I haven’t given any ‘blogging’ advice in a long time. And whom and I to give it?

But I have noticed one little thing that can help get your posts a little edge. Maybe it’s this increasingly ‘real-time’ World, or maybe they’ve always done it, but Google is so much constantly crawling, that when your content changes, even on an older post, the Google ‘bot’ almost immediately notices and comes running to check it out. So in this ‘timely’ World, it could get you a spot on the top or at least on the front page of results, for your particular topic. In other words, one gets the since that ‘timeliness’ is increasingly an ingredient in the secret ‘sauce’ of Page Rank.

Also I’ve noticed another benefit: It sort of gives you a sense of continuum and wholeness to your ideas if you’re keeping them alive in this way. In other words, if you add to them when some new material arises, simultaneously your subsconscious goes to work, ‘effortlessly’ bringing you some new creativity and synthesizing your main ideas, perhaps by doing it’s own ‘crawling’ in the otherwise overlooked areas of your mind.

In response to John Battelle’s blogpost: Google+: If, And, Then….Implications for Twitter and Tumblr, I wrote the following: (Note such posts harken back to one of my blog posts about blogging itself: That is, if you find something you are interested in, and read blogs about the topic, often times your replies become long enough to qualify for blog posts. Also, by replying and leaving a link to your blog, it drives a little traffic as well.)

That was one of my first thoughts when I experienced Google+ that Tumblr was in trouble

Still they have a community. I’m on it. My impression of it is more of photo and gif sharing, but not personal photos as much as interesting photos, magazine like photos, that people are posting from somewhere else. To get attention on a Tumblr to post, the photos need to be striking, extremely funny, or otherwise “headline” grabbing.

Like Twitter, not a lot of personal feel to it, but fun, and I like Fred’s attitude that companies don’t kill other companies as much as companies kill themselves.

But my main takeaway from Google+ is not so much the service itself, although it is great, as like you say, it’s integrated with all of Google’s other services. Google may be Germany, but the seem to be the one company of all of these that has all the pieces. The whole is greater than the sum of the parts. And that will be a powerful value proposition.

It almost reduces Twitter and Facebook to applications on this vast Cloud OS, rather than platforms in and of themselves. And Apple, for all it’s wonder, doesn’t have a Cloud Syncing OS, much less a Social Network. I think Apple should buy Twitter and Facebook should merge with MSFT.

The deep integration of Google+ with Android will be compelling and I don’t see the “app” for the iPhone as being as robust an experience as it will be on Android. This could be a long term threat too Apple as well if they don’t get their Cloud Offerings together.

Young people already having fun in "Hangout" the killer video app that will drive mass adoption to Google+

My introduction to Google+ was by way of watching  yesterday’s episode of TWiG, which featured Bradley Horowitz and Vic Gundotra, the two leaders of the Google+ project.

But what caught me,  got me really excited about Google+, happened in the minutes before the show actually started.  Leo jumped on a feature of Google+ called “Hangout,” an instant video conferencing application that is automatic, and which can include up to 10 people from your various “Social Circles.” What immediately jumped out at me was how FUN, spontaneous, and effortless it seemed (as well as being productive). You don’t have to place a call to someone or schedule a video chat. If you see someone “hanging” out you can just jump right in, sort of like the serendipity of jumping into a Twitter or Facebook conversation (known as dipping in and out of the “stream”).  But those are text,  and this is VIDEO, and that makes a big difference. Leo’s first friend who “popped” into his video hangout was Trey Ratcliffe, noted photographer, and for some reason, watching it, there was this surreal feeling that Trey (who happened to be in Chicago I believe) was actually inside the computer, like behind a cardboard cut-out, instead of being thousands of miles away. It made me think of all those hundreds of avatars I see each day on Twitter or Facebook, if they could suddenly come alive, instead of being frozen as they are in still photos. Suddenly the internet had “come to life,” as it were. A marvelous feeling. Among other things that are great about Google+, it seems more “alive” than the other social networks. More living, breathing. And “Hangout” is a big reason why.

Leo said it himself, almost spontaneously,  that Hangout was one of the coolest things he’d seen in a long time, and I agree.

The rest of Google+ is beautiful, engaging, and full of potential, but Hangouts is the killer app, I believe will drive mass adoption.

So the conversations around Google+ were inevitably “Will it kill Facebook? Will it Kill Twitter?”

That question remains to be seen, but I think folks nitpicking this feature compared to that feature, and on and on, are missing the BIG PICTURE.

The big picture is what Google is after, and I would argue has the most vision about, and the most resources to execute.

The Key here is that the Whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

If you take the individual pieces, you could say Twitter is better at what it does, Facebook is better, and Apple is better with it’s mobile OS. I think it’s fair to say that each of their individual pieces is better than the individual pieces of Google’s platform, albeit, just from one evening with Google+ it seems to be every bit as good as Facebook and perhaps better especially with the Hangout feature and the Social Circle feature, which makes it FUN to create lists. No one wants to create lists, but everyone likes to have them. And one more thing about creating “Circles” Did you notice how “Applely” it feels to drag so easily your contacts into the circles. It has the same feel as dragging things on OSX. A prime example of how an operating system can execute with the same feel as a desktop system. One little nudge in Chrome’s direction (Another piece of the puzzle)

But the key here is that Google has all the pieces. Think about it. Neither Twitter or Facebook has a mobile OS. Google does. Apple has an OS but doesn’t have a Social Network, nor the back end Cloud Syncing Data capabilities that Google has. This is why Apple and Twitter are having a “shotgun” wedding in iOS5 and why Microsoft is engaged with Facebook. But these types of “bolted” together arrangements rarely work. Two different companies, two different cultures. But still you get the point: These other companies don’t have all the pieces to bring together the new paradigm of the Web and Mobile being the new productivity platform. Google does have all the pieces. Their “jigsaw” puzzle type logo is now making more sense.

This isn’t just about a Social Network. This is about a platform of services that are tightly integrated.

What became clear to me last night is that this isn’t just about Google+ (as great a product as that is and will be), it’s about the fact that, with this launch Google has, in effect,  reduced or ‘highlighted’ Twitter and Facebook-type functions as mere applications, powerful and important as they are, within a much greater whole, but not platforms. In a sense, they are apps without a platform and Apple is a platform without an App. I know that sounds silly with what all the hundreds of thousands of apps in the App Store, but what I mean is a data app, a cloud app, an app to Data Productivity Services that syncs all of your data immediately in the Cloud, as well as to a Social Network, which I am arguing is simply an “App” of this new Cloud Computing World. Apple Apps are wonderful, beautiful, but they are in a sense isolated islands.

Why is the Cloud so important and why is it considered the leading paradigm? The “Cloud,” as it were, marries the two most important aspects of the data revolution: Automation (Micro Electronic Revolution) + Distribution (The Telecommunications Revolution).  Light and Electrons. Electrons for storing and automating data, photons for delivering, communicating, distributing data. The Cloud is needed to leverage the exponential productivity gains that comes from combining these two separate technologies. Each separately have given us productivity gains as great or greater than even the Industrial Revolution. But together the productivity gains are even exponentially more so. One which both businesses, individuals, governments, and society alike find opportunity and achieve higher standards of living.

Apple is trying with iCloud, but does anyone actually think they have the ability to compete and execute on that front (or maybe I should say ‘back-end’) with all the Data Centers and Engineering expertise in the Cloud that Google does? I don’t. At all.

Last night Scoble scoffed, “Hangouts is kinda cool.” Kinda Cool? What? That’s it? No other company on the face of this Earth could emulate what it takes to make that product happen at scale. Facebook can’t simply copy that feature. They don’t have near the resources or engineering to do it. Not to mention Twitter. Apple has the cash, but I’d argue, it’s not in their DNA. Apple likes to sell things, not connect things. Cloud Computing is not their forte, their passion. They’ll endure it, but I don’t see the product or experience as being particularly promising.

But let’s not get bogged down by individual features. Let’s look at the big picture. Google is the only company that has all the pieces of the puzzle, and as they bring these pieces together, it will invoke a value proposition that users would be depriving themselves of if they didn’t join.

Think for a moment about what I said about Facebook not having a mobile OS. It’s simply an app on the OS that you have to open each time and load your photos manually.

With Android tied to Google+ all of these signals, including photo uploads happen automatically. And that’s just the Social Network aspect, the social signal: Automation.

Google has a plethora of other invaluable services, Maps, Gmail, Location, Search, Music, Video, Cloud back up, automatic effortless syncing, and on and on. And they’ll continue to add productivity and all the categories of apps that people find useful. And with an OS that is tightly integrated with those services, I don’t care how beautiful your hardware is, how beautiful the interface is (I love my iPhone by the way), I’d bet my bottom dollar even diehard iPhone users will think long and hard about what their next phone is going to be, and in a year or two their tablet as well. Google is building and connecting a platform that essentially is the most valuable “content” for mobile computing and experiences. Even when they get around to an iPhone app, the experience won’t be nearly as robust as if one were using it on an Android device.

From this vantage point, Twitter and Facebook are looking a lot like Lotus and Wordperfect did in the 80s. Even though Microsoft Office wasn’t as good when it first rolled out, it iterated and became “good enough” then as good and then better. And the momentum was the integration and trust that came from the suite being tied to the OS.

The same will happen for Chrome, Android, Google Services, and Google Productivity suites all driven by the powerful backend, unmatched backend of Data Centers, the Cloud, and their unmatched expertise in those areas.

Before, Google was the backend that needed Apple for distribution. Now with Bradley Horowitz designing a beautiful front end for Google’s interface they have their own distribution channel, and a way to bring all of their enormous resources to bare in the marketplace.

Is Twitter dead? Is Facebook dead? Or Apple? No, not by a longshot. All of these companies are run by innovative geniuses who are not going to spit out the bit like Myspace. This will be a horserace, and a damn good one, but if I were placing my bets today, I’d say Google will win by a nose at the wire. They’ve always had the best horse. And now they have a winning jockey.

But in the end, the essence of the web is not a zero sum game. One can imagine all of these companies growing, being prosperous, and what’s more important, imparting enormous benefit and productivity gaines to civilization, all without having to annihilate each other. I’d say Myspace went down for lack of vision, lack of focus. In other words, not because of Facebook, but because of themselves.

John Wooden used to say that he rarely scouted the competition, that instead he focused on he and his team competing with themselves to get better. Twitter, Facebook, Apple, and Google all have this same drive and spirit. And what would be better than one defeating the other, is if they all constantly innovate, are “into” it, and in effect, all win.

Update: 7/2/11: I’m kind of angry. Today Tom Anderson wrote the following on G+, which is my same idea, yet it got an enormous headline on Techmeme via being copied in a post on Mashable. Kind of makes me mad, because I wrote this post on Thursday and sent it to Techmeme. On the one hand they must have put a small link to my post because I did get some traffic from techmeme, but nothing like a big headline they are giving Tom. Well, I guess that’s life. Tom is Somebody. But still, the idea is exactly the same as mine and yet they gave barely notice, but now that Tom said it, it’s the talk of the town, so to speak.

“Google+ seems like a “reaction” to Twitter/Facebook. But are you starting to see the ways that Google+ just makes Google a better, more integrated set of services? Google already has top-notch products in key categories–photos, videos, office productivity, blogs, Android, maps and (duh) search. Can you start to see/imagine what Google+ does for Gmail? Picassa? Youtube? Not to mention search? The +1 system that Google now has control of (unlike Facebook Likes) can really influence and change the nature of their search.

My original vision for MS was that everything got better when it was social–so I tried to build all the super popular things used on the web (blogs, music, classifieds, events, photos) on top of MySpace’s social layer. When Yahoo launched 360, MSN launched Spaces, and Google launched Okrut, I was shakin in my boots. But quickly I saw that it’s really hard to layer in social to features after the fact. At MySpace we had the luxury of having social first, and building the products on top of that layer. Then I choked and Facebook realized that vision.

But Google+ really seems to be primed to make good on that original premise–that everything gets better when its social. And unlike FB, Twitter, or anyone else, Google already has the most advanced set of products. And if I can clearly see where this is headed, then I think what we are getting is a much better Google. Does that kill FB/Twitter? Who cares? I’d use all 3, but more importantly, I’ll be using Google products I never used, or use them in new, better ways I never used them before.

Oh yah and I love my Google TV ”

-Tom Anderson, Founder of Myspace in a post on G+ on 7/2/11

More interesting reading:

Gina Trapani – Smarterware.org - What Google+ Learned from Buzz and Wave

Google+ Everything You Need to Know – TechRadar.com

Finally Getting Google – BigEvidence – Thom Kennon

Ad Free Google Plus 50 – Chris Brogan

The Top Google+ Tips and Tricks – Ranker.com

Is Google Hangouts It’s Killer App? - Nytimes.com

Google+ Improves on Facebook – David Pogue Review for the NYtimes.com

Google+: The Complete Guide – Ben Parr for Mashable.com

10 Things CMO’s Need to Know About Google+ : Chris Brogan writing for Forbes.com

Google+ is the Social Backbone – Ed Dumbill – O’reilly Radar

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Update: I totally didn’t expect this because this particular blog post isn’t about Qualcomm specifically, but IT’S actuallys showing up on the Google finance page for Qualcomm! I feel a little guilty about that, but I guess that it’s because I have either the name or Symbol within the post. So I guess you don’t necessarily have to have in the blog title. But I’ve already got about 20 hits from it this morning. Weird. Exciting, but as I said, I kind of feel guilty and didn’t intend that. Still it’s interesting to note.

I noticed a little “Easter Basket” type unexpected thing that can get you “free” traffic. If you are interested in stocks and you blog something about that stock, use the stock symbol in your headline and it will show up on Google’s finance page.

The other day I saw and insight by George Gilder on his forum about the company Qualcomm (QCOM) and it wasn’t a very long statement, but it was too long to be tweeted. I even tried FriendFeed which allows more characters but it still wouldn’t fit. So I went ahead and blogged it. I wasn’t thinking about getting exposure. I simply wanted to remember this statement, but I thought in the back of my mind that if I tweeted the headline with the tag $QCOM that it might show up on the sight Stocktwits.com.

Then I noticed I was getting a lot of hits from Google. I went to the link and it was to the finance page for Qualcomm. Halfway down the page theres a list called “As discussed in blogs” and there my post was right on top! Now Qualcomm is a big company with almost 20 million shares traded daily. So you know that page gets a lot of traffic. So if you write about a smaller company, then it might not do as well.

But of course I wouldn’t write just to get traffic. Only write about a stock or anything if you are truly interested in it and have something to say. And if you are an individual investor its a good idea to spend a couple hours a month investigating the news, press releases, and quarterly statements.

I just happen to be interested in individual investing and of course the companies I’m invested in. If you’re not, then obviously this tip isn’t right for you, but I do think it demonstrates the upside surprises that can come by writing something your are really interested in.

And it really impresses me more and more about Google and how it surfaces good blog content. I’ve heard before that Google likes blogs. And this demonstrates it’s true.

Also Google has recently updated its algorithms to get rid of the junk and content farms. This is beneficial for the individual voices who are publishing things they truly interested in.

In a keynote presentation at the GSMA Mobile World Congress, Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs declared that the mobile industry is on the verge of new step in its evolution, becoming our ‘sixth sense’. “We’re at a similar stage of evolution to when the mobile Internet started to happen,” he said.

“Jacobs claimed there will be hundreds or thousands of things around us that we will be able to connect to. How can this be accomplished without software radios?” – said George Gilder on his  Gildertech/board a few days ago.

Other interesting news that came out yesterday in a story on AppleInsider entitled “Mass production of Apple’s A5-, Qualcomm-powered iPhone 5 rumored for Sept.”

Among other things the story notes that “Apple will switch to Qualcomm’s basebands for both the CDMA & GSM versions of the phone, along with an improved antenna design.”

I don’t know how much sales and margins are in “basebands” but that’s gotta be good news for QCOM. Turns out their technology and innovation are not limited to CDMA only phones.

I was worried what effect LTE would have on QCOM in the long term, but George never answered that question I posted. But I get the feeling Qualcomm is innovating in all areas of mobile, and maybe there’s not a better investment in this whole huge paradigm of mobile growth?

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Downloadable .mp3 link: Gillmor Gang 4-15-11

We all should be riding on waves of light, but false monopolies propped up by Government regulation of communications has stifled innovation and business plans alike.

I was just listening to TWiT and they were having this discussion about the internet connectivity problem, the fact that we have a duopoly of telco and cable controlling it and now threatening bandwidth caps that could effect the coming consumption of video streaming that is coming online with Netflix, iTunes, Amazon, and the advent of live streaming from Ustream, Justin.tv, et. al. This is in fact the new paradigm, “Real-Time” as its known in the industry, and the falsely earned duopoly is threatening to turn off the spicket as it were just as video, a major leap forward for the net, wants to take center stage.

Leo Laporte suggested why doesn’t the government just force the cable companies to sell their access to other companies, just like they do with telco, in order to solve the problem.

Sounds reasonable, right?

No, no, no! A thousand times no! This is the very action embodied in the Telco Act of 1996 that caused the problem in the first place. It was the false propping up of competition that killed real competition.

Remember all those small telco companies that cropped up out of nowhere in the 90′s who promised you the moon and then quickly went broke?

Their entire business plan was not competitive, not investing their own capital, but merely using government regulation that allowed them to piggy back on existing infrastructure with no capital invested.

Then the whole thing came crashing down. It sucked the life out of broadband, and since all of the business plans of Web 1.0 were based on ubiquitous broadband, we had the great internet crash of 2000.

Think about it. If you had the billions of dollars it would take to make a go of it in the connectivity market, would you invest in laying fiber to people’s homes, when the government can come in at any time and force you to resell that access at no profit to an upstart “connectivity” company, a phantom company? NO. And that, my friends, lays the problem.

We all should have a fiber connection to our home for a reasonable price. The technology is there, the market is there, but the only thing that is standing in the way is Government regulation in the first place.

People like Leo still believe that the government is on the people’s side in this issue. But it isn’t. The government is on the Oligarch’s side. It’s like the old bit of “Good cop, bad cop.” The government in the major industries plays “Good Cop,” but behind the scenes it is the industry leaders who are writing the very legislation that the Government blesses, and thus stops investment in productivity, and ends up lowering the standard of living for all.

The only solution is for the government to get out of the way. On the one hand you have to let the Telcos and the Cables do what they want and have their data caps if they want. On the other hand they have to make it very clear that they won’t interfere with any real capital that is anxious to enter the market, making it clear that they can fairly compete.

The Mylikes_Retweet account on Twitter. Makes publishing an ad almost effortless, and totally fun!

Remember when I wrote about Mylikes, the social media ad platform, that allowed you to leverage your Social Media efforts? Well, I still love it, for all the reasons I mentioned in the post, but I noticed lately I haven’t been as active on it. There are more than a few reasons for this, but one of the biggest was LAZINESS. For one thing I got a new Mac, I didn’t remember my password, and I’d have to walk ALL THE WAY to the next room to log on. Just think of that: I’d rather walk to another room, boot up another computer, than simply reset my password! I just found out last night that I can log in to Mylikes through Twitter (or Facebook for that matter) but I was alway hesitant to do that because when I used that strategy with CinchCast, Cinchcast simply opened up another account for me, instead of linking me to my existing account. Not Mylikes. Simply logon through Twitter or Facebook and it links you to your existing account. Nice.

But it gets even better, and easier.

A Retweet is All it Takes

I noticed the other day that they have set up a special account called @Mylikes_retweet that tweets ads, and all you have to do is simply retweet (use the twitter retweet button) and of course not only is that ad published to all of your followers, any time that it is clicked you earn money! Talk about removing any friction! Not only do you not have to go to Mylikes and pick an ad, the copy is already written for you. And it’s great, eye catching, fun copy that is more conducive to “clicking” (translate, good for publishers!) As a matter of fact when I do it, I almost have to keep myself from clicking the retweet in my own stream (which would be against the rules.)

I love this feature because of its ease, but not only that, it interests me because it shows the innovative nature of the company. I mentioned in my earlier post that the founders, Bindu Reddy and her husband were ex-Googlers and that that fun, innovative approach was in their DNA, just like it is at Google.

Fun is something that is way underestimated, especially in Western Culture. We tend to divide “fun” away from our business life. Almost a firewall between fun, life, and business. But I just finished reading Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose,and the secret to Zappos’ culture is just the opposite: Fun, social, caring are intrisic to Zappos’ DNA. In fact it is their business model.

This theme struck a bell inside me earlier this week. I was chatting with a web developer friend. I mentioned that I was looking for a photo editing, creative application that wasn’t so intimidating (and expensive) as Photoshop. He mentioned Pixelmator and after telling me all the nice features about it, at the end in an unconscious exhuberence spouted, “And it’s fun!”

Well, for all the philosophical debate we have over advertising and it’s place, especially in Social Media, what about the philosophy of Fun?

If you are already a member of Mylikes, simply go to @Mylikes_retweet and pick an ad from their tweet stream. Simply retweet it, and see if you don’t have some fun as well as potentially earn some money.

And if you are not a member go sign up here: Mylikes.com (It’s free, and if you sign up with that link, I have a chance to win an iPad2, which you can too once you are a member.)

A few days ago my iPad’s home button stopped working. Seems like it happened right after I upgraded to iOs 4.3. The only thing I could do to use it was turn it off and back on. Mine’s a first generation that I got at Best Buy the first day it came out on April 3rd, 2010. I searched the web. There was a blog post where a lot of people who were having the same problem talked about solutions and whether it was hardware or software caused. Some found answers. Most didn’t and ended up taking it back and getting it replaced. Since mine is almost a year old and I didn’t buy any of the warranty from Best Buy or Apple, I figured I would have to take it back, they may send it off and that it would cost me something.

Anyway on this blog post I know one guy mentioned that his would work in Portrait mode. I tried portrait mode, still nothing. So I let the thing sit for a day. I’d thought about a hard reset, but how are you going to do a hard reset if the home button doesn’t work?

Anyway, yesterday, even though it was still not working, I found something funny: I noticed that when I held it in landscape mode, pushed the button, held it, then rotated it to portrait mode, then released, it started working, maybe half the time. I thought, “OK, I can live with this for a few days until I take it up there.”

Then later on, I had the iPad sitting flat on my wooden desk next to my desktop. I pushed the button. It worked every time. I thought, “Hey this is cool. OK.” I thought maybe it had something to do with the hard surface. Now my iPad is not in a case, so I don’t know if that may make a difference.

Now, a day after that, it seems to be totally working again like normal.

This could be totally anecdotal and have nothing to do with my exercises. Maybe it was just a glitch in the software that some how “healed” itself. But its worth a try if you find yourself in this same situation.

So try this:

• Hold the iPad in front of you in landscape mode
• Push the button and keep it held while you gently rotate it to Portrait mode, then release.
• See if you get any response: 1 out of 2 times, 1 out of 3, etc.
• If that works, or even if it doesn’t, lay the iPad gently on a hard, smooth surface, so there is even resistance. (If its in a case, I’d recommend taking it out) Push the button, hold it in a second longer than normal, then gently release.
• This may be totally anecdotal but it “feels” like it started responding when, after I pushed, I kept it pushed for a second, and then gently released.

Well maybe this is totally luck and yours still won’t work or maybe there’s something to it, and either the maneuver or the slight resistance somehow put it it back in place (assuming it is hardware related) or somehow fixed the “glitch” if it is software.

Either way, what I’m describing above is in no way harming the iPad. I wasn’t pushing any harder than normal or trying to shake it or anything like that. No need to push harder. Although it did seem, at first, that when I would hold it pushed in for just a second longer than normal and then gently released, it started to respond.

Don’t do anything that could damage your iPad, but try the above and see if it works for you. Give it a day or two. Maybe you’ll have the same “luck” that I did, and it’ll start working again.

If not of course take it back to the Apple Store. But either way, if you are one of the unfortunate ones like me that this happened to let me know how it works out. I’d love to hear your experiences. And learn.