Robotics Club kicks off at Salt River Elementary

A few months ago I never thought I’d be taking on the mantle of coach of a Robotics club.

Well, that day has come!

Today, we kicked off the first meeting of the Robotics Club at Salt River Elementary School. I’m honored to be working with Dr. Bill Johnson, who could probably build one of these amazing bots (to call it a toy is an insult!) in the dark, with one arm tied behind his back.

For all those who despair about kids today being more taken up by computer games than reading and writing, I have news for you.

Last year’s school team, ‘The Titans,’ (students between the ages of 9 and 11) researched the basic conditions and consequence of diabetes, then proceeded to build a robot using mathematical calculations to send it off on a ‘mission’ to solve the problem. They were so good at it and their mission was so well thought out, that they went on to represent the school at the world championships in St. Louis, Missouri.

Care to know more about this? Check out this story.  ASU also featured it here.

Today, we showed parents what humans could do to robots. I talked of the several robots we have taken for granted. Yes, you may have heard of HAL and Roomba.

But not many people have heard of Jason (doing oceanographic studies) DaVinci (performing robotic heart surgery, left), Predator (the drone, of course), Hobo (the fearless robots that disarms explosives),  Dante II (the 990 pound, eight-legged robot built to monitor volcanoes), Kurt (the sewer inspector in Germany).

But more importantly than what humans do to robots is what robots do to humans -the interdisciplinary field of robotics helps us step outside our boundaries, and rethink what seemed impossible.

Here’s one of the smart robots that Dr. Johnson has created. It responds to sound and touch. But, as he notes, that’s only scratching the surface of what these kids are capable of doing.

 

 

Top speakers at tomorrow’s Social Media event

If you had planned to do it and procrastinated, today (Thursday) is the last day for any discount codes for Social Media AZ (SMAZ)–the much awaited annual event.

The event is tomorrow and you may buy your tickets at the door, but it will cost ya! $225!

• When: February 11th, 2011
• Time: 9 am – 4 pm (doors open at 8 am)
• Where: The MadCap Theaters in Tempe - 730 S. Mill Avenue, Tempe, AZ 85281 (Map)
• Parking: Discounted parking available
• Agenda: Check the topics and speakers here

The keynote will be by Jay Baer (of Convince & Convert), and Amber Naslund (of Radian6). They will talk about their new book, The Now Revolution. All attendees will receive a free copy of the book! More background here when we interviewed Jay on our radio show two weeks ago.

Several speakers from other states will be presenting as well. They include:

• Kamran Qamar the president of mobile development company.
• Patrick Seaman (Mr. Broadcast.com himself!)
• Christian Briggs (chairman of BMC capital)

Check out the line up of speakers, here.

In case you’ve been to a SMAZ event before, do note that there will be new topics this year covering mobile, location, search, and e-commerce.

Register today!

 

In a job search – again?

What if this is not the last career move you’ll ever make? Job searching in a world of blogs and social networks has been a topic I’ve spoken about –and still wrestle with — considering the fact that resumes are not exactly passe.

So this topic ‘What is this isn’t my last job search?” is very relevant. It’s the theme of a networking event next week in Phoenix, hosted by the Southwest Job Network (SJN).

The Speaker: Jason Alba, author of  “I’m on LinkedIn – Now What???” and the person behind JibberJobber.com (a software app)

• When:  Wednesday 9th February
• Where: Gateway Community College. 108 N. 40 Street, Phoenix, AZ 85034
• Cost: Free.  SJN exists on donations; the suggested donation is just $5 –which is tax deductible.
• Registration and more details: At this link

 

A working model of ‘Social Capital’

I’ve been indulging in Wikis a lot this year.

I wrote quite a bit on the topic here and elsewhere, recently. And his Monday I was in charge of the wiki portion of what amounts to the launch of the first open source business development plan in Sustainability, for Arizona. More about this here.

So on Wednesday, when I visited Gangplank to get a better sense of this remarkable working environment I could not help notice the parallel.

If Gangplank is a piece of software, it would most probably be a Wiki!

It’s a a true collaborative space, whose ‘permanent residents’ (independent businesses) don’t pay rent, though they get to use the utilities, the workspace, conference rooms, wifi etc for no charge. Derek Neighbors, co-founder of Gangplank and our guest on the radio show this week, prefers to call this an investment in ‘social capital.’ It reminded me of another semi-financial term used in the book Groundswell –how collaboration earns a person ‘psychic income.’

But to get back to the topic of wikis, if you consider how much time has gone into Wikipedia –approximately 1 million man hours, according to Clay Shirky-- it is a model that works even among largely anonymous people. So of course it world work when you get a room filled with creative people.

Just step into Gangplank, and you’ll see a working model -or a ‘use case’ if you prefer another geeky term!

 

Crowd-sourcing employees in Phoenix

Incentives and employee motivation go hand in hand, as we have been noting here.

So this story strikes close to our heart, since it is right here in Phoenix. It’s not some hi-tech company doing this. It’s the City of Phoenix!

You may not hear the word ‘insourcing’ often, because its evil nemesis outsourcing gets so much of press. But drawing ideas from the well that’s within the organization is often overlooked. Often there are no mechanisms in place for ideas to bubble up, resulting in apathy or timidness in generating suggestions.

This story by Lynh Bui today (in the Arizona Republic)  talks of 25 out of 175 ideas being implemented in 2009-2010. That’s about a 11 percent success!

Now what if the City of Phoenix was to open up the valves in the employee idea reservoir, and say, aim at generating 720 ideas next year (a measly 60 a month). That same 11 percent rate would then triple the number of implemented ideas.

Incentives are great. But many employees don’t always wait for these to get started. Bui’s observation is spot on: “Employees aren’t necessarily turning in ideas just for the awards.”

 

Social Media Meetup in Tempe!

Once again, Fred Von Graf is pulling together a great event with his outfit Social Media Arizona (SMAZ).

It’s the Tempe Social Media Day Meetup at MADCAP Theater from 5-7 p.m.

Here is what it’s all about:

You get to take the MADCAP stage and deliver “a verbal, in-person Tweet about why you love your favorite social media tool and talk about something great that happened because you used it.”

There’s live music, food and prizes.

Details here:

 

Quotes for the week ending 8th May, 2010

“In the Future, we’ll all have 15 minutes of privacy.”

Scott Monty, head of social media for Ford, on a post about Facebook’s latest move to connect to the rest of the web

“No one is laughing in Arizona. Do your job and secure the border.”

Governor Jan Brewer, in a YouTube video aimed at president Obama, who made a joke about the immigration Bill that Brewer signed into law.

“A lot of great stories are hidden within the public”

Manesh Nesaratnam, Malaysian film director of a movie, Your Grandfather’s Road, which is being crowd-sourced.

“That QR code on the left will even take your smartphone to my Twitter feed. And if you really liked this story, you can re-Tweet too.”

Kit Keaton, whose column in Fast Company, features this Quick Response code.

“A nastygram.”

Shel Holtz, referring to the letter Apple, which sent a nine-year-old girl a cease-and-desist letter after she suggested enhancements to the iPod.

“You gotta give him credit for his media manipulation skills.”

Pat Elliot, commenting on a post I wrote for ValleyPRBlog, about the value Sheriff Joe Arpaio holding a press conference to announce he is NOT running for governor.

“We are heartened by news reports that J.S.Tissainayagam appears to have been pardoned…”

CPJ (Committee to Protect Journalists) in a statement on the presidential pardon for journalist J. S. Tissanayagam in Sri Lanka

 

Crowd-sourcing as internal communication tool

Smart mobs, crowd-sourcing, citizen journalism –have you noticed how these waves of outside influence keep crashing on our shores?

Howard Rheingold, in Smart Mobs, uses a powerful analogy of human intelligence and computers. If you consider thousands of computers in a building as heaters running at full capacity, he says, only a small part of the heat generated is being used to warm the building. The rest of the energy leaks outside. It could easily be distriuted to other parts of the enterprise.

Now consider the ‘leakage’ of intellectual capital in your office every day. Employees arrive at the workplace, power-up, and are left to run, but vast amounts of  knowledge and ideas are untapped. The occasional survey, the large meetings where no one wants to raise their hand only scratch the surface.

Crowd-sourcing (despite books like this on the future of business) as a driver of big ideas, or as an  internal communications / HR function has not taken off. When it has been attempted –in a controlled environment such as focus groups — the costs and time involved make it a very expensive nice-to-have.

So how do you connect the internal circuits of your human resource that occupy the building? I’ve come across voting tools, idea-generation apps and feedback systems. Here are a three:

• IdeaScale – for community-level conversation tracking
• ConceptShare - for teams of designers and Creatives to collaborate and generate ideas
• GetSatisfaction -a tool for customers and employees to gather ‘social knowledge’

Feedback widgets are here –and coming soon to a mobile device near you. Many of them only go so far. Some experts even warn of getting entangled in intellectual property problems. But the big hurdle to consider is motivation. Engagement goes hand in hand with incentives -the old WIFM concept.

My client, Arizona-based GreenNurture has takes the concept of feedback and employee engagement further. Deeper! 

Here’s how it works: In a company that wants to deploy a sustainability program, employees login to a social media-like app, come up with ideas, start comment or conversation threads, make pledges and vote on each others ideas. When hundreds of them start talking to each other, some idea gets refined, tossed out or voted up. The cream rises to the top, so to speak. There’s more granular information, including an assessment tool, deep reports etc –making sure no ‘heat’ is lost.

If you are interested, check the demo here!

 

Quotes for the week ending 30 Jan, 2010

“Was he a talk-show host masquerading as a politician?  Or a politician masquerading as a talk-show host?”

Editorial in the Arizona Republic, on J.D. Hayworth, giving up his 3-hour slot on talk radio, to possibly run against John McCain.

“Democracy in a nation of 300 million people can be noisy and messy and complicated.”

Barack Obama, State of the Union address, 2010

“Reverse Psychology: Chinese Knock-Off Firm to Sue Apple Over iPad”

Fast Company, on Shenzen Great Long Brother Industrial company claim that the iPad is a knockoff of its P88 model, presented six months prior at the IFA

“It’s time to find your voice and get an online printing press.”

Wayne Kurtzman, at MediaBullseye

 

Plenty of “non-experts” – tons of social media expertise

A funny thing happened in the lobby of MADCAP Theater, Monday.

It had nothing to do with these two familiar faces. Most of the 400 + attendees at the Social Media for Business event –a..k.a SMAZ –about all things digital, indulged in one of the oldest communication tools, business cards.

I loved how, despite seeing a Twitter handle on the last statutory slide of every preso, this tiny cardboard rectangle still works. It probably illustrates how social practices like this will not go away despite the attention we give to trackbacks, Tweetdeck or Posterous.

In between working the floors wearing that funny hat, I sat in on some great sessions. The panel on Building Brand Evangelists with Social Media, moderated by Kevin Gawthrope (@gawthrok), was very enlightening.

Then there was our very own Linda Vandrede moderating Social Media 101 a panel that included Amanda Vega, Chris Hewitt, Scott Andrew and Sheila Kloefkorn. Talk about heavyweights! If you’d been to last year’s SMAZ, you would have notices how the audience had changed, even at a 101 level. One of the sticky topics that came up was about outsourcing content. There were two schools of thought here, but both maintained that content creators have to be transparent and committed. Blogola and astroturfing won’t cut it.

As I mentioned earlier, the tone was set by Sitewire president, Greg (“I am not a social media expert”) Chapman but having said that, there was plenty to glean from. Especially in the hallways!

My takeaways (updated):

• Be the message, don’t just post the message!
• Don’t treat Facebook like the Yellow Pages.
• Listen first, tweet, post later. Use Social Media as a listening post.
• Be cognizant of the ‘channel agnostic customer.’
• Google handles hyphens better than underscores, so be watchful when you write headlines, tags.
• “Social media is free” is a huge misconception. There’s a human resource cost attached to it.
• Social media is not a strategy – it is what you embed into your Comms strategy, marketing strategy, PR strategy.
• Google’s new search engine, Caffeine, will knock your socks off.
• Think less about the platform, more about the content.
• Content isn’t king. Optimized content is king!
• Start with small things. If your boss or client wants to start tweeting, facebooking, start with small goals before the big-hairy-audacious ones
• There’s a difference between a News Feed and a Live Feed on Facebook.
• Train others freely. Give away secrets. The rising tide lifts all boats.
• Differentiate between Goals and Tactics. People mix these up.
• Just like the way they confuse Strategies and Tactics, I suppose.

If you read other takes on SMAZ , you’ll see that there’s a lot of tech stuff to wrap your head around. But for all the talk about ‘matchbacks’ and Seesmic, Tweetie and Flowtown, I came away with three things:

• “Social Media is an ingredient, not an entre.” – Jason Baer
• “Hang out where your customers hang out” – Sheila Kloefkorn

And …

• Bring a lot of business cards, next time, dammit

Cross-posted from ValleyPRBlog