With that said, there are plenty of places and articles floating around the web outlining some of the features now available in the still-in-beta “project” from Google, so I’ll spare you the rehash. Instead, I’d rather focus on what you can be doing right to get ready for when your Google+ invite arrives.

First and foremost, it’s important to keep in mind that you already have a major portion of your Google+ profile filled out if you’re using an @gmail.com email address. Remember those changes that Google’s been rolling out over the past few years? Your YouTube address was associated with your gmail address, if you had hosted images at blogger, they were all moved to Picasa, etc. All of these are now tied to your Google+ account, if you join the network with your primary gmail address.

Now for me, I have a pretty obscure and outdated email address. It held relevance when I first ventured away from Hotmail, but today, it’s a jumble of numbers and letters that, to be honest, is a bit difficult to remember. So with that said, I’m currently testing Google Plus with my old account details, but once the invite button goes live again, I’m going to switch over to an address I’ve had kicking around for some time, but haven’t really utilized. Why you might ask? Well, as we all know, branding is everything. And normally, I could care less about my email address, given that it’s most probably copy/pasted, and very rarely needs to be remembered. All that changes with Google+.

Remember that mad “land grab” when Facebook custom URL’s went live? I for one was up at 6am Central European Time in order to grab facebook.com/dantaylor, only to be beaten to the punch by another Dan Taylor. Ok, so I ended up with dantaylor1. Certainly better than dantaylor253 or some other derivative, but you start to see the importance of your custom URL. With Google+ your custom URL is directly tied to your Google profile name. And with that name, comes along your entire Google identity.

As with any writer, I had to cut my teeth somewhere, and waaaaay back in the day, I too had a blogspot.com blog in operation, tied to my Google account. Since launching turnthescrew.com some 4 years ago, I hadn’t really touched that old blog. In fact, I pretty much forgot that it was still in existence. Needless to say, Google+ dragged all those “My god…what a piece of garbage. Did I really write that?” memories out of the closet, and suddenly at my feet yesterday. So much so that I took the drastic step of exporting the blog (safety first) and deleting it altogether.

Why? Well, first and foremost, the content was by no means focused. Posts ranged from, literally, what I had for dinner last night, to found humor images, to YouTube repeats. Not awful, but certainly not the way I’d choose to represent myself today.

Likewise, a quick poke around the “Your Albums” section brought up a host of images that I’d virtually forgotten about, and as with the blog, didn’t necessarily want to have linked to me. Thankfully, there’s a feature within G+ that allows you to completely hide the albums from public view. As with the blog, I’m not 100% ready to delete this album, but I’d rather lock it down.

So…to get prepped for the day when your Google Plus invite arrives:

• Ensure that the account you want associated with your Google Plus identity is one that is memorable and speaks to who you are. Yaddabla184 is probably not the best representation. No, that’s not the account I used.
• Login to Picasa and Blogger under this account, and double check that you’re not confronted with mountains of yesteryear images and text. Unless of course you’re 100% happy/comfortable with your archives being on display.
• Head on over to your Account Overview and start adding the details about yourself that you’d like to be on display to the world

Speaking of your Account Overview, one thing I found particularly interesting was how search results will be affected my Google Plus. From Google:

Your name and any other fields you make public in your profile are searchable on the web and may appear in Google Search results.

This is a crucial bit of information that I believe will truly change the way people present themselves on the internet. As you can see from my screenshot (I’ve blocked out the specific URL, and you’ll see why in a second), my location, work title, bio, and the top three links I’ve added to my profile are displayed. For me, the links are the most crucial of the entire bit. Bios and titles are one thing, but pointing to other examples of your internet presence is huge.

And as I draw to a close, I myself am at a bit of a crossroads. As stated above, the email address that I entered Google Plus with holds no particular relevance to me (or anyone else) any longer, and it’s time to phase it out. With that said, as soon as the invite switch is returned to the ‘On’ position, I think I’ll invite my other, more meaningful @gmail account to the project, and then repeat the process of adding people to my circles – which might be a whole lot easier thanks to Google Takeout. A grind, for sure, but in the long run, a wiser, more focused approach to what I believe is the first service to give Facebook a run for it’s money in quite some time.

The New Media Measure data indicates that the number of consumers making visits to the cinema, defined as those who watch 3 or more movies at the cinema within the past 6 months, has dropped 11 percent over the course of 2010. On the home-cinema side of the coin, the same report found that 36 percent of film fans are streaming full-length movies online, representing a 16 percent increase over 2009’s numbers. Interpret points out that of those surveyed, the trend of being “first!” to see a film in theatres is on the decline.

“While the number of active moviegoers is down, there is a silver lining in that movie lovers are turning to other media to view movies,” said Dan Casey, VP of the Movie Group at Interpret. “Moviegoers’ use of other media – like video games and social networking – has also increased, offering studios and marketers new ways to interact with movie-loving audiences.”

Beyond the Theater: Moviegoers and Other Media –

Building on the theme of Ideas Worth Spreading, in 2009 the TED organization decided to allow others to host their own TED inspired events under the banner of TEDx. The first of these independent conferences was held at USC in 2009. Two days ago, on November 15th, 2010, TEDx celebrated it’s 1000th event; a true testament to the power of great ideas.

As mentioned, the TEDx events are independently organized, and there’s a very slim chance of two events overlapping anywhere in the world. However, this coming weekend, the exact opposite is about to happen, as TEDxYouthDay, which coincides with Universal Children’s Day will see organizers from around the world host events for (and by) youths. While the events range in size and scope, they will all share a common thread: inspiring curiosity, igniting new ideas, and empowering young leaders.

Some planned highlights from around the globe:

• TEDxYouth@NASA, who gave seats away for their event to area school districts to give to nominated student delegates, will include speakers from NASA including Jon Viet Nguyen, lead archtect for NASA’s “Eyes on the Solar System” software, and Lesa Roe, director of the country’s first civilian aeronautical research lab.
• TEDxYouth@TheSchool will be hosting speaker Stacey Murphy, founder of BK Farmyards, a nonprofit that turns private property into urban farms.
• One of TEDxYouth@Toronto‘s speakers is Rob Dyer, who founded Skate4Cancer, and skated across the United States and Canada to raise awareness for cancer, after finding out his mom was diagnosed with the disease.
• Kelly Stoetzel and Rives, hosts of TEDActive, will be hosting TEDxYouth@Castilleja, and speakers at the event include Twitter VP Kelly Stanton and Charles Huang, co-founder of Guitar Hero.
• At TEDxYouth@Metroplex, speakers are 8th- to 12th-grade students from three local ISAS schools in the community of Arlington, Texas.

I had the pleasure to meet Dr. Sunddip Nahal via a project that I’ve been working on with MindMeister. She recently informed me that she’s been granted the license to host the TEDxYouthDay @ Vancouver – for 2011. That’s right. There’s an entire year of planning involved in hosting a TEDx event. If preparation is the key to success, you can imagine the bar that TEDx events are held to.

“I am SUPER EXCITED! I have always been an educator who believes that students should have a chance to let out their creativity and innovation in the classroom. This event is about encouraging students to learn from other students who have explored a creative concept or innovative idea. Youths also have the power to inspire change and make a difference,” comments Dr. Nahal.

Above is a mind map from Dr. Nahal’s presentation at this year’s TEDxUBC event. To learn more about her, and what she has in store for tomorrow’s leaders, visit her at www.classroommanagementworkshops.com.

The global TEDxYouthDay events kick off this coming Saturday, November 20th, 2010, and will be live streamed throughout the day.

Credits: Pow Designs and Halloween Express

One thing is clear, most Americans believe that their friends and family are not uncivil, but the majority of the public views those outside this circle as being uncivil. Particularly hard hit in the survey were politics, high schools, talk radio, motorways, and Hollywood and professional sports.

72 percent of Americans think the government has got it all wrong. This overall opinion has appears to be having an impact on participation and interest in the political process. Nearly half of all Americans are simply no longer interested in politics, with 63 percent indicating that the general tone and level of civility (or lack thereof) as a major factor in their decision to tune out. 46 percent are no longer interested in opinion and editorials in the media, 45 percent citing incivility as the driving force.

When it comes down to the naming of names, 71 percent of Democrats surveyed said that they thought Republicans were uncivil. 74 percent of all Republicans viewed Democrats as uncivil. Political independents view Republicans more uncivil than Democrats, although independents think that both parties are more uncivil than civil (58 and 50 percent, respectively).

“Our research provides hard evidence that constituents and consumers alike are fed up with the polarization of our political system and the uncivil tone of our country as a whole,” said Jack Leslie, Chairman of Weber Shandwick. “As a result, Americans are tuning out and turning away from news, information and informed opinions that make up the very foundation of American democracy.”

Outside the political world, Americans are still hopping mad about the general incivility of the nation. Three quarters of Americans believe that companies that exhibit uncivil behavior should be boycotted. 56 percent of Americans have refrained from purchasing one company or another’s products based on their own perceived levels on corporate incivility. 55 percent have reevaluated their opinions of said company, while 49 percent indicated that they’ve advised friends and family against purchasing a company’s product.

And while the majority of Americans view their nation to be uncivil and are quick to point fingers in every direction, they still believe that there is hope to turn the tide. When asked who is responsible for improving civility, 87 percent answered “The American public.” 83 percent said political leaders, and 81, 79, and 76 percent indicated news media, businesses and places of worship.

The online survey was conducted by KRC Research and polled more than 1,000 Americans on how civility affect’s individual views of and participation in social media, politics, and buying behaviors. The executive summary of this survey is available here.

I have but one quote to offer to this news: “Be the change you want to see in the world.” – Mahatma Ghandi

Commissioned by Dr. Steven Denenberg of Omaha, Nebraska, the “Facial Plastic Surgery: Before and After,” app displays hundreds of before and after photos and communicates what’s involved in the facial plastic surgery process.

“The iPad is the next powerful communication tool,” Dr. Denenberg said. “Its gorgeous display lets us present huge photos, and its touch screen makes the app fun and easy to navigate.”

Harvard and Stanford trained Denenberg has been listed as one of America’s Top Doctors by Castle Connolly Medical Ltd. consecutively since 2001. Denenberg has been recognized by Vogue and W magazines, and serves patients clients from over 50 countries around the world.

Now I’m not quite sure what makes this an ‘app’, as from what I’ve seen, it’s basically a glorified e-book. Which reminds me, if viewing hundreds of photos of what plastic can do for your looks isn’t enough for you, Denenberg’s app also includes a bonus 200 page e-book including photos of how plastic surgery operations are performed. Ghoulish fun included!

If the app included the ability to integrate high resolution photos of one’s self, and then using the touch screen interface, manipulate the image via the confines of what today’s plastic surgery can do – ok…win. But again, as it is right now, there’s plenty of pictures, but that’s about it.

Score one (more) for Dr. Denenberg, as he’s first-to-market with a plastic surgery app, as well as owning the perfect plastic surgery URL, FacialSurgery.com. I’m not sold on the effectiveness of the app, but clearly Dr. Denenberg and staff know how to drive traffic, and ultimately sales. Hats off to you sir.

Should you need a facelift are interested, Dr. Denenberg’s scary book of pictures can be found at App33.com.

In a press release, Apple CEO Steve Jobs says, “One million iPads in 28 days–that’s less than half of the 74 days it took to achieve this milestone with iPhone. Demand continues to exceed supply and we’re working hard to get this magical product into the hands of even more customers.”

To date, iPad users have downloaded 12 million apps and 1.5 million ebooks.

Early estimates from industry analysts placed 1.3 million iPads sold by the end of June. As per usual, Apple is blowing predictions out of the water.

And in related news…

Games Developer legend David Perry has been working on some exciting stuff over the past few years, least of which is his Gaikai project. At it’s root, Gaikai is a browser based game streaming technology that uses server side streaming.

Great. Browser based games are nothing new, and at first glance, Gaikai might just be another run of the mill, games in browser technology. However,

When’s the last time you played WoW on anything other than your desktop?

Perry recently posted this image to his personal blog, showing a live copy of World of Warcraft running on an iPad (or a really good photoshop job). What’s interesting about this is that Gaikai is designed to work with a Flash Player, which obviously isn’t going to happen on an iPad. So has Perry cracked the code, or is this a prototype version of the game specifically designed for Perry and co. to test with? Either or … expect to see WoW on the go in one form or another in the near future.

During the 1990’s Stevie was a pre-law student at the University of Kansas by day, and hardcore gamer by night. She joined the ranks of the Cyberathlete Professional League (CPL), and holds the honor of being the first ever professional female gamer. Post world gaming tours, Stevie moved into game development rolls, and eventually found herself in the world of High Tech Management. She currently juggles the hectic pace of heading up business development at microtransactions software provider, as well as being a full time mom “and loving it,” says Case.

Partnering with NewWorld.com, Stevie has recently signed a two-year agreement to host a weekly podcast, appropriately titled Stevie FTW. The podcast will focus on not only gaming, but the high tech lifestyle including web culture, digital media, and the latest gadgets and tech trends. Not solely bound to tech, Stevie will seek to cross her passions for adventure, food, wine, travel and more with her unique industry experiences.

The StevieFTW podcast officially launched yesterday, March 31st, and will air every Wednesday. Her initial guest, none other than gaming industry icon Cliff Bleszinski of Epic Games. Bleszinski is one of the driving forces behind the Unreal franchise, as well as the Gears of War series. If this isn’t a high bar to set in an inaugural episode – I don’t know what is. I, for one, can’t wait to see where she goes from here.

“This is something that I’ve done for years, just not in Podcast form,” says Case. “There’s all this great info floating around in my, and others’, heads, and so the option to put it down on tape [so to speak] was a no-brainer. “

Catch Stevie FTW at stevieftw.com. No iTunes stream has been set up yet, but Case assures me it’ll be there “very soon”. You can also stay up to date with Stevie FTW on Twitter and Facebook.

4/4/10 Update: Here’s the Stevie FTW iTunes Podcast link.

The Crime

Matthew Chow, a member of the infamous “Rabid Neurosis”, or RNS as they were better known, has been found ‘not guilty’ by a jury of his peers. Chow was on trial for the charge of ‘conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement’. In other words…Digital Piracy Yarrrrrr!

According to the federal indictment, authorities claimed that RNS was the world’s largest music piracy ring. Between [at least]1999 and 2007, Chow and co-conspirators illegally uploaded thousands of copyright-protected music files, which were provided by music industry insiders. In 1996, RNS released their first file, Metallica’s Ride the Lightning (Yes, this WAS one of the bugs up Lars Ulrich’s ass), and finished their 11 year run with Fall Out Boy’s Infinity on High. The group’s most notable claim-to-piracy-fame was the early leak of Eminem’s Encore album.

Federal authorities charged Chow with one count of conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, which carries a maximum prison sentence of five years, and a $250,000 fine. Moreover, Chow could have been ordered to pay restitution to the RIAA, the only named victim in the crime.

“I am relieved by the jury’s verdict and I am grateful to my attorney for his hard work,” says Chow. Houston attorney Terry W. Yates, who represented Matthew Chow comments, “We encountered some extremely complex factual and legal issues in this case. The jury was very attentive during the trial. Their verdict was just.”

In total, six members of RNS were charged with offenses. Patrick L. Saunders was charged on Aug. 14th, 2009, and plead guilty. James A. Dockery was charged on Sept. 8th, 2009. Adil R. Cassim, Bennie Glover, Matthew D. Chow, and Edward L. Mohan were all charged on Sept. 9th, 2009. Only Chow and Cassim were found not guilty. The remaining four pled guilty to copyright infringement charges, three of which turned state’s evidence and testified for the government in the Houston trial.

Lessons learned

Sooooo…what can we learn from this? There’s a number of things (both right and wrong) going on in this mess. I often wonder Karlheinz Brandenburg had any idea how his work might effect the lives, carriers, criminal records, of thousands and thousands of individuals. My thoughts on piracy are this: Find me a computer in this world that doesn’t have at least one pirated line of code on it, and I’ll find you a box to ship it in, because it’s gotta be factory fresh.

I’m not saying that I support music or software piracy, but rather – accept that they are here, and rapidly becoming, if not already, ingrained in our daily lives. I think we all know by now that Musicians aren’t making any money from record sales. The upside to this new economy is that Musicians are making money the old fashioned way, by going out on the road, playing shows, and earning it.  In fact, there are a number of bands that have already embraced this philosophy, and have given away their music (think Coldplay, Radiohead, NIN), and let’s not forget about The Grateful Dead and Phish, who for years, have allowed legal taping and trading of their live performances.

Likewise, the video game industry has been (and will perhaps always be) fraught with disc pirates. The solution? One small company in Korea decided to start giving games away, and charging one small piece at a time. The result? Microtransactions and social gaming as we know them today.

The positive way to look at the entire RIAA and copyright laws, etc. is that yes, it’s going to happen. However, that doesn’t mean that innovation and competition can not drive a better mousetrap. In a way, we all owe pirates a debt of gratitude. In another way, I blame them for the $75 ticket price, and $0.99 for a digital sword.

Pirates. Yarrrrrrr!

But how could one of the world’s largest online service providers overlook such a detail? It comes down to a simple lack of widespread testing. Buzz was only tested internally at Google, something the company normally does NOT do. Most often, when Google wants to bring a new product to market, they’ll tap into their unofficial “Google Trusted Tester” program, a network of family and friends of Google employees who have proven track records and are trusted with a high degree of confidentiality. These “Trusted Testers” are in exchange, given early access to a soon to be launched Google product. Unfortunately, Buzz did not receive the same treatment. “We’ve been testing Buzz internally at Google for a while. Of course, getting feedback from 20,000 Googlers isn’t quite the same as letting Gmail users play with Buzz in the wild,” comments Jackson.

To battle the negative buzz now surrounding Buzz, Google has set up a “war room” at their Mountain View, CA. headquarters that is strictly devoted to sorting out the Buzz issues.

“If it becomes clear that people don’t think we’ve done enough, we’ll make more changes,” said Jackson.

He acknowledged that many of the networks “tens of millions” of users were “rightfully upset” and that the firm was “very, very sorry”.

“We know we need to improve things.”

The Changes

Only three days after launch, Google team members called a meeting to make the quick fixes. With obvious holes open in the “who do they communicate with the most?” format, Google pulled the plug on the “friend” matching process, and is now only suggesting friends that the Buzz user may be interested in following back (how they determine this, like all things Google, remains a mystery). They’ve also announced that they’re implementing a feature that should make it easier for Buzz users to shut the service off entirely. Jackson says that “transparency and control” are “top priorities” and that users will “continue to see improvements”. And while it seems “transparency” is top priority on paper at Google, that isn’t always the case in the physical world.

Additional changes that Buzz users can look forward to include a better preferences menu that should allow users more control over what’s arriving in their inbox, as well as a more prominent “Mute” button that would switch the service off altogether. Further illustrating the flub at Google, Jackson adds that the idea has been discussed to make Buzz a service independent from Gmail.

“We think that integration with Gmail was absolutely the right way to go – we wanted to make Buzz easily accessible to people,” Jackson said.

“We also want to give people who don’t use Gmail the ability to use Buzz, so we’re exploring the idea of offering a separate destination site.”

Google reps expect the changes to Buzz to go live sometime this week.

It looks like Google has heard what the audience has said, and is making the appropriate changes. However, with the recent ‘what is this? I don’t get it.’ crash-n-burn surrounding Wave, coupled with the Buzz ‘wanna know who I talk to most?’ blowup, Google’s going to have to pull some magic out of the proverbial hat to get me excited about a new product launch.