Well, YouTube have begun streaming a new format called 4K as in (4096 x 3072 pixels) or 3 times the resolution of 1080P!
One downside is they recommend a 25 foot screen as in a full sized cinema screen (And I thought my Tv was big!)

YouTube have a bunch of these videos shot in this new format for you to checkout and they are simply stunning, make sure you select “original resolution” and then fullscreen…

4K Preview

Where will it ever end?

Wonders Of Wireless Breakfast Meeting Wedenesday 14^th July 2010 

Ben Keehan B2BNZ , sales agent and reseller of Wireless Office Solutions for Small Business.

Case Study 1.

John has a small accounting company with 5 staff soon to be increased to 8 full timers .  5 of his staff spend time on the road and the new juniors are office bound. John’s customers are all over the country and he and his staff talk a lot by phone , his bills are normally about $1500 per month plus $400 for mobile use. 

John is trying to save money across his business but also needs to upgrade his PBX as it is an 20 year Aria on its last legs. He has had some quotes but its not in his budget right now.

He had read an article on Fruitbowl recently about a chap that was doing great work with mobile office solutions , got the name and number of Ben Keehan , rang 06 9299940 and made a time to meet.

 Ben (that’s me) listened to what John was doing and Ben  come up with a real smart solution that met all of Johns needs with little upfront costs and did not sacrifice call quality.

 The solution is as follows:

 For Johns 5 mobile staff each user gets a Vodafone  mobile  phone with unlimited calling to any NZ mobile or landline number for a low monthly fee. Plus they get free voicemail and a free Local Number on Mobile.

The office juniors all get a Vodafone  GSM Wireless Office Phones with unlimited national landline calls for $40 per month

Another of Bens suppliers ,Orcacom provides a SIP trunk for $20 per month with all the PBX features they need , Attendance greeting with option 1 , option 2 etc. Voicemail to Email, remote dial tone, call hunting and simultaneous ring tone.

A 20gb ADSL2+ PTSN line remains for faxing and if required as back up from Vodafone with ITZ.

All incommeing calls to Johns main number are taken over the SIP trunk line and routed to the appropriate extension, the call between the trunk and Wireless office phone is free.

The 5 mobile staffers only have Vodafone mobiles phones, with Local Number(06 ddi) on mobile so any call from the SIP trunk are also free and any calls they make to customers are included in their monthly access fees!

 John really loves this idea as it requires no hardware cost, he can reduce his dependence on the PTSN network and his ongoings will be far lower.

 Current spend is around $1900 per month with mobile and landline

 Proposed costs

 $890.00 for all mobile access, adsl,PBX and desk phone usage saving John conservative $12,000 per annum.

 John signed up to a 24mth term, got free Nokia E63 for 4 staff and an 8GB 3GS Iphone for $249.00.! He tried twisting Bens arm a little harder and got some bonus Airtime credits to leave his current mobile providor.

John was pleased as all his needs had been met with one call, to Ben Keehan B2BNZ. 06 9299940

 Applause:

My daughter has taken to using social media in a big way this year. It started with Moshi Monsters last year, and this year she is blogging big time. In case you are wondering, Moshi Monsters is a networking web site for children.

With three blogs on the go, she has taught herself to use a range of cloud computing services, and recently added a podcast. She is constantly digging around the HTML code and rewriting sections of it to make it work the way she wants it to; adding animated graphics as well as creating backgrounds for her blogs and her online friends’ blogs.

So when the HTML5 for Web Designers book arrived yesterday, we had to fight over it. She won! Unfortunately, my daughter’s success at trying to get HTML5 code working this morning was not successful (thanks to the blogging platform’s tendency to rewrite code it doesn’t understand), but I don’t think this is going to stop her.

So as you can imagine, I have only had access to the book for less than an hour since it arrived. This isn’t a huge book. It does provide valuable insights into what HTML5 is all about and like any great book on web design, it focuses on best practice rather than coolness.

Oh, and in case you are wondering, as responsible parents, we closely monitor our daughter’s posts and online activity. If you are interested in what a ten-year old can accomplish in six-months of blogging, visit The Fun Filled Blog.

So I got one anyway.

And here are my thoughts on it…

The iPad is like an iPod Touch on steroids. It’s about the size of a paperback novel and has a touch screen.
It has 32GB of memory, so plenty of room for music, photos and videos, and Wi-Fi connectivity so you can surf the web, check out Facebook and Twitter, and read your emails.

The touch screen and tilt action makes it much more intuitive than a keyboard and mouse. The games are very cheap. Some really good ones are free or only cost about $3. If you have kids, they will love it, especially the excellent educational games and Angry Birds, a cult classic in which you destroy pigs sheltering in elaborate fortifications by launching birds at them with a catapult.

My mother-in-law loves playing scrabble on it – she’s a teacher so she loves the chance to exercise her vast vocabulary.

The iPad’s niche seems to be couch computer – you can play on it while watching TV or lying in bed – or spending time in your “office”, as the Fonz would call it. Computer is not really the right word for this thing, perhaps it should simply be called a tablet device. After surfing the web for a few minutes with its beautiful high-resolution touch screen, a laptop seems as antiquated as a typewriter.

I’ve already noticed some changes in my behaviour. I’ve never been unable to sit passively watching TV – my attention span is far too short. I need to read the newspaper or a magazine or change the channel every 15 seconds.
The iPad has made watching live sport a much more interactive and enjoyable activity. I watched the World Cup match between the USA and Ghana while following Google’s new real-time Twitter feed and it was like watching the game at a pub catching snippets of hundreds of random conversations. Some of the tweets were funny, like listening to Beavis and Butthead passing snide comments. When the USA lost, I actually felt sorry for some the fans, even though I really wanted Ghana to win. The iPad gave a real sense of community.

We’ve been using it as an iPod to play music through the stereo in the office. It makes it so easy for downloading music, and it’s cheap too ($13 for an album). We’ve downloaded more music in 3 weeks than we have in the least 3 years.

Things to be aware of before you get one:

• It doesn’t have a camera, and it doesn’t have a USB port so you can’t plug anything into it.
• The battery doesn’t seem to charge up from a PC, only from a Mac. If you haven’t got a Mac, you’ll need to charge it up from the wall instead.
• It doesn’t support Flash, but YouTube still works.
• It doesn’t have a phone, but it’s too big to use as a mobile phone anyway. However, it has a microphone so you can use it for Skype calls.
• It’s Wi-fi only so you can’t connect to the Internet outside of Wireless hotspots, although 3G iPads are now available.
• It seems a bit slippery and fragile, and until I got a folder for it, I was always scared of dropping it on the hard floor.

So the big question is “Should you get one?” Hmmmm… The iPad is very, very cool but it feels like it could be better. I would probably wait a while and see what improvements Apple makes to it and then see what else appears on the market. Most of the other manufacturers have devices in the works and some of them look pretty good.

http://mashable.com/2010/01/27/9-upcoming-tablet-alternatives-to-the-apple-ipad/

Rumour has it that Microsoft’s rumoured tablet device has been cancelled:
http://gizmodo.com/5527442/microsoft-cancels-innovative-courier-tablet-project

And Cisco has recently announced a tablet device aimed at business customers:
http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps11156/index.html

If anyone wants to have a play with the iPad, I’ve got it here at the Mogul office most days. Come and check it out!

They have a nice referral model where you can invite new people to DropBox and earn extra storage. Very clever (and why I’m posting this).

DropBox is great if you’re doing sales because you can have all your collateral and files available anywhere, even if they’re huge. We share a DropBox folder amongst our sales team so they always have the latest updates on their laptops.

DropBox seems to be the easiest way to get files onto an iPad. GoodReader has DropBox support so that you can simply drop a pdf in from your PC and pull it into GoodReader from anywhere.

Any other cloud products you’d recommend?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arjiHvkVXfA&

In the past, it was enough to have a brochure website, ensure it was visible in Google, and send out the occasional email newsletter to your customers to tell them about a special promotion you were running.

But this approach isn’t really working any more, especially if your target audience is under the age of 30.

For most web users under the age of 30, the first thing they log into each day isn’t their email, it’s Facebook. The first website they visit isn’t Google or Yahoo or even Trademe, it’s Facebook. When they get up in the middle of the night to go to the toilet, they check Facebook – maybe on their phone. You get the picture…

If this sounds far-fetched, here are some numbers:

There are now more than 400 million active Facebook users. ‘Active’ means they use it regularly.

50% of active users log in every day.

OK, so how do you get your website into the social networks so it’s visible to all of these people? They don’t check their email much, and tend to change their email address all the time anyway.

• You could start by creating a Facebook page for your business. But what are you going to put on it? who’s going to keep updating it? And why would people want to visit it?
• You could also create a Twitter account. But how are you going to get followers? And what are you going to tweet about?
• You could put links to your Facebook and Twitter accounts on your website. But why would someone want to visit those if they’re already browsing your website?

We seem to be missing the point of social networks here… if you think pushing out a one-way stream of content is an effective use of social media, you’re wasting your time.

Social networks exist because people like to interact with each other.

If you want to penetrate the social networks with your messages, you need to give people a reason to follow you, share your content for you, and interact with you.

So how do we do this?

• Offer your followers and fans an incentive – e.g. a prize draw, exclusive offers, a free e-book, whatever you think will work for your target audience and get them on board.
• Enable your website content to be shared by placing Facebook and Twitter sharing links on every page and article on your website, so when someone shares or tweets your page, all of their friends or followers will be notified with a link to your website.
• And make it easy for people to interact with your content by asking questions in your social media updates, e.g. ‘Do you like our new website?’ is quite a hard question to answer but ‘Do you like our new website more than our old one?’ is easy to answer. It just takes a Yes or No.

If you want to see some of these social media techniques in action, check out the following Hawke’s Bay sites we’ve worked on lately:

• Need a Nerd
• Lumsden Kindergarten
• Smart
• Rockmybaby (and Rockmybaby Australia)

If you’re keen to find out more about how a well-planned social media strategy can increase the effectiveness of your online marketing, make sure you come along to one of our workshops at the Mogul offices in Havelock North. We hold them every second Friday and places are limited.

Contact us today to register your interest.

Vodafone New Zealand is revolutionising the business of calling with its new talkZoneZero Plus plans for business customers.

With Vodafone’s talkZoneZero Plus, customers can call anyone in New Zealand, anytime and anywhere for no more than $136 per user per month*.

Building on the success of Vodafone’s talkZoneZero tariffs, this new offer provides customers with a consistent and transparent pricing structure – starting from as little as $36 a month per user. Businesses with five or more users can manage and increase control of their spend at a time when budgets are tight and many businesses are under pressure to reduce costs.

talkZoneZero Plus provides:
• A mobile calling plan for 5+ mobile users
• A single calling account for all your business mobiles
• Unlimited free calls between your business mobiles/calling group
• Flexible plans to suit your business needs: choose to upgrade to include landline and Vodafone mobiles, NZ landlines and mobiles
• Local Number on your Mobile**
• Free access to Voicemail in New Zealand***

Becky Lloyd, General Manager – Business Marketing at Vodafone NZ, comments: “From speaking to businesses on a daily basis about their communication needs, we’ve learnt that complex pricing plans for mobile communications are an unnecessary headache for managers faced with continuing economic pressures.

“Our new talkZoneZero Plus pricing plans offer a transparent pricing structure, total control – and unbeatable value. SMEs know what they’re paying for their business mobiles every month, and don’t need to worry about how they – and the wider team – use their phones. There’s no bill shock as the monthly price is fixed.”

And those businesses taking the New Zealand Zone at $100 a month (on top of their base plan), also get Local Number on a Mobile – which lets their customers reach them on a local number, without the unexpected expense of a mobile call. Armed with both offers, mobility-focussed-businesses can look to reduce or even eliminate fixed lines from their organisations.

Vodafone talkZoneZero Plus is available from 16 June, 2010. For more information about talkZoneZero Plus, talk to your business account manager.

ENDS

Notes to editors:

• Five or more mobile connections per customer are required to qualify for the flat fee pricing ;
• All connections within the account must be on the same Zone (i.e. you can’t have one connection on the New Zealand Zone – $136 per connection – and the remaining on the Landline Zone at $66 per connection);
• Customers need to re-sign all connections onto the new plans – transfer fees will be waived from existing talkZone plans;
• *Fair Use Policy applies. Vodafone Business terms and conditions also apply. See vodafone.co.nz for further details.
• **Businesses taking the New Zealand Zone at $100/month on top of their base plan also get Local Number on a Mobile – which lets your local customers reach you on a local number, without the unexpected expense of a mobile call.
• ***Businesses who take any of the zones on top of their base plan will get free access to their Voicemail in New Zealand

Monthly Access Fee determined on the number of connections

Embracing the government’s Local Loop Unbundling (LLU) regulation is cornerstone to the scaled capability that will bring faster broadband and lower calling rates.

Founded in 2002 by Sam Deller, we set out with wireless based technology targeted at customers that had a need for high speed internet access. We now have a customer base of in excess of 700 businesses – boasting some of the regions largest corporates is testament to the quality of our service. It is the combination of embracing LLU and our existing wireless infrastructure that, once fully rolled out, will amount to the best broadband and calling coverage in Hawke’s Bay.

Implementation will be undertaken in a phased fashion over the next 12 months, with customers within approximately three kilometers of the central Napier and Hastings exchanges being first to benefit. Other high priority exchanges are planned for September.

Steve Stuart, CEO, says that “This is significant as we are the first non-incumbent telecommunications company to have embraced the LLU regulation in Hawke’s Bay”. He then goes onto say that “It is the installation of our own equipment into exchanges that enables us to use alternative technologies to offer faster connection speeds and a feature rich service”. Steve explains that “Significant investment has gone into ensuring that the move to Airnet is seamless with customers being able to retain their existing phone numbers. We will be sending out some information to existing customers explaining in more detail about these changes and how they will apply.”

We can now also provide access to fibre, where there is a requirement for ultra fast broadband.

These are the first of many significant changes that will benefit customers, current and future, which we look forward to sharing with you in the months to come – Watch this space!

The report supports the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) findings earlier this year:

• online advertising is now over 10% of all domestic media spend
• all other media reported declines in 2009

So there’s a definite structural shift of traditional media spend moving to online marketing spend.

This global shift is occuring right here in Hawke’s Bay and the last 6 months at Mogul have given us front-row seats to what is almost certainly the biggest period of transformation in the media since the advent of broadcast radio and TV. Increasingly, our clients are demanding integrated strategies for the new interactive marketing channels, especially blogs, Facebook, and Twitter.

The idea of instant success in social media through one-off ‘viral campaigns’ is a dangerous myth. An effective social media strategy depends on a long-term attitude change amongst marketing staff. I ran a workshop this week where the phrase ‘ambient awareness’ was used (by EIT’s Joyce Seitzinger) to describe the effect you want to achieve in this new marketing space. Ambient awareness is the feeling of being physically close enough to someone to pick up changes in their mood from subtle cues. The ultimate aim of a social media marketer is to engage the customer at this deep level. In the past, this has been extremely difficult to do online because of the lack of interaction and real-time updates. A steady stream of well-organised, relevant, and original content delivered through the social media channels is key to building and maintaining your ambient awareness.

OK, I digress. Back to the report…

PricewaterhouseCoopers partner Chris Perree said:

“The ‘buzz’ around the online advertising industry continues to grow and we are noticing more knowledge sharing within the industry, and insights into what works well. It is encouraging to see how business decisions and the approach to online spend are changing. These insights translate into greater investment in the industry. The consistent growth in the total market year-on-year highlights the increased support for the industry. Breaking the 10% market share in 2009 for total advertising market spend paves a positive path for the year ahead.”

I’m interested to hear thoughts from all of you marketing, PR, advertising, and web gurus out there. You can read the article here:

http://www.iab.org.nz/news/item/new_zealand_online_advertising_spend_experiences_healthy_growth_in_q1_2010