This week was announced that Google has waved goodbye its all-in-one collaboration tool Google Wave.

On Wednesday and Thursday, multiple sources have reported that Google has acquired Slide, a social application developer for $182 million.
In July, the news was announced that Google has invested in Zynga to form the cornerstone for Google Games.

Are these all indications that Google is leaving the arena of platforms and is focussing on the content, which is being deployed on the Web?

The rumors about a social network experiment called “Google Me” are not in lign with the aforementioned developments, but a rumor is a rumor.
Facebook and others, like Twitter and Myspace have such a large userbase, it would be very difficult for Google to compete.
Like Google Wave, other social experiments have not been succesful.

By investing in social gaming, it will get a better grasp on one of the activities employed by users online, making advantage of the large and established userbases of Facebook, Myspace and others.

Not only for Google but also for other companies trying to get a share in social networking, it is becoming hard. People have established networks, time and attention are fragmented.
The advantages need to be really compelling in order to persuade users to be active on yet another network or leave a present one. If an extra network is added to the users’ portfolio, less attention and time is available per network, which is a disadvantage for both user and the social networks.

Secondly, Google kills two birds with one stone, Google Games and social gaming distributed via Facebook and others.

This development fits to overall approach of Google, the Web as a platform where all sorts of activities are deployed.
Think of entertainment/video via YouTube.
Think of communication via Gmail.
Think of information via its core, Search.
Gaming fits this list of activities very well.

What’s your opinion on the developments concerning Google and (social) gaming?

The five game mechanics she refers to, are:
1. Collecting
2. Points
3. Feedback
4. Exchanges
5. Customization
Applying those to the context of social sites is easy to understand, it motivates. Motivation increases usage and usage increases loyalty, traffic, income and so on.

View below the aforementioned presentation:

Yesterday I found a presentation on Youtube of Amy Jo Kim, about the topic of Game Mechanics on Social sites.
Enjoy, it’s interesting.

Her approach to use game words like players instead of users is a start to see sites as games and how you can approach networks with this point of perspective.
Think of Foursquare, Gowalla etc.

What do you think of the gaming approach from a social architectual point of view?

A summary of the presentation can be read on Mashable, where it also explains the three different Word of Mouth Influencers.
In the so-called Peer Influence Pyramid the Social Broadcasters (at the top), Mass Influencers (middle), and Potential Influencers (bottom of the pyramid) define the three types of Influencers which, as a brand, you need to take into account. First to understand the dynamics how these three types of Influencers spread messages and influence.
Secondly, the create and reach the best as possible these three types in order to address all three.

The article further reports that people are making a staggering 500 billion influence impressions on one another. This is massive, business-driven advertising and influence is being challenged by these outside influences which bypass the brand but talk about that specific brand.
Why?
Because the Web is transparent, it centralizes content which has effect that in increases the influence of comments, ratings and such, much more than the offline equivalent Word of Mouth messages. These are fragmented and not “eternalized”. The Potential Influencers are the group of people where the real trust can be found. It’s also the largest portion of people. Exactly this group of Influencers can create a chain reaction, triggering friends’ friends and further on.

Mashable ends with

In summary, Bernoff and Ray’s advice to marketers includes:

Build a strategy for reaching all three types of influencers.

Allocate your budget in light of a potential 500 billion impressions of peer influence.

Analyze and reach out to your mass influencers specifically for maximum reach.

To make a step back, before building a strategy, reach mass influencers and allocate budget, brands first need to identify their Influencers. Without the identification, it’s harder to effectively reach and empower them.

What do you think of the Peer Influence Pyramid, are there types of Influencers that miss?

There are Word-of-Mouth three forms marketers need to understand: Experiential, Consequential and Intentional Word-of-Mouth.
The Experiential is the true C2C marketing, whereas Consequential and Intentional Word-of-Mouth is a B2C2C marketing, where Word-of-Mouth is being orchestrated and promoted by the company in order to trigger their target group(s) for further viral the C2C distribution.

The Experiential Word-of-Mouth is the most powerful and trusted form, because it’s a direct experience of the product/service by the person, which then is being positively or negatively recommended. If it’s positive or negative depends on the gap between the expectation and experience of the product or service.
Here the thorough understanding must be present that Experiential Word-of-Mouth is forcing a paradigm shift in brand experience, it is what your target audience think your brand is, instead of a push perceivement.

The shift from a produced influence -solely- created by the company to a prosumerist or co-creational or even customer-driven influence can be seen clear in the image below:

A couple of points stand out in the image:

* In a developing market, Word-of-Mouth is the most powerful influencer in the customer decision journey. This has the advantage that the innovators and early adopters do act as evangelists, which trigger their peers to show similar behavior. The second advantage is that Word-of-Mouth is relatively cheaper than advertising tactics, being able to achieve a better margin or lower overall costs in the introduction phases.
Extensive information is not yet available, forcing consumers to rely faster on each other.
* In the mature market, Word-of-Mouth is less influential, this has part to do with the transforming market, also because advertising in mature markets and later phases in product life cycles require lots of advertising and other still “conventional” tactics to be able to compete in the mature market. It could be well that proportionally there were much more advertising touch points with the target audiences than the consumers amongst them, creating a lower percentage which blur results.

The second image below is the equation by McKinsey which shows an interesting perspective which can be applied to understand better how Word-of-Mouth impacts the brand and the causes, be it on any kind of device or channel, which I will elaborate later on.

Because media convergence is rigidly diffusing amongst (mobile) devices, companies need to overthink tactics twice before executing them, the power of consumers is huge, the hyperconnective society is updated nearly in real-time, making the companies vulnerable when actions are not well thought.
The Volume and Impact equals the Word-of-Mouth Equity.
The Impact is determined by four aspects, Network, Sender, Message Content and Message Source.
The Volume is of importance with regard to the reach per message, but it doesn’t determine the quality of the reach. From an utopian one-on-one marketing point of perspective, the smaller the reach is, but the better the quality is, due to personalized or relevant alignment between Sender, Message and Receiver.

Why is it important to understand the impact on media convergence?
Because it offers many opportunities for companies to granulate content (in the Consequential and Intentional Word-of-Mouth) to create a most effective trigger for their consumers per touch point, per channel.
Online communities grow, vertical networks with highly specialized topics and followers do grow.
Networks become interoperable, devices become interoperable, content can be requested via mobile, laptop, TV and iPad, “small” is relative and the impact is and will be forceful.

The advent of Social TV is only going to increase the power of Word-of-Mouth Marketing to new levels, creating new opportunities and challenging companies at the same time to understand, yet another channel used by consumers.
Think of what will happen if TV widgets (Twitter, Facebook and others) will enable real-time direct communication with their network to comment on the content which is being broadcasted?
Advertising, product placements, concepts, lots will be subject to consumer influence, instantly.

I do think the Word-of-Mouth Equity is worth the try in understanding what kind of messages will impact the brand more than others.
What’s your opinion on Word-of-Mouth Marketing?
Is the equation one that you would experiment with in understanding the dynamics of Word-of-Mouth?

Augmented Reality networks still have to validate their value, but novelty of such networks and the AR technology itself fuel initial interest of users.
A business model for Tagwhat is of course advertising which blends in with other types of tags, creating a less pushy advertising model. Besides this, context/location is key, making advertising more relevant and less disturbing.

Pre-conditions like the following make or break a social network:
*The amount of interaction between people.
*The amount of quality content/interaction between people.
*The amount of people.
*The amount of active people must be big enough, most people are passive, they like to sign up and read, but are not the content/interaction generators.
*The community must be relevant and specific to one or more segments, the more niche, the higher value added, but the fewer people and thus interaction.
*People need to make a choice.

The furthering fragmentation of the social network landscape will create increasing pressure on succession or failure. Augmented Reality has the power to uniquely position a platform in favor of its usage. It’s up to the users to adopt and integrate a network like Tagwhat in their daily lives.

Will such social Augmented Reality networks diffuse or not?
What could business models be for User Generated Content networks like these?

We need partners. We need financial backing to redevelop the project.

… where viewers can create a virtual character, pilot it in the TV environment, meet, compete, play and even talk to other viewers/competitors via phone.

What is the Cross Media Social Platform (CMSP)?

The TV market is ‘on the move’ – competition is growing and digital channels via ISP’s and IPTV providers are now crashing through what was once the walled fortress of broadcast television. Interactive content and social media are the buzz and broadcasters are looking for both innovation and revenue generation models that fall outside of the traditional advertising box of the past. And the need for all types of content is growing exponentially, of which one is created by users themselves.

The Cross Media Social Platform is a unique product that not only offers a business model that encompasses current and widely spread advertising revenue – it also has added value by offering broadcasters the opportunity to earn money via telephony (Premium Rate Numbers and Premium SMS) via freemium modelling, as well as web and phone subscription models – where users can augment their profiles and characters on the web for TV and the web.

We created an interactive, virtual world on both television and the Internet that envelops social networking, community, user generated content, competition, and entertainment. And we are interested in developing this further with principles who were involved in the previous project. And it works on both standard broadcast or terrestrial TV as well as IPTV, Satellite, Cable etc.

See video of work we did in the past at Youtube

Visuals of the Cross Media Social Platform (CMSP)

Below you will find a basic CMSP architecture demo and a couple of screenshots.

It evens goes further, technology developments are evolving, partners have released an API enabling developers to create unified communications (telephone, cellular text message, instant message (Jabber, AIM, Yahoo, MSN) applications using traditional document-based web development flow. This sort of technology can be implemented in the Cross Media Social Platform, adapting to the needs and ways of nowadays communication.

Why Agora Media?

We have the experience and know-how, without having to invent the wheel and exploit this competitive advantage, we can respond very fast and accurate to the concretizing needs of the Social TV/Social Media/converging Media community and industry! We have a vast network of 2.0, cross media and technology pioneers, working closely with them to stay on top of trends and developments which will enhance the Cross Media Social Platform.

Why now?

The interest in Social TV is rising, the television landscape is changing, permanently. Media consumption is converging and increasingly socializing. More and more experiments, products and services are initiated and developed to meet these changes. Being on top of these trends and offering new digital cross media experiences to your target audiences and putting you permanently on the map!

Feel free to contact us if interested or wish to receive more information.

by Richard G. Kastelein

If we all thought the Facebook and Twitter social media growth phenomena were extraordinary, wait until Social TV hits your screens.

And it’s not as far away as you think — not only with the logical IPTV market, but also terrestrial TV. I recently attended the International Broadcast Convention (IBC) in Amsterdam, which bills itself as ’The content creation management delivery experience’. IBC2008 attracted 49,000+ visitors and 1,300+ exhibitors from more than 130 countries. This year is expected to be bigger. Last year, I was part of a team exhibiting at MIPTV in Cannes, and was expecting something a bit similar… but this was almost all about hardware and software and less about the actual formats and programs. However, this was not a disappointment. For embedded in the show there were some jewels… which have profoundly altered my view of Social Media, the future and the implication of reach that will touch billions not millions.

One diamond-in-the-rough was Israeli-based Orca Interactive (link), who was pitching their Social TV product, which was still in Proof of Concept (POC) and this was their first showing to the general public. Orca specializes in IPTV middleware and applications. But they are aggressively moving into social TV. I spoke to CTO Ofer Weintraub (Ph.D.) on their strategy and the nuts and bolts of the technology on offer.

“This is truly social TV — there is nobody on the market with similar offerings,” said Weintraub. He added there is an SDK (Software Development Kit) available now for select partners, but they certainly would not rule out an open API in the future.

And there is tight integration at the database level with website Trustedopinion.com. I discussed the integration with TO founder and CEO Shahar Smirin — whose site topped a million users recently.

“It’s a natural fit,” said Smirin, who then went on to show his web product and how he’s built a viral invite and social ’consolidation’ framework focussed on opinion where one can pile everyone (all your friends, imported/invited) from most major social media sites and really focus on what your friends think about entertainment (mainly movies and theatre for now).

There is synergy between Orca and TO, but let’s now look at Orca. And why this marriage could take social media truly to the masses via IPTV.

One thing to note… Orca Interactive is owned by France Telecom and the 2008 M&A has positioned this duo to take Social TV to a mass global audience. The acquisition last year means that they are well positioned near the ear of one of the world’s leading telecommunications operators and proprietor of the multinational Orange brand. Orange has a base of almost 200 million customers in 30 countries.

There’s nothing overly extraordinary in the makeup of the product — it’s nothing that Internet social media buffs have not seen before. But for TV users, this is going to revolutionize the way they watch TV… from being a passive, solitary, experience into an active, community one.

Here below, you can see recommendations from your friends on a particular movie or program. You can see related VOD products. You can rate it yourself, you can recommend it to a friend, you can see further information and you can send it as a gift to another person (purchased shows are good for 48 hours).

Here you can see your friends’ profiles, chat with them, send them a gift, see their recommends or send them a message.

Here you can send a gift to one or more friends.

And remember, this will all be integrated with your monthly billing. There will be no need for pulling out a credit card and security issues, there will be no need for digging deep to remember your Paypal password. No, the bill arrives like any other or is likely debited from your bank account automatically these days.

One can also set their mood — and then recommendations will be laid out according to complex algorithms and data mining based on your friends and your own data and viewing habits.
As Facebook revolutionized the way advertisers can niche-target their online demographics, Social TV will profoundly change the ad agencies and marketing departments will offer their wares in the television realm. Neilson ratings seem vague, less targetable and will likely become obsolete in TV 2.0.

Equally as interesting, but taking a different tack, is another gem called NDS (link), partially owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, which has a reach to over 107 million pay-TV subscribers worldwide. Their latest product, Social TV was also in POC stage and looks a lot more like ’widgetized’ TV rather than a singular network.

Their model is quite different, but also appealing and unique for a number of reasons. One being it lends itself more to an iPhone app store scenario, with plans for an open API, which positions it well for social media developers and long tail monetization of the social TV landscape. But monetization or not will be decided by the operators not NDS. It also has impeccable design with a beautiful interface.

Obtaining details was a bit sketchy due to their PR person being in meetings and there was, understandably, some hesitancy in getting anyone to go on the record.

However, one of the demo managers did talk to me about some interesting API integration potential with Flickr for instance. If you see something interesting on TV you can be simply one click away from viewing images of that place, object or person. Conceivably the same could be done with the Youtube API in the video space or even Lastfm for music for that matter.

Social networking is also alive and well on Verizon’s FiOS TV and new features are being added such as Facebook and Twitter Widgets.  The new Widget Bazaar applications marketplace is located within FiOS TV’s Interactive Media Guide.

Verizon has worked with social media innovators Facebook Connect, Twitter, ESPN, Veoh, blip.tv, and Dailymotion to create a converged Internet-to-television experience that lets FiOS TV subscribers connect with others while watching TV, plus search and view a variety of online, personal PC-based videos on their television screens. Verizon also plans an open development platform (SDK) to permit developers to write interactive FiOS TV applications that will be available through the Widget Bazaar.

Customers are saying they love the new “social TV” Widgets, but they want more.  They want to send Tweets, not just look at them.  They want to create their own unique Facebook status messages.

According to Shawn Strickland, vice president, marketing for Verizon  Telecom, Verizon is working with some popular companies on the Web to create the foundation for a high-quality, engaging Internet-to-TV experience.

A recent report by The Nielsen Company found that there are 87 percent more online social media users now than in 2003, with 883 percent more time devoted to social media sites. Also, the number of American users frequenting online video destinations has also increased by 339 percent since 2003.

Subscribers can Tweet about the TV show they are watching or search and follow their friends’ Tweets. Viewers can also update their Facebook status with their own messages. All of this is simply done via the FiOS TV remote control and an onscreen keyboard.

The Verizon At Home blog for the latest on the Widget Bazaar application marketplace.

A Belgian company called Zappware also launched social networking features for its “iView Core” services suite at IBC09. And they had a demo showing how the add-on allows the viewer to connect with friends and family to:

• see what they are watching on their TVs
• exchange favourite lists of TV programmes and VOD movies
• recommend TV programmes or VOD movies to one another
• send VOD movie gifts to their friends
• lock their TV screens onto one another and watch the same content

Koen Swings, CTO & Managing Partner Zappware:

“Social networking has been a buzz word in the past few years, in particular on the internet. With these extensions to our EPG, VOD and PVR products, we now extend social networking from the PC domain to the TV domain, because we are convinced that there is no better environment for sharing TV experiences than the TV itself. In a world, in which people are continuously seeking to connect and in which consumers are willing to embrace new technologies that allow them to connect better and more often, these social networking features on TV will be highly appreciated by viewers. Operators that include these features in their iDTV offering, will be able to offer their subscribers a cross-platform social networking experience, hence adding value to their triple or quadruple play offer and resulting in increased subscriber loyalty.”

So at the end of the day, this is a win, win, win for all — TV stations get better data on their viewers and offer convergence with web ideas and sites, viewers get interactive community-oriented, social television and can make interesting viewing choices based on mood and network of friends, web-based community and social media sites can make more headway into IPTV and broadcast TV, still the Tour de Force of media, and entrepreneurs and developers find a new medium to develop and monetize via new, open-source-philosophy-driven API and SDK environs.

Richard Kastelein, a social media strategist and publisher, is CEO of new startup, Agora Media Group LLC (link), a new creative and innovation agency based in London, UK. Kastelein has been building online communities for over a decade and is an Open Source evangelist. He’s an adept team player – a publisher, writer, photographer, marketing director, web developer and graphic designer with more than 20 years experience in the development and operation of newspapers, magazines, web media and marketing of multinational, companies in international settings.

Asymmetric information imbalances have always been competitive advantages -in any way expressed- for companies’ existences.
The Web’s transparency is changing this for good and worse.

The increasing tranparency of the Web certainly has challenges for companies to keep its advantages over others. Publicly available information which is accessible to anyone is the prime challenge.
The information widely available applicates to competitive intelligence, information on products and services, information on brands, information with regard to target groups, which all can be used to enhance -both- the internal and external processes of businesses.
Web 2.0 forces companies to be open, to be transparent towards the market and the players/customers. If this isn’t done, the consequences might be even worse, due to the co-involvement consumers demand in transactions.

Though, paradoxically, if processes are enhanced and adapted to the opportunities that Web 2.0 offers, bigger asymmetric information imbalance  and competitive advantages can be created!
Think of all the information available on social networks, bookmarking sites, Wikipedia’s, blogs, microblogs which can be used to create or enhance business and further increase the asymmetry. Networks of people or companies always have existed which added value to the competitive advantage of business, but the easier access to all this information is being facilitated by the Web, forcing companies to extract intelligence from it easier, faster and with more accuracy.

Because information is out in the open, companies need to be able to learn and adapt faster than their competitors. This is the skill that can be mastered. Learning curves will follow each other quicker, advantages don’t remain as long anymore and information overload is all around us.
Overcome the challenges of the Web’s transparency but at the same way, alter the company to new levels with help of its transparency.

How do you think the Web can contribute to information asymmetry?

It’s not only possible to see what friends around you are doing, but with the new app, advertising through Augmented Reality is displayed on your mobile screen.
The collaborative kind of Augmented Reality which is offered by Brightkite enhances the advertisements, because of the recommendations/comments by friends add a new real-time dimension to it.

This kind of advertising can be relevant and targeted, the challenge will be to enable the users to create simple filters of what kind of advertisements will be shown and which ones won’t.
These developments are next steps increasing the importance and opportunities of Location Based Services and Proximity Marketing.

You can download the Layar App from the app store here.

How do you think the amount of advertising can be regulated by the user in a easy way?
By checking boxes which specify certain verticals, or by filters, or by collaborative filtering?

Lonely Planet, the world’s favorite travel company, has teamed up with mobile augmented reality pioneer Mobilizy to bring a world-class mobile AR experience to their renowned travel guides. Whether you are a seasoned traveller or fledgling explorer, Lonely Planet Compass guides provide expert recommendation and useful information to help you navigate city locations.

Lonely Planet Compass guides offer a unique augmented reality experience to extend your travel adventure with useful information about your surroundings, nearby landmarks, and other points of interest by overlaying information on the real-time camera view of your Android phone.

Looking for the ultimate guidebook? One you can slip in your pocket? Lonely Planet’s Compass Guides for Android give you interactive, personalized and fully searchable mobile access to Lonely Planet’s best-selling travel content .

Currently there are 10 Lonely Planet Compass Guides enhanced with Wikitude AR available for the Android market in the US: Boston, Chicago, Miami, New Orleans, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Seattle and Washington D.C. More titles are coming soon.

Features of the Lonely Planet guides enhanced with augmented reality include:

• Enabled with GPS so you can see your current location and plot itineraries on dynamic maps;

• Augmented reality camera-view to visualize data overlays of Lonely Planet recommended points of interest;
• Hundreds of listings for places of interest – bars, clubs, restaurants and more – search by category, distance, or by address and
• Helpful information on the city, its history and events and more.

Visit the website for more screenshots of the application.
Good to see an application by a brand like Lonely Planet. Their books can be augmented as well to make an offline-online connection and intertwine their channels and business models.
The content was already available by Lonely Planet, thus extending this information to the mobile digital realm was a logical move which responds to the rise of Augmented Reality.

For travelers it’s a new and interactive experience to discover their travel destinations and address to the vast amount of information digitally to enhance their knowledge.
Who knows the Lonely Planet Guides will become 2.0 due to collaborative efforts by users, and what the effect will be for the product and information quality.