Social Cache.
A Nemo blog. Dealing with uncommon cents.

Move over, iPhone. The Google phone has arrived. T-Mobile has partnered with Google to launch the G1, which is the first phone to feature Google’s Android software. As you may have guessed, Android makes the phone function very similarly to the iPhone.

Like the iPhone online store, the Android Market is full of free applications and widgets developed by programmers around the world. A big difference between Google and Apple though is that Google will allow open submissions to its store instead of turning away programs it deems inconsistent with its mission.

Critics cite the G1’s biggest improvement over the iPhone as being the Menu button that pulls up a panel of large buttons of functions that relate to what you’re doing. For PC fanatics, it’s the equivalent of a right-click button on a computer mouse.

As would be expected with version 1.0 of this phone, there are many small glitches, but these are expected to be ironed out quickly. Some bright points though are picture messaging, voice dialing and the option to turn any song into a ringtone. Additionally, as a Sidekick phone, the screen pops open with a small keyboard underneath.

Though the G1 isn’t as streamlined or beautiful as the iPhone, soon enough Androids will expand into a variety of formats and networks. Finally, adopters looking for an iPhone alternative have some viable options.

Sports, technology, iconic brands and social networking all wrapped up in one package – Nike+ there are only winners here. The Nike+ Sports Kit has allowed athletes to share their data with friends and others who then compete online. This coming together of computer and running shoe technology between Apple, who’s iPod is a way to gather and upload the runner’s data (speed, distance, steps etc) and Nike who’s shoes include the Piezoelectric accelerometer for measuring the data.

And now a campaign to register runners globally to run a 10k and have every mile tracked whether they run, walk or jog and Nike will count those miles towards a charity of its choice. Time to get away from the monitor.

Best Buy wins the third party sales slot. That gives you 970 more stores to find one in stock, or not.

I was reading a report today from ComScore Media Metrix about how American and European mobile users are accessing maps from their mobile devices. No surprise that the iPhone is the leading device in the USA with the Nokia N95 and N70 leading the way in Europe. More interesting was the data on Mode of Transport Intended to be Used when Accessing Maps. As you’ll see in the grid below USA mobile users lead the way in use whilst driving in the car, come last in using their devices whilst traveling on public transport and last again in use whilst working out. Whatever the data means it does point to the fact that we drive more and use public transport less than our European counterparts. Or perhaps it’s a demographic issue?

My good friend Brian Zisk, the man behind the always interesting SanFranMusicTech Conference, has announced the next gathering. It will be back at San Francisco’s Hotel Kabuki on October 20th. There are early bird tickets currently available through August 8th which you can grab here. I will be there as a panelist along with the following folks:

Bob Heyman – Mediasmith, Chief Search Officer
Steve Jang – imeem, CMO & Head of Business Development
Ethan Kaplan – Warner Music Technology, VP
Rachel Masters – Ning, VP of Strategic Relationships
Jack Moffit – Speeqe, CEO / Chesspark, CEO & Lead Developer / IceCast Streaming Media Server, Creator / Xiph Foundation, Co-Founder
Sean O’Connell – Music Allies, Founder & CEO
Dave Ulmer – Motorola, Sr. Director Multimedia Products and Services
Carnet William – Sprout, Co-Founder & CEO
Brian Zisk – SanFran MusicTech Summit, Executive Producer / Future of Music Coalition, Technologies Director

Once the mainstream media and the more hysterical tech blogs have got over the fact that the success of the iPhone 3G launch caused Apple’s servers to be overloaded, we can sit back and take stock.

I own the iPhone v.1 and I’m currently happy without 3G access so I remain content with my device. One reason for staying put with the original model is that the new software update from Apple brings some rather cool new applications [or Apps in the vernacular,] that improve the original phone’s productivity.

I chose a couple of productivity apps, Zenbe, a list sharing tool and Jott, a voice to text tool. I got AirMe for uploading my iPhone pictures up to my Flickr account and added MPG and Spend [no link available, tsk, tsk] so if I care I can track my miles per gallon in the Element and set budgets for my gourmand extravaganzas. These apps all perform well without G3 and most were free. One app that fell into the epic fail bucket was Reqall. Couldn’t sign up on the iPhone and couldn’t load the web site either. Fail! Turns out that Jott does the same stuff anyway.

The most interesting app of all is Loopt which enables users to broadcast their whereabouts and send a status of a broad set of services and find interesting locations and reviews nearby. This could be the next breakout social networking platform as it works best from the phone [mobiles, not just the iPhone] and is simple to update ala Twitter. In fact it has a Twitter plug-in so you can post once and hit Twitter too. Follow me on Twitter here.

One problem though – Loopt could be a predators dream. In fact Loopt’s Be Safe page spells out in no uncertain terms that you need to control who has access to your location.

Anyway, here’s my thinking behind the title of this post. David Griner wrote a post entitled Are Blogs Still Good Places for Conversation? which at first glance I took as simply a Google bait tactic. The answer would seem to be “of course they are.” He raises a good point but I still believe a good, well written blog is the place for conversation. Twitter, a micro-blog, is not. I use my Twitter account to drive traffic back to my blog where the conversation can really open up. After all Twitter only allows 140 characters so truncated updates are the norm, which is fine. If I follow Marshall Kirkpatrick on Twitter I get up-to-the-minute breaking tech news from him but I prefer to read his blog at Read Write Web for a more in-depth review. On both my blogs, the other being Pampelmoose, I enjoy reading comments that can often be longer than the original post – something that is impossible with Twitter.

Joining the conversation and being invited in are two things I have stressed when it comes to advising our clients on their forays into social media advertising. A blog is the right venue for extending conversations, not a micro-blog. By all means post links to your original content stories to Twitter so that interested followers can link to your blog. Be sure to use FriendFeed to share your blog posts with others, use Tumblr too for the same reason, but understand that many of the social networking arenas, Twitter, Loopt even Facebook, are way ahead of the general online populations’ capacity to juggle all of them, and those folks not partaking in every widget, bell and whistle are your customers too.

Run a blog, embrace radical transparency, get invited in to communities that might enjoy your products and join the conversation. But whatever you decide to do, don’t do this – OHSU Director’s Blog. If you don’t immediately see why feel free to ask me.