3foldComm

Just earlier today word spread throughout the Twitterverse that SOPA and PIPA have been delayed/postponed. The general consensus is that this fight is not over, but, in the absence of any additional detail around when we can expect Congress to take this issue up again, the team here at 3fold spent some time this morning having a good laugh over some of the tweets that came out of the protests. In particular, those using the hashtag #FactsWithoutWikipedia. Until we know about about the future of these proposed bills, please enjoy these tweets while you wait:

@mkinyon (Michael Kinyon) – After successfully slowing down #SOPA, Twitter has turned its attention to more important topics, like #ReplaceBandNamesWithPenguin.

@JohnnyInfamous (Johnny Infamous) – Star Wars is based on the lesser known Shakespeare work “Thy Force Be Stronge” #factswithoutwikipedia

@strangedave (Dave Cake) – Pluto is no longer a planet due to copyright claims from the Disney corporation #factswithoutWikipedia

@rage_abc (rage) – Marilyn Manson did not play Paul from The Wonder Years. He was, however, a member of the Mickey Mouse Club #factswithoutWikipedia

@WootLive (Woot Workshop) – There is no such thing as gluten. #factswithoutwikipedia

@dvnix (&e-ru) – Sarah Palin successfully defended South Carolina from marauding Northerners in 1857. #FactsWithoutWikipedia

@dogwelder (Luke Gattuso) – Dogs are actually tiny horses. #FactsWithoutWikipedia

@TheJakeShort (Jake Short) – Bacon is good for you. #FactsWithoutWikipedia

@ReillyRick (Rick Reilly) – 97% of the earth’s surface is covered by Beefaroni. #factswithoutwikipedia

@pete_sinclair (Pete Sinclair) – Pasta lovers can now plant a spaghetti tree in order to reduce their carbonara footprint. #FactsWithoutWikipedia

@slarkpope (brian braiker) – Scott Bakula is the founding father of quantum physics #FactsWithoutWikipedia

As usual, we are always looking for your input. What were your favorite SOPA and PIPA moments from Twitter the last few days?

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Facebook rolled out features of its new open graph with 60 third-party apps that can interact directly with Facebook yesterday, making the social network more of a lifestyle operating system than a destination website. The new apps from Pinterest, Foodspotting, Foodily, Ticketmaster, Rotten Tomatoes, Pose, Kobo, Gogobot, TripAdvisor, and others help add more to your timeline allowing you to share more of what you are doing, buying, reading or experiencing to your timeline automatically.

The new partnerships mean you can go beyond the simple “Like” and venture out, expanding your social vocabulary to include “read,” “listen,” “cook,” and “watch.” Along with the new Facebook timeline feature, these new apps are part of changes announced at the f8 developer conference in the fall we have seen being trickled out over the last few months.

This is a great opportunity for the approved apps to extend their reach. As users make “branded” updates, the applications get more reach through that user’s social graph. The downside is too much sharing can take away that personal touch that drew us into Facebook and into information overload.

On the positive side, AllThingsD’s Liz Gannes had a chance to talk to many of the app partners and has a great rundown of the unique implementations, including Fab.com offering you payment for sharing your information. Definitely worth reading her post for a good overview of the possibilities these apps present.

Coupled with how the applications can creatively use this feature, finding that right balance on how much information that person wants to share with their social graph will be the essential to how successful the open graph will be in the long run. Just like other posts, Facebook allows you to delete any updates directly from the timeline and you can adjust your settings in the activity log on just how much information is shared.

Overall, this is an interesting move from Facebook and we should see some fun and creative applications come out and it’s just a matter of time before we see more applications introduced. Have you had a chance to play around with these new apps? What is your favorite? Have any applications on your wish list?

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Fun facts about Martin Luther King and “I Have a Dream”

As we remembered Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., with a national holiday this past Monday, looking back on his impressive work with the American Civil Rights movement, his inspirational “I Have a Dream” speech comes to mind. Delivered 48 years ago on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C., Dr. King’s speech still resonates today. As an essential part of the Civil Rights movement, King was an inspiration to many at that time and we need to do our part to ensure his message lives on each day.

In memory of Dr. King, we had a fun time compiling some interesting facts about him as well as his famous speech:

• Delivered on August 28, 1963, “I Have a Dream” is a 17-minute speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., in which he called for racial equality and an end to discrimination.
• The speech, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, was a defining moment of the American Civil Rights Movement.
• Believe it or not, the “I Have a Dream” speech was originally titled “Normalcy, Never Again” and the first drafts never included the phrase “I have a dream.”
• Near the end of the speech, famous African American gospel singer Mahalia Jackson shouted to Dr. King from the crowd, “Tell them about the dream, Martin.” Dr. King stopped delivering his prepared speech and started preaching, punctuating his points with “I have a dream.”
• Beyond the biblical scripture, the speech contains references to Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, the Declaration of Independence, the Emancipation Proclamation, and even Shakespeare.
• Dr. King was so busy organizing the march even 12 hours before he was scheduled to stand in front of the masses at the Lincoln Memorial, he didn’t even know what he was going to talk about, much less have anything written.
• January 20, 1986, was the first national celebration of King’s birthday as a holiday.
• Despite “I Have a Dream” considered the top speech of all time by American Rhetoric Martin Luther King Jr. received a “C” in his public speaking class.
• He won the Nobel Peace Prize on December 10, 1964, as the youngest and second black recipient of the award.
• Graduated from Morehouse College in Atlanta in 1948.
• Was born Michael Luther King Jr., but after his father changed his first name to Martin when he became a minister. The younger Michael changed his name to Martin as well, initially against his father’s wishes.
• Is the only U.S. citizen to have a national holiday dedicated to him.
• Time Magazine’s “Man of the Year” (1963)
• Was an original Trekkie as a fan of the original Star Trek TV series and even encouraged Nichelle Nichols (Lieutenant Uhura) to remain on the show.
• He stated that he would not live to be 40. He died aged 39.
• Among his personal, non-violent reform heroes was Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948).
• During his funeral, his casket was pulled by a mule-driven cart down Atlanta’s main street.
• No meat for him! Dr. King was a vegetarian.
• In 1988 on his 60th birthday, the U.S. government unveiled a statue memorial to commemorate the progress of civil rights.

[Facts vis CafeMom and MLK Online]

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The end of the year and beginning of the next brings the onslaught of retrospective posts and posts taking a glimpse into the future. Overall social media and the digital world advances at a rapid-fire pace, taking giant strides year-to-year in both function and application. It’s fascinating to imagine what the future might hold, so a few 3folder’s had some fun and took a crack at making some bold predictions at what the future of the social and digital space might have in store for us (even if that means years from now!).

Digital Retail Tours
Based on your shopping habits or preferences your phone can guide you from store to store and product to product, on a journey to discover and explore items that are based off your budget and taste. (Clay Nutting)

Ready-and-Waiting App
Program your order into an app, once you enter a zone close to the retail environment, your order will be ready and paid for, all you have to do is pick it up! (Clay Nutting)

Enhanced Brand Experiences with QR
QR codes have been a buzz word for the last year or two, but brands are finally figuring them out. Forget snapping them and being sent to a website, the next phase of QR will involve snapping a QR at a museum and hearing the artist talk about the work you are looking at, or snapping one on a street sign for reporting potholes, accidents or even crimes to the local authorities. (Angela Criser)

Textbook Gamification
Learning has never been so fun! You achieve an epic win for completing a difficult chapter, points for improving your test scores from month-to-month, and recognition for top scores – pitting you against the brightest minds in the class, state, country or even the world! It is a virtual competition against yourself and fellow students with incentives provided by some of the top educational foundations. (Clay Nutting)

Facebook Teen Tracker
Facebook will release an enhanced timeline feature for parents interested in better monitoring their growing kids’ activities. A special feature will notify parents when their children mention activities that cost money, automatically calculate the value of that activity and provide a running total at the top of each parents profile.  Parents will then have a better understanding of whether their kids really need money for more books in college, or whether “book fees” are just supplementing a pizza party or “gotta-have-that-new-top-at-Abercrombie” run. Warning – May be thwarted with “Damn It, My Mom Is On Facebook” app unless advanced controls are activated — for an additional fee of course! (Gordon Fowler)

The Year of Pinterest
Social bookmarking upstart Pinterest will get bigger and better as a social bookmarking tool in 2012. Besides being fun and refreshing, it’s a great space for inspiration and bookmarking the things you love. (Alicia Allen)

Social TV
This one is starting to become a reality, from social networks like GetGlue to the just-announced MySpaceTV to custom TV show apps – TV is getting social. Only problem is, these apps still won’t solve tape delaying shows and events. (Brian Blank)

Mining the Mobile Stream
While paid apps, freemium services and social advertising can generate revenue through mobile devices, it will be the companies that create interesting ways to mine the endless data stream mobile device users generate that will create the real value (and hopefully revenue). Scary Big Brother issues aside, the basic bits of data (location, travel, age, gender, etc.) our phones provide could be useful in other areas beyond augmented reality and location based services. (Brian Blank)

What are your thoughts? Do you see any of these coming through in the next year? Even better yet, what are your predictions?

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After a frantic season of Christmas shopping, many people spend January recovering from retail fatigue. How can businesses energize consumers stuck in a post-holiday haze? In Japan, many brands participate in New Year’s festivities by selling “Lucky Bags” to bring attention, and traffic, to their retail stores.

Lucky Bags, also known as “Lucky Packs” or “Happy Packs,” are essentially grab bags on steroids. Customers come to the store to pick out a nondescript tote full of mystery merchandise, priced with a significant discount compared to the retail worth of the goods inside. Despite not knowing the exact contents, customers are drawn to the bags because they know they will receive quality products from a brand they know and love – there are no white elephants among the bags – for a fantastic deal.

This year, Apple’s packs drew the most fervor, with fans lining up overnight for a chance to grab one of their ¥33,000 ($435) deals. It seems like a lot of money to spend on a bag of the unknown, until you find out what some people received inside. One lucky customer ended up with an 11” MacBook Air (MSRP $999), with a few additional accessories. Another walked out with a baseline iPad 2 (MSRP $499), with headphones, a case and a data card reader. The company also included an exclusive Apple T-shirt and collectible pins in all bags.

Japanese street fashion designers, such as Angelic Pretty and H. Naoto, have seen so much success with their lucky bags that they’ve extended the practice beyond New Years. These brands mark other cultural holidays (and slow sales seasons) during the summer and fall with lucky bag sales that net their customers hundreds of dollars in savings. A shopper can receive pieces of an entire coordinated outfit (including handbags and accessories) for as little as $200, when the retail price of all the items would normally exceed $500.

With the borderline insanity we often see on Black Friday sales, we know American consumers love a crazy deal as much as anyone. If brands in the United States are looking to reinvigorate their consumers during sales season doldrums, taking a page from the Japanese playbook could be a great strategy. With lucky bags, brands engage and energize their audience, clear excess inventory, and jump start revenues during slow periods. And I don’t know about you, but I think a discounted set of workout gear from Nike or a collection of Sephora’s latest products would make pretty sweet lucky bag!

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