Neal's Notes

Two years ago, a McKinsey Quarterly report on e-government wasn’t exactly a glowing testimonial:

“Three obstacles have limited the impact of e-government efforts: ineffective governance, lack of Web-related capabilities, and reluctance to allow user participation in the creation of applications and content,” the report stated.

But 24 months in tech years probably equates to something like 500 dog years – in other words, advances in e-government technologies/processes have been remarkable.

These software solutions are now being implemented by various public agencies and municipalities both stateside and overseas.

Some capsule snapshots:

• The Newnan, GA Police Department is using an integrated software program called SunGard ONESolution, created by SunGard, a privately held Fortune 500 (ranked #434) software/technology services company. Once fully implemented, the city will team up with the Coweta County Sheriff’s Office to share important information as part of a multi-jurisdictional law enforcement strategy. SunGard says the interagency approach will enable emergency dispatchers to push info into the field faster and also help officers access data remotely via wireless-enabled mobile technology. The software suite is also being used for the City of Johns Creek, GA (tenth largest in the state; incorporated in 2006) for local government, including apps for finance, human resources and community development.

• The Tauranga City Council (TCC) in New Zealand is using e-government software from Accela to manage more than US $2 billion of city assets and infrastructure. Tauranga is New Zealand’s sixth-largest urban area with about 120,000 residents. TCC also plans to use Accela Mobile Office, a mobile solution that will allow workers and contractors in the field to receive/transmit from-the-job work orders, inspection data, GIS data, and occupational health and safety information.

• GovPartner’s online permitting portal, known as CommunityDevelopmentPartner, has been a big hit with the Municipality of Abu Dhabi (pop. 1.6 million). The portal, accessed via the Abu Dhabi municipal website, issues more than a thousand monthly permits and handles electronic plan reviews. Here in the U.S., National City, CA (just south of downtown San Diego) is using the company’s software to centralize and streamline the city’s Community Development processes – it has also automated multiple departments, including Building, Business Licensing, Code Enforcement, Engineering and Planning.

“The old paradigm of residents having to go to City Hall to conduct business is shifting significantly for two reasons – technological innovation, and the ubiquity of Internet-ready devices,” said National City IT Manager Ron Williams.

Look for e-government to be a big part of so-called ‘smart cities’ in the next few years. ABI Research recently reported that $8.1 billion was spent on smart city technologies last year (including what they called ‘smart government’ services). The market research firm expects this to increase to $39.5 billion by 2016. ABI Research said there are currently 102 smart city projects worldwide – Europe has 38, North America at 35, Asia Pacific at 21, the Middle East and Africa at six; Latin America with two.

Writing in Public Management, GovPartner President Mike Daniel said that the most relevant e-government trends “will have as much to do with management principles as with technology, including integration, self-customization, and shared services and outsourcing.”

Palo Alto (CA) Mayor Sid Espinosa best summed it up:

“Technology providers are often seen as the delivery mechanism for these shapeless, faceless advancements that government leaders will then contend with. But the truth is that the simple daily use of a system coupled with a permit technician who thinks outside of the box, or a municipal staffer who envisions a new way of using that software, is what truly drives e-government.”

Unless you’ve been living in that proverbial cave, been mummified or have been cast adrift on some remote South Pacific island, you already know that Facebook is the world’s most popular social media platform for sharing info/interacting with people.

Cities and counties are fast discovering that Facebook can also help local/regional governments keep in touch with their varied constituents.

But there are some caveats to consider before cities/counties take the social media plunge. A 2010 National Association of Counties survey of member counties revealed that 36% had a Facebook page and 41% said they used Twitter. But almost 80% said they had no social media policies in place.

Obviously this can be a significant problem – who’s responsible for managing Facebook – the city council? The county? The mayor’s office? A paid employee from one of the aforementioned? Many local governments may find themselves in a bit of a quandary about how to best proceed.

In fact, last year, the Redondo Beach, CA city council voted to scrap its Facebook page after the city attorney outlined a number of concerns about First Amendment and state legal requirements.

Some of these included:

• May city officials remove vulgar posts and misinformation, or are the comments protected by the First Amendment?

• If a quorum of city council members comment on a Facebook post, is it a violation of the open meetings law? Such laws often require advance notice of meetings and an opportunity to attend.

• Is the city obligated to retain user comments under the state’s public records law?

• Could the city face liability for employee comments deemed offensive in the workplace?

In California, for instance, it’s also important to note that just as emails can be subject to the state’s Public Records Act (CPRA), Facebook status updates (and tweets and blog posts) can be too.

To wit, according to a CPRA overview, “governmental records shall be disclosed to the public, upon request, unless there’s a specific reason not to do so. Most of the reasons for withholding disclosure of a record are set forth in specific exemptions contained in the CPRA. However, some confidentiality provisions are incorporated by reference to other laws. Also, the CPRA provides for a general balancing test by which an agency may withhold records from disclosure, if it can establish that the public interest in nondisclosure clearly outweighs the public interest in disclosure.”

Oy vey.  Despite all the legalese to consider, Facebook can be a phenomenal digital tool to help with a city or county’s branding/marketing/new business development endeavors.

A few brief examples:

• The Columbus City Council uses Facebook’s Events Tab to announce upcoming council meetings.

• The City Council of New York posts news and discussion items on its Wall and lets citizens comment/react.

• Panama City Beach, FL uses Facebook’s Discussion Board to not only solicit public feedback on key issues, but to clarify administrative policies.

• Back in May 2007, Greensburg, KS was just about wiped out by an EF-5 tornado. Facebook’s been used to solicit ideas from residents on rebuilding the town.

• Orlando, FL’s Facebook page includes posts for a free workshop for people facing home foreclosures.

Michael Riedyk, who blogs for GovLoop, an online community of more than 50,000 local/state/federal government employees and consultants, encapsulated nine ways city councils can use Facebook (and these are also germane for counties too):

• Announce council meetings and events

• Publish documents

• Talk to the people

• Use multimedia

• Provide elections information

• Offer more info

• Collect ideas and feedback

• Discuss issues

• Use a thematic approach

Bottom line? Facebook – and for that matter – other available social media tools and platforms – can significantly enhance a city and/or county’s image and provide valuable information to constituents. Just make sure you have a social media policy in place before going full tilt with a Facebook page(s). It may take a bit of bandwidth to develop this, but you’ll give yourself a digital high five afterwards for doing so.

Municipalities nationwide continue to lose millions of dollars in sales tax receipts due to slower retail sales. The City of Vallejo, CA filed for bankruptcy in 2008, a victim of the real estate crash.

Four hundred miles south in Orange County, CA, municipalities are getting whacked by having considerably less revenue and the growing realization that they can’t afford public pension liabilities. The California Independent Voter Network recently reported that in 2009-2010, 23 Orange County cities outspent their general fund reserves. Translation: Most of these cities have not only slashed their budgets, but may also have to go into reserves, perhaps even borrow and cut services.

It’s enough to make a city manager’s hair go prematurely gray – or experience some sleepless nights before the weekly city council meeting – or both.

But a solution may be just a few clicks away. More and more cities around the U.S. are jumping on board the social media bandwagon and utilizing various tools/programs to not only be able to provide time-sensitive material as quickly as possible (e.g., emergency info, usually via Twitter), but to market/promote their fair city to the widest possible audience.

NetProspex, a B2B sales/marketing contact database company, rolled out last month its 2011 Summer Social Business Report. One section of the report focused on ranking the top 25 U.S. cities for social media usage by businesspeople. The report was developed by analyzing what NetProspex said were “verified business contacts in its crowd-sourced database; 12 million employees at U.S.-based businesses were analyzed for Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn activity.”

Not going to list all 25 but here’s their Top 10 list: San Francisco; San Jose; New York; Ventura, CA and Austin (tied for 4th); Stamford, CT; Seattle, Dallas-Ft. Worth; Boston; and Denver and Oakland (tied for 10th).

So how are some cities using social media? Not surprisingly, even small-to-medium sized municipalities are finding that a properly orchestrated campaign can yield significant rewards:

The City of Tomball, TX, 28 miles northwest of Houston, was founded in 1907 by Texas State Senator Thomas Henry Ball (hence ‘Tomball’). The town was initially established as a railroad center for transporting agricultural products.

The city recently hired its first marketing director, Mike Baxter, who worked in the tourism industry for 30+ years. Baxter created a Tomball, TX page on Facebook that provides updates on things to see/do in the city and in nearby communities. Daily updates include food dishes offered by area restaurants, even where to shop for gifts for guys. A Flickr account was also launched, enabling visitors to see digital pictures of Tomball. Baxter has also posted videos that feature slide photos from city shops and events held — all posted under the ‘Tomball1907’ account name with the city’s slogan, “Tomball…Texan for Fun!”

The social media programs are generating buzz and revenue, notes Baxter.

“Tourism dollars don’t just affect a festival,” said Baxter. “Money is spent in town at hotels and at restaurants and even further down the line at the gas station and tourists may stop at a convenience store or the local grocery store.”

Quite a few metro Atlanta cities are now using social media – everything from tweeting to webcasting. Two of them are Decatur and Suwanee. Decatur established a blog way back in 2008; that morphed to include Twitter and Facebook pages. Decatur today regularly partners with the Georgia Municipal Association to conduct social media workshops on the city’s site, and last year added an online component for the city’s 10-year strategic plan.

“We wanted a component for people who wanted to attend meetings but couldn’t,” said Linda Harris, assistant director for community and economic development.

Suwanee started a Facebook page in 2009 and uses it to promote/announce open houses, public meetings, even art shows. Last year, the Atlanta Regional Commission gave the city an award for technology innovation.

Two more examples – Boston has a number of iPhone apps to streamline government bureaucracy. Citizens can use them to report potholes, graffiti, downed power lines, and more, to City Hall. After filing the complaint, users get a tracking number so they can monitor if the job’s getting done.

Mashable reported that in 2010 the City of Orlando, FL was trying to get a New York City-based company to relocate. The Metro Orlando Economic Development Commission launched a microsite that also included YouTube and Flickr links. Facebook and Twitter city pages included testimonials and stories about why residents and businesses loved living/working in Orlando. An e-newsletter waxed eloquent about Orlando’s attributes.

Unfortunately, the company never moved south but the campaign helped in rebranding efforts and many of the social media elements continue to be used for recruiting purposes.

Social media isn’t designed to be a complete economic panacea for municipalities. But implementing targeted campaigns and utilizing available tools and programs germane for your city can be an important first step.

Whilst doing some research for a client on some of the social media pitfalls for businesses both public and private – not being able to maintain control over info, malware, brand hijacking, etc., etc. – it became obvious that while social media is by and large an effective business tool, there are some red flags to watch out for.

A 2010 study by the Center for New Communications Research reported that 83 percent of Inc. 500 companies use various social media tools; the companies indicated that having these additional communications lines to customers has been advantageous.

To mitigate social media risks, some companies have instituted comprehensive policies that encompass ethics, legal responsibilities, education and training. DuPont, for instance, created what they call the DuPont Web Based Social Networking and Digital Media Policy.

According to Matt McGonegle, DuPont’s ethics and compliance manager, the Policy “addresses internal social networks, external social networks, codes of conduct and guidelines.” McGonegle added that DuPont also has a ‘Social Network Steering Committee’ that reviews/approves the creation and use of all social networks to ensure adherence to issued guidelines/standards.

“Education and training is equally important and DuPont is establishing a social media training program that will educate employees on the risks of social media, best practices for using social media and DuPont’s policies,” McGonegle said.

All of the aforementioned is critical for any company utilizing social media. Last year, ISACA (previously known as the Information Systems Audit and Control Association, a 43-year old international organization that researches IT governance/control), issued a white paper that highlighted the top five social media risks for businesses – viruses/malware; brand hijacking; lack of control over content; unrealistic customer expectations of ‘Internet speed’ service; and non-compliance with record management regulations.

“The greatest risks posed by social media are all tied to violation of trust,” said ISACA Certification Committee member John Pironti. “Social media is built on the assumption of a network of trusted friends and colleagues, which is exploited by social engineering at great cost. That is why ongoing education is critical.”

And just over a month ago, Symantec Corp. issued its 2011 Social Media Protection Flash Poll that took a close peek at how organizations protect themselves from potential negative consequences of using various social networking sites. The poll showed that there is cause for concern within the enterprise – a typical enterprise experienced nine social media incidents, with an astonishing “94 percent suffering negative consequences including damage to their reputations, loss of customer trust, data loss and lost revenue.”

In fact, Symantec reported that the top three social media incidents a typical enterprise encountered over the past year were: employees sharing too much info in public forums (46 percent); loss or exposure of confidential information (41 percent); increased exposure to litigation (37 percent).

Even more recently, Forrester Research issued a report on Aug. 16, ‘Resources: The Real Cost of Social Media Marketing.’ The report stated that sharing the right social media resources is the biggest challenge today. Interactive marketers, noted Forrester, need to be shepherds, coordinating the sharing of people, technologies, processes and budgets.

Forrester recommended a three-pronged social media approach: 1) Help build a social organization for marketing; 2) Put guidelines in place to empower teams; and 3) Create new cross-team processes.
Whatever the methodology or process your business implements, you need to do something to protect the company information flowing through social networks.

ISACA’s Pironti best summed it up:

“I think that the blinders have been on at a lot of enterprises. ISACA isn’t warning companies not to fully embrace social networking – they just need to go into it with their eyes wide open to the risks as well as the benefits.”

An organization called The Amphion Forum has been spearheading a series of invitation-only executive roundtables that this year have been held in Las Vegas, Chicago, and most recently, Washington, DC. I was extended an invitation to last week’s Washington event and found the forum both elucidating and informative.

Participating organizations included a welter of public and private sector entities that have a vested interested in Internet security-related issues. Some included the U.S. State Department, the U.S. Army, Cardinal Health, Cryptography Research, Mocana, Symantec, and VeriSign, to name a few.

The presentations were quite varied – ‘Federal Devices in Critical Contexts’ talked about how engineers and scientists in the medical, industrial, military and utility sectors have tended to lag behind the consumer electronics industry in adopting connected smart devices and how they’ll have to ramp up quickly to connect everything.

‘Attacking the Device/App Security Problem with Collaboration Models’ focused on the importance of making innovative inroads in device security and what’s being done in the public and private sector to defeat security threats targeted at (or via) connected devices.

‘Security, the Internet of Things, and Federal Law’ brought together experts who expounded upon what kind of international legal framework is needed to handle a global information architecture that will not only provide adequate security, but also protect the privacy and digital property of device users.

Panelists for the ‘Internet 2016: A Whole New ‘Net’ session, talked about how five years now, both our business and personal content will follow us even more seamlessly and intuitively from device to device.

One of the panelists from Internet security firm Mocana, Senior Analyst Robert Vamosi, also recently authored a book, When Gadgets Betray Us. All attendees were given a copy of his book; sections of two paragraphs of the inside cover flyleaf particularly grabbed my attention:

“How many of us actually stop to think about potential threats to our privacy? Keyless entry systems in many high-tech car models make auto theft easier than ever. Commercial photocopiers are equipped with hard drives that can document everything we ever copied on it. And our digital photos, even after they’re cropped, can expose the entire original image…from iPads to Blackberry devices, online banking to keyless entry systems, we’re increasingly giving over the management of our crucial information to the latest and greatest electronic gadgets.”

So between listening to what the panelists had to say, reading snippets of Vamosi’s book and networking with other attendees, gave me pause for concern on how widespread our security problems are, what needs to be done, and how we go about resolving these issues.

In a related story I wrote in last month’s issue of IEEE Computer on mobile security(http://www.leavcom.com/pdf/Mobilesecurity.pdf), I quoted Mocana VP-Marketing Kurt Stammberger (who invited me to attend this Amphion Forum session).

A reprise of one of his remarks is especially apropos to conclude this posting:

“Our dependence on an always-on, connected, mobile device environment is going to be profound in critical contexts that we can’t imagine today. We have to be able to trust these devices, but we can’t now. There’s still a lot of work that needs to be done to get to the point where that trust is warranted.”

That geeky guy who was a member of the high school chess and math clubs – now probably cashing in millions in stock options from his latest startup. The blonde cheerleader you had a crush on – long relegated to the deepest recesses of your cerebrum. Perhaps even the English teacher who kept on reaming you over those dangling participles.

Unlike Gen. Douglas MacArthur’s famous Apr. 19, 1951 quip before a joint session of the U.S. Congress – “old soldiers never die; they just fade away,” thanks to Facebook, those high school, and in many cases, even middle and elementary school classmates –and the occasional teacher – won’t fade away either.

All of the aforementioned has now been officially substantiated by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, which recently released a report entitled, “Social Networking Sites and Our Lives.’

It’s the first national survey of how the use of social networking sites by adults is related to people’s overall social networks.

As the report is 85 pages and summarizing all of the findings would take numerous postings, I’ll comment on a few points that were rather illuminating.

Yes, the largest single group of Facebook friends is your high school classmates. Survey respondents were asked to classify friends into a number of categories – immediate family, extended family, coworkers, neighbors, people from high school, college/university classmates, members of voluntary groups/associations, folks they’ve never met in person, and people they had only met once.

The survey revealed:

• Average Facebook user’s friends list has 56 people from high school – about 22% of the total.

• Extended family was second with 12%; coworkers,10%; college friends, 9%; immediate family, 8%; people from voluntary groups, 7%; neighbors, 2%.

• About 31% of Facebook friends weren’t classified in any of the categories per previous bullet.

The survey authors surmised that these were probably dormant ties and friends-of-friends.

Other key findings:

• The number of those using social networking sites has nearly doubled since 2008 and the population has gotten older;

• Facebook users are more trusting than others;

• Facebook users have more close relationships;

• Facebook users get more social support than other people;

• Facebook users are more politically engaged than most people.

And this was somewhat surprising – MySpace users are ‘more likely to be open to opposing points of view.’ The survey measured “perspective taking,” which the authors said is the ability of people to consider multiple points of view.

“There is no evidence that social network site users, including those who use Facebook, are any more likely than others to cocoon themselves in social networks of like-minded and similar people as some have feared,” the report said. “Moreover, regression analysis found that those who use MySpace have significantly higher levels of perspective taking. The average adult scored 64/100 on a scale of perspective taking. Using regression analysis to control for demographic factors, a MySpace user who uses the site a half dozen times per month tends to score about 8 points higher on the scale.”

As the 2012 presidential election starts to register amongst voters nationwide, it’s also interesting to note that the survey reported that a Facebook user who uses the site multiple times per day was two and a half times more likely to attend a political rally or meeting, 57% more likely to persuade someone on their vote, and 43% more likely to have said they would vote.

The findings, say the authors, show that there’s little cause for concern that people using social networking sites “experience smaller social networks, less closeness, or are exposed to less diversity.” Those with more education tend to gravitate to LinkedIn and Twitter. But total network size may not be as important as intimacy, for instance.
“Americans have more close social ties than they did two years ago – and they are less socially isolated,” noted the report. “We found that the frequent use of Facebook is associated with having more overall close ties.”

So you just might want to ‘friend’ that cheerleader after all.

Touch is becoming an integral component for numerous display products, yet it’s still in an evolutionary phase.

Rhoda Alexander, director of monitor research for market research firm iSuppli, said hardware designers are overlooking an opportunity to leapfrog over what Apple is currently offering by moving the mobile platform beyond a simple consumption tablet to include true creation offerings.

“Touch provides the all-important key to a growing number of content doors, enabling users to easily flick from one application to another,” said Alexander. “Yet for the most part, these doors swing one way, allowing users to easily pull content while providing only rudimentary input options.”

The ideal paperless solution, added Alexander, would allow users to interact with the electronic content in the same way one does with the media it is replacing. This is particularly true in education environments where students and educators want more flexibility than a soft keyboard provides.

“They want the ability to make notes in margins and underline critical passages with the simple motion of a stylus, to jot down thoughts as they occur, and to sketch out a diagram or a mathematical solution,” she said.

Guillaume Largillier, co-founder and chief strategy officer of Bordeaux, France-based Stantum, which has been providing multi-touch technology solutions since 2002, concurred that education will be a key vertical for touch – and the broad solution will be multi-touch technology, an ideal form factor for mobile and school computing because it’s transportable and offers enough surface area for proper content manipulation and viewing.

“But the specific form factor requires the right type of multi-touch technology—a technology that makes touchscreens easier and less costly to build than those that use traditional capacitive multi-touch and, most importantly, that respond best to the needs of the user,” said Largillier.

“A user-friendly, touch-enabled smaller screen that doubles as a connected, multimedia e-textbook would be welcomed by students, parents, and teachers,” says Lynn Marentette, a noted school psychologist who blogs about accessible off-the-desktop natural user interfaces.

“Tech-savvy teachers often incorporate digital storytelling and multimedia activities into their lessons, and 21st century learners need a fast and easy way to input and manipulate their creative content. Although some of the netbooks in line for purchase by the schools offer this capability, they don’t provide the mode of touch that students love, a touch that might make learning tangible—and real,” Marentette adds.

In developed countries, noted Largillier, students account for about 25 percent of the population. But in emerging countries, with governments investing heavily in developing their IT and education infrastructures, the addressable market is already close to a billion users. Also, given that education is now on the cusp of the cloud revolution, it would not be surprising if the education market becomes the next El Dorado for makers of connected devices of any sort.

“Computerized slates could be a learning and discovery tool from the very start, rather than yet another discipline to learn—a concept that has much more in common with paper notepads and plastic slates than it has with traditional classroom PCs,” he said.

And Largillier notes that a single interface could respond to the educational needs of users throughout their school careers—from elementary school to university—adapting input mechanisms, graphical elements, interaction flow, and applications as the user’s ability grows.

The numbers may vary depending on the respective report, but the end results all come to the same conclusion – connected consumer devices are growing at a rapid clip worldwide and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

“The explosion of connected devices is being driven by consumers seeking on-demand access to movies, music, social networking services, apps, connected devices, and other content,” says Mark Ritorto, president of Infinite Research.

His company recently released a report entitled, ‘Global Consumer Connected Device Market Forecast.’ Infinite Research estimates that overall shipments of consumer connected devices will increase from 262.1 million units in 2010 to 712.1 million units by 2015; the global installed base of consumer connected devices will top 2.1 billion units by 2015.

Virtually all mobile devices, noted Infinite Research, including e-readers, tablet computers, portable game consoles, media players, digital cameras, and camcorders, are being embedded with Internet connectivity; ditto for stationary consumer electronics devices – smart-TVs, connected set-top boxes, video game consoles, Blu-Ray/DVD players, digital photo frames and media phones.

London-based UMTS Forum, an international non-profit industry association that helps its members profit from the opportunities of 3G/UMTS networks, predicted in its report, ‘Two Worlds Connected: Consumer Electronics Meets Mobile Broadband,’ that there will be a global population of one billion mobile broadband consumer devices by 2016 and that consumer electronics (CE) device connectivity will overtake overall wireless market growth, also within five years.

“There’s no doubt that the CE industry must ‘connect or perish.’ In particular, we encourage operators and CE vendors to collaborate on developing new business models – like revenue sharing – that reduce upfront investment risk while generating new sources of value,” says UMTS Forum Chairman Jean-Pierre Bienaime.

Another report from market research firm Berg Insight says the global number of shipped consumer electronics devices with cellular connectivity grew to 22 million last year, compared to 11 million the previous year.

“The sheer availability of affordable devices with embedded connectivity has exploded during the last year with substantial price reductions on connected personal navigation devices and popular e-readers such as the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble’s Nook,” says Berg Insight Senior Analyst Johan Svanberg.

And all this ubiquitous connectivity is radically transforming CE products, says Tony King-Smith, vice president of marketing for UK-based Imagination Technologies, a global leader in multimedia and communication silicon technologies.

As King-Smith outlined in the January/February issue of Vision, the flagship publication of the Consumer Electronics Association, within four years, more than 70 percent of all mainstream CE products will be connected to the Internet; these technologies will not only drive the next wave of connectivity in all types of consumer products, but usher in a new era of mass market cloud connectivity.

“How all these devices connect together and how they will be controlled and managed will be one of the major challenges facing CE manufacturers in the years to come,” says King-Smith. “However, what is certain is that an increasing dialogue between devices will become the norm, with the cloud connecting all, storage being shared (and often not even in the home) and maybe even load balancing of process and storage across all your connected devices.”

Whilst recently roaming the hallowed halls of the Moscone Center in San Francisco during the Game Developers Conference, there was not only a definite uptick in attendance, but the overall aura/attitude seemed more positive.

Usual colorful characters were in full regalia promoting a respective company and/or product – a pair of vertically challenged hires wore head-to-toe bear costumes, an attractive young lady decked out as some kind of fairy godmother passed out flyers, and a number of people sported coiffures with bright hues of green, tangerine, even magenta.

Standard stuff for GDC.

Looking beyond GDC, overall, the PC gaming industry appears healthy and poised for significant growth assuming the economy slowly continues to improve both in the U.S. and abroad.

Market research firm Jon Peddie Research recently released its figures on the forecast for video game graphics boards sales for the next two years and actual Q4 2010 shipments. The firm found that worldwide, consumers spent five percent less during the holiday season on ultra high-end enthusiast video graphics than during Q3 2010, but four percent more on upper-end midrange performance boards.

This suggests, says Dr. Jon Peddie, president of the firm, that consumers were still watching their wallets and despite some encouraging news about an improving economy, cast their votes with their hard-earned dollars.

Overall, noted Peddie, the graphics board market generated sales of $4.4 billion in Q4 2010, and of that the firm estimates 44 percent was for gaming graphics (although the graphics boards can of course be used for other functions).

Looking forward, Peddie sees a steady growth in the high-performance enthusiast segment and expects it to reach $2.45 billion by 2013. And last month the company released a PC gaming hardware market report, estimating that 2011 expenditures will be up 27 percent over 2010 to about $22 billion worldwide.

Another market research firm, NPD, released its figures covering video game console and game sales for February. They reported that U.S. consumers spent three percent more (a total of $1.36 billion) on video games last month compared to the same period a year ago. NPD said console accessories sales figures scored the biggest gains – a 22 percent hike from last year – primarily due to sales of Microsoft’s Xbox Kinect motion sensor controller.

NPD said for February, the top five games in the U.S. were Call of Duty: Black Ops; Marvel vs. Capcom 3; Just Dance 2: NBA 2k11; and Dead Space 2.

In an interview with Gamasutra, EA Games President Frank Gibeau said MMORPG’s (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) and other PC games will continue to be a key revenue producer for EA.

“The user base is gigantic,” said Gibeau. “PC retail may be a big problem, but PC downloads are awesome. The margins are much better and we don’t have any rules in terms of first approvals. From our perspective, it’s an extremely health platform. It’s totally conceivable it will become our biggest platform.”

There are a number of key factors influencing the amount of money people are spending on PCs as a gaming platform.

Here are a few of these as reported by Jon Peddie Research:

• The natural cycle of PC hardware purchases from historical inflection points. The biggest inflection points correspond with highly anticipated software releases. The refresh cycle of PCs for this crop of gamers is hitting over the last year and through the next year. This stimulates sales.

• System demands of modern FPS (first person shooters) and RTS (real-time strategy) titles. To play Black Ops or Starcraft II at good resolutions and frame rates requires a pretty decent rig. Gamers that are interested in these titles are buying new rigs to run them, stimulating sales.

• The cost of 1920×1080 PC displays has dropped to around $200. This is a very important factor in mid-range PC gamers buying and upgrading equipment to run on this resolution at good frame rates.

• Solid state drives are on the wish lists of a lot of PC gamers and they are using this technology as the decision base for upgrades and new rigs.

• Steam, The EA Store, Direct2Drive, and other services make buying PC games very convenient. The word is getting out and it is influencing people to adopt the PC as a gaming platform.

• The current console platforms are old and they have performance limitations. Gamers are choosing the PC because of the incredible quality that is possible beyond a console. One can obtain a $600 PC that exceeds the capabilities of a console (and you can use it for a lot of other things).

• Direct X 11 is being widely applauded amongst higher end PC gamers who spend a lot of money.

• PC gamers are spending a lot of money on high quality speaker systems, headsets, mice, cases, cooling, and other accessories and customizations.

• 3D is also opening the wallets of PC gamers. Though it is not universal, there is a significant and growing interest in 3D capabilities.

• Ultra HD displays are on the wish lists of many high end PC gamers. Gamers need a very fast system to run these resolutions and this is stimulating sales.

• Wide gamut displays are starting to attract attention and dollars from PC gamers. Traditionally used by graphic designers, “wide gamut” displays are capable of showing more of the color spectrum, often making games look better.

Games go well with desktop and notebook computers. The PC as a gaming platform appears healthy and the market should get stronger over the next several years.

One of the sparks of the Egyptian revolution, Google marketing manager Wael Ghonim, has exemplified how social media has played a pivotal role in the ongoing protests against despotic rule in North Africa and the Middle East.

As you’re probably aware by now, Ghonim’s Facebook page helped gather momentum in fomenting popular dissent against former President Hosni Mubarak. Ghonim called it ‘Revolution 2.0.’

In reviewing numerous articles, blogs, and listening/watching radio and TV reports, a few really struck home. Evgeny Morozov, a visiting scholar at Stanford University, succinctly summed it up in the Wall Street Journal.

Morozov said that while it’s important to acknowledge the role that the Internet played in Egypt, don’t forget that the protesters “were blessed with a government that didn’t know a tweet from a poke – as illustrated, most of all, perhaps, by its desperate (and belated) gambit in temporarily shutting off the county’s access to the outside world.”

But Morozov also added a caveat, stating that while it was Mubarak’s ignorance of the Internet that helped bring him down, other regional dictators are already playing catch up and quickly reviewing the playbook on how to effectively roll out online propaganda.

In Bahrain, for instance, Twitter was inundated with government propaganda in a clumsy attempt to make it a less credible information source about the protests. Sudan’s President Oman Al-Bashir (who is the first sitting head of state indicted by the International Criminal Court in the Hague on counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity for allegedly orchestrating a campaign of murder, torture, rape and forced expulsions in Darfur) plans to provide more electricity countrywide so his supporters can wax eloquent for him on Facebook.

Seemingly overnight, social media has become an influential trigger of these regional revolts. Beyza Unal, a doctoral student at Old Dominion University, recently wrote that “today’s social media supports an explicit ideology that backs up openness and transparency in state formalization, facilitating a higher standing – a political discourse on its own that can change the course of events.”

Jeff Jarvis pens Buzzmachine.com, which focuses on media and news. He’s an associate professor and director of the interactive journalism program at the City University of New York’s Graduate School of Journalism.

Jarvis recently blogged that Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are fast becoming the Gutenberg press of the Middle East because they provide similar tools that empower people to speak, share and gather.

“The revolutionaries of the Middle East use-indeed, depend upon- these social tools and the net. That is the reason why we must protect them, for by doing so we protect the public and its freedoms…when Mubarak shuts down the Internet, they violate the human rights of their citizens as much as if they burned the products of Gutenberg’s press.”

How these transformative protests will eventually play out is still unknown. But the power of the online connection demonstrates that Revolution 2.0 has opened up a Pandora’s Box of freedom of expression throughout much of the Arab world that will hopefully take root and flourish.