connected marketer.

nothing makes me happier than seeing visitors from kazakhstan to my website.

eric ritter — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 15:13:34 +0000

google analytic screenshot proves that the goal of my website has been achieved.

Hello, my name Borat and I like www.connectedmarketer.com!

facebook stats for the IPO (image).

eric ritter — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 00:20:08 +0000

facebook IPO stats

some great facebook facts and stats for the IPO, including 845 million active monthly users.

best android vs. iphone quote in a while.

eric ritter — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 13:18:07 +0000

OH- “the best part of having an android phone is that my kids never want to play with it”.

— Bryce Roberts (@bryce) January 29, 2012

bob ross and “the joy of social media”.

eric ritter — Fri, 30 Sep 2011 13:26:08 +0000

ever wonder how painter and television personality bob ross would portray social networks such as facebook or twitter? well, now you can see for yourself.

on the canvas of bob ross, facebook is a mega mountain with 600 million happy little users, and google buzz (remember that?) is a desert with “swirly tumbleweeds.” bob ross also takes on the lesser known likes of path, color, digg, reddit as well as a bunch of other social web apps.

see for yourself and click the image to see full-size version.

a tour of the facebook timeline and open graph 2.0.

eric ritter — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 13:58:36 +0000

The rumors have now been officially confirmed: Facebook has overhauled the profile pages and introduced the so called “timeline”. But what are we talking about? Below we’ll show you the first steps of the new timeline.

In essence, the timeline is a visually and very graphic way to present all of your activities. It is arranged chronologically, allowing visitors of your profile to understand your development and see a chronicle of your life. Something similar has never been implemented in any other social network in this form, thus Facebook has definitely created a USP for itself.

Actually, the timeline will not be rolled out for a few weeks, but with a little trick you can already make yourself an impression of it.

After you have enabled the timeline, Facebook offers a tour in order to get to know the new features. Five steps teach the basics to users.

I – Cover
The first and most important eye-catcher for your timeline is on the cover. This allows you to display particularly beautiful or important moments as well as create an emotional impression with visitors. Of course you can change the cover as often as you want and therefore use other images as wanted or needed.

II – Views
In this area, the central or main information of your profile are presented. Besides your personal information, photos, “Likes”, and other applications, such as where you have checked in are displayed.

III – Activity Log
Clicking the “View Activities” button shows a log of your activities on Facebook. With this you (and only you) can easily view the entirety of your activities since you joined Facebook and make changes to the visibility of them on your timeline – this includes the deletion of posts.

IV – Stories
In the timeline, the activities that you actually want to have published are visually processed and depicted. The extent of what is displayed ranges from status updates to photo and video postings. In addition, it is possible to quickly and easily add contributions to the past. For example, you can supplement stories or as in my case add life events such as wedding or the birth of a child. You simply click on the bar in the middle to create new posts and then place them on any one date.

V – Star or Hide
Of course you can also edit your history. The star icon allows you to highlight specific posts on your timeline. On the other hand the the pencil icon allows you to alter the activity by hiding it or deleting it completely from your timeline.

After completing the tour gives Facebook give you a few more tips for the journey. New events can now be added via the “life events” menu. In addition, you are prompted to integrate new social apps and edit posts regarding their visibility.

Open Graph 2.0
Due to all of the excitement over the new Facebook Timeline another innovation that was actually supposed to be the main component of the f8 conference was virtually overlooked. Facebook has announced new partnerships and collaborations with with film and music streaming companies that will allow user to follow television shows or listen to music.

The key point is that friends are automatically informed of all activities (if you add the apps to your Timeline) and can automatically receive valuable tips and recommendations. This opens new ways of discovering music, movies, etc.

The spectrum of such “social apps” will steadily expand in the future. So, in the future it should be possible to share the video game you are currently playing, your last jogging routes, or even your most recently used recipes with friends.

According to Zuckerberg, some of these apps are advertising based and thus will be free to users, while others will build upon a subscription model.

i have altered the facebook. pray i don’t alter it any further.

eric ritter — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 23:35:34 +0000

is darth vader behind all the recent changes to facebook?

social network used for ad campaigns.

eric ritter — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 14:55:15 +0000

social network used for ad campaigns.

i pledge allegiance to the flag.

eric ritter — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 19:08:27 +0000

if only i had a flag pole.

besides being pretty darn funny, their blog post illustrates how apple has become more than a tech company or a brand. some people call it a religion, but perhaps for some it has become more.

the future of the internet [video].

eric ritter — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 15:09:36 +0000

in the year 2015.

i saw this video a while back and have been meaning to share it for a while. it combines my love of infographics, visions of the future, and facts. where will we go next in this exciting digital world we live in?

Digital Life: Today & Tomorrow from Neo Labels on Vimeo.

html 5 vs. mobile apps. my thoughts.

eric ritter — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 12:11:33 +0000

it seems as if the debate between creating a mobile app or a html 5 site / app is raging on almost a daily basis somewhere – like in our office. while i believe that both have their pros and also cons i’ve decided to start a list on the pros and cons of html5 versus mobile apps. maybe i just want to keep track or perhaps deep down i even think that i can convince myself that one is better than the other. to quote pam from the office here: “whenever i don’t know what to do, i make a list.” well pam. today is your lucky day and i’m starting my list now.

html5 vs. mobile apps. the list.

html5.

screenshot of eight bit.me - a html5 site that looks like an app.

cross platform compatibility.

a html5 site (if done correctly) will work on most mobile platforms – regardless of what os they are running. who will win apple or google? who cares – with a web app you serve both!

no walled garden.

the apple app store is sometimes referred to as a “walled garden” as they scrutinize and only allow apps in that meet a certain standard. with a html5 site you don’t have to worry about an approval process.

no police.

no one will snooping around and checking what you are doing. you won’t have to worry about someone telling you to remove a button to your store from your app.

don’t get lost in the android marketpalce or apple app store.

there are so many similar apps out there that it’s easy to get confused with someone else’s app. a great example is the “pop tart cat” app (i’ll defiantly be writing a future post about it, so stay tuned). long story short there already is a knock off of the original nyan cat being sold in the app store.

they do what apps can do.

i’m pretty confident on this point (minus perhaps accessing the camera). a great example is eightbit.me a purely html5 site that allows your to check-in into places like foursquare. it places an app icon on your iphone home screen and then functions just like an app but it’s actually a html5 site. also, see the end of the post for more examples.

mobile apps.

need to find a classy toilet in grand central station? there's an app for that.

there’s an app for that.

apple has done a fantastic job of marketing apps. they have brainwashed me into believing that if i need to find a high-class toilet in times square i can use an app for that (by the way there really is an app for that).

easy.

mobile apps are much easier to use then a full blown website.

screen sizes.

apps can be create to fit the exact screen size of the device. a website may render correctly on an iPad, but not on an iPhone.

lazy people.

apps get you what you need fast and easy. they are the remote controls of the 21st century.

make money.

you can sell your app for money in the app store.

every one has one.

there are so many apps these days that some are bound to be bad. and oh boy are there “let’s fire out an app as cheaply and as quickly as possible” apps out there. the westshore pizza app is a great example of this. i was going to order pizza from them the other day with their new shiny app, but gave up after 5 minutes.

no compatibility issues (unless you use android).

in general, an app is an app and will simply work. no long qa or testing phases like on websites.

html5 web app examples.

domino's mobile website emulates the ui of an app.

tumblr dashboard on an iphone.

please keep in mind that this list is purely for my enjoyment and portrays my skewed subjective point of view. also, due to my extremely limited knowledge of android this post is heavily focused around ios.