We live in the Social Media Galaxy
The clue of Social Media Marketing is reaching potential customers through those a brand already has. When companies deliver a great product or service they can leverage Social Media by engaging greatest fans who in return naturally recommend them to their friends within their social networks, which is of course a great added value to a company.
Authors of the article (Alexis Christie and Ludwig Siegele) strongly claim that books transform from the traditional books we know to book applications. This transformation, process should be called "the law of McLuhan". It is though as inevitable as are the laws of physics (to those who don't know McLuhan was my insporation for this blog, as well as its title "Medium is the user").
The medium is different. We consume electronic books from E-ink technology or tablets like iPad or Galaxy tab. The trend is growing in numbers. Amazon and other ebook sellers claim to hit records in sales this Christmas. Strong competition on the market will make these devices faster, more endurable in terms of battery performance and more affordable (sometimes even free of charge). Who knows, maybe next year we will see this trend in the streets of Poland?
But the biggest change is on the side of the user experience. Book applications on tablets are rich. They have embedded multimedia and allow readers to interract with their content. E-ink ebook readers are pure and smart. Kindle provides me with instant translation of difficult words, sharing options, highlighting and notes. These devices also strip magazines like Bloomberg BusinessWeek or The Time down from unnessesary photos and disturbing elements allowoling me to focus on the true content itself.
We will see arguments between ebook early adopters and strong fans of book smell and feel in the coming years. We will also see a shift in book production not only in presentation (multimedia), but also in the plot itself. One thing is certain, the 500 year old tradition of book is at the edge of a radical change.
What is transparency?
The very metaphor of transparency suggests a medium through which we view things and through which others can view us. This metaphor makes two important assumptions, as J.M. Balkin has noted.2 First, it assumes that what is on one side of the transparent medium is conceptually separate from what is on the other side. Second, it assumes that the process of seeing through the medium does not substantially alter the nature of what is being viewed.
Why transparency?
For the purposes of this report, when we discuss transparency, we are generally referring to published information about government processes, budgets, and public officials. (There are also projects, such as CorpWatch24, Publish What You Pay25, and Sourcemap26 that aim to publish more information about the private sector that is in the public’s interest.) Sometimes this information is made available by governments themselves. For example, in June, 2002 then-President of Mexico Vicente Fox signed his country’s first freedom of information law, which requires government agencies to publish in a routine and accessible manner all information concerning their daily functions, budgets, operations, staff, salaries, internal reports, and the awarding of contracts and concessions.27 (A clear analysis of the law was published by Kate Doyle the day it was passed.28 John Ackerman has published a three-year evaluation of Mexico’s implementation of the law in comparison to similar freedom of information initiatives around the world.29)
Today is the day of the presidential elections in Poland. It is our civic responsibility to take part in them, since it is the one and only productive, responsible and caring way for us to contribute in defining our country's leaders.
You know what makes a great service? When after few minutes of using it you think to yourself: how did I manage to live without it? Like the bakery round the corner you visit to grab a bagel. It makes you happy, life without it would be different.
