InsidEPR

We are Thankful

Complied by Molly Reynolds

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, the team at Engage PR has been reflecting on what we’re thankful for. We’ve compiled a short list; feel free to add your own thoughts.

Happy Thanksgiving from the team at Engage PR!

 

• I am thankful for my great clients and their interesting technology which motivates me to come to work everyday.
• I am thankful for GPS!
• I am thankful for my iPhone – it brings me email, music, connections with friends and family, games, restaurant suggestions and reliable directions to everywhere I would like to go.
• Keyboard short cuts!
• I’m thankful for Google Alerts about client coverage.
• Outlook meeting reminders – I would be lost without them!
• I am thankful for iOS5 and the updated Google Maps feature that shows me three different possible routes for my trip.
• I’m also thankful for the Google Maps app on iPhones because of the “use public transportation” option.
• The Wii Fit that will help me work off all the wonderful holiday food!
• I'm thankful for Facetime on my Macbook; I can still feel close to my family who live far away.

In Sum: Nick Bilton’s “I Live in the Future and Here’s How It Works”

By Caitlin Mattias

I recently dove into a book from Nick Bilton, lead writer and technology reporter for the New York Times Bits blog, titled “I Live in the Future and Here’s How it Works.” As a PR practitioner, I’m skeptical when a journalist actually commits a book to print about technology – it seems dated the moment it hits the presses; but, overall I commend Bilton for his examination of culture and human behavior as it relates to the growing tech landscape.

Here are his most compelling points…in sum:

Adapt or die.Well, he doesn’t put it in such bleak terms, but those people (we all know at least one) that starkly refuse to purchase a smartphone, do not IM and frown upon emoticons and abbreviations, will soon be tagged as cultural outsiders. Bilton points to a quote from New York Times’ coverage around the introduction of the telephone in 1876:

“Thus the telephone, by bringing music and ministers into every house, will empty the concert halls and churches…”

We all know that the music recording industry didn’t collapse until the introduction of file sharing via Napster, so clearly the telephone’s detractors overestimated a tad on how long it would take for the phenomenon they describe to impact society. Long story short, the texting and social media naysayers are the “earth is flat” subculture of our generation. Come on, even the Dalai Lama is on Twitter these days.

Trust is king.With a constant stream of information about friends and family, products and news available via SMS, web browser or app, the way that people consume and filter data has changed. In the consumer world, word-of-mouth has long been known as the most impactful information leading to someone making a purchase. But in an environment where those endorsements come somewhat anonymously through forums and conversations online, we’ve developed a more sophisticated filter for what information is more valid or trustworthy for us as individuals.

Digital natives now look to their social “anchors” for the best information about where to eat, shop and play. These anchors vary on the situation, but are most often friends, family, coworkers and acquaintances. In the digital world, however, our anchors also expand to certain journalists and experts that we’ve developed virtual relationships with online through reading their blog, following their comments on Twitter, or listening to podcasts, etc. The power that these community “anchors” wield has not been lost on marketers, who are now keenly focused on building influence and credibility online.

Bilton posits that as artificial intelligence advances and takes advantage of our online activity (purchasing decisions, reading materials, email content, etc.), we may trust our Watson-like computers to act as the filter between us and the world.

It’s not you, it’s me.In the short history of social networks and online services, one trend is still plowing ahead: personalization. From the lastest iPhone’s Siri personal assistant technology to Spotify’s recommendations for what music you prefer, advances in software and hardware lead to consumers being able to make things more their own. Bilton sites a laundry list of services that have become wildly popular based on their ability to “guess” what our preferences are and deliver us the product that we’d be most likely to purchase, rent, or view as a result.

Customization has become key to the way that digital natives evaluate the quality of experience they receive from a device or service and what they’re willing to pay for it. This is having a profound impact on business models for digital services as companies flounder to find the right equation of pricing and unique experience to keep their customers engaged.

Back to the future.As technology and the way we use it evolves, Bilton expects big changes to our cognitive processes as a result of our mulit-tasking and always-on behavior. Are we addicted to our devices? Can video games make us better drivers or surgeons? Only time will tell how the brain reacts and filters the data we throw at it, but we can expect that the changes of the past 15 years will be eclipsed by the next 15. Hold onto your wi-fi, because it’s about to become a bumpy ride!

Mostly Cloudy with a Chance of Standardization

By Suzanne Panoplos

I had the opportunity to spend part of an afternoon at the Cloud Expo West in the Santa Clara Convention Center and one thing that became clear – the cloud hasn’t lost its buzz.  Having been in high tech for more years than I care to admit, it is often the case that this year’s hot tech can quickly become yesterday’s news.

This is not the case with the cloud. The show was humming with all aspects of the cloud – from cloud security to cloud automation to private clouds. It was clear that there was still some definition needed when it comes to defining the cloud in general and this becomes even more “gray” when you start to explore topics such as “private clouds” or what is “enterprise-class security”. Whereas vendors had surprisingly slightly different approaches when it comes to the cloud, one thing became apparent – 2012 will be the year that the cloud becomes more defined.

Take for example one panel on Security, presented by an all-women panel from the Cloud Network of Women. Aside from the fact that it was amazingly refreshing to see more women presenters (not to mention a panel of all women), the presenters offered up guidelines for securing the cloud that transcended the usual discussion of technology alphabet soup. The panel began with the speakers noting that most cloud apps/images are attacked within 7 minutes of being placed on the web. This is often the case because most developers are not security experts and either rely on weak default passwords or have migrated over security issues that already existed within the enterprise, on to the cloud. For example, almost 10% of all laptops have a botnet and for those that are personal laptops and brought on to the enterprise network from the "outside" - almost 30% have a botnet.
 
What companies fail to recognize with cloud security is the human factor. Despite all the security technology that is in place, employees without the proper knowledge base and defined processes cannot protect data in the cloud. An organization must first have robust security practices in place and make sure that the workforce has been properly educated on implementing robust security guidelines. 
   
Hand in hand with security is data management. The panel also discussed the fact organizations must have a SIM or a Security Management System in place to make sure that they had command and control of the data in the cloud. This also extends to memory forensics and analytics so that organizations can glean more information to better manage its cloud services.

With a security discussion focused on processes, systems, best practices, education – it sounds like cloud standardization is not far behind.

Pumpkins, Spiders and Candy… Oh my!

By Leslie Schmidt

The spookiest time of year has yet again come and gone - but not without leaving a trail of delicious candy behind at Engage PR!

Engage PR has quite a few holiday traditions in the office, but my new favorite is BOO-ing! For those of you who have never heard of this strange tradition, let me take you though the steps. Starting on October 1st, one sneaky EPR employee decorated a colleague’s desk without their knowledge. The next day when the colleague came to work, they unexpectedly walked into a black and orange circus tent full of pumpkins, spiders and candy corn! And so it began. One by one, each employee was BOO-ed until no desk was left un-spider webbed! This year, the BOO-ing lasted all through the month, leaving many employees scratching their head as to who could have done the sneaky decorating!

Once all the EPR desks were decorated from floor to ceiling, it was time to celebrate. On Halloween day, we did what EPR does best - had a festive potluck! Only this time we were eating in style. Costume style that is. On the day of the potluck, the office also decided to have a costume contest. With a witch, a nerd, an Occupy Alameda protester, GI Jane, Michael Jackson, Charlie Chaplin and the devil twins  - there was quite a variety for voting. In the end, the protester and Charlie Chaplin took home first and second place! Congrats ladies!

For even more Halloween fun check out this scary slideshow to see EPR’s Halloween decorating skills!

Celebrity Journalists & the Trust Factor

By Caitlin Mattias

Newspapers, and the publishing world in general, are in crisis. We’ve watched as the biggest names in national news have floundered to regain subscriber numbers by alternately posting free content online, despairing at low advertising returns, erecting paywalls and tearing them down again. Meanwhile, print subscriptions continue to be cancelled and aggregators like Google News have become our go-to source for news in real time.

Many journalists have given up the industry altogether, heading for greener (and more secure) pastures practicing public relations for companies they once reported on, or even launching their own venture capital fund, e.g. Michael Arrington’s CrunchFund. With fewer overall journalism jobs, the competition is fierce…but no less fierce than the fight for readership.

Our world is now driven by metrics like page hits, retweets, and Facebook “likes.” Though many publications have denied using web traffic as a metric in performance reviews and layoffs, there’s no denying that some journalists and bloggers have risen from the masses as pseudo-celebrities. This is especially true in the tech world.

These big names – think Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher of Wall Street Journal’s All Things D, Nick Bilton, David Pogue and Jenna Wortham of The New York Times – are becoming more relevant in a changing culture where trust is the true coin of the realm. In an online ecosystem where rumor abounds and the allure of page hits often trumps verifiable facts, readers have developed highly-sophisticated radars for paid content. We can smell thinly-veiled advertising a mile away and don’t turn to that blog or news source again as we make purchasing decisions.

All the statistics will tell you that we first trust “people like us” more than any journalist or so-called expert, but this mindset only extends so far. Especially as consumer electronics companies rely on the live media conference launch of Apple fame, we have no other choice than to turn to reporters who were front-and-center to drill down the facts for us. The question is – have these reporters developed such cache that we’ll follow where they lead?

Earlier this year, popular consumer technology columnist Rob Pegoraro left The Washington Post, but hasn’t seem to affected his invites to major product launches, like the recent launch of the Kindle Fire. He’s been enjoying his time according to his blog, spending time in the garden, but has been recruited as a freelancer by the Consumer Electronics Association and Discovery. He doesn’t get the scores of replies he was used to while working for the Post, but it’s clear that he’s still viewed as a credible source of gadget knowledge.

Josh Topolsky and a whole host of Engadget’s greatest writers left the site last spring and are close to launching The Verge,what’s sure to be a new competitor in the tech blogosphere. Knowing the quality writers backing this project, I’ll be sure to drop in to check it out at the very least.

Only time will tell how this trend continues, but do you see yourself following the journalists you trust from publication to publication? Or are they only the cogs in the wheel of great journalism that’s sure to continue with or without them?