When will then be now?  Soon…

The first part of the migration to the online world was really about replicating activates that we previously did offline… mail a letter, make a phone call, book a reservation.  The second act was/is about improving those, scaling those, and fundamentally altering those activities…online chat and video calls, Open Table.  The third act is more immersive, it crosses more boundaries, or better said, removes them all together.  It’s about actions that are fundamentally born in the digital world – shifts that are taking place that don’t have an offline precedent.  A major driver of that third act is the influence of data and who controls it.  The start of this can be seen in social networking.  Our desire for a social network is not unique to online, nor is “sharing” and online phenomena – but the mixture of a private and public persona…a quasi public life on top of which interests, new, stories, general communication, and even commerce and business marketing all occur – that is new.  Prior to this third act this type of mixture of life and data wasn’t really available offline, and it really isn’t all about scale – sure for marketing or sharing a picture the scale is the trick – but the idea of instant updates, commentaries, locations, recommendations, and actions that leverage the social graph is unique.

But as we look forward, what will it mean to conduct a greater and greater percentage of our lives in a connected way?  The lines of traditional commerce and community, already blurred by the forces of the connected world, are all but disappearing.

Big Data: Real Time, Real People, Really Important…

Companies like Social Flow and Bitly present wonderful sets of data that show context as being the most important factor of all in a data stream.  Location is nice, demographics and history too… social circle a good bonus, but context… or the conversation as someone put it, is a much more important piece.  For example, if you and I are walking down the street near a Starbucks talking intensely about the Yankees win last night it may be more relevant for someone at that moment somehow someway to suggest I get my son a Jeter  jerseys for his birthday RIGHT THEN as opposed to interrupting me about a 10% coupon for lattes after 3pm.  Sure, I but lattees a fair amount, but right then you are interrupting my conversation, my space, to present me something that is not additive to my experience.  Yes, I understand why you are doing it, but it’s still misplaced.  The jersey is additive and captivating.  Data sets like Twitter often have better context.  The main draw back of the social data is that it is curated.  Your Facebook persona is curated.  Your search history on the other hand, is random and representative, but may just be tangents.  Twitter is RIGHT NOW.  The three are distinctly different.

Another dynamic that is emerging is true realtime web interfaces.  Not those that require a refresh or an automatic browser request.  But true interactivity on a website.  This raises the specter of “web 3.0” being something transformative for both consumers AND companies.  A company called Realtime is working on this.

Fun Data Anecdote…

This is from a data analytics professional.  The best indicator of the potential for a prison riot is…. A run on Snickers bars at the sundry shop.  This rational activity reflects concern that the sundry will close during and following the riot.