Predictions From Last Year: How I Did (2012 Edition)

Every year around this time I do two things: First I look back at my predictions from a year ago and grade myself, then I get around to making a new set of predictions. These are often my most popular posts of the year, proving the old magazine saw that the world loves a list. So who am I to buck the trend? Let’s get cracking on seeing how my crystal ball turned out, shall we?

As you can see from my 2012 predictions roundup, I took something of a new approach to the prognostication game last year. Instead of one lengthy post with all my predictions, I actually broke them into a series of posts, seven in all. I went into detail on why I thought each forecast would prove correct (save the last one, which was a series of “shoot from the hip” predictions.)

I’ll be as brief as I can with this review – this marks the ninth time I’ve done it. Overall, I’ve had a pretty good run of it. I hope 2013 keeps pace.

Read More
7 Comments on Predictions From Last Year: How I Did (2012 Edition)

SIGN UP FOR THE NEWSLETTER

Stay up to date on the latest from BattelleMedia.com

Retargeting Is Just Phase One

Toward the end of the year, annual predictions come out (I’ve been guilty of this for nearly ten years now). I was perusing these from Triggit founder Zach Coelius, and his ninth one hit me right between the eyes:

Retargeting will be taken out of the tactic box marketers have been myopically placing it into, and instead they will recognize that retargeting is simply the first step to a sophisticated data driven marketing strategy.

Retargeting, or the practice of showing you ads from sites you’ve recently visited, is all over the web these days, and many folks revile the practice. But as Zach points out, retargeting isn’t the end game, it’s just the beginning.

Read More
14 Comments on Retargeting Is Just Phase One

With Google’s 2012 Zeitgeist, You Won’t Learn Much. Why?

Guess what? This guy was big this year. Really!

I think readers know that on balance, I’m a fan of Google. I recently switched to the Nexus 4 (more coming on that front as I settle into really using it). I believe the company has a stronger core philosophy than many of its rivals. Overall, given that it’s nearly impossible to avoid putting your data into someone’s cloud, I believe that Google is probably the best choice for any number of reasons.

But that doesn’t mean I won’t criticize the company. And every year about this time, I end up doing just that.

Read More
12 Comments on With Google’s 2012 Zeitgeist, You Won’t Learn Much. Why?

For Microsoft, The Worm Turns Through Apple

(image) Wow. That’s about the sum of my initial reaction to this story from ATD: Exclusive: Microsoft Pressing Apple to Take a Smaller Cut on Sales Inside Office for iOS.

The wow isn’t that Microsoft is trying to reduce the 30% cut Apple takes on every dollar that flows through the iOS ecosystem. That’s to be expected, though I very much doubt it will happen.

The wow, to me, is how massively the world of software has changed, in particular as it relates to Apple and Microsoft.

Read More
9 Comments on For Microsoft, The Worm Turns Through Apple

As Long As It’s Legal, Corporations Will Act Selfishly

(image) There’s a hubbub in the press this week about Google employing a “Double Irish – Dutch Sandwich” tactic to funnel profits from Europe over to Bermuda, where there is no corporate income tax. Reuters reports that the company saved around $2 billion in taxes by employing the structure, which, as far as I can tell, is perfectly legal.

Of course, there’s a difference between that which is perfectly legal and that which seems, well, unseemly. Creating multiple shell companies across four nation states so as to avoid paying taxes may make shareholders happy, but it sure has pissed off a bunch of (revenue starved) countries in the EU. The article mentions the UK, France, and Italy as all investigating Google (and Facebook, among others) for potential abuse of the tax code.

To which I must say this: What else did you expect?!

Read More
6 Comments on As Long As It’s Legal, Corporations Will Act Selfishly

Another Thoughtful Personal Essay: Fragile

You know that phenomenon that happens – right after you first notice a pattern, you then start seeing it everywhere? Well, here’s another wonderful personal essay, again by a young(er) author (Nathan Kontny) involved in the tech world, this time about losing a friend with whom he worked. Also part of the pattern: It’s on the SVBTLE platform, which is clearly finding great new voices.

The piece is called “Fragile” and it connects our often-unconsidered compulsion with taking care of our expensive devices to the fact that perhaps we are not taking the same care of ourselves or our relationships to others. Wonderful stuff. From it:

But what’s crazy is, as I look at all this care and attention I spend on this phone, I can’t help find myself now asking:

Read More
Leave a comment on Another Thoughtful Personal Essay: Fragile

Locked and Bloated

(image Vator News) Companies get big. Companies gain market dominance. Companies slowly pivot from their original values. Companies justify those shifts with nods to shareholder value, or consistent user experience, or inconsistent implementations of their platforms by (former) partners.

It happened to Sun. To Microsoft. To Apple. To Google. It happened in the entertainment business, it’s happening in agriculture, for goodness sake.  Now it’s happening to Facebook and Twitter. (The latest example: Instagram CEO feels Twitter card removal is the correct thing…).

I don’t have any problem with any of that, it is to be expected. The services all these companies provide are great. They’re simply wonderful. And as they get big, they get public, protective, and defensive.

Read More
10 Comments on Locked and Bloated

Writing Every So Often: The Personal Essay Makes A Comeback

Browsing Hacker News, which I’ll admit I don’t read very closely (because, well, I’m not a hacker), I saw an interesting headline: I quit Twitter for a month and it changed my thinking about mostly everything. Well, that’s going to get my attention.

I clicked through and noted the author’s name: Adam Brault. I don’t know Adam Brault (at least, not well enough to recall reading him before), but with a headline like that, I sure wanted to read the piece. It’s quite a thoughtful rumination on his snap decision to stop using Twitter for the month of November.

Some of what Brault said didn’t resonate with me, not because I disagreed, but because it’s clear he uses Twitter in a very different manner than do I. He follows people closely and feels a connection to them that I rather envy. I follow more than 1200 people, and I’ve become a bit inured to the resulting torrent.

Read More
23 Comments on Writing Every So Often: The Personal Essay Makes A Comeback

One Less iPhone Purchased: Day One With The Nexus

I finally did it – I slipped the sim from my failing iPhone 4 into a shiny new Google Nexus last night.

And damn, the thing just worked. And it’s So. Much. Better.

But….there are things I wish it had. I figure I’ll take notes here, so folks can both learn from my experience, as well as tell me what an idiot I am help me out.

Read More
34 Comments on One Less iPhone Purchased: Day One With The Nexus

Can The Future Be Perfect? It Can Certainly Be Better

As my 2011 review of his Where Good Ideas Come From: A Natural History of Innovation proves, I am a Steven Johnson fan. So it was with relish that I settled in to read his latest release: Future Perfect: The Case For Progress In A Networked Age.

Steven had already told me the premise of his book – the first he’s written since moving to my neck of the woods in Marin, California (I hope we can keep him from going back to Brooklyn, but we’ll see…).

In short it’s this: the evidence has become overwhelming that a new form of political expression is developing, an expression deeply informed by the gravitational pull of the Internet (for more on that, see Steven’s piece in the Times: The Internet? We Built That).

Read More
2 Comments on Can The Future Be Perfect? It Can Certainly Be Better