Nati Shalom

Cloudify is a tool to smoothly launch applications in a cloud environment with a recipe that describes everything necessary, including resources and their configurations. GigaSpaces’ new product (at least, I thought it was new) is eXtreme Application Platform (XAP), an accelerator for NoSQL databases. GigaSpaces’ XAP is not a database, analytics tool, or visualization tool. In short, it is an in-memory utility to enable real-time data processing for other NoSQL databases, like Cassandra and MongoDB. SQL or no SQL, the rate and the speed of Big Data have become a problem for a database to process. A simple solution is to put some kind of front end in place to process such high-volume and high-speed data. In-memory data processing is usually much faster than any data storage dealing with disk I/O. Both VoltDB and Couchbase, which I interviewed at the same conference, use their implementation of an in-memory database for this. Other databases may partner with other companies to provide such a technology. Nati referred to Edd Dumbill’s blog, which says that one of the trends in Big Data is streaming data processing. For that, in-memory technology is invaluable.

I thought XAP was a new product that came after Cloudify. However, XAP was developed about 10 years ago, when the Internet bubble was in full bloom. They thought high-speed data processing was necessary to accommodate business-to-business (B2B) interactions with scalability. As we all know, the dot-com era did not last very long, and their prediction did not materialize. Actually, the financial community was an early adopter because of real-time data processing in such things as credit card transaction processing and stock trading. So GigaSpaces decided to develop a product to serve those needs in 2004, and they have kept improving it over the years. The current version of XAP is the ninth edition. As I wrote in a previous blog, the NoSQL domain includes companies that develop databases, utilities, analytics engines, and visualization tools. This classification is shown in Matt Aslett’s blog with leading NoSQL companies. Matt places GigaSpaces in the data/grid cache category.

The following is a summary of my chat with Nati about his solutions and his view of the NoSQL market.

GigaSpaces is headquartered in New York and also has offices in San Jose, CA, London, and Israel. Nati said that Big Data is fueled by different things, depending on the geography. In the US, SNS drives Big Data on the West Coast, while the financial requirements mentioned above drive it on the East Coast. SNS and financial applications are very different, but they both generate a high volume of data at high speed. SNS, especially, generates data in an unformatted way, such as tweets.

Regarding the relationship between XAP and Cloudify, they are currently tightly integrated. Data cluster management is necessary for the management of large data sets. Cloudify needs the same data cluster management for applications. Thus, the two share the same underlying data cluster management platform. After all, applications and data should go hand in hand for provisioning and management. Nati’s blog describes this integration in more detail. In short, XAP accelerates data acquisition and Cloudify manages the cluster.

I was not sure about the relationship between the two products. Nati gave me a little more processing information, as follows:

When streaming processing is required, both XAP and Cloudify are deployed. If streaming is not required, Cloudify alone is appropriate. This is a logical diagram, but in reality those three boxes can run on a single physical server, or two on the same machine, because XAP should work closely with a database. Cloudify is written in Java, and XAP is written in both Java and C++. XAP not only accelerates data acquisition but also provides data processing and guarantees data consistency.

Next I asked him to draw a picture showing where something like GigaSpaces’ XAP resides between NoSQL and NewSQL. Here’s the picture, showing the two domains in an oversimplified manner for ease of understanding. Note that each database, whether NoSQL or NewSQL, is different in its offering and performance. For example, Couchbase claims high processing power, although it is classified as NoSQL database.

OK, then, there seems to exist another category between NoSQL and NewSQL. I asked Nati what this new category is. His answer was that it is a Big Data system or streaming/real-time processing system. Remember Edd Dumbill’s blog. Nati said that streaming processing is currently a niche area but definitely required for application areas that process a high volume of data at high speed or with little tolerance for latency, such as financial transactions like risk analysis.

I asked him about the application of streaming data processing. Some utilities companies process Big Data with Hadoop to analyze meter-read data. Streaming processing may be a niche, but it is becoming necessary to process such things as meter-read data that may come in from millions of power meters in semi- or real time. It would be interesting to combine those data streams with weather data that might also change in real time. For a balancing authority like California ISO, which is tasked with balancing power demand and supply in real time, the real-time data sources vary and can be very large. It is necessary to source a large volume of data to process to get a good picture of the status of the power grid in real time to avoid blackouts. I have yet to see any examples of streaming data processing in the utilities business, but I think such an application area exists.

Nati mentioned that real-time requirements are growing and that Google, which invented the concept of Hadoop, is moving to Percolator, which supports real-time Big Data. Maybe this domain will not remain a niche for long.

The whole GigaSpaces system looks pretty complex, and integration seems to require a lot of hand-holding. Nati said that it normally does, but he makes extra efforts to make it very easy. He continued as follows:

“BigData systems are complex by definition – look at Hadoop, NoSQL, etc. What we do is integrate them in a consistent way and make reduce large part of the operational complexity and development complexity.

If you would compare the amount of effort that is required to build a twitter like real-time analytics with GigaSpaces you’ll see that all you need to write few snippet of code to process your logic, scaling, fail-over, integration with BigData storage, management and monitoring is all curved out from the developers.”

They also provide training. One thing they thought of was an interface with popular NoSQL platforms like Cassandra and MongoDB. GigaSpaces has a semi-official partnership with those database companies. This is intended to exploit the fact that more people have worked with those databases; GigaSpaces can ride on their knowledge to lower the training curve.

Moving forward, I asked Nati to consult his crystal ball as to what will happen to the NoSQL/Big Data market. Will any standard emerge from a standards body or two? He told me that, as in many emerging markets, many of the companies will be consolidated and disappear, except for some like Hadoop, Cassandra, and MongoDB. As for the storage mechanism, one form is good for one thing but not other things. If there is a standard way of accessing data, key-value, tabular, or document-based data will be consolidated, but the forms themselves will survive because one size does not fit all. He also said that SQL by itself is not wrong but its implementation is. It is interesting to compare his remark with Scott Jarr’s, who said the same thing. Nati predicted some sort of standards would emerge by consolidation but not from standards bodies.

After conducting five interviews, I have some idea of what NoSQL is all about. One thing I am certain of is that the utilities business is increasingly dependent on ICT technologies. Without them, smart grid will not be accomplished.

I consulted for MySQL before and knew something about the relational database market. But after it was bought by Sun, I stopped following it. I knew there was such a thing as NoSQL but initially thought it was “No to SQL”; it is more like “Not only SQL.” NoSQL started to get attention circa 2009, and the NoSQL Now conference was only started in 2011. So it is a relatively new area and, as in any new area, the market is very confused. Many terminologies and acronyms are floating around, with many claims by vendors. Quite frankly, it is very, very hard to walk through this market without getting totally confused. Prior to attending the conference, I studied the companies I planned to interview and read anything and everything I could put my eyes on. The sad reality was that I was further confused.

What is NoSQL, technology-wise, component-wise, and application-wise?

Technology-wise

The NoSQL market can be described in a few ways. One way is to categorize it by the technologies used. The 451 Group’s Matt Asllet, in his blog NoSQL, NewSQL and Beyond: The answer to SPRAINed relational databases, gave a pretty good picture of the market, with categories and the vendors who belong to each category.

Matt Asllet’s database categories

This figure alone is very valuable. This figure helped me to understand where my interviewees’ companies fall in.

This view is great, but I was still not comfortable enough to say, “Yes, I got it.” Bob Wiederhold, president and CEO of Couchbase, made it much simpler for me.

Bob Wiederhold

He thinks NoSQL is playing in a segment that is not concentrated on by NoSQL players that are good at transactions or suitable for backoffice applications. He further classified NoSQL into four categories:

• Key value
• Document
• Column family
• Graph

The current Couchbase (1.8) belongs to the key-value camp but will move to the document camp at its 2.0 version launch. He also told me that the key-value and document camps are being merged and the combined camp will be the biggest of the three new categories. I plan to write about his interview in a future blog.

How they fit together in the enterprise

How do NoSQL technologies fit into the enterprise? William McKnight, of McKnight Consulting Group, presented a keynote speech titled, “Putting NoSQL in its Place—in the Enterprise.”

William McKnight

One of his slides shows really well how data is collected, aggregated, and analyzed in the enterprise, and which components are there for each function. Data are collected for analysis; otherwise, there is no reason to collect them. There are two major groups for analysis: real time (streaming) and static (stored data). In his slide, Hadoop (which processes data in batch mode) is placed on the analytic side. But if you need to analyze a massive amount of data as it comes in real time, you need streaming analysis. Hadoop is not meant for that. That is why we need databases that can handle real-time streaming data, which is in a totally different area from that of Hadoop.

In the picture, blurry brown lines indicate a set of clouds. The components surrounded by the brown lines may be hosted in a cloud.

Application Areas

This is great. Then, what about application areas? Where does each NoSQL technology apply? Scott Jarr, cofounder and chief strategy officer at VoltDB, gave me the following figure.

Scott Jarr

Actually, he drew this on a piece of paper but he had a published blog. I will cover it in more detail in a future blog. He looked at the five areas of applications: interactive, real-time analytics, record lookup, historical analysis, and exploratory. He then placed each Big Data technology in one of the five areas. This is a pretty good explanation of NoSQL in terms of application areas. In the figure, VoltDB is colored differently from NewSQL, but he classified it in the NewSQL camp.

Applications to Energy (Smart Grid)

The applications areas discussed most throughout the conference were publication, financial, and SNS. A couple of people said that SNS is a driving force for Big Data and NoSQL on the West Coast, but on the East Coast it is primarily financial communities. What about its application to smart grid? In the Soft Grid conference, focus was on metered data, which will be collected, aggregated, and stored in real time but analyzed in no real-time fashion. I heard during the Soft Grid conference that some utilities were using Hadoop to analyze their metered data.

The Northeast blackout of 2003 was caused because timely actions were not taken to isolate the problem area from the rest of the power grid, and faults cascaded to the entire area. The causes of the blackout were studied intensely. But in 2011, it was repeated in the San Diego area. The initial cause may be different from the one in 2003, but the impact cascaded in the same way as in 2003. With the more connected ICT technologies, modern monitoring systems like SCADA, and real-time analytics of power grid health, this could be avoided. The decision to cut off faulty areas from the grid requires real-time action by monitored data coming in in real time because power moves very quickly. This is an application area that is different from the trend analysis done with Hadoop.

Those companies I interviewed told me the application to smart grid may be an interesting idea, but it is still premature, as they do not see the market forming. Finally, I just want to mention that David Brown of EMC, a parent company of VMware, used GemFire to implement data collection and analytics for some unnamed utilities. His case was an exception, and I guess the market is still being formed for the utilities.

David Brown

First, for employers:

• You shouldn’t fire employees who are expressing lawful opinions that you do not agree with, even if you can. And based on where you are sited, or where your employees work, maybe you can’t. It’s a rotten world if every Republican CEO can fire Democrat employees, and vice versa.
• The NLRA needs to be examined in detail, and you should tailor social media policy documents to specifically state what the NLRA does and does not allow you to do, as an employer, and what the rights of workers are. Vague exhortations about professionalism are likely to be no help in a NLRB issue.

Stowe examines another post by Jon Hyman, Does your social media policy educate about being “profersonal?” who provides an anecdotal look at how folks, and their employers, might all get along, from a lawyer’s point-of-view.  Hyman provides some semi-sage advice from his legal idea of what folks ought to do to avoid having to deal with folks like him:

“Hyman then concludes with the most blatantly reactionary summing up imaginable:”

What’s the real lesson here? Social media is an evolving communication tool. Employees have not yet figured out what it means to be “profersonal.” Employees need to realize that anything they say online can impact their professional persona, and that every negative or offensive statement could lead to discipline or termination (even if employers can overreact in these situations). Until people fully understand that social media is erasing (has erased?) the line between the personal and the professional, these issues will continue to arise. It is our job as employers to help educate our employees about living in a “profersonal” world, even at the risk of offending the NLRB’s prickly sensitivities.

Prickly sensitivities aside, on the B2B side of things, we have quietly worked with many corporations to get their message out to their audience from both a top-down and bottom-up perspective.  NH has always believed that the message coming from both angles was important to our client’s customers, the media and those considering their technologies.  Since the vast majority of our clients provide a business-to-business range of products and services, no voice for the consumer market has been seriously considered.  Our biggest issue in doing this is building trust between the IT buyers and the folks within companies who speak the same language.

Harmonic convergence has not always been evident, but we’ve seen few occasions where bloggers have been threatened by job loss or political incursions into management’s druthers.  Since bottom-up speak has been viewed over the decades as dangerous by the legal icons inside every large technology company, vetting the columns and parsing the words has been excruciating at times.  For starters, lawyers and IT folks don’t share the same lexicon or world view on what customers, potential and real, need to know and when they need to know it.  Mix into that the marketing folks, whose territories have been invaded, and you often end up with a stalemate.  Nothing is worse to put all the time and money it takes to build the infrastructure, and end up with nothing.

Whether you’re in Texas or Hawaii, opinions often are not necessary when it comes to getting your message out across the social landscape.  Politics are never necessary in the social sphere any more than they are at trade shows and for that you can be sure.  Customers, new and old, really want to know how technologies like ERP, CRM and SAAS are going to affect their jobs, their lives and their bottom lines.  If publishing the facts about a disaster is looming on the company’s horizon, it’s always best to get out in front of it and address the solutions, so that users can see how you handle it.  You will find that being up front about problems may be your best campaign slogans and you will find that customers are your best advocate when the trust that you aren’t going to hide negatives.

As with most things, the answer is it probably depends.

However IMHO the answer is NO, social media and networking when incorporated as a part of doing business is not a waste unless like anything else you let it becomes a waste of time.

I have chosen to leverage social media networking along with traditional mediums, venues, news letters, in person events, and other means of communicating, learning and doing business vs. ignoring it.

Does that mean I jump on or join in every new social networking medium or venue? Nope, however I’m always watching to see where to invest time and effort and find the return or benefit.

Some observations about social media and networking include:

You get out of social media and networking what you put into it: When it comes to LinkedIn, which Michael Naylor told me several years ago to get involved with, you will get out of what you put into LinkedIn (or other venues for that matter). Now about eight or nine years later, even despite the spam, I completely agree how true Mike’s advice has been and remains.

Engagement, interaction, discussion (or debate) are all part of the discourse in and around social media and networking. Louis Gray who got me hooked on twitter and some other mediums years ago has a great blog post that unless you are engaging or interacting, you are not social networking. What that means is simply using social networking media and mediums as a broadcast or one way communication platform is just that, talking at vs. talking with or too people. Thus get out of your comfort zone, step out from behind your pulpit or podium and engage with audiences or participants vs. talking at them to get out of what you put into it.

Dont be afraid of joining different groups or venues, listen, lurk, observe, learn from others in the same or adjacent areas online, however also keep time in perspective to get other tasks completed. This also means you can build your own castle or venue for people to come to or you can do a hybrid including your own site(s) as well as taking discussions and conversations to where other audiences are.

Let me put this a different way, I like to fish and catch. Sometimes I know where the fish are based on experience and when they might bite, then there are other times when they move. This means knowing when and where to go to different locations to catch a fish or catch a conversation.

Building on the above, don’t be afraid to get involved or start a conversation.

Sure on some venues you will get spammed and a bunch of responses that you might not like particular if venturing out away from the safety of your own castle or site. However use those conversations and engagements to learn and interact, see what is on people’s minds or that they are interested in vs. what you want to tell them.

Where wasting time can come into play is trying to be part of every discussion, watching what everybody is doing or saying in all the various venues. For the trick has been to pick which venues are useful for where I want to invest time along with what I will get out of them in addition to using different tools to help find the applicable conversations and discussions. If you are not using things as basic as Google alerts you are probably spending too much time out looking for conversations or discussions, or, you are missing out on them altogether.

I have also noticed that there tends to be a correlation between those who are involved in one way communication and comment diminishing or dismissing social media and networking as a waste of time or not practical, hmm, go figure.

Although, I have also noticed those who tend to be involved in one way or non interactive discussions or that limit comments and discourse tend to also have lower numbers of followers, appear on fewer lists or get shared by others, hmm, go figure.

I have also noticed that some who do very well in cyberspace may not do as well in person and vise versa, however there are many who can do both. Likewise there are those who do well in columns that support interactive comments and those who do not.

Perhaps there is a hadoop big data analytics algorithm out there for someone who has lots of time to do some research on all of this?

In the meantime, for those interested, check out Johnny Bentwood (@JonnyBentwood) and some of the things he has done around analytics and social media and metrics if so interested.

What this all means is that to each their own, that is comfort zones. If your comfort zone and sphere of influence is in one way communication via print, online, video or what ever, then play to your strengths. Likewise, if yours is as a commentator or something else, go with it.

Leverage and get involved, don’t be scared, find your voice, engage, take part, however also be ready to be challenged while increasing your network of contacts, ability to learn and get out of what ever you put into it. Otherwise, stay in your comfort zone or within your sphere of influence.

As to if social media and networking are a waste of time and only for those who have nothing to do, well, if that is the case, last year was a banner year for me and my business. That is both in terms of activity, contacts, coverage, awards and accolades not to mention increasing discussions and experience in other areas as well as being involved in traditional media and venues or activities. I guess if that is the result of being involved or investing in social media and networking it is an honor to be among those who waste time and have nothing better to do.

Why do I take time out of my busy schedule to share this?

Simple, you get out of things what you put into it, and granted some will simply take advantage as opposed to contributing back, maybe they too will evolve to give back what they take out.

Feel free to engage or simply read and lurk, that option is all yours.

Ok, nuff said for now, have to get some other work projects done now.

Cheers
Gs

It’s no secret that Google wants to be social. It attempted at doing so numerous times already. First came orkut which failed to catch on here in the US, then came Google Buzz which didn’t seem to catch on anywhere. Then came the short-lived Google Wave, which was the biggest disaster of them all. But Google didn’t rest there. And who can blame them, with Facebook and Twitter quickly taking over the web as a social medium and gaining users faster then anyone could ever predict.

Announced last week after seemingly endless leaks, Google+ represents a major push for the software giant. The service began showing itself to a small group of tech “hipsters” via a (very) limited invitation system, as a dark gray bar across the top of various Google sites such as Google.com and Gmail. A “+You” button on the far left of the bar activates the service and various other features can be activated on the far right of the bar.

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One week later (earlier this morning), Google+ was declared one of the fastest-growing networks ever, having already reached 10 million users according to one estimate. This is amazing growth even for a giant such as Google, as Mashable reported: “We cannot remember any social network reaching so many members so quickly after its release.”

So what’s the secret to the success of Google+? Why are the same people that ignored all the search giants previous attempts now all jumping in head first? To answer this, we first have to look at where Facebook and Twitter are lacking.

As social human beings, we differentiate between people we connect with, whether we’re teenagers, twenty-somethings, married, or retired. We don’t want to share the same part of our lives with say, our inner circle group of friends, our new acquaintances, our parents, and our boss. This is where “Circles” comes into play. This Google+ features makes users differentiate between exactly who they are adding to their list right off the bat.

Google+ starts you off with four Circles: Friends, Family, Acquaintances, and Following. The first three are there to do exactly what Facebook doesn’t: separate the different types of people you socialize (or don’t socialize) with. The last one simply takes on Twitter by allowing you to follow people who you find interesting, but don’t necessarily have any plans on communicating or sharing anything with. And best of all, making a new Circle is as easy as two clicks, so you’re not tied how Google thinks you should live your life.

So what does this mean to Google shareholders? Well, in just one week of invite only activity, investors added $20 billion to Google’s market cap. A Morgan Stanley downgrade on Friday, brought the total down to $15.8 billion because of doubts on whether Google will be able to capitalize on new products such as Google+, a problem both Facebook and Twitter have. But weather it’s $15.8 or $20 billion, this is a very impressive figure for a service that isn’t even in it’s infancy stages yet.

Here’s something else to keep in mind when thinking about the future of Google+: while Facebook has ~600 million users, Google is sitting on a staggering 1 billion users. That’s one sixth of the world’s population! So while Facebook, Twitter, and every other social website had to start from scratch at launch, this is not something Google+ has on it’s list of problems. Not by a long shot!

For the West, the miracle of the Internet and its concomitant boom to commerce and Information Technology seems a fait accompli.  I don’t think anyone can imagine how our world might work if the Internet changed dramatically.  The only reason, in this writer’s humble opinion, that social networking applications are doing so well is because we have become used to the expansion of services enabled by the central access point the Internet has provided.  There is nothing technilogically extraordinary about Facebook or LinkedIn or any of the myriad of networking applications now being peddled as manna from the Gods.  As far back as the 80′s, companies programmed similar sites for intranet usage but they never got the backing or investment from organizations who tried them.  Originally, these networking sites were developed to build cohesive organizatons and the idea was that, if you shared your extra curricular activities with those with whom you worked, the workplace would be more exciting.  People might work harder and become attached to their lives at work.  Those project were shelved and have yet to find new life with the public choices for networking.

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Twitter on the other hand, and “devices” such as the hashtag, #, were never expected to deliver value to the communities they serve, no less to the entire sphere to which they occupy.  We knew and we proclaimed this to be the age of “content as king,” as we said here many times.  We never expected ordinary humans to drive growth or to fill the vacuum exposed by such tools as WordPress and the blogosphere.  These accidental successes fuel speculation that whatever comes next, may just be the next Facebook, or LinkedIn.

Now the world is catching up and the promise of a next generation of users from places like Egypt and Sudan and Yemen are gaining access and we don’t expect these people to be willing to go backwards any more than we expect the folks here in Silicon Valley to move backwards.  The destiny of the people of the Middle East has changed dramatically over the last year.  Begining in Tunisia, people have found that this is the time to speak out loudly and often because if you do not, you may never get another chance.  Just how does access measure up to Western services, and where should we look for an explosion of freedom next?

Access in most countries of the ME is challenged by lack of competitive offers, a dearth of Arabic language content and hegemony from those still clinging to power.  Qatar, Bahrain and UAE have high household broadband penetration, at least among nationals. Saudi Arabia, has low penetration but it is gaining fast.  The biggest problem may mirror the same problems we have experienced here in gaining competition.  As long as companies that attempt to crush competition and dominate markets are allowed to buy political favors, the wonders that are at our global doorsteps may never realize their elegance and power to bring the world to peace and prosperity.

This post is dedicated in memory of Gil Scott-Heron.

Connectivity, seamless integration, multiple digital devices all connected to my habits and likes. The seamless options to integrate my blogs with my social media accounts…all provide wonderful opportunities. They simplify many tasks and interactions I deal with on a day to day basis. At times these can get messy and I understand that many of these integrations between the digital devices I use and social media platforms I interact with are still trying to evolve. I believe the future of this convergence of digital devices and communication platforms will only get more seamless and effective, that is exciting. For users the potential is huge in leveraging  these tools and opportunities into our social and professional lives.

and now……

I am noticing something, and it seems in the last few months all this seamless integration of digital devices and social networking media is generating some caution by a few. For me the first odd event was when Facebook suddenly decided without asking me (actually they never asking me anything especially if there are changes) that it would only feature in my news feeds the friends I interact with on a regular basis and not the friends who I just interact with rarely or periodically…. my news feed narrowed in its diversity of people I could see. Good news you can change this, and I did. The issue is who should make the decisions for us?

I also am noticing with my search results (Google/Bing/Yahoo) that they tend to be little different when I search the same topic as my wife and kids….. the search algorithms seem to learn my likes and dislikes and then provide me with information which falls into my previous search patterns and within my opinion and interest range. Diversity of opinions or information which I do not agree with seems slowly to be pushed away from me, I am reading only what I want to believe .  This seems to be a growing trend as explained in an excellent: TedTalk Eli Pariser: Beware online “filter bubbles”

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The Apple Developers conference again showed how our devices, operating systems and virtual worlds are now taking on more tasks without us having to be involved, as a way to increase our efficiencies. Now you do not need to save in OS Lion, if you have iCloud there is sinking of content between different devices automatically without you being involved. Your digital devices in the Apple environment now can be independent of your desktop or laptop, giving these devices the ability to do all the necessary tasks right there and now. These are exciting changes and definitely provide the user with more seamless tasks which we do not need to be involved with. This in someways is pushed even further with the IOS5 function that if you have list or tasks to do there is a geographic locater embedded so when say you drive by a grocery store and in your IOS5 device you have a shopping list it will pop up and remind you of the list and the option of doing this now as it has located a grocery store.

The list goes on…. our technology tools and environments are being equipped with algorithms and (spiders and robots) automated tasks which are becoming more intelligent, and at a level are given more independence to make executive decisions to enhance tasks in reaction to our online behaviors and habits. This is a huge shift, and with this a whole set of philosophical questions and dilemmas arise which delve into privacy, who has ownership, who gets to decide what these tools and algorithms do, and how much independence should they have? I am reading and seeing more evidence of this change, where we are asking our technology tools and systems to think for us and help make decisions. At this stage it all seems useful, helpful and harmless. Who minds having something save everything without you having to remember. Who minds having their devices do in the background of our awareness, updates, sinking, and analysis ? At this time it is useful and a time saver….and to be honest this has been going on for a while with a variety of technology tools. An example is commercial aviation which has been relying on automatic pilot controls for a large percentage of tasks related to flying. There are definitely huge advantages, and at many levels these make the processes we rely on more efficient and seamless .

As we move forward with our digital evolution:  our tools, operating systems and devices are given greater independence to manage our lives. The question I currently struggle with is at what point do we feel comfortably giving up control and let many of these devices  have complete autonomy of certain tasks, decisions, and information we get to have access too. To what point do we let convenience and efficiency erode potentially our own independence to make decision ourselves with these digital environments. There is no doubt that for the companies behind these tools, devices and operating systems, this control and information is becoming a critical commodity to generate information databases which leverage a greater capacity to target products, habits and behaviors effectively to the user. This then generating profits for the companies behind these devices, software and operating systems.

I am like many, I love the seamless integration, the fact that more mundane tasks are being taken over, and me not having to think about them. But when is too much, and when will we suddenly wake up and realize so much has fallen over to algorithms and (spiders and robots) automated tasks that we have lost control and now are having many of our decisions and tasks dictated by others who we have let say with.

As Gil Scott Heron say so aptly ” the revolution will not be televised“

John@https://beyonddigital.org

Facebook Users for 2011Q1

Facebook has continued to grow during the first quarter of 2011, showing an increase of approximately 79 Million Users, going from 585 to over 664 million subscribers worldwide. Facebook subscriber data, country by country, is available at Facebook Stats. Please take note that the penetration rates are based on the new population estimates for mid-year 2011.

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Regarding demographics, nearly 30% of the new FB registrations are from users in the 18-24 age group. This age group remains the largest with 210 million registered Facebook users. The next in size is the 25-34 age group with approximately 20 million new subscribers, for a total of 174 million registered Facebook users. The third group, both in growth and in size, is the 35-44 age group with an increase of nearly 11 million new subscribers, for a total of 90 million FB users.

In summary, 72 % of all Facebook users, 475 Million approximately, are in the age group between 18 and 44 years of age. Facebook continues to grow and attracts new users every day in over 213 countries and regions of the world. Almost one out of every ten persons in the world has a Facebook account.

Microsoft Academic Search is a new academic search engine (beta) for exploring scientific publications, authors, conferences, journals, organizations and keywords. It is useful to scholars, students, librarians, and other users. The search results are sorted based on two factors: relevance to the query and global importance

http://academic.research.microsoft.com/

bit like Donald Trump complaining that he was called a “thousandaire.”

Mr. Parker’s online personna is not what I would call consistent across the Internet.  He identifies himself as “a” founder at both Napster and Facebook.  The Wiki claims, “Contrary to popular belief, Parker was not a co-founder of Napster, as depicted in the movie The Social Network and post-Napster news articles, but rather an early employee as detailed in contemporary literature.”

They do confirm that “In 2004, Parker began informally advising the creators of Facebook, and became its first president, receiving 7% of Facebook’s stock when the company incorporated later that year.”  However, the Wiki claims Parker got busted on cocaine charges and, “Facebook’s biggest investor, Jim Breyer of Accel Partners, pushed for the ouster.”  http://www.businessinsider.com/facebooks-first-president-was-fired-over-a-cocaine-arrest-2010-5

Over at VentureBeat, they claim that it was, “his cheekiness drew anger from the recording labels, which eventually shut down Napster with lawsuits.”  Cheeky or not, Mr. Parker represents a part of the wild west Internet that may be making a comeback.

“After Napster, Parker co-founded Plaxo, a site that updates contacts. Soon, Parker was in peoples’ faces again. Some accused Plaxo of spamming, because of its constant update requests. During the post-bubble downturn, Parker got pushed out by Sequoia Capital and Ram Shriram, and there’s been silence over the real reasons ever since.”

I think Parker could be the next Internet super hero, but I wish he’d let his connection to Plaxo fade into the sunset, and drop the word abuse from his heartaches.  Just saying Plaxo sounds medicinal..  I knew guys who were pimping that hustle ten years ago, and it looked snarky then.  I hope Parker and company realize that you can’t push that sort of intrusion to the people any longer.  It’s like a guy smoking a ten cent cigar, looking for a twenty dollar conversation.

Online communities that are using the Internet for commerce, will kill your business, if you don’t meet their ideas for a relationship.  SPAM is more evil now than ever before, in all its renderings. It’s key to respect your community and put a face on your business.  This is the ‘Age of the Literary’ and people are willing to talk but they aren’t going to accept the grifting that’s been going on.  Just ask your pals at FB.

I hope that the Sand Hill crowd isn’t so addicted to the FB models that they forget to find some funds for more innovative Internet startups, but these guys seem pretty good at picking the next whales:  Parker also came up with much of what we see as the Facebook News Feed, and he believes that format is the future of communication on the Web. “The social graph,” he says, referring to the connection people have with others through multiple degrees, “is the critical ingredient.”

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		Affordable End-to-End Storage for Mid-Sized Organizations
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But everyone who thought that consoldiation was imminent, and the markets would slow down, jobs would dry up, well they continue to miss the mark on the technology sector.  Many believed that business would dry up and bury the eonomy, and end jobs.  They didn’t really take into consideration that there just might be a few new Rock Star moguls who will want to move this economy the way it moved in ’98.

The consumer hordes flocking to the social networks have created a meaningful subsidy to the advertising industry. Our poor print friends, and TV and radio friends, are suffering the last few years, but Internet 2.0 is living up to the hype by providing new global eyeballs with lots of crossover to the business markets. Unfortunately for many agencies, this isn’t simply retooling, and jobs are not easily transferred from direct marketing channel providers, to Internet savvy jobs, especially when the skills required are technology and communications based. If B2B advertising services are going to serve enterprise software lead generation requirements, it’s time we updated our coverage checklist.

Social Networking Checklist For Big Technology

Until recently, every suggestion for covering social networks -to generate sales leads- was coupled to the blog. The blog was generally shot down in any meaningful way from the start. The blog taboo has prevented marketing managers from making a proper assessment of the other social channels that are thriving for the technology community. Some forward thinking companies are using their social network plan as the blueprint for their marketing, instead of an afterthought. Some of these companies are actually built around the same architecture. Domains of interest continue to emerge

I would guess that Twitter is now as important to technology companies, as Google was ten years ago. As a “niche” tool for gleaning leads and testing offers, Twitter is a novel approach. However, if you don’t understand the IT sector, and all the different offers, and all the different responses, you will be guessing. LinkedIn has some very expensive paid eyeballs but they also have some great access via their “Group” function. Lots of great innovative ways to network and a brave new world. But folks, this is not going to happen with your conventional press release dispatch.

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		Increase Your Revenue by Optimizing your Data Center
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If you want a program that addresses how to make sure your message, along with your brand, is broadcast across all the social channels, and refined with the right groups, you have to talk to the folks who have been trusted in this space since 1998. If you would like us to design a list to check where your IT audience is hanging out, let’s discuss it.

Clever Presentation by http://www.jwtintelligence.com/