If you’re a blogger, tweeter or regular garden geek, you’ll like this little iPhone tip. It’s not an earth mover, but you will say “Oooo“.

As someone who blogs, but lacks design skills, I find the process of creating images – particularly screen shots (aka screen captures) – to use in my posts a little clunky. I don’t have Photoshop, so I bodge it using trusty old Paint. Results can be a little hit and miss.

That changes with the discovery on my iPhone of the screen capture feature. I found it by accident, after an image of a webpage I’d read earlier appeared in my Photo album. A little bit of digging revealed how my clumsy fingers had stumbled upon this niffy little tool.

Capturing a screen shot

It’s quite simple.

1. Find the image / webpage you want to screen grab
2. Hold the ‘home’ button at the base of the iPhone
3. Press the ‘power/sleep’ on the top of the iPhone
4. There will be a white ‘flare’ on the screen and an audible click as the image is captured
5. That’s it! Open the Photo album on your iPhone to locate the image file

You now have a file on your iPhone you can upload to your blog / website or tweet to a friend.

Bonus Tip: If a friend foolishly leaves his iPhone unsecured in your presence, you can always screen grab a copy of his iPhone home screen and set it as Wallpaper. I’m not condoning this childish behaviour, but I’m just saying…

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1. MOBILE: iPhone or Android – which is more App for your business?

Okay, so I’m really late on this one. There was snow and…well, snow really.  It’s 2010 and it’s really time to put finger to keyboard again.

You’d have to have been in a dark hole for a fortnight not to have seen the deluge of 2009 reviews across the web. There are some really great ones out there, but after a while repetition sets in and you’d rather tackle that mountain of paperwork than look at another one. However, when I saw the video below I had to sit up and take notice due to the novel approach taken to illustrate (pun intended) the key events of the year.

The video and sketches are by a guy called Rob Cottingham, who I have to admit I’d never heard of before this (though his 3,000 Twitter followers are looking smugly on). Rob has a great sense of humour and is very adept at finding the giggles and snorts in technology.

Check out his Noise to Signal blog here. I’ve added the blog to my Google Reader and followed him on Twitter, so I’ll no doubt be sharing more of his stuff throughout 2010.

Enjoy!

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1. Social Media Innovation

Last week I read, and was inspired by, Julien Smith’s article ‘How To Read a Book a Week in 2010‘. Take a read, maybe you will be too.

In a nutshell, Julien set himself a challenge last year to read a book a week, 52 books a year. He read 54.

Why, you might wonder?

In his words, “It feels awesome. It gives you an amazing amount of ideas. It helps you think more thoroughly. It’s better than TV and even the internet. It makes you understand the world more. It is a building block towards a habit of completion. Did I mention it feels awesome?”

Double use of awesome; this man is passionate about books. Me, I love books too. Or at least I did, before the internet came along and I let it spoil my infatuation. There never seems to be time anymore. True, I’m married with a small child, own a house, have a busy job and half a dozen side projects on the go. Somewhere along the way, it became more convenient – and perhaps more instantly gratifying – to reserve my sporadic reading for the internet (and yes, I’m looking at you too, Mr iPhone).

Julien’s article made me remember how much I used to read when I was a kid and up into my 20s – and specifically, how much I used to get out of it. Not just the learning but the joy of entering other people’s heads.

So I set myself a resolution – I will read a book every fortnight throughout 2010.

I shall keep a log on here to keep track of the books I read. I’m rather intrigued to see what that list will look like come January 2011. Please feel free to comment on the books I list, I’m happy to discuss or debate opinions on any of them.

Rather fittingly, the first book I’m reading is Trust Agents, co-authored by none other than Chris Brogan and Julien Smith.

Laptop is shutting down now, off to read a book.

You can follow Julien Smith on Twitter.

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Sex toys, crime statistics and the Artic Monkeys.

Words I never thought I could unite in one blog post. Take a moment to consider where this could go…

Nothing quite so sensational, I’m afraid, but interesting nonetheless.

Anyone who knows my geeky side will know that I have a penchant for Google Maps Mashups (If you don’t know what they are, take a quick Google Maps mashup detour. Just remember to come back).

They don’t need to be all bells and whistles, fantastically designed or integrated. It’s the idea that always fascinates me. The imagination and breadth of subjects poured into Google Maps mashups seems to be infinite.

We can't help ourselves - we have to know!

I’ll produce a list of some of the best ones at a later date, but for now I’ll share three that have caught my eye recently. And perhaps shed some light on the cryptic start to this post.

The Sex Map from LoveHoney.com – If you’re at work reading this, don’t worry there aren’t any images here that you don’t want your Boss or Tech guys to discover. LoveHoney is an online retailer of adult toys, lingerie and associated paraphernalia.

They have been really clever with their Google Maps mashup. They have tied together sales data from their own site, data from the UK Census, competitor and manufacturer accounts, and internet traffic monitoring services, and mashed it together with the Google Maps API. The end result is an amusing, yet fantastic bit of linkbait, which no doubt has brought a few extra pennies to the pot from inquisitive visitors.

Oddly, I felt somewhat disappointed to find my home town ranked only the 530th sexiest place in the UK. What goes on in Upminster (ranked #1) is anyone’s guess though?!

The Drugs Map – okay, not just drugs, but all kinds of crime, be it robbery, homicide or car theft. Crimereports.com say the U.S. site was created to help law enforcement agencies make crime data accessible to the public. It standardises the data from the different agencies and enables individuals to monitor what is happening in their neighbourhood, right down to their specific street or block.

I think this is a great example of how technology can be utilised to harness disparate information, organise it and communicate it in an easy to understand way. The participating organisations should be commended for supporting the scheme.

My one concern would be how obsessed a worried user could become with monitoring crime outside their front door. However, on a more practical note, it would be a useful evaluation tool when house hunting.

And finally, the Rock & Roll Map. Whilst not a big buyer (or listener) of music, I’ve always been appreciative of good album cover design. So I found it interesting to discover this Google Maps mashup the readers of UK music mag, Word Magazine, have been putting together.

The Google Maps mashup plots the locations of where iconic album cover photographs were taken. Whether its ABBA at Barkaby Airfield, the Beatles at Abbey Road, or The Verve lounging in Richmond Park, flicking through the list is a quirky and fascinating tour of music’s historical landmarks.

These are just three of the thousands of Google Maps mashup examples out there – and I’m sure there are many more brilliant than the ones I’ve chosen here. If you’ve seen any, let me know. I’ll be featuring more mashups here at a later date.

Have you built a Google Maps Mashup you want to share? Seen one you loved, but secretly wished you’d had the idea yourself? Or maybe you’re just rueing the day you skipped programming class and have to wait for the day when Google can make a simple wizard, so you can build one of these cool things yourself? Whatever, just get in touch.

Related posts:

1. I see Aliens in Google Trends
2. Google Profiles in UK Search Results

I love the current series of altered Google logos celebrating 40 years of Sesame Street – especially today’s featuring the Count (one of my personal Jim Henson favourites).

However, I can’t help feel that it might have been slightly more appropriate to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall today.

Of course it does present the slightly tongue in cheek (and perhaps slightly not, I can’t decide) question – which had the greater impact on the world – the tearing down of the wall, a pivotal moment in the collapse of communism in Europe or Cookie Monster, Elmo and Big Bird teaching the kids of the world about numbers, letters, emotions and life?

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Would you pay a guy $1 (or £0.60p at today’s exchange rate) to wear your branded t-shirt for a day?

Seems an odd question, but hundred’s of companies are apparently doing it.

Jason Sadler of iwearyourshirt.com has made $70,000 this year by selling ad space on the tshirts he wears, according to Mashable. Prices start at $1 for January 1st, $2 for January 2nd and so on until you get to $365 for December 31st. It’s working so well that he has sold out all of 2009 and the first four months of 2010. From next year the prices have doubled (outrageous price hike!), but you do get the benefit of his friend Evan wearing your t-shirt too.

Aside from the people he meets during the day, your t-shirt will get exposure on his blog, his Twitter and Facebook accounts, plus photos and a video show.

So is it worth it?

Well, the daily video blog runs on Ustream.tv, which reports his videos have been viewed over 129,000 times since 16th December 2008. He also distributes the video content to Youtube, Vimeo, Dailymotion among others. The top video on Youtube (below) was watched over 9000 times, though most sit around the 150-350 mark.

So there is plenty of exposure as a whole, but it’s debatable whether your single day of exposure and subsequent viewings will have much impact for you. But then we are only talking $1…

As an advertiser, I’m not convinced I would do it. Yes, it would be pretty easy to get a ROI, it would probably only take one person to visit your site or purchase your product to make the investment back. But in that scenario, it’s almost not worth the time to process the paperwork (unless of course you sell high price products). You probably have other more pressing projects that need your attention.

Where it would work, is if you could make the video of him wearing your t-shirt the one that reaches 9,000+ views and get it to prompt a whole series of purchases. For that to happen you’d probably need to have an extremely clever idea or giveaway, and utlise it as part of a larger campaign.

What really impresses me about this though, is the fact that it’s a great idea. Kudos to Jason for making this work. He’s come up with a really simple idea and found a way to make it work. And did I mention he made $70,000 wearing t-shirts? I do that for free. Actually no, I pay brands to wear their tshirts. I’m a mug.

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1. I’m a Socialist – Not really but it won me a t-shirt

Just heard that I’ve won a Microsoft ‘I’m a PC’ t-shirt through a competition I entered on Mel Carson’s blog. For those not in the know, Mel is Microsoft Advertising’s adCenter Community Manager in London.

The competition was to come up with a personal t-shirt slogan that starts with ‘I’m a…’, plus explain why it’s applicable to me.

My entry was “I’M A SOCIALIST”

and on the reverse – “Find me on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook”

The T-shirt is in the post

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Apparently, Google isn’t causing the end of life as we know it after all  (at least not environmentally).

According to TechCrunch, it seems that the Times might have been a little over zealous in the writing of the article, latching on to Google as the culprit. At the centre of the controversy, is the claim “that performing two Google searches uses up as much energy as boiling the kettle for a cup of tea”.

Well apparently, the research’s author, Alex Wissner-Gross never even said that. According to TechCrunch…

For starters, he says he would never refer to any sort of measurement having to do with tea (he’d go with coffee). But his findings have nothing to do with Google as a company, either – they’re concerned with much more generalized stats, like your computer’s rate of CO2 production when you look at a webpage.

Wissner-Gross says that the widely circulated 7 gram/search figure came from some other source (he’s not sure where), and notes that if you read the article carefully it only makes it sound like it’s from his data. He has confirmed that he did make some vague statements regarding Google, including “A Google search has a definite environmental impact” and “Google operates huge data centers around the world that consume a great deal of power”. But the “tea kettle” statistic that has been repeated ad nauseum simply isn’t his.

Just an opinion, but it does sound like someone at the paper dug through all the scientific aspects of the research press release, saw a reference or two to Google and wondered how they could make the headline more exciting. What would the average Brit relate to?  Hmmm. Ah, Tea.

You can imagine the conversation, “Let’s work out how many cups of tea you could make using the same energy as a Google search!”

So, it’s all a load of nonsense. Google are not doing any evil. After all, they are the guys who patented the wave powered server farm back in 2007.

Related posts:

1. Google causing global warming?
2. I see Aliens in Google Trends

Apparently typing ‘how to save energy’ into Google might not be the best way to do your bit for saving the planet.

According to research by Harvard scientist Alex Wissner-Gross, performing two searches on Google can produce about the same level of carbon dioxide as boiling a kettle for a cuppa.

It’s all to do with how Google has it’s servers set up, running the same query on several servers to return the results from the quickest one. Part of the problem seems to stem from the fact that Google’s 450,000 servers are spread all over the place – apparently that uses up more energy. But I guess it’s going to take quite a bit of power to respond to the 200 million daily search requests  Google receives.

With a typical search generating about 7g CO2 and boiling the kettle about 15g, I guess you’ll have to either:

1. stop using the internet or
2. give up caffeine or
3. cut down on searches for generic terms and jump straight to the long tail

Well it ain’t going to the first option, so I guess I’ll have to go for Option 2 or 3.

Of course, it begs the question – Does Yahoo generate less CO2 than Google?

A new selling point perhaps? You may get slower or less less accurate results but you’ll be saving the icecaps.

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1. Google Not so Evil After All

Now this is going to sound a little weird.

One of the brands I’m working on at the moment is running a pretty big branding campaign, with both online and offline activity. It’s running in 6 week bursts and is about to enter its second phase.

The first burst ran in October and early November and was very successful. We saw a significant spike in traffic and on site activity. As part of our analysis I’ve been looking at a lot of charts that show similar patterns as this Google Trends chart…

Google Trends Chart

I spent a lot of time in November looking at these charts, I might add.

Anyway, Christmas comes, I take some much needed time off and rent some films. One of which is a classic – Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

So I’m sitting there watching the film when I see my chart…

It wasn’t quite Mashed Potato but subliminal or what??

I didn’t feel an unexplainable urge to get in my car and drive to the middle of nowhere, but I knew which film I wanted to watch.

Troubling as this may seem, at least I’ll know what movie to rent if I start seeing dead people in my analytics data.

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