With the advent of the iPhone some 2 years ago, and now with the introduction of the iPhone’s big brother, the iPad, earlier this year, there’s been a significant shift in the way we mere mortals use the internet.

Not only do you see the uptake/market saturation of these button-less devices (iPhones proudly displayed on coffee shop tables), or the ease of use/intuitive controls (young children taking to them like a duck to water!), but there’s now solid proof of the ramifications of their increased usage: new reports show that 1 in 10 searches on Google is now on a mobile device. iPods, iPhones and iPads are both the market leader and the thought leader.

Let’s look into this new revolution a little bit further…

Why are iPhones/iPads so revolutionary?

The short answer: because they only have one button. The longer answer is that they are interfaceless – they don’t *have* to be a mobile phone when you don’t want them to be a mobile phone. They don’t have to be a games device when you want to do some serious web surfing. With only one large touch screen and only one physical ‘home’ button, they can be all things to all people.

In the last 30 years, computers have virtualised our traditional pencil and paper processes. We don’t need reams of paper and filing cabinets, just a computer to do the grunt work, a screen to verify the results, and a mouse and keyboard to enter in information and control everything.

The laptop that I’m typing this one, for instance, still has all the above components: central computer, screen, keyboard and mouse (in this case, a trackpad). So when I’m in ‘typing mode’, it all works wonderfully. But for times when I’m in ‘games mode’ or ’surfing mode’, I hardly need the keyboard, just the mouse.

So if I could have a device that gave me a keyboard only when I needed it, and got out of the way when I wanted to read ebooks, that would be the ultimate device.

Enter the iPhone and iPad.

Pack a small device with one large touch screen, a GPS, a compass, tilt sensors, huge storage, is always on the internet, and a decent battery life – and the only limit is then the software that you can put on it.

Currently, Apple’s App Store has some 240,000 ‘Apps’ – software applications, ranging in price from free to a few dollars, to over $10 in some cases.

There are apps for finding your car again in a car park; apps for watching movies or reading ebooks; apps for finding that song you like when you only know one line of lyrics; heaps of educational kids games and games for all ages; and, my current favourite, an app to sense your body movements in the morning, and wake you up near your prescribed time, but only if you’re in a light sleep.

It’s a very safe little ‘i’world – all transactions you make are safe, and there’s no programs allowed that can harm you new favourite device.

Tech heads who like to tinker under the hood of their computers don’t enjoy the limitations, but for the rest of us – the moral majority who either want to work, play or just *use* their devices, the convenience/reliability outweighs the limitations.

What’s the next revolution?

Yikes – I’m not going to go out a limb and predict the future in 10 years, but I can safely predict a move in the coming years: the iPad Duo.

Stick two iPads together along the long edge, so it can function as either a laptop-like device (keeps the top screen at a good angle while you type on the bottom screen), or it can be a ‘real’ ebook if turned sideways: two screens side by side just like a magazine.

Either way, as (single screen) iPads get bigger, we’ll want something to protect that glorious piece of glass – what better than with another screen?

When you need to type, out comes the full keyboard. Whenv you want to play the piano, the keyboard vanishes, and 3 octaves of ebony and ivory keys appear. Need to edit photos? Your bottom screen becomes the grid of selections, and the top screen lets you work on one photo at a time, with your Photoshop controls all within reach.

Remember, you heard it here first.

AB out

With the rise of instant messaging (IM) programs, text-based chatting, SMS, IRC and in-game virtual world chatting, your fingers sure do get a little weary of typing common phrases over and over again. Yes, yes, you could pick up the phone and *actually talk to someone*, but when you’re stuck in the cyber world with only a keyboard as your means of communication, shortcuts rule.

The following is a short list of the some common Leet words and their plain-English counterparts. Feel free to use them at will in your next SMS, but also feel free to keep on typing your SMSes in full words, with punctuation and grammar. Old school is still cool.

<3
Heart, turned sideways. So i <3 u = I love you

AFAIK
As far as I know

AFK
Away from keyboard. Not here right now, or about to go AFK.

BF
Boyfriend

bio
Taking a break to go to the toilet!

BRB
Be right back

Epic Fail
Really bad / really bad form / really trying hard but failing

Fail
Bad / bad form / trying hard but failing

FTW!
For the win! (Opposite of epic fail)

GF
Girlfriend

GG
Good game

Gratz/gz
Congratulations

GTG
Got to go / good to go

IDC
I don’t care

IDK
I don’t know

ILY
I love you

IMO
In my opinion

IRL
In real life

KK
OK OK

Leet/l33t
‘Elite’, but tongue-in-cheek.
From someone who thought they were ‘elite’ but mis-spelt it as ‘leet’, hence the continued self-deprecation.

Leetspeak
All this

LOL
Laughing out loud

noms
Food. eg: I’m in UR room, eating UR noms.

Noob
Newbie, new to the scene. Can be insulting, can be quite liberating!

NP
No problem

OMG
On my God!

OMGWTFBBQ
Sort of an anti-comeback if someone if using too much leetspeak

OP
Original poster (referring to the first person who wrote something)

OT
Off topic

OTT
Over the top

own/owned
To really beat/thrash someone or some score in a game

PAW/PIR/POS
Parents are Watching/In Room/Over Shoulder

PEBKAC
Problem exists between keyboard and chair. ie: the user, the human.

pron/pr0n
Alternatives for ‘porn’ that used to make it through simplistic internet filters. Now just an alternative.

pwn
An easy mis-type from ‘own’, so same meaning, but more deprecation

pwnage
The act of ‘pwning’ someone

ROFL
Rolling on the floor, laughing

ROFLOL
Rolling on the floor, laughing out loud

ROFLMAO
Rolling on the floor, laughing my ass off

soz
Sorry

TISNF
That is so not fair

TL:DR
Too long, didn’t read. (Cut to the chase, please)

TTYL
Talk to you later

TY
Thank you

UR
you’re

VBG
Very big grin

WB
Welcome back

WTF
What the…

YMMV
Your mileage may vary – a way of disagreeing nicely!

ZOMG
(a big or a tongue-in-cheek) oh my God!

-z
Tacking a ‘z’ onto the end of anything makes it more leet. Apparently. LOLZ

And that’s barely scratching the surface. There’s also an uber-leet level of leet that replaces individual letters with other characters, so that ‘Andrew’ might be ‘4|\||)23\/\/’ in leet. That’s more like internet graffiti for ultra-cool geeks, whereas the above list is more the realm of the internet-savvy socialites.

There’s two main trends there above: first, the handy/cool/self-deprecating set that allows the users feel part of a in-crowd; but there’s also a second set up there, that begins to disguise/hide/subvert common language so that adults (in particular) can’t read what’s going on.

For both trends of leetspeak (the innocent and devious) the web site noslang.com provides many more examples AND it has a ‘translator’ from leet into plain English. Feel free to test it out, but turn the swear filter off, as a large portion of leet includes such words, but were (mostly) excluded here!

So, go forth and be leet for some serious GenX/GenY pwnage. FTW!

AB out

The phrase ‘what happens if you die’ is one that I’ve heard a lot in my business. To date, I think every major client has asked me that question at some point in our partnerships. While it’s kinda nice that your clients are enquiring about your long-term health and your ability to cross the road without getting hit by a bus, they actually have a point – what would happen to their business if I dropped off the planet – and what would happen to *my* business, and my family, if I wasn’t around?

Lots of things to talk about, namely: chain of command; systems and processes; and the concepts of proprietary vs open source. Still here? Good. No-one’s getting any younger!

The Chain of Command

Starting out easy. The first obvious step is to have someone to step into your shoes when you’re not there. That means not only having said person in mind, but ready, willing and able to take on where you left off.

For medium-sized businesses, that’s beginning to be immediately possible. There may be senior staff who already run divisions or segments of your business without your direct supervision.

The problem is more with small- and micro-businesses, whereby ’small’ meaning 20 employees or less, and ‘micro’ meaning 5 or less. In both these cases, you have much more of a direct link to your business – there isn’t much that doesn’t pass your desk or your eyes, and you may only have one or two ’senior’ team members.

All this talk of finding a replacement is moot when we get down to the solo-business. It’s you. There is no other – that’s why it’s just you. This is indeed the predicament I’m in when presented with this ‘ultimate’ question – how do you replicate your own skills and talents?

Systems and Processes

Boring, but hey, this in fact the *essence* of business continuity: documenting your systems and processess, and automating them where possible. Again, it’s easier the bigger you are – but it’s no less important when it’s just you (or just the few of you).

Begin with the basics: you need to formalise your customer-facing processes, but equally you need to document your administration tasks, too. Receiving goods, payment terms, chasing accounts, staff salaries – all important to have written out somewhere accessible. Even if they’re extremely fluid processes, and have a habit of changing over time, at least they can be a backstop in case of an emergency.

Going further than just documenting your processes is to automate them. I have a unique theory on this called the Big Red Button Theory™, where by I try to automate my clients’ businesses to the point that they can come to work at 9am in the morning, press one Big Red Button™ that does all their work for them, then be home by 10am. It never happens, but it ’s the goal. The more you move the mundane or purely number crunching grind of your business out of your brain, and into an expert system, the more it frees you up to do the important, human-centric tasks.

Proprietary vs Open Source

In the software/internet world, these two concepts raise their heads rather often: that of choosing between well constructed but ‘locked in’ options, or free open-source but ‘no responsibility’ options.

Think about the same two extremes and how they relate to your industry: are you using tools/suppliers/products that depend on you being the driver – or have you chosen tool/suppliers/products that can interact with anything/anyone in the event that you’re not there? The internet is moving more towards ‘open’, mainly for the convenience and the benefits of inter-connectedness that follow – which direction is your business headed?

OK – back to the present. The good news is that all of the above is also an excellent start to *purposefully* working your way out of your own business – to be able to let your business run without you for extended periods of time.

If that’s your ultimate goal – to have you business make money for you when you’re not even there – then begin to think as if you might not be around at all one day. Your family, your customers, your suppliers, your staff, will thank you for it. You, of course, by definition, won’t care – you’ll be dead.

On that slightly morbid note,

AB out

Official SMX Sydney Site: www.searchmarketingexpo.com.au

Official Twitter Hash Tag: during the conference, it was #smx, but post-conference, it’s reverted back to #smxsydney

Live Blogging

Glenn Murray (@divinewrite): great live coverage, both Day One and Day Two
Kalena Jordan (@kalena): a dozen articles, covering a session each, starting here, continuing here, and ending here. Wow.
Matt Burgess (@therealburgo): a very captivating recap of Matt’s highlights here

Photos

A few hundred of Kalena’s photos on her public Facebook gallery
My efforts: Night 0 / Day 1 Morning / Day 2 Afternoon / Day 2 / Day 2 Site Clinic & Harbour Cruise

Videos

Interviews by The Lost Agency (@thelostagency): Jet Interactive / AdLux

Presentations

From Brent Payne (@brentdpayne): SEO for Content Management Systems

Analysis

Jaaved Khatree (@jaaved): a quick write up from his point-of-view as an exhibitor here
and from Martin Reed from Dejan SEO: this report
Marc Ellison from Bruce Clay gives a quick rundown of Day 1
Chris Thomas from RESEO with a lengthy rundown

In the gallery below, you’ll see the presentation of the iPad to the lucky attendee; the official conference photo; and the ‘Under the Bridge’ Harbour Cruise. As before, feel free to pinch any photos, just include a one-liner attribution if you can.

For more photos, Barry will soon have all 2500 photos from the conference, and should be putting all 400 or so of the best on Flickr.

Thanks once again to Barry, Lisa and Paula for a great SMX Conference – another memorable and brain-expanding couple of days. AB out.

PS – Feel free to download/pinch/upload these photos and use them as you wish. Attribution to me would be lovely. Either ab@rebusiness.com.au or @allroundniceguy. Easy!

Upstairs at eMetrics, the attendees were learning about measuring qualified visitors.

Bootcamp sessions were jam-packed full of introductory content on dozens of important topics: Pay per click; SEM Essentials; Social Media; Blogging; Facebook; Twitter…  and lots more.

After the final afternoon session, much-needed drinkies were served.

Barry Smythe opens the conference…

…and Chris Sherman, Executive Editor of searchengineland.com, delivers the keynote…

Ballroom A at the Sydney Hilton was packed…

Record attendances…  1000 on the first day alone

Meanwhile, upstairs, Jim Sterne leads the eMetrics stream of the conference.

The free Search Engine Bootcamp sessions were always full, with an array of speakers holding the crowd’s attention.

The exhibition hall was the place to be during breaks – and the food! That’s a post in itself…  : )

Greg Boser, from 3 Dog Media, started the morning sessions on Day One.

Miniature tiramisu. *wow*. The fact is though, that the food got better and better as the conference went on. Seriously.

OK. I have this Wordpress Gallery thing figured out now – here’s the complete set of Day 1 morning session photos… Enjoy!  : )

A wonderful warm week in Sydney – typically 25º all week…  lovely!

In the Marble Bar under the Hilton for @kalena’s Tweetup the night prior to SMX. Who won the prize for best geek t-shirt??

I know who won the prize for best poser: @motherwell  : )

OK. I have these Wordpress Galleries figured out now – no more odds’n’sodds of photos – here’s the complete ‘good ones’ Gallery of  Night 0: Sydney/Tweetup

To quote some Monty Python, “we’re all individuals” – and yet, we’ve already been ‘classified’ as to the types of managers we are. Management theories list at least four basic styles of management, plus a compliment of industry-specific styles.

What’s important about the following list of management styles is not so much in identifying which style sounds the most like you, but in looking at the other styles, to see if there could be benefits to you, your staff, and your business.

Autocratic: “What I say, goes.”

The boss is the boss, and the workers are the workers. Sounds a little nasty, but in many cases, it’s the most direct style of managing a team when there’s a lot of simple tasks to be carried out, or when the industry in question doesn’t have any wiggle room for creativity – and the manager is the only link in the chain with the *need* for decision making.

Apart from feelings of inferiority (“help, help, I’m being repressed!”), this style can also lead to staff becoming dependent on the manager for their next task, which in turn necessitates more management to keep things running.

Paternalistic: “I’ll listen, but ultimately I’m the decision maker”

Just like with a parent-child relationship, the ‘grown-ups’ are in charge, but the ‘kids’ feel like they’re part of the process. And like any large family, different seniorities of staff will have different levels of feedback to give to the manager. The instant benefit over the Autocratic style is that the feedback loop (if taken seriously) boosts morale; whereas a disadvantage is the added layer of admin. There’s no free ride in any of these styles: either you, the manager, gets involved in the low-level work OR you get involved in administration OF the low-level work.

Democratic: “Let’s vote on it”

In a Democratic style, the manager allows staff to take part in decision-making: everything is agreed by the majority. This allows for the collective mind of you and your staff to find solutions to complex problems – but it can also turn simple solutions into complex answers. Remember, a camel is a horse designed by committee. The challenge is to steer the ship the best you can, and begin to realise when solutions are ‘good enough’ vs ‘perfect’. Perfection vs commercial success are two different concepts: sometimes they align, but other times, they need to be poles apart.

Laissez-faire: “Let them eat cake”

Allowing your staff to find their own solutions takes both a) guts, and b) the right environment. In some industries, it’s just not possible (hey, let’s let Jimmy find his own recipe for making molten steel). The prime benefits are in the release of creativity of your staff, and in the lack of admin for your, the manager; whereas the dangers are in the resulting unco-ordinated efforts, and the lack of strategic focus of the business.

And lastly: “just barely managing”

Using the definition of ‘manage’ as ‘just coping’, this final style of management is not as atypical as it sounds. There are many situations where we are suddenly plunged into new areas of business, new locations, or new technologies, where suddenly we’re faced with the sink or swim proposition.

Our reactions to new situations are the times when we’re both at our most vunerable AND when we’re the most needed. My suggestion is to use the word ‘manage’ in the same sense as the word ‘design’ was intended: as a word meaning ‘planning’ and ‘thought’ – doing the strategic thinking and the day-to-day co-ordination of activities, to ensure your business runs smoothly.

AB out