Author: JD Rucker

As it does with most trends in marketing, the automotive industry has gone from way behind just a year and a half ago to shaping the venues and carving the path today. There have been some missteps to say the least, many in the business from car dealers to manufacturers are fully embracing social media as a venue to get their brand and message out to the masses. Earlier this year we wrote about how the industry is embracing new media. Now, we’ve compiled a breakdown of the major manufacturers and how their current social media presence ranks in this competitive world. By the numbers There’s an old saying:…

When Mark Dean, CTO of IBM Middle East and Africa, declared this morning that we are in the “Post-PC Era”, a tinge of frustration and anger popped up in me. Items that are used daily in millions of households across the world don’t simply die. I was annoyed when IBM CEO Lou Gerstner declared that “The PC is dead” in 1999. I was annoyed when they made the same claim in 2005 when they sold their personal computing division to Lenova. I was annoyed this morning when I read it again. Then, I realized something: they may be right this time. The younger generations Y and Z – 10-30 years old or whatever those boundaries…

Trolls. We all love them. We all hate them. They are entertaining when we aren’t the victim, but when they focus on us, they can make us want to cry. There are things that you can do to fight them. We’re here to help. First, you must identify them. Getting into a conversation with one can lead to a trap if you don’t know what you’re getting into. Once identified, you have to take control of the situation and lead the direction of the conversation. Finally, you need to know when to fight back and when to walk away. This graphic breaks it down for us and shows how to keep it all under “con-troll”. Click to enlarge….

The concept of robots that learn may seem relatively simply. We see robots and machines that are able to perform complex tasks flawlessly and many believe that this type of technology means that artificially intelligent robots are right around the corner (or here already). The biggest challenge has been in programming robots with the ability to adjust to changing environments and circumstances, applying what they know and extrapolating what they do not know to make a proper choice in new situations. Sounds easy, but it’s not. Not yet, at least. Researchers in Japan have developed a “Self-Replicating…

This could also be titled, “How Larry Page is starting to run Google more like Steve Jobs would.” Google has operated in many ways like Microsoft and other tech companies that are going after a bunch of things at once. It worked for them better than most, but there were still too many failures and distractions to keep the company from achieving its goals. Things have changed with Larry Page at the helm and as a result, the company seems more focused. It seems more like Apple. The latest addition to the Google feature list is Instant Pages for Chrome. The concept is very simple – when a user does a search…

It’s not that big of a deal, really. It’s just a Chrome extension that someone made to add some spice and life to Google+. Many people will be doing their browsing from mobile devices and clients and may never actually go to plus.google.com very often. Still, it’s really nice to see how quickly and easily it was made. What you see above is the top of Google+ the way I see it on Chrome. I installed this extension and in seconds I had a nice new look and feel. Again, this is nothing earth shattering. Then again, can you do this on Facebook? Yes. It’s just not very easy. Perhaps Google will be rolling out different…

It seems like there are two things without limits: Mark Malkoff’s ability to pull of crazy stunts in New York and Apple’s willingness to accept their customers in any form and with any pets. Such was the case earlier this week when Malkoff added to his colorful resume of stunts with 4 impressive tests of New York City Apple Stores’ patience. “Recently I have noticed that the Apple Store allows customers to things you could never do in any other big brand name store,” Markoff said. He started off simply by having a pizza delivered to the Apple store. They allowed him to take delivery and eat it at the store….

Every IT person, developer, and programmer has an opinion when it comes to the various open source content management systems out there. It often comes down to functionality and ease of use, but even then the lines are often blurred and there is rarely a clear-cut victor. Wordpress vs Drupal vs Joomla – which is really the king of open source CMS? Our friends at Devious Media tackled the question and did a comprehensive breakdown, putting each CMS under a microscope to answer the most important questions to help people make a choice. For us, the choice is clear, but blogging is not the only thing important…

It was fun while it lasted. Something new and shiny popped into our social media lives in the last month that offered nearly everything we’ve ever wanted. Much like a new significant other, we fawned over how cool this feature was or how amazing that feature was. We declared our undying love for this new network and vowed to someday completely transition away from the old hag run by Mark Zuckerberg. We only saw the good. There was nothing bad other than a few bugs here or there and some quirky taste-choices. It was great. The shotgun wedding that saw 20 million users flock to Google+ in three weeks (versus…

Had this “deleted scene” been aired during the season 1 finale of Lost, it would have answered a lot of questions. Actually, no, it wouldn’t. It would have created a whole lot more questions in the series that already confused millions and left many feeling, well, lost at the end of every episode. At the very least this spoof put on by the Lost exec producers Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse at Comic-Con this weekend would have done one positive thing – reveal the name of the smoke monster. …