Some thoughts after a week at SXSWi.

The online business world is clearly different. Everything is so much less tangible. Obviously, you cannot pick up a product or talk to a store agent, you have to make decisions based on a sterile, silent, 2D world. Most of the older generations simple do not trust this world, and with good reason. What if you had to buy an apple only based on a picture? How awkward does that feel?

Very.

So to survive in this online marketplace one needs to become transparent. OK, buzz word bingo time, yes, I know, but hear me out.

Why transparent?

Being transparent builds trust. But remember transparent is not open. Open allows others to walk in and fuck with things. Transparent is building that trust behind a pane of glass. Letting just enough info out to the public without everyone knowing everything.

Restaurants have been doing this for years with the design of the open kitchen. Being able to look over and see the work being put into your meal, hear the noise but not really what’s said, watch the flashes of flame but not know what’s really cooking, adds energy and excitement to a certain setting.

This is transparency in our online world. This is how the trust is built.

No one likes the man behind the curtain anymore. Blogs, forums, and things like twitter have enabled the occupants of Oz to out the man behind the curtain. They are just no longer scared anymore. All you have to do is take that curtain down, add some personality but not too personal and you can maintain your privacy.

The fear of a digit imprint days are over, it is time to open up. Those are the best at it with a good product will rise to the top.

Back in 1996, I lived and worked in Boston. I’d get up every day and the first thing I did before I hopped on the train to go to work was to buy a Boston Globe. I read it cover to cover even though I was online at this time.

This lasted until about 2002, when the web really started to take over how I received information. A combination of faster internet connections, better computers, great search engines, and better websites started to decline my newspaper purchases. By 2004, I rarely bought a newspaper. My sources of information were mostly delivered from online resources and is even more true today.

From 2002-2008, I used to search the internet about things I heard on TV, a conversation at work, something my friend called me to talk about, etc, then find websites I’d like and bookmark them, the CNNs, ESPNs, MSNBC, etc.

In 2009, I’m back to reading the Globe, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. (not the paper format, the online format)

How?

Twitter.

Now I subscribe to twitter users (feeds) for the sources of information. They lead me to direct links of articles I am interested in on Boston.com (Globe website), Wall Street Journal, etc.

For those of you who don’t “get” twitter yet, I have heard it called Macro-blogging but think of Twitter as ‘reverse forum’. You have all visited an online forum via website-> forum-> forum topic-> forum thread-> view individual post. If you want to post, you then sign up and join the conversation.

Twitter starts with you, the user. You sign up, and you subscribe to other users posts. You dont have to say anything, you can ‘lurk’ anonymously, and follow who you wish. And you can find tweets (twitter actions) posted in categories under hashtags, like #poker, #stocks, #Obama, #redsox, and then subscribe to the users who are providing you with information that you like, etc.

Now when I’m using twitter I see replies, and Re-tweets, from the users I follow and I look up the profiles of users they follow. If they have information I like, I subscribe. I find myself going to Google less and less and subscribing more and more. It a Twitter-user snow-ball effect.

Google knows Twitter is big. They recently have signed a real-time search connection with Twitter. Once you find more and more Twitter users to follow, you will not be returning to Google as soon as you get the snow ball started.

IMO

You can follow me on twitter: http://twitter.com/joetall and DeucesCracked here: http://twitter.com/deucescracked

Oh yeah, one note, Facebook, my twitter updates my facebook, so I never go there anymore as I do not care if you found a secret stash of Dubinas in Mafia Wars, honestly.

Pranav Mistry: The thrilling potential of SixthSense technology.