Google Plus isn't my social network, it's where I live. (Part one)

Today, Chee Chew announced that Hangout on Air are open for everyone!

This is huge. You now have a full, worldwide television station attached to your Google Plus account. Go live anytime for demonstrations, discussions, parties, fun, business, whatever works within the 10 person live video streaming platform of YouTube. (Note, there are some countries that are not currently allowing their citizens to be On Air: Germany is one.

Google Drive for collaboration

I've just started using this for work with a new associate and we've both found it to be incredibly useful. Google's free tools won't necessarily replace similar ones out there, but they are tied in with the GoogleVerse, and that seems to be a great advantage to me.

Gmail needs no introduction

I've been using it for years, bith as a paid and a free app. I run my own servers and it is trivial for me to run my own mail, yet I opted to pay for Google Apps for our small business and do all my personal mail on Gmail.

Daily News in a Vertical Sector (VoIP)

Every morning I do some news reviewing for the weekly VoIP & Tell on this page. Google News is one of the first things I see in the morning, sometimes before my mail.

There are many other great Google services like Maps, Books, etc. I think most of them will be tied together with a common toolbar some day. Google may not be the answer to every single situation. Perhaps you shopuldn't put all your eggs in one basket, but compared a social network, I'm happier on Google Plus and have no immediate plans to change that.

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(Part One is here)

I don't see G+ as a social network:  The Social Backbone.

Google Plus will become the glue that holds together all of Google's platform. Think about how important that is. Instagram is a game compared to this future "social backbone".

YouTube, one of the top destinations on the Internet. When Sarah Hill (she's not a star, but she just passed a million followers) goes live on YouTube, G+ers join her to give input about the topics of the day. I heard a rumor that the thumbs up and down are going to be replaced by a +1 button for Google Plus.

Look at Gmail, Drive, Documents, Play, Calendar, Schemer and the rest of the Google space. Everything in that universe will probably be tied together by Google Plus some day. The ways these things can be combined will be amazing, sharing photos, documents, files, solutions to problems you haven't thought of yet. And Hangouts, public and private. Hangouts that can be learning sessions or seminars, paid for using Google Wallet.

Ok, you don't have time to deal with "yet another place to check in", learn an unfamiliar paradigm, explore a new universe, because you think it's a new social network?

Think again.

Part Three

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Facebook is a social network. I don't see G+ as a social network, nor do I see Linkedin or Twitter as social networks. Here's why.

Linkedin is a professional directory. I accept only professional contacts there and then, in media or telephony or networks, nothing else. Twitter is a feed network, much of what you see there are links to blogs (including an auto-Tweeted one from this blog). It's also related to world, national and local news in short bursts and a few pleasantries between online friends.

Google Plus is more like a party.

 I compare it to a cocktail party where you mingle, as opposed to a dinner party where you sit with the same 4-6 people in conversation range. If you don't drink alcohol, there's fruit juice.

You meet new people at a party. As you walk around, you sample conversations. Assuming you are polite, civil and write in good faith, as opposed to in a purposely contentious manner, you'll be welcomed into the conversation. In real life, you wouldn't listen to a conversation, hear a statement and say "Totally man!" and nothing else. On G+ you might use the +1 to say that. Or you might want to actually chime in with an opinion or fact, in which case you might shout out the person's name with the @ or + sign, since comments are not threaded.

The key to me, and why G+ isn't a social network is that while relationships are created (and sometimes broken) there, they are based more on content than knowing the actual person. 

The key to a good experience is who you circle

One of the reasons G+ is not exploding is the difficulty of discovery. It's hard to get started. For a quality experience, you really have to circle people based on past postings, which, like for mutual funds and stocks, "may not be a guarantee of future performance". This can translate to a lot of work, circling and uncircling people or putting them in places you watch less. My purpose isn't to give tips or write a guide, only to say why I like it and think it's worth the trouble.

Hangouts, public, private and On Air

Hangouts is Google's word for video conferencing of up to 10 participants. A hangout can be private where you invite specific people. Those people can invite others. Or, a Hangout can be public, open to anyone who sees them. One of the big sticks Google has is Hangouts on Air (HoA). HoA are available to a limited number of users at the time of this writing while debugging and development is taking place. Soon, everyone will have this awesome power.

The HoA difference

HoA have a "Broadcast" button. When this is pushed, the Hangout appears as a live Youtube stream. This is a very important feature because it allows a huge potential audience to view the Hangout. Imagine panel discussions, interviews, lessons, demos... all of these things and more can be shared by millions live. Stop and consider how amazing this is: start a conference, send the live URL out to Twitter, Facebook, your mailing list, Google Plus, Tumblr, anywhere. The same URL will persist after the HoA and once the video is processed, it's available there for those who didn't see it early enough to view live. Basically, this feature is similar to competing offers costing between $30 and $300 per month, with the result being hosted on Youtube, connected to Google's ubiquitous search engine AND the Google Plus Cocktail... er "Social Network".

Google Plus is a force to watch and I believe that if you have any interest in what goes on online these days and into the future, it can not and should not be ignored.

My current HoA are posted at http://PlusRealTime.com and started on the Plus Real Time Page.

There is an excellent post by Cliff Roth on Google Plus comparing G+ to a convention.

Part TWO

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Test photopedia widget

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I just learned today of the death of an old friend, Red Holloway. I met Red in 1974 on the gig with John Mayall. Red was a great jazz and blues player, and that year we recorded an album on Polydor and toured Europe, then Japan, Australia and New Zealand. Hanging out with Red was an amazing experience. He was 47, I was 27, and we were from different worlds, as was everyone in that "Latest Edition" band. Touring Europe with Red and drummer Soko Richardson, especially when we ate in fancy restaurants. Soko travelled with at least 12 bottles of hot sauce in his bag and Red would tell the waiters, "pass that gravy over here, sucker!".

Musically, Red was a giant, check this Youtube video. 

Red played with an impressive lineup of talent, including Billie Holiday, Muddy Waters, Chuck Berry, Ben Webster, Jimmy Rushing, Arthur Prysock, Dakota Staton, Eddie Vinson, Wardell Gray, Sonny Rollins, Red Rodney, Lester Young, Joe Williams, Redd Foxx, B.B. King, Bobby Bland and Aretha Franklin. Later in his career, he teamed up with Sonny Stitt.

When Red came to Paris, we used have lunch at least once, when he'd play places like the one on Rue Jacob. Funny that as I learned of his passing today, I laughed thinking of the lines he sang on "Cleanhead's Blues" at that club: "If you see Kay.... tell her I'm lookin' for her..."

Good night, "sucker", rest in peace.

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GWOBorg is an international coalition of passionate problem solvers working together to assist people whose survival is improved through access to technology or communications in instances of violence, neglect, or catastrophe.

Background:

In 2000, Johnny Diggz co-founded Voxeo with Jonathan Taylor.  For over 10 years, Voxeo has been demolishing barriers and unlocking communications between disparate networks, varying protocols and proprietary social communication tools.  A decade later hundreds of thousands of developers, 45,000 companies (including half of the Fortune 100), have run millions of applications on Voxeo’s global cloud network and premise solutions.

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I wish that 2012 could be the year that every soldier from every country came home for good. (vote and be active in your country's choices)

I wish that 2012 could be the year that every human being on the planet had an equal chance for dignity and self-determination that would bring food and shelter to their families and make the world a better place for all. (participate in http://kiva.org)

I wish that 2012 could be the year when we could give up the notion that we alone are worthy and understand that all deserve a chance, the same chance that we, the privileged, were born with through no inherent qualities of our own doing. (get over yourself, collectively, we've been brainwashed)

I wish that 2012 could be the year that people who have kids would become patient, ardent and inspiring teachers to their own children in the hours they could be spending on that responsibility. This alone would change the quality of life for the entire world. (got kids? Think about the time you spend with them and the effect you need to have on what and who they will become)

I wish that 2012 could be a year where the quality of life of every being on this planet would improve, just a little. (Stop selfishly wasting resources)

You may notice that these were my wishes for 2011. Little has changed, unfortunately.

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Brough Turner, founder of Netblazr which he describes as "a radically new form of wireless ISP." 358: Brough Turner of Netblazr by VoIP Users Conference

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Don't believe the image, it's beautiful out here right now! Will this new app save Twitter? twitter.com/randulo/status…

— Randulo Zeeek (@randulo) December9, 2011

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Randall, Google Plus is waiting for you and here's why:

• Your Tweets that you consider throwaway during chronic insomnia are not disposable at all, but they're recycled a lot. You're a great writer, you know it, we know it. 
• There is no law that says you have to post things longer than 140 characters, but you'll never be stopped by that limit.
• There's no law that says you have to post a photo, but should you care to, you can post one or more
• There's no law that says you must post links, but you can post them and they will usually be  presented in an interesting inline fashion at the bottom of your post.
• Posts on G+ can be edited and deleted forever, should you care to. Same with comments.
• Public posts are indexed in Google's search results. Don't want that? You have full control of it.
• In fact, you can aim your posts at anyone you like, from the full public + future public who sees search results to one person.
• There's plenty of noise on G+, but just like on Twitter, you don't circle (follow) noisy people, you won't see them.
• Yes it takes some work and time to get it working right. Making wine doesn't? Raising kids? The Time Crossword Puzzle? Nothing worth doing does it self.
• Hangouts. I won't get into this here. Just Hangouts.
• Serious discussion? It's up to you, once you've made your environment, you can be serious or just a desperate insomniac at will.

What's in it for you?

Let's face it, of those 
356,663 followers
you have, how many are interacting with you? At night when you can sleep? Sturgeon's law, my friend.

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Thinkup 1.0 is released! @ginatrapani and the crew talk about how they got here and where they're going.

Thinkup Talk Podcast is also available on iTunes

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Social media is not for everyone. Does your butcher shop even need a web site? 

But here's the thing. If you are going to do something, put your heart, soul and possibly money into it and do it right. I'm looking at two Facebook fan pages. I call these brand pages. One has many thousands of followers, the other about 10% of the first, yet these represent equally well-known luxury brands with a nearly identical consumer demographic. They were created at about the same time. There is only one reason why there is a ten-to-one ratio of activity and followers. Can you guess what it might be?

Page A is open to fans posting photos, videos, and comments. Page B is not. Page A has a dialog going on week after week. Page B has a continuous feed of vanity posts, liked by people either from the company or from their agencies. Page A wants to engage with you. Page B wants to preach and blurt. Not by coincidence, the same two have Twitter accounts with the same comparison of engagement level. Page B does a little better on Twitter, because it started earlier and Twitter is more forgiving. Why? Because your posts are not usually read all lined up like they are on Facebook, so the lack of engagement isn't obvious. If you could examine the Twitter activities of of the pages on a tool like Thinkup, you'd see a huge difference: Thinkup calls Page B a "broadcaster". It's really just a news feed with no dialog at all.

Take a long hard look at what your company (product, brand or service) is doing out there. Is it possible you don't get it? One of the first things you need to do is to put yourself in the place of a visitor. Why do they come? How easy is it to find what they've come for? If you can honestly say that you've answered those two questions and that your page or site meets those expectations you've determined, you're good. If not, you'll need to decide whether it's worth continuing.

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Podcasting is now, and a lot of high visibility talents have adopted it with a passion. Kevin Smith has a whole network of comedy tailored to the taste of Silent Bob fans.

Of that group, Jay Mohr, who I first noticed on his series Action, explained to comic buddy Patrice O'Neal on a recent episode of Mohr Stories, how he started and what he sees as the benefits of podcasting. Someone told Mohr about how podcasting would help fill up his live gigs, and he says this works. I don't doubt it. I'm really happy to listen to Mohr - if only he'd talk a little about Action, which had so many qualities and was so ahead of its time on TV. Mohr told Patrice O'Neal he's seeing better crowds at gigs already, and tried to explain how people listen to audio podcasts while commuting, traveling, etc. They talked about Louis CK as well, another pioneer, this time in self-produced TV Louie. It's all proof that the future is now. What are you waiting for?

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I really like this product!

You can make free calls between units, so if you have family at a distance that costs money to call, you can effectively set up free calls between the units.

Got Google Voice? You need one of these ObiHais at home or at the office to connect it to a phone and not need to have a computer on all the time.

Check the Amazon link for pricing on the Obihai. (support the VUC buy buying it through Amazon if you care to)

While the ObiHai product is a geek's dream with a zillion parameters to tweak, an ordinary mortal can set it up in a few minutes.

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There are already too many channels, but I can't find a channel that everyone is listening to, and it's a problem. I will cross post this on at least 5 of them: email, Facebook, Google Plus, IRC, and the Unblog.

While at Astricon, every single night there were ad hoc groups forming to go to dinner. Some had American cells, some got the wifi cut off and had no data, etc. So how were we to keep in touch? The irony of a large conference entirely about telecommunications, convergence, VoIP and telephony is surely not lost on you, gentle reader. We really need a single channel if we want to keep in touch. That channel, for my part and until something better comes along is Google Plus.

If you want to be included in future dinners, wine tastings, lunches, breakfasts, strip clubs, poetry readings or whatever comes up when we get together in meat space or virtually, please get on Google Plus. It matters not if you do not follow anyone or are not active, but it does matter that that channel is the most flexible at the moment. Adding my prejudices, Facebook isn't good for this, IRC is too old school, email too iffy. Assuming you have a cellphone and data, Google Plus is the way to go. If you eschew social networks - of which Google in NOT in my opinion - fine. But don't be surprised if you don't hear about things in a timely fashion.

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I was looking at the statistics from two podcasts I've produced over the last 5 years, the current VoIP & Tell (the VoIP Users Conference) and the New Wine Consumer which hasn't recorded a new eposide for about 18 months.

What's interesting to me, is that these are very targeted sessions, something akin to presentations at a trade event. When you do a presentation at the typical trade show or convention that I have attended, you'll be talking to maybe 25-80 interested people.

During the 18-month hiatus of the New Wine Consumer where no new material is being produced, we still see about 1,500 unique IP downloads each month of the 250 existing recordings. Suppose a single sponsor had a mention at the beginning and end of each of these. That sponsor would have reached an audience of over 160,000 very narrowly-targeted people. Compared to the scatter approach of TV, radio and newspapers, you might start to see why this is so impressive.

The case of VoIP & Tell (VUC) is much different, because each week we gather between 35 and 100 live callers. Those who are unable to call live will usually listen to or download the recordings. The current average of downloaded VUC recordings is 5,000 to 6,000 per month. In one year of sponsorship, about 60,000 listeners are listening to guests and regulars discussing this very vertical market.

I look forward to meeting many of them at Astricon, Digium's Asterisk product showing in October of this year.

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Thinkup Talk #9

Lots of great contributions from the great Thinkup community:
Very improved Facebook plugin, Beta 15 migration issues, manual migrations, future planned improvements and features.
Mentioned links
http://waxy.org/projects/thinkup-launcher/ 
http://expertlabs.aaas.org/thinkup01/?u=The+White+House&n=facebook+page 
https://dev.twitter.com/blog/introducing-twitter-web-analytics  
http://www.mongodb.org/display/DOCS/Use+Cases
https://github.com/ginatrapani/ThinkUp/wiki/Installation%3A-Local-Computer

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I think the It Gets Better Project for gay teenagers is a great idea. There is nothing as depressing for a young person than to experience ostracism, bashing and abuse in a period of life that's hard enough to deal with. I'd like to point out though, that not only gays suffer from this kind of thing in their teenage years.

When I was in junior high, living a normal social life with friends of both sexes, looking forward to a sex life on the near horizon, my family moved 2,000 miles across the US and I was plunged into a new school in the middle of the second year. The social pecking order in such places is already established, I didn't fit in anywhere. I was pretty much shunned by most of the other students, but I met a friend and neighbor, Owen Husney with whom I've corresponded all these years. Owen and I shared the common problem of "not fitting in" and we hit it off right away. We both learned to play the guitar and formed a band. Later we went our separate ways musically, but we've kept current with each other. We both went on in life to do some surprising things, considering how little respect we got in those early years. After playing and recording with a band called High Spirits in Minneapolis, Owen got into management and signed and developed an artist who has made a deep and lasting mark in the musical landscape: Prince. Owen also managed Al Jarreau, a seven-time Grammy award winning jazz singer. Owen has been playing the big league of the music business for decades.

On the occasion of fifty years passing since we first met outside on a snowy day in Minnesota, I recorded a chat with Owen about our lives then and now.

It Does Get Better by randulo

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Santa Barbara Airport, the newly opened (beautiful) terminal, Wednesday morning. Who's sitting there a few feet away from us? Why he's probably on his way to play his next gig in Northern Cal (the SFO flight is next to our gate).

Before I tell you what Jeff said to that, I have to mention that I have shaken some very famous hands before. I'm not an autograph guy, I'm not a photo op guy, I shake hands and mutter whatever comes to my mind. I swapped a sentence or two with all four Beatles and recall George saying what sounded like "Bagsy!" when I handed him a guitar. Ringo said "What'ya got for me, then?". Mel Brooks said something witty as did Milton Berle. Shirley MacLaine smiled and I can't recall what she said. In short, celebrities, at least the ones I've met, who actually are famous for doing something, for being someone, are most often just people. If you don't try to interfere with them, they're as gracious as you or me, maybe even more so, noblesse oblige.

All this to say, what that Rooster Cogburn voice replied to my compliment, "I really like your work" was just this: "Well thank you... I like your glasses, man." Imagine, someone at that level of achievement who, when complimented, sends a vibe like that right back with as much sincerity. I truly believe there's a lesson in this for all of. I hope I can remember it next time someone says "I like what you do." It does happen, you know.

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