Twitter Japan’s Subscription Model Might Work. The post cited that Japanese mobile users are already used to having to pay for several services similar to Twitter. They also stated that Japanese users are sometimes more interested in the personal lives of celebrities and growth on Twitter Japan is accelerating compared to Twitter usage elsewhere that is beginning to flat line.
I’m very skeptical of having to pay for tweets. The first concern that came to mind was that I doubt many people would want to have to pay for tweets to begin with. Yes, there are some obsessive fans out there, but what if they are fans of 50 celebrities who all start charging for access to their tweets? I’m guessing each update would be a few cents, but that could certainly add up quickly. Next, what is to stop certain people from aggregating tweets of several people and releasing them under their own account? They could follow a few celebrities themselves, retweet the tweets and then charge a lump sum so that their own followers would then get the updates of a number of celebrities. I’d rather follow and pay for one stream instead of pay for 50 individually.
I can certainly see charging corporations a small subscription fee for tweeting. Many companies are benefiting greatly through both sales and customer relations as a result of their social media interactions, including Twitter. If Twitter wants to make money, it seems like it would be much easier to charge people a subscription fee instead of charging to view individual streams. Of course, as soon as they start charging subscription fees, I’m guessing many will decide to go with other microblogging services to get their link, news, and status publishing fix.
Mashable is one of my favorite blogs to read. The content is always interesting and covers a variety of social media topics. Today I came across a post titled, What the F**k Is Social Media? Here’s an Answer. The post goes on to explain that marketing director, Marta Kagan created a presentation titled What the F**k Is Social Media? last year and has now followed it up with a second presentation titled What the F**k Is Social Media: One Year Later. Marta gives a whole slew of statistics related to social media and different quotes from business executives basically saying, if you don’t get involved, you’re screwed. It’s definitely a presentation I will share and one that I will probably refer customers to if they are still in doubt on the subject of social media and why they should get involved. Take a look at the presentation above.
“Fantastic video on the progression of information technology, researched by Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod, and Jeff Brenman, remixed” -- YouTube video description of Did You Know? video.
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