Blog - Page 57 of 203 - Sam Harrelson

What’s Important for Your Website?

At the annual Minecraft conferences the young fans are not provided free workshops on how to play Minecraft but on “Video Creation 101″.

What will they do when they go back home?

Source: 15 Digital Marketing Trends for 2016 That Could Destroy Your Business

Last night I dreamed that I had been brought into a website redesign and new branding initiative for a large university (I know, but this is what I do for a living, so of course I’m going to have the occasional “work dream”).

The group that the university had assembled to work through the process with me was well versed in what they wanted in a web site and had no shortage of personal opinions to share and cling to (which is normally how the process starts in real life as well).

After hearing their thoughts, wishes, and concerns on everything from user interface to colors to layouts, they asked me what I had in mind. I looked at their notes and the site they wanted looked like a site that was a perfect fit for a forward looking university in 2007.

“Mobile,” I said. “80% of your traffic in the next three years will come from mobile devices with screens smaller than 5.5 inches. That’s radically different than how university (or business) websites were laid out five years ago and means that you have to rethink your opinions and wishes and start over.” (I wrote this down in my journal that I keep bedside after waking up to feed our newborn at 4 am).

I asked everyone to pull out their phones. Everyone at the table, regardless of age or “tech ability” had a smart phone of some sort (most were relatively current iPhones).

“Now, let’s design your site based on those screens. What are your favorite mobile sites? Do you have any or do you just use apps? Do you need a website? What are you trying to communicate or do with your university’s site? What’s important?”

Do the reading if you want to be treated like a professional

The reading exposes you to the state of the art. The reading helps you follow a thought-through line of reasoning and agree, or even better, challenge it. The reading takes effort.

If you haven’t done the reading, why expect to be treated as a professional?

Important thoughts from Seth Godin. Keep up with the reading, regardless of what you’re doing.

Episode 14: Thinking Out Loud 91: Homemade Root Beer – Thinking.FM

Elisabeth is joined by UNC’s own Molly McConnell this week (Merianna is on maternity leave). They dive deep into the nature of reading, writing, and spicy beverages.

Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic
A Tale for The Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
Ravens in Winter by Bernd Heinrich
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien
The Intuitionist by Colson Whitehead
The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell
Michael Crichton
The Handmaids Tale and Stone Mattresses by Margaret Atwood
Tiny Beautiful Things by Cheryl Strayed
Blenheim #9 Diet Ginger Ale Review
Ale-8-One
Homemade Root Beer

The post Thinking Out Loud 91: Homemade Root Beer appeared first on Thinking.FM.

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The Web Strikes Back

Google has actually been indexing the content of mobile applications for two years now, as a move against the search giant’s potential obsolescence as the world of computing increasingly shifted off the desktop and to take place inside native applications running on consumers’ phones. Since its launch, Google has expanded its ability to surface “deep links” (links that point to pages inside an app) from beyond a small set of early adopters on Android and now indexes applications across both major mobile platforms, iOS and Android.

Source: Google Search Now Surfaces App-Only Content, Streams Apps From The Cloud When Not Installed On Your Phone | TechCrunch

Interesting concept of “streaming apps” from Google… basically allowing people to use the functionality of native apps without having to leave the browser and / or install the actual app on their device.

Of course, not every app developer is not going to participate in this, but it does mean that Google is thinking of creative ways to keep the web (and web advertising) relevant in the app dominated present.

Amazon Finally Gets 2 Factor Authentication (Please Go Turn This On For Your Account Now)

amazon_logo_RGB

Here’s how to enable Amazon’s Two-Step Verification, a feature that adds an extra layer of security by asking you to enter a unique security code in addition to your password on computers and devices that you haven’t designated as trusted.

Source: Amazon.com Help: Turning On Two-Step Verification

Amazon finally has 2 Step Authentication. By all means, please go turn this on (and turn on for all the services you actively use from GMail to Slack to Dropbox to Facebook to Twitter etc).

I’m a big fan of Authy as my preferred authenticator, but Google has one and you can always use your mobile device for receiving authentication texts.

But you need to do this asap for your personal and business accounts or count the days until you’re “hacked.”

Don’t Sell Out.

At some point in the past ten years, selling out lost its stigma. I come from the Kurt Cobain/“corporate rock still sucks” school where selling out was the worst thing you could ever do. We should return to that. Don’t sell out your values, don’t sell out your community, don’t sell out the long term for the short term. Do something because you believe it’s wonderful and beneficial, not to get rich. And — very important — if you plan to do something on an ongoing basis, ensure its sustainability. This means your work must support your operations and you don’t try to grow beyond that without careful planning. If you do those things you can easily maintain your independence.

Source: Resist and Thrive — Medium

As someone who runs a marketing agency but comes from the Kurt Cobain school of “not selling out” myself, I found lots to identify in this post from Kickstarter’s CEO.

We’ve lost the notion of “selling out,” or it doesn’t sting like it once did when someone accused you of such or called you a “poser.” Remember the term poser? We should bring that back.

Too often, we sell out. We lose our idealism and our independence and we trade in our soul for those things that make us a few more zeroes of digital currency.

It’s not worth it, trust me.

Be yourself, whether you’re an entrepreneur or a church or a nonprofit group.

It’s much more difficult, but it’s more rewarding (even financially).

Thoughts in the Presence of Fear

We did not anticipate anything like what has now happened. We did not foresee that all our sequence of innovations might be at once overridden by a greater one: the invention of a new kind of war that would turn our previous innovations against us, discovering and exploiting the debits and the dangers that we had ignored. We never considered the possibility that we might be trapped in the webwork of communication and transport that was supposed to make us free.

Source: Orion Magazine | Thoughts in the Presence of Fear

Wendell Berry is a modern day Amos, speaking to us in a prophetic voice that we are quick to admonish.

Although written shortly after 9/11, this essay still resonates just as the words of Amos and Hosea challenge us today.

Practice Resurrection.

Episode 13: Thinking Out Loud 90: Creating the Feels – Thinking.FM

Elisabeth and Merianna talk about the importance of including and invoking emotions in readers. They discuss what they have to overcome as writers in order to cause suffering for their characters and create whole, full characters. Of course, they also talk about dogs, leaf blowers, and Baby Harrelson imminent arrival (who arrived on November 12, 2015 after this show was recorded!).

What are Elisabeth and Merianna reading?

The post Thinking Out Loud 90: Creating the Feels appeared first on Thinking.FM.

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This is an aspect of web marketing that I personally detest (and think is wrong)

Minimize cognitive load by building on existing mental models and reducing the need for users to remember things from one part of text to another.

Source: Legibility, Readability, and Comprehension: Making Users Read Your Words | Nielsen Norman Group

Google’s quantum computing announcement on December 8

It’s not exactly clear what this announcement will be (besides important for the future of computing), but Jurvetson says to “stay tuned” for more information coming on December 8th. This is the first we’ve heard of a December 8th date for a Google announcement, and considering its purported potential to be a turning point in computing, this could perhaps mean an actual event is in the cards.

Source: Google reportedly planning a ‘watershed’ quantum computing announcement for December 8

If Google has cracked quantum decoherence, we’re in for a very fascinating course of events in the next few decades.

Facebook’s Notify and the New Age of Invisible Apps

Facebook’s Notify is live and ready for your iOS consumption.

Apps are moving quickly to be “invisible” and only interact with us in the notification space that is agnostic of the former modes of app badges and alerts.

If you think this is just a ploy to flood your phone with news you might be semi-interested in throughout the day, you’re wrong.

Notifications are the next interface of computing.

Episode 12: Thinking Out Loud 89: Camaraderie Over Word Counts – Thinking.FM

Elisabeth and Merianna talk about the power of collaboration, especially during NanoWrimo. They talk about how much confidence is instilled when you connect into a network of people. They also discuss how women writers have been made more of an appearance in the publishing world and why that is.

What are Elisabeth and Merianna reading?

The post Thinking Out Loud 89: Camaraderie Over Word Counts appeared first on Thinking.FM.

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Episode 11: Thinking Religion 57: We Can’t Stop and We Won’t Stop – Thinking.FM

Thomas and Sam discuss the role of N.C. State as an upsetter along with the role of religion in presidential politics with talk about private and public hermeneutics of the 2016 candidates (and the weather in Tallahassee).

Show Notes:

Why Can’t Christians Join the Revolution? | Al Mohler
Fear and Voting on the Christian Right | CNN
Ben Carson: I’m not saying it’s aliens | Raw Story
Archaeologists To Ben Carson: Ancient Egyptians Wrote Down Why The Pyramids Were Built | Forbes
Pope and the Catacombs Pact | Washington Post

The post Thinking Religion 57: We Can’t Stop and We Won’t Stop appeared first on Thinking.FM.

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It’s about the ads

“The goal of Facebook Instant Articles is to keep you on Facebook. No need to explore the larger Web when it’s all right there in Facebook, especially when it loads so much faster in the Facebook app than it does in a browser.

Google seems to have recognized what a threat Facebook Instant Articles could be to Google’s ability to serve ads. This is why Google’s project is called Accelerated Mobile Pages. Sorry, desktop users, Google already knows how to get ads to you.”

Source: How Google’s AMP project speeds up the Web—by sandblasting HTML | Ars Technica

“Speeding up the web” is a wonderful sentiment, but Google, Apple, and Facebook are well aware of the impending transition to a post-mobile computing interface that will transform how we see and interact with advertising.

Google AMP, Facebook Instant News, and Apple News are stop gaps to make a few more dollars on a rapidly transitioning medium (web advertising) as it exists in its current state.

NYT VR

Saving this for when we look back in 10 years on the first mainstream uses of VR in much the same way we fondly look back at web pages from the 90’s today…

“Today, The New York Times takes a step into virtual reality. NYT VR is a mobile app that can be used — along with your headphones and optionally a cardboard viewing device — to simulate richly immersive scenes from across the globe.”

Source: NYT VR: How to Experience a New Form of Storytelling From The Times – The New York Times

Amazon’s Retail Store, Uber Surge Pricing, and The Ever Changing Price of Things

“It’s all about the data. Under the hood, the Amazon store has a few unusual features. Every book has a shelf tag that includes a capsule review from the website, a star rating, and a barcode. There are no prices listed. To get the price, you scan the code with the camera of your smartphone and the Amazon app. If you don’t have a smartphone or the app installed, an associate can do it for you. This brings up the product page for the item you’re looking at, with full reviews, specs and pricing.”

Source: Amazon’s Retail Store Has Nothing To Do With Selling Books – Forbes

Price is the main motivating factor in most purchasing decisions under $50, so it’s interesting to see that Amazon is trading off that variable with the need to scan a code with its app on your smartphone in order to give you the information.

There’s a very good reason Amazon wants to do that, of course… if you have the app installed on your smartphone and use it in their store, they are able to (in relative real time) offer up a more customized, or personal, shopping experience to you based on what Amazon knows about you. If you’re online in 2015, that’s probably a good deal, especially for Prime members with Echo’s and a long purchase history like me and my family.

Variant pricing will initially surprise consumers. “What do you mean he gets to buy that Star Wars book for $2 less than I do?” will be a common refrain. Amazon knows my wife and I have a little boy due to arrive any moment now (or they should based on our recent purchases), and they know I’m a Star Wars fan based on my Amazon Prime Movies streaming, and purchase of toys and collectibles for our kids (*cough* … ) or the frequent amount of times our 5 year old asks Alexa to play the Imperial March from the soundtrack.

So, psychologically there’s a great deal more involved with a purchasing decision than price point.

As we move towards a cash-free and digital transaction based economy (thanks, Apple and Android Pay!) and continue to contribute both our data and our purchasing habits to recommendation engines, it will be more economically efficient to move towards a market where goods and services are based on context and situational awareness (Uber’s Surge Pricing, for example).

“Showcase Stores” such as Best Buy get this. Even the weekly grocery store discount ads in the newspaper circular (for us old folks) will follow this lead and require an app or an interface not based on universal pricing in order for the “cost” of something to be displayed. Our nearly automated financial markets full of nano-second timed transactions carried out by bots are already there.

Time for advertising and marketing to catch up.

It’s going to be a fun decade ahead.

“Hey Alexa, play my Beatles mix. And order more newborn diapers.”

Yes, your brain (and mine) needs more downtime

“Downtime is an opportunity for the brain to make sense of what it has recently learned, to surface fundamental unresolved tensions in our lives and to swivel its powers of reflection away from the external world toward itself. While mind-wandering we replay conversations we had earlier that day, rewriting our verbal blunders as a way of learning to avoid them in the future.”

Source: Why Your Brain Needs More Downtime