Does Anyone Still Read Industry Publications?

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From: Andy2Boyz 

The possibilities are endless..., a custom daily briefing on virtually any subject of interest.

I was working my way through a professional membership application when the questions turned to demographics.  How big is your organization?  What is your budget?  How many people in your department?  Then they popped the question that I hadn’t been asked in ages:  What Industry Related Publications Do You Read?

I was taken aback and realized that the question was quite normal in 1995, even in 2005 or maybe even 2010.  But today, in 2013, with the vast increase in social media, blogs, twitter feeds, podcasts, and professional online communities, I must say that I don’t read any of them any more.

It was a good list, made up of the cream of the crop from 2003:  Business 2.0, Business Week, CIO Magazine, Computer World, Forbes Magazine, Info World, Information Week, Network World, Red Herring, Wall Street Journal, just to name a few.  But the reality is that it has been many years since I received any physical magazine in my inbox.  Come to think of it, for the last 18 months, I received nothing physical at work, other than a few vendor gimmicks.  All of my communications and my consumption of content has become digital.  The switch finally happened and I didn’t even notice.  Read on to see how this Social CIO keeps current today.

It started about four years ago when I began following thought leaders, analysts, and bloggers on twitter.  I found if I was selective with my “follow” population, I could get a customized feed in my twitter stream every day, throughout the day to satisfy my technical appetite.  Once I started following 400 or 500, I began to get overwhelmed, missing many tweets.  As a result, I found myself getting very selective about adding new tweeters to my stream.  That’s when I discovered the power of twitter lists. 

Twitter lists are an ingenious invention that allows you to segment those you follow into logical lists grouped by topic, locality, or anything you like.  I pulled together about 300 sources that I thought were most valuable based on my then-current interests around Enterprise 2.0 and Mobile trends.  That became “The Short List”.  It wasn’t so short, at 300 sources, but provided a very focused feed and allowed me to keep adding to my twitter “following” number without worrying about getting overwhelmed in the feed.

Later I created an additional list, simply called “list”.  I didn’t want to offend anyone on “the short list”, but this group was mostly professional acquaintances and a subset of my “short list” pared down to the 100 that I wanted to follow even closer.  Since then, I’ve added other lists for various topics, and followed lists created by others who’s opinions I respect, but I keep coming back to my “Short List” as the key source for my daily information feed.

Moving from Push to Pull

My personal daily paper 

I dabbled with Zite, and Flipboard, but found those too restrictive and never really liked the editorial choices they made.  But my Short List was just what I wanted to hear from every day.  Then, about two years ago, I stumbled upon Paper.Li.  This handy website takes my “Short List” and builds a daily paper based on the most popular feeds of this custom list of curators working just for me.  “The Short List Daily” as it is called is my daily paper giving me a quick briefing on all tech trends and topics.  It groups them into sections (business, technology, stories, culture) and sometimes even into hashtag groupings around events that might be taking place (#e2conf, #e20s for example). The paper has been indispensable.  I like it so much, I share each new issue every morning on my twitter feed.

Curated by the top influencers in
Enterprise Mobility

Just recently, I discovered a service called Littlebird created by industry veteran Marshall Kirkpatrick.  Littlebird does the work of finding the 500 most influential tweeters on any subject (instead of having to build my own “short list”) and allows one to build a twitter list from the result.  I took the list for Enterprise Mobility (created by @ITSinsider using the service) and fed it into Paper.Li and now I have a second “paper” to read every day, “The Enterprise Mobile Daily”.  Littlebird can also create a custom feed of blog posts from all of these top influencers as well.  Imagine a custom feed of all the blog posts from the most influential tweeters on the subject of Mobility, or Enterprise Collaboration, or DNA testing.  The possibilities are endless, providing today’s tech savvy information consumer a custom daily briefing on virtually any subject of interest.

Future this! collects future
oriented stories

I have also found a few other custom papers that I like to check into frequently.  “Future This!” is one of the best at following developments in future thinking.  I’m sure if you check around, you will find any list or “paper” on the subject that interests you as well.

I have just mentioned two sources of expert lists and content presentation platforms.  I expect there are and will continue to be other products continuing to evolve as they tap into the collective editorial skills of the crowd and produce custom feeds of news, trends, and developments in a handy easy-to-digest format.

So, getting back to that original question, What Industry Related Publications Do You Read? For many today, it’s the wrong question all together.  The real question should be How do you stay current in today’s fast evolving technology world?  My answer is a customer feed of self-maintained and custom generated expert lists, combined with the publishing platform of Paper.Li.  I would love to hear how you stay current in the comments below or through your return tweets.

Now, do you understand why the entire print news industry is on “death watch”?

Sections of The Short List Daily

Steve Jobs: Impressions from the Biography

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Steve Jobs was quite a remarkable man. I rarely read full books and cannot remember the last time I read a biography. But I just finished a fast 3 week journey through the recently released 650 page biography by Walter Isaacson. (Kindle on iPad edition, by the way)  It was quite a remarkable story and even more remarkable with its openness (as pre-approved by Steve) to be a clear, unbiased account of the author’s impressions after over 40 interviews with Steve and more than a 100 with those that knew him. What results is a enduring picture of a 20th / 21st century technology icon who is as unique as the products he introduced.

I’m not one to do book reviews, but I wanted to share some of my impressions mainly because his work had such an impact on my career and my “early adopter” mentality.

Steve is a several years older than me, but as he and Bill Gates were redefining the computer market from two different angles, I was just entering the workforce, having worked on both IBM and Apple computers, programming my way through the last few years of college. I remember watching the product rollouts and also choosing sides during the 80s when I needed to bet on the technology that would determine my career. I chose Microsoft and continued to keep an eye on Apple through the rollouts of various products through the 80s and 90s. Then when the 21st century Jobs emerged, I left my first choice behind and made the switch to Apple products, first with the iPod, then iPhone, iPad, MacBook Pro and finally even a Mac Mini, just because. The technology released in the last 10 years has been nothing short of revolutionary and we should all be indebted to Jobs for his persistence, his perfectionism and his vision to go with his gut.

As I was reading the book, many asked me what were my impressions. Here they are in no particular order.

1. Steve was a very hands-on manager. He never hid behind reports, market surveys, PowerPoint slides, or “expert opinions”. He was naturally curious and drove for perfection in everything he did. Early stories tell of how he insisted on every element of the original Mac design right down to the perfection of the layout of the circuit boards inside the case itself.
2. He was never afraid to voice his opinion. When you would show something to Steve, he would generally reply with one of two signature responses. Either he would “love it” (which was rare) or he would simply reply “That is sh—“ . No matter how hard the team worked, he was always stepping on egos and ridiculing his staff. I guess it made it all the more special when he finally liked what he saw. He insisted in hiring only “A-players” and equally insisted that everyone needed to have thick skin and needed to hear the truth (even though his “truth” often reversed into something else later depending on his moods.)
3. Steve and Bill Gates were really good friends through it all. I was taken by how much of an impact Microsoft had on the original Mac software. Their commitment to develop Word and Excel for the Mac was a big decision that paid of quite well for both Apple and Microsoft. Through the years, the two sparred often quite publicly and one would think maybe hurt feelings or grudges would take over. But the two truly needed each other and right up to the end when Bill came by to visit Steve in his final months, the two had a tremendous mutual respect for each other. I suppose they had each other to share in their common but equally unique journeys through the explosion of the personal technology wave.
4. Steve knew his life was likely to be cut short. Even before he was diagnosed with cancer in 2003, he pressed on to move as fast as possible. He was eager to make a difference, not for the money, but for the pure pleasure of making truly remarkable products. But looking back, his more significant work happened in the last 10 years of his life. He had a string of wins one after the other with the original iPod, iTunes, iTunes Music Store, iPhone, the App store, and finally the iPad. (We often forget the contribution his company, Pixar, made to animation with Toy Story and a string of hits through the late 1990s and 2000s with Toy Story, A Bugs Life, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, Cars, and Wall-E.)
5. He was a dedicated family man when it finally counted in the end. Jobs was very private as he lived, but after his death, he allowed the “family man” side of him to be documented. The book has several great pictures with Steve and his children (including 2 teenagers still at home). Yes, he made many mistakes, but in the end, was a dedicated husband of 20+ years and a loving father to his kids.
6. Steve, went to “find himself” during his early years. Very vocal about his experimentation with LSD and his travels to India, he did not have a strong religious foundation and instead spent his entire life searching and focusing on eastern philosophies. As a teenager he claims he abandoned Christianity because he could not reconcile why there was suffering in the world. In the end, he continued to be unclear about the afterlife and says he had come to a 50/50 conclusion about the existence of life after death. He did begin to make “deals” with God as he described it. One was that he really wanted to live to see his eldest son, Reed, graduate from high school. It’s sad that such a visionary in the tech world could be so confused all his life about the spiritual world.
7. Apple is Apple today only because of the unique vision, leadership, and drive of Steve Jobs. The company started with his inspiration, grew quickly through its early innovations, nearly choked on corporate “hand’s off” management without Jobs, and then was revived to become the world’s most valuable technology company under his encore leadership. Yes, Apple still has a great pipeline and will likely put out several more innovations over the next few years, but I would expect that it will unfortunately wind down without the wind of Steve Jobs in its sails and never get back to its earlier glory.

In the end, Steve wanted to write the post script. I feel I should give him that same honor here in this post.

“What drove me? I think most creative people want to express appreciation for being able to take advantage of the work that’s been done by others before us. I didn’t invent the language or mathematics I use. I make little of my own food, none of my own clothes. Everything I do depends on other members of our species and the shoulders that we stand on. And a lot of us want to contribute something back to our species and to add something to the flow…We try to use the talents we do have to express our deep feelings, to show our appreciation to all the contributions that came before us, and to add something to that flow. That’s what has driven me” - Steve Jobs

Thank you Steve. You certainly succeeded by adding your “something” to that flow. For that, those of us in technology are truly grateful.

Rest in Peace Steve Jobs.

It's Not the Tools; It's About the People

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We are all on Google+ now. It’s great because of who is here.
We were all on Quora at Christmas, because of who was there.
We continue to stay engaged on Twitter because of who is there.
We are bored with FaceBook because of who is there.
We use LinkedIn because of who we can find.
We use SocialCast in the Social Business Council because of who is there.
We use Jive with the Community Backchannel because of who is there.
We use Yammer in our jobs because of who is there.

It’s not about the tools, it’s about the relationship. The great thing about any social network is the socializing that takes place there. Yes, the tools are nice and a bad tool set can certainly squelch the conversation. But it's not about the tools it's about the relationships.

I've had the opportunity to speak with many people over the past few months who are not at all engaged in the social web. The line goes something like this…."I don't have time for all that social media." What they are really saying is "I don't value those relationships and what I learn there. I get all I need from other sources."

That’s fine. When people start to understand what they can get, the relationships they can build, and what an amazingly large diverse set of ideas is out there, they decide to connect.

Many stick with email and cocktail hour networking. That’s fine, I do that sometime too, but I find it is not at all efficient as a stand alone activity. It’s good when I want to go deep with someone, but at a typical event, I can only do that with 1 or 2 people. At best, I'll touch base with 5 or 10. During that same evening, I can touch hundreds or even thousands through online tools.

Through my Blog, Twitter, Google+ and various private communities, I can keep a conversation going with hundreds and my network can jump into overdrive when needed.

If you don’t want to use the social media tools now and think it’s too geeky, that's fine. We used to say that about CompuServe and then AOL came along to break the ice among the masses. Then came FaceBook and everybody went online.

It is indeed gone widespread. Google+ may not replace FaceBook. Everyone may not get on Twitter, but in the long run, the mega trend is that, more and more, our lives are moving online. What was once called a “virtual” meeting is just a meeting.

Do any of you call your FaceBook friends “virtual” friends? Do you call these virtual conversations? No, it’s a wall post, it’s a message, it’s real interaction.

Social is happening, it is happening in different rates for different people, but there is no going back. As my friend Chris Rollyson says, It’s an “and” world, not an “or” world. We keep getting more ways to connect, as a result we are more connected, and finally we can innovate and move faster.

That is just what’s happening. Don’t deny it.

So go ahead, get social. You can start by connecting with me on Twitter, LinkedIn, or Google+ and while you are at it, subscribe to my blog.

See you online!

Seven Days with Google +

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The Google+ introduction is a major tectonic shift in the social software landscape. Its aftershocks will be felt for some time to come

I received my invitation to join Google + last Wednesday evening from @ITSinsider.  It was a bit of a surprise.  I had just heard of the launch a day or two earlier.

Since then, it's been a daily party like I have not seen with any other SNS (social networking service) launch.  We had heard something about Google's Social Circles back during SXSWi, but the launch turned out to be just a rumor of what was to come just four months later.

iPhone in browser mode

My first take will be a little different from most because my time with G+ has been almost exclusively on an iPhone 4 or iPad 2.  Of the 15 or so hours I've been on G+, only about 15 minutes or so have been on a PC.  Even though the product is optimized for the full PC / Mac OS or Android mobile OS.  I must admit, even with its many flaws, the iOS experience is good enough to keep me coming back.

Here are my first impressions.

Central to the User Experience is the circle concept.  We all socialize in various circles. Google+ has made that literally the metaphor.  G+ daily offers me up to 500 invitations to add to my circles.  If the person is not yet in G+, they will get an invitation.  If they are already in, they join into my circles and I begin following and sharing with them.  (Be patient, G+ is still throttling invitations.)

Since I have not use the PC version with a webcam, I'm missing out on Hangouts - multipoint video chats.  That will come in time. I expect very good value for work groups and enterprise applications of this feature.  I also expect integration with Apple products with the forward facing camera (ala multi user FaceTime). With the recent introduction of Apple's FaceTime and now Google's new Hangout feature, perhaps personal video conferencing will finally reach the tipping point to general adoption.

I'm also excited about the ease of adoption.  Google+ has quickly added most of my social graph to their SNS and the conversations are quickly turning to real substance other than just discussing Google+ itself.

So what are my takeaways so far?

iPad in Desktop Mode

1. This is going to be big.  Google+ has scaled very quickly showing robust, well thought out features. It works easily on many platforms, combines access on any device to central cloud storage, performs well, and has already attracted the necessary early adopters.

2. This will evolve quickly.  Google is known for quick iterative innovations and promises constant upgrades and introduction of new features.  They also appear to be leveraging many of their various products without any sign of internal power struggles that will derail progress.

3. Facebook and Twitter have a real competitor now. Most early comments have been that Facebook should be scared, but little has been said about Twitter also being in Google's sights.  With the recent announcements of tight integration between Twitter and Apple's iOS, it looks like the Google+/Android camp is stacking up as a good alternative.  It might even be a three way race if the rumored Facebook / Skype entry materializes.  Anyway, like Facebook, Twitter has been acting monopolistically as of late (terms of service, acquisitions, apathy to partners)  It is good to see a product come along that offers a viable alternative.

iPad in Mobile Mode

4. Enterprise 2.o is in the game plan for Google+.  All the talk about Consumer and Facebook should not hide the fact that Google+ coupled with Google Apps will offer a powerful platform for enterprise collaboration, eating away at the SMB market first and later moving up the food chain to the Fortune 500 market.  E2.0 stalwarts such as Jive Software, Socialcast, Yammer, IBM Connections, and, to a lesser extent, SharePoint will see Google+ providing a new alternative in the young and growing Enterprise 2.0 collaboration market space.

That's my first look.  So much more can be said, but there will be plenty of time for that in the future.  The Google+ introduction is a major tectonic shift in the social software landscape.  Its aftershocks will be felt for some time to come.  So find me on Google+ http://gplus.to/jimworth  and let's continue the conversation.  I look forward to adding you to my new Circle of Friends.

The Social Mobile Enterprise

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Enterprise social mobility is the next big thing.

Yes, I said it.  I'm going out on a limb and predicting that the next major wave of enterprise innovation will be a combination of today's emerging social networking explosion fueled by a move to mobility in mass.  It feels like a very stable limb based on all that I have been seeing over the past few years.

Let's look at it in context.  Many have written about mega trends in evolution of enterprise technology.  Rawn Shah wrote an excellent piece recently outlining the move from Mainframe, to Departmental Computing, to Personal Computing, to Internet Computing, to today's Social computing environment.  I think the next in line on the same scale may be Mobile Computing.

It's funny, as I read this list, and the traditional mentions of "Computing", I realize that term has run its course and it really is time to retire the term "Computing" since it has become irrelevant, something reserved for calculations, tabulations, lists, etc.  Ever since the Internet age, it's really about collaboration and connectivity, not computing.

The Enterprise mobile revolution is happening.  A recent Infographic by Zendesk says, of Fortune 500 companies, 80% are deploying or testing iPhones and 65% are deploying or allowing iPads.  Over the next few years, every enterprise will have made major headway into allowing BYOD (bring your own device) linking iPhones, Androids, and iPads into the enterprise systems.  I am convinced that the convenience and serendipity enabled by Mobility makes all the difference in driving engagement of today's Social Enterprise systems being deployed (see my post on the Upside Down Enterprise Portal).

Mobile brings a new dimension to communications.  For me it started with the Palm Pilot back at the turn of the century (I always wanted to say that) when we began to sync with our calendar and contacts to have this information right in our pocket.  I remember the excitement of having my assistant schedule meetings and then watching them "air sync" right to my device, while I was on the road.

Many a corporate road warrior (including me) became completely dependent upon his BlackBerry (or CrackBerry as we called it) in the mid-2000s.  The BlackBerry showed the world that it is very useful to have instant access to calendar, contacts, and now email, all in one device.  An entire generation of boomers and X-ers became proficient at the thumb typing model on the excellent blackberry keyboard. Soon after getting mine, I remember discovering the browser and beginning to do simple web access activities (checking weather, flight times, simple ecommerce) with the very limited and clumsy early blackberry browser.

Then, my life changed when I moved to an iPhone in 2009.  I had just heard a "future of technology" conference speaker refer to this generation of smartphones, not as powerful telephones, but as small / portable computers. The explosion of the Apple app store and those that followed for other platforms (particularly Android) quickly showed the world that these devices could become a major supplement and often a substitute for the laptop computer.  I giggle to myself when I see someone walking between meetings awkwardly carrying his open laptop, trying to preserve his connectivity to the corporate wifi while changing rooms.  That will be a fleeting "sign of the times".

As corporations were finally figuring out the power of social networking platforms, they began to exploit SharePoint, Jive, IBM Connections, Socialcast, Yammer and a host of other Enterprise 2.0 Platforms.  They found they could use these tools to connect a widely dispersed workforce, create rich employee profiles and online communities to meet and work.  The activity stream and microblogging emerged as a way not only to communicate in quick short messages, but to also allow the system itself to inform colleagues of progress being made, milestones being met, and steps taking place along the course of a project.

These platforms are indeed game changing, but as the mobile revolution has been continuing, many of the E20 platform and tool vendors forgot that they were retooling an enterprise based on a 2000 paradigm.  Many were designing with the idea that they needed to connect stationary knowledge workers who only log in from their corporate desktop or laptop.  Their solution to mobility is to allow a worker to connect to the E20 platform from his / her VPN connected laptop.  This severely hampers adoption.  Relying only on the normal 8-5, at the desk, environment for social engagement is truly unnatural.

Each of the collaboration platform vendors recognizes the need for a mobile component and they have been working hard to create that capability.  Like all transformations in technology it moves in steps. They focus most of their effort on the laptop / desktop worker and then "bolt on" the mobile capability as an afterthought.

The game is changing again.  It is time now to create environments that recognize the following facts:

• Workers are mobile, even in their office
• Workers collaborate 24x7
• Firewalls are going away
• Workers will continue to bring their own devices to work
• Tablets will not go away
• Laptops will become much less relevant (like Desktops have)
• Knowledge work is being distributed to external partners

The next generation Social Mobile Enterprise solutions must be designed to allow:

• Mobile access to all corporate services and information assets
• Cloud based storage accessible to all business partners
• Mobile connectivity among the workforce in the same office and across timezones
• Mobile / Social stickiness through "Gamification" engagement models
• Mobile / Social connectivity with equal access for employees, contractors, and business partners

What do you think?  Are you also seeing this trend?  Can you give some examples of what your enterprise is doing or planning in the comments below?     

(By the way, this post was authored on my iPad and edited only iPhone. Only the final upload, graphics and hyperlinks were done with my laptop.)

iPad 2: You Only Have One Chance to Make A First Impression

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My 7 year old son is sitting next to me. He just woke up and came downstairs to grab my iPad 2 from my hands. His first words..."Oh cool, you got iMovie"

That's OK, he can play with it for now. I have been up for 2 hours and can take a break to write up my first impressions. I'm typing on my laptop because writing a blog post on the touch screen keyboard is just too slow for this seasoned touch typest. But that's OK. The iPad is not designed to replace a laptop. It's another animal all together. As Steve Jobs said it is part of the Post PC class of devices.

I unboxed my new 32GB White wifi unit last night at 6pm. Here's how it went.

• It came fully charged
• I plugged it into to iTunes and was automatically asked if I wanted to restore from my iPad 1 (16GB wifi) backup.  The restore took about 15 minutes, but no apps came down.
• I had to manually select all the apps and do another sync.  This time it took about 20 minutes.  I went to eat dinner and came back about 6:45.
• All passwords needed to be re-entered (mail accounts, app store, etc.)
• By 7, I was up and running.  Most frustrating was that my app icons were all over the place.  I needed to manually set them back where I wanted them.  There was no real rhyme or reason to the app location on my iPad 1, but over the last 11 months, I had built up about 6 pages of apps and just become accustomed to where they were.  I guess the discipline of cleaning this up was really necessary.  So no big deal.
• I tried to call a few friends with FaceTime.  I got through to my iPad buddy Nate who was setting up his too (read his post).  In about 5 seconds I saw him with his 3 year old son and we had a nice chat.  We had nothing really to talk about so we hung up.  I called two more, but got no answer.  Later that evening my iPhone buddy RB called me back...that is really cool.  I like FaceTime.
• The camera is nice, but remarkably coarse and low quality, especially in low light.  It works, but I expect this will be one of the upgrades when the iPad 3 comes out.  For now, coarse front camera is better than no camera...kind of like the early camera phones.  The back camera is better, but you need good light, not the ambient light at my house after dinner.
• Yes, it is fast.  I'm not sure if it is 2x as fast or 9x the graphics, but if Steve says so, it must be true.
• I really miss my standard Apple iPad case.  The store did not have any accessories, so I'm using the iPad "au natural" with no case.  I'm not sure I will go with the standard "smart cover".  (See the review here.)  I really like to cover the back, it prevents slips when I set it down and also makes it easier to hold.  There is a reason they put a textured cover on a book.  I would never read a metal slippery magazine.  I really don't get where Apple thinks we will all do that.  Back to the case, I put my iPad 2 in the standard Apple iPad 1 case and it looked like a skinny kid in his father's suit.  Even with the baggy fit, I may use that case until I can buy one with the same function that fits the slimmer offspring.
• Speaking of kids, my 7 year old is all over this iPad.  He is making some incredible music with Garage Band and already working some videos with iMovie.  Both are incredibly powerful applications, perform well on the iPad 2 and bring pleasure immediately in their simplicity and ability to create a slick media product.  That's $9.98 I don't mind spending.
• It's not about the device, but about the media and the content.  I reloaded Murdoch's "The Daily" and caught up on the news...There is plenty of it today with the horrible devastation in Japan.  All my content feeds work well....web browsing with safari (I didn't even notice any of the improvements), tweeting with twitterrific, gmail, and a new app called Zite.  It creates a custom magazine based on my tweet reading habits (kind of creepy, but it looks promising)

Well, that's what comes to mind right away.  I'm an experienced iPad user who is eager to stay on top of the technology as it evolves.  It's a good experience that just got a little bit better.  In time, I'm sure I'll have plenty more to say, but this is one happy Early Adopter. 

Now if I can only get it back from my son.