You have enough New Year’s resolutions to keep up with in ‘08, so don’t let your goal of learning about the latest gadgets get in your way. MediaSauce is here to keep you from falling off the virtual wagon. Here are 10 technology resolutions that are easy slam dunks for your list of “must do’s” for 2008. You don’t have to take on all of them, but be brave, roll up your sleeves, and challenge yourself to just a few. Believe me, you’ll thank us for it later!

1. Set up a Gmail account
Gmail is Google’s free email service. Not only do you get five gigs of storage (yes, five!), but you can send huge attachments and forward your other email accounts to your Gmail account. And, when you reply to email, Gmail will automatically reply via the account and email address the original email was sent to. Gmail is super easy for mobile use and even has a built in chat feature.

Try It: Gmail

2. Post Pics to Flickr
Whether you use your cell phone, a digital camera, or even an old-school film camera, digitizing your photos makes it easier to edit, post, and share them with friends and family. Rather than attaching huge images to emails, why not post them to one place and invite others to view them? Don’t have web space to host your images? Flickr to the rescue! Flickr is a free online photo sharing site that allows you to upload and share your pictures with anyone and everyone (or limit access to only those you’d like to allow to see them). It’s easy, fast, and works with any kind of device (you can even quickly upload pics from your phone!)

Try It: Flickr

3. Try Microblog
You’ve probably heard of blogs and maybe even write one. But sometimes writing a whole blog entry can be cumbersome. Why not Microblog? Rather than writing 500 words, microblogs limit you to just 140 characters encouraging quick, succinct posts that can be informative, entertaining, useful, and just plain fun! There are several microblog sites available, most of which have about the same features. They’re free and easy to use so give one a try!

Try It: Twitter Jaiku Pownce

4. Set up a Google alert for your name or your company’s name
Want to know what’s being said about you or your company on the Internet? Using a Google alert will ensure that you get immediate notifications (in your email) any time a key word gets mentioned in a blog, a web site, a news story etc. Google alerts are easy to set up, but be sure to be specific in your terms. Using a Google alert for a term like “Internet” or “architect” will yield more results than you can manage.

Try It: Google Alerts

5. RSS
RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. Here’s how it works: Perhaps there are several sites that you like to read (newspapers, magazines, blogs, business partner sites etc.) but you’ve grown tired of forgetting to read them, finding the links to the sites, or visiting the site only to find that there’s nothing new to read. RSS solves this problem. An RSS reader remembers and checks sites for you, alerting you when there is new content on your favorite sites and letting you preview (or read full versions) of the sites without having to look up every link or visit every site.

Try It: Google Reader
If you’re a Mac user try RSS Desktop Widget

6. Share a YouTube video
Viral Internet content is the stuff of legends! It’s the video that begins small and gets passed to millions of people. It’s the web site that goes from no traffic to thousands of visits simply by being passed from person to person. To understand how viral content works you really need to participate. To get a taste of how it all works go to Youtube.com, pick a video you like, and use the “Share” icon below the video. Recommend something fun or informative to a few people you know and check back on the number of views of the video (you can see this below the video on the YouTube page).

Try It: YouTube

7. Really use your cell phone
We all carry powerful communication devices in our pockets. Today’s average cell phone has 100 times the computing power of the largest room-filling computer in the 1970’s and yet most of us only make use of a few features. This year, do more than make phone calls. Send a text message, download a new ring, check a stock quote, or take a picture/video.

Try It: iPhone

8. Join a social network
Whether it’s Facebook, LinkedIn, Spock, or Plaxo, social networks are all the rage. But rather than being fads, social networks can actually be very useful technologies for creating new contacts, sharing information, finding new employees/partners, and more. Make this year “The Year of the Network” by singing up for one of the following social networking sites.

Try It:
Facebook (no longer just a site for college students)
LinkedIn (a networking site for professionals)
Spock (a slightly more social version of LinkedIn)
Plaxo (a combination of online address book and social network)

9. Put less than 20 words on PowerPoint slides
Not all technology is good technology – and even good technology can be misused. We’ve all sat through presentations in which the speaker has crammed an entire 30 page annual report into a dozen slides with text so small you’d need an electron microscope to read. Be the rebel of your office by breaking away and following the lead of today’s best public speakers! Make a resolution to not use bullets and loads of text in presentations, but to instead use powerful images and evocative key terms that will engage your audience rather than leave them all leaning forward and squinting to read your slides or snoozing in the back row.

Try It:
Slideshare
Presentation Zen

10. Play a video game
In the United States, there are four gamers for every one golfer. Video games are no longer the domain of pimply faced teenagers. Nintendo Wiis are in retirement homes; Baby Boomers are buying Nintendo DS’s “Brain Age” to stave off Alzheimer’s and keep their minds nimble. But more than just being fun, video games encourage new kinds of problem solving, learning through failure, and lots of other great skills that we can all benefit from. This year, rather than passing the controller to the nearest teenager, give a video game a shot. You just might learn something!

Try It: Wii and Nintendo

 About the author:

Sarah “Intellagirl” Robbins is the Director of Emerging Technologies for Media Sauce, Carmel IN. She’s a pink-haired, tattooed, mother of triplets who plays video games, surfs the net, and predicts the future of the Internet. She can be reached at sarah dot robbins at mediasauce.com.

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Click here for the slides from MediaSauce’s Web 2.0 for Business event: Driving
Traffic to Your Website

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Faster information, user-generated content, selling less of more, two-way communication, and a truly global reach are hallmark characteristics of a digital economy. If you sell steel fabricated buildings, with a few clicks on the Internet I can know all about steel fabricated building – what they cost, who you compete with, how they are built, what choices I have - anything I want to know in a matter of minutes. Custom content delivered at the request of the viewer. It is a pull world not a push. More and more we want to pull information to us. And it’s all faster. Broadband means richer content can be delivered in ways only dreamed of in the past. Broadband doesn’t just mean faster Google, it means more reach and deeper, more robust content delivered to the user, preferably at the request of the user. It means two-way dialogue, both parties talking in real time and no more one-way communication. Two-way communication is fundamental to contribution and collaboration. And contribution is today’s online currency. In the online community, it is a gift culture. A place where your status is determined by what you give away. YouTube, Second Life, Wikipedia - these online spots, like so many others, give users credit for what they give away. How crazy is that? Well, it’s not that crazy. It has been working for years inside companies. Companies foster collaboration and contribution among employees. Why not involve the rest of the world, including your customers? It works, and it is a new way of marketing.The digital economy is one of reputation. Your reputation is based on “friends” and other trusted sites. It has been a reality for years: happy customers are the best advertising. The online, virtual world gives users or customers a powerful voice. If you doubt it, watch the Internet media relating to political elections. Online media is shaping voting preference for many voters every day and the candidates are taking note. The digital economy is here and it is fundamentally reshaping communications. When it comes to your business or world, remember it’s not a matter of will every industry continue to be redefined; it’s when it will happen.

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Can’t make it to our Web 2.0 event this Friday with Sarah “Intellagirl” Robbins? Join us virtually with live streaming video available on Friday, December 14. The live feed, available here will be activated beginning at 9:00 a.m. and run through 11:30 a.m. It will not be available until then. Should you have problems accessing it, please try refreshing your browser, or contact Lindsay Dudeck, director of communications at 317.218.8333. Additionally, the event will be recorded, archived, and available for viewing at a later date.

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We are entering the world of screens - a world where there isn’t a television in each bedroom, a desktop computer, a laptop, an iPod, a navigation system, a mobile phone or PDA – instead there are only screens. In this world, we will refer to any place we get content simply as a screen no matter the size, shape or location. And screens will be available virtually everywhere. Imagine being in the car and having wireless broadband Internet? Think of that navigation system coming to life with more than just directions to your destination. Picture the ability to access the Web site of the restaurant you are passing and being able to view the specials that night and meet the chef - perhaps even see a meal being prepared?

It isn’t far off - this world of screens - a world where your Web site is your micro television station and every business to consumer Web site broadcasts or makes available information and dialogue relevant to their audience. These businesses offer viewers information that creates relationships. And you can’t create relationships by just putting video on the Web. You have to integrate the functionality of the Internet with the video creating interaction and two way relationships. Most traditional media companies believe that the Internet is just another distribution platform for their content. It’s not. The Web has shifted the entire marketing and communication paradigm.

Consumers don’t go to a Web site looking for commercials. They don’t want to view repurposed content that aired on television on the Internet. Marketing on the Internet is not about what you want to tell people or how you would convince them of something; it’s about providing the environment for them to make their own decisions. And that’s not something that happens by applying the same interruption tactics used on television to the Internet. It happens by breaking the traditional rules and providing an environment for exchange - where people can challenge your ideas and really get to understand and know your company.

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In journalism, as in life, it’s all about having credible sources and connections. Franklin College journalism students recently learned a lesson in connectedness via their professor, a digital marketing agency, and one of the world’s leading digital manufacturing companies.When Jeb Banner, consultant for Carmel-based digital marketing agency, MediaSauce, began teaching Media Technology classes at Franklin College this semester, he wanted to incorporate video technology into their journalistic endeavors. In this digital age, modern application and exposure to professional technology would provide the college students with the knowledge and skill set needed for entering the journalism field in the 21^st century. However, with just one linear tape camera for 50 students in two classes to share, Jeb needed to find a better way to incorporate technology. So, he approached Seth Jenkins, account executive on the MediaSauce/RCA account, about the cost of RCA’s Small Wonder camcorder. Seth knew of RCA’s philanthropic endeavors and asked RCA Internet Marketing Manager, Jeroen Smit, if the manufacturing company would be willing to donate 50 Small Wonder cameras to the Franklin College Journalism students. “I was excited about the opportunity,” commented Smit. “This is really like a pilot program for us to continue giving, and if anything, is the start of something much bigger.”  On November 7, Jeroen and Seth visited Banner’s Franklin College classes and presented and demonstrated the Small Wonder camcorders to the two journalism classes. The donation of the 50 camcorders is valued at $6,500. Over the next several weeks the students will be digitally capturing their story assignments with the Small Wonder and will be posting their work on www.youtube.com, the leading user-generated video website, as well as the social-networking site, NING, www.franklinpsj.ning.com. ”This is a marvelous gift not just for the Pulliam School of Journalism at Franklin College, but for all of the students that Thomson is going to help with this,” said John Krull, director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism. “Our students are at the start of what promises to be really fantastic careers. Your gift and generosity are an investment in their futures and in the future of quality journalism. I can’t tell you how grateful we are. We will strive to make you proud.”

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