Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Lykke Li, Blogging and Google+



At the end of this video, Lykke Li asks the question:

"What would people be doing if they weren't blogging all the time?"

She acknowledges that the current state of all things digital has made it possible for her to have a career, yet it's valid to wonder if the actual music being made today would be better if musicians devoted more of their time to doing that and less time talking about it.

For me, the last year (plus some) without blogging has been all about the new adventure of working in mobile apps. I am currently VP and Managing Publisher of the Zumobi Network. Download the msnbc.com app to get the gist.

So, what has inspired me to come back to blogging now? First, is the exciting journey that has been my career in mobile. In some ways this cycle feels like 1998-2000 all over again, but with less irrational exuberance (if you exclude the Facebook valuation).

In other ways it feels much bigger than that. Over the winter holidays I spent some time in Kenya and Uganda. It's hard to miss the fact that mobile phones are everywhere. Mobile airtime is currency. There are more than 5 billion people with mobile phones and 1 billion of those are smartphones. The things we take for granted in the so-called "Western World" are liberating forces across the planet. Rebel content indeed.

Second is Google+. I'm a fan, I'm in and I hope my friends soon follow. While I have Facebook fatigue, it's not just about getting away from Facebook. It's about moving to something that's more integrated with a primary tool I use every day, several times a day: Gmail.

Some time ago, I had hoped that Facebook messages could eventually replace email for me, but the tide never turned completely and my box became cluttered with garbage fast. Google+ is my email provider becoming a social network instead of a social network becoming my primary email client. It offers me a better way to connect and ideally, a more efficient way to do it so I can spend less time telling and more time doing things like my radio show. New edition coming this Friday. Stay tuned.