Here is the textbook that I used for teaching my New Media Technology class during the Spring semester of 2012 at Hannam University's Linton Global College. I took great effort to give credit where it is due. I aimed to show my students how they could access enough free info on the web that was of equal or greater value than expensive textbooks. Feel free to share and please support the true authors of this book in any way you can (money, likes, comments, links, etc.) I am simply the currator of this content. If you would like a tablet-friendly PDF file just email me at kenmorrison30 @ yahoo.com (no spaces)

1. New Media Technology
Curated By Ken Morrison
Hannam University, Linton Global College
Spring - 2012
1

2. This non-traditional textbook represents the best knowledge available for free on
the internet. Much of it is directly from the minds of the people creating the
changes in the tech world. The articles and linked videos been curated by Ken
Morrison for students at Linton Global College (Hannam University), in Daejeon
South Korea. Morrison is an Assistant Professor of New Media & Global
Communications. All materials were free at the time of the curation and creation
of the .pdf file. I have taken care to provide links to all of the original content. I
highly endorse all websites included in this .pdf and encourage you to follow the
links to learn more.
From Awel Ghonim to Mark Zuckerberg, 2011 has been an exciting year of many
benchmarks of humans finding new ways to use technology to connect and create
change. This course will study the convergence of how new media technology is
changing the worlds of business, education, and Society. We will also briefly
examine how this changing landscape effects journalism, law. globalization, and
even how technology changes our brains and our behavior. Most importantly,
students will learn how to use free new media tools to personalize their learning to
help prepare for success in reaching for their future goals.
We live in a new world where information that was once reserved only for the
wealthy, is now becoming a commodity. However, this new luxury comes with a
new responsibility. We must learn a new set of skills of how to swim through these
massive waves of information in order to find the information that is most helpful
for us. I have modeled the skills that I will teach in this class to collect the
following 340 pages of information that I feel represent a solid foundation for
success in this new digitally-connected world.
We will learn from Bezos and Brogan for business, Turkle and Shirky will teach us
about society, We will learn about law from Lessig, changes in education from
Rheingold and Siemens for, and changes in journalism from Assange and
Cashmore. Although the front lines of “The Great Tech War of 2012” is in the
United States, we will use these materials to discuss the implications of these
changes around the world. Most importantly, students in this class will be able to
use new tools to connect and create, while also using new thinking tools to become
critical consumers of information in a digital age. Let’s begin!
2

3. NEW MEDIA TECHNOLOGY
Textbook Curated by Ken Morrison for Linton Global College www.lgc.hnu.kr
New Media Technology Syllabus! 7
The Great Tech War Of 2012! 16
SOCIETY! 29
Is Social Media Actually Making Us Less Connected?! 30
genM: The Multitasking Generation! 31
Do you obsessively check your smartphone?! 37
IBM Worker Email-Free for 4 Years: How to Live without Email! 42
How mobile is forcing us to change the way we measure the Internet! 44
Why your computer is becoming more like your phone! 48
GOOGLE, MOTOROLA, AND A PATENT WAR! 51
Twine: The Revolutionary Box That Can Make Your Appliances Tweet! 52
BUSINESS! 54
Let’s Talk Social Media For Business! 55
How to Systematically Build a Mountain of Links! 95
EDUCATION! 100
New Media Literacy In Education: Learning Media Use While Developing
Critical Thinking Skills! 101
College students limit technology use during crunch time! 109
THOUGHT LEADERS! 112
Tim Cook! 113
Mark Zuckerberg! 115
Sergei Brin! 120
Larry Page! 123
Ev Williams! 125
Sheryl Sandberg! 134
Pete Cashmore! 143
3

4. Tariq Krim! 147
Clay Shirky! 150
Nicholas Carr! 152
George Siemens! 157
Sherry Turkle! 165
Sugata Mitr! 184
Steve Hargadon! 185
Awel Ghonim! 191
Jeff Bezos:! 193
Chris Brogan! 198
Julian Assange:! 204
Yoshikazu Tanaka:! 206
TERMS! 208
TERM #1: LOCATION-BASED MARKETING! 211
By Cynthia Boris on February 14, 2012 The Future of Location-Based
Marketing is Cool. . . or Scary! 211
7 Things You Need to Know About QR Codes! 213
STOP CENSORSHIP: THE PROBLEMS WITH SOPA! 214
Wikileaks! 216
What is digital media literacy and why is it important?! 217
HOT TRIGGERS! 220
Hashtag! 224
KHAN ACADEMY! 226
CONNECTIVSM! 229
CROWDSOURCING! 231
Content Curation?! 234
COGNITIVE SURPLUS! 235
INFOTENSION! 238
4

5. MOBILE:! 242
MECHANICAL TURK! 246
Digital Divide! 249
SECOND SCREEN! 252
FLASH MOB! 253
SEO (SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION)! 255
AUGMENTED REALITY! 257
GOOGLE HANGOUTS! 259
GENERATION FLUX! 261
PETE CASHMORE! 271
FLIPPED CLASSROOMS! 282
ORKUT Orkut App Finally Arrives for iPhone, iPad! 286
RENREN! 287
PLN! 290
PROGRAMS! 293
GOOGLE+! 294
GOOGLE DOCS PROGRAM #2- GOOGLE DOCS (http://docs.google.com)! 307
Evernote! 310
LIVEBINDERS! 311
NETVIBES! 315
Qwiki! 317
Other Programs We Will Preview:! 319
USING TECHNOLOGY TO HELP YOU GET A JOB! 320
DIGITAL PORTFOLIO Using Technology | Electronic Portfolios in the
K-12 Classroom! 321
FACEBOOK TO GET YOU A JOB INFOGRAPHIC! 324
View full-screen at http://mashable.com/2011/12/11/can-facebook-get-you-a-
job/! 324
5

6. 5 Ways You Should Be Using Pinterest To Attract Employers! 325
HOW TO: Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile for the Job Hunt! 327
9 Ways Students Can Use Social Media to Boost Their Careers! 330
Twitter Literacy (I refuse to make up a Twittery name for it)! 334
EXTRA! 338
ABOUT KEN MORRISON! 340
Assistant Professor of New Media and Global Communcations at:! 340
http://lgc.hnu.kr/ Biography: http://lgc.hnu.kr/sub2/sub2_01_morrison.php! 340
6

7. New Media Technology Syllabus
Linton Global College
Hannam University
Spring 2012
Instructor : Ken Morrison, MS (Instructional Design & Technology)
E-mail : kenmorrison30@yahoo.com (best way to contact me)
Cellphone : 010-8653-6352 (Please send text message if there is no answer)
Schedule : 12:00 AM – 1:15 AM (Wednesday & Friday)
Blogs Due : Every Friday 5 PM
Classroom : 330-103 (Computer Lab)
Office : English Cafe 104
Website : http://lgcnmt.ning.com/
Why Is This Course Important:
We have crossed an important point in world history. Very recently, media and technology
has changed everything. New Media Technology has changed how businesses make
money, how governments lead people, how teachers teach, and how family and friends
communicate and think. It is very important for us to understand this trend in order to be
educated participants in the 21st century. As communication majors, it is crucial to
understand how new media technology is changing your field. If you are a business major,
you will also learn many things that will directly affect your future.
Course Overview
The official Hannam University Website says:
This course will provide students with a good theoretical and practical understanding of
how to harness the power of the new internet applications and media tools in a highly
networked world. Students will look at the social implications of new technologies and also
look at the technologies themselves to understand their level of complexity and how
consumers and organizations can use or implement them appropriately.
What does that mean?
We will study how New Media Technology is changing our world and your future in four
ways:
1) Business 2) Social 3) Education 4) Politics 5) Journalism
I. Course Objectives:
1. Explore new media tools that may help you succeed in your career
2. Explore new media tools that new media can help you succeed at LGC
3. Explore new media trends that are changing society, business and education
4. Gain experience using new media in a safe, private environment.
5. Learn resources to help you make future adjustments when new media tools and
trends change in the future.
6) Learn facts about 20 people who are changing how we use technology today
Textbooks and Course Materials
7

8. I am creating an updated textbook with Apple’s brand new iBooks 2 Author Program. Your
textbook will be available for download in .pdf format. I suggest budgeting about 30,000 W
and printing out the book and additional printouts
Required Technology.
You do not need to own a computer for this course. Yet, you will need access to a
computer with reliable internet access for much of your homework. Plan your schedule so
that you can do homework when you have access to a computer connected to a reliable
internet connection. Please make a schedule to do much of your homework in a computer
lab on campus.
Office Hours
Monday 12:00 - 14:00 (My Office)
Tuesday: 2:45 - 3:45 (My Office)
Wednesday 1:15 - 2:15 (Pink Building Computer Lab)
Thursday: 2:45 - 3:45 (My Office)
Friday: 1:45 - 2:15 (Pink Building Computer Lab)
Evaluation and Grading System
There will be two major examinations. They may contain multiple-choice, true-or-false,
matching, fill in the blank and essay questions. You will have many quizzes over your
homework to prove that you have been doing your readings. This is to reward students
who do their homework. You will have weekly writing assignments due in the form of blogs
that your classmates can see. Your classmates will see your work, so make sure that your
writing is of high quality. Attitude, attendance & participation are all very important keys to
your success. Some of my grading for test questions and projects are quite subjective. I
will provide rubrics so that you can know what I am looking for when I am grading.
Attendance
I need to be as clear as possible here. You must be at class. This is not a class that you
can miss and catch up easily I give attentive points, not attendance points. Simply
coming to class is not enough. If you want to earn points you must
1) Be in class on time
2) Pay Attention
3) Avoid distractions. If you are playing on your cell phone or browsing the internet, I will
not give you credit for coming to class that day.
4) No Sleeping. I do not give attendance credit to students who sleep in class!
I will allow up to three absences (excused or unexcused). Use your absences wisely.
Budget time for being sick, conferences, HNU/LGC events, family emergencies. You must
communicate in advance when you will miss a class. You can not make up any quiz that
you missed during an absence (excused or unexcused). Being late three times equals one
absence.
Classes always start on time. Being late three times is equal to one absence. In other
words, don’t be late. As regards absences, we will strictly observe the university rule that
students absent for more than 25% of class periods will receive an automatic “F.” In the
same way that I prepare for every class, you should do the same by reading the assigned
references and submitting your homework on time. Cheating or any other form of
academic dishonesty will not be tolerated in this course. Any student caught plagiarizing
will automatically receive a failing grade for the course. In order to avoid being accused of
plagiarism, please do not forget to cite your sources. Before turning in your work, please
8

9. edit and proofread it. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any problems
related to the course. You may send me an email, leave a comment in my blog or drop by
my office. I reserve the right to revise this syllabus. Should I decide to do so, I will post an
updated copy on the class website and tell you in class. Be aware of some schedule
challenges. I will make all reasonable efforts to get your questions answered. I need you
to plan ahead so that I can help you in best way possible. I will return all phone calls and
emails and website posts within 24 hours. It will be a rare situation when you actually wait
24 hours during the week, but that may happen. This is similar to many managers’ policies
in the working world. So remember to plan ahead.
Participation (5 Points)
Participation points in my class are my way of rewarding students who give extra effort to
participate in class and/or online in a way that shows that they are willing to actively share
what they are learning in class. These points are not easy to earn. In 15 weeks, you will
have many opportunities to be a leader and share what your opinions and new information
from this course. It is up to you to share that information with the class.
VI. Preparation & Participation
I plan your homework carefully. All homework assignments are directly related to helping
you meet the short-term and long-term objectives of this course. You must do your
homework to succeed in this class. You should be prepared to give specific points that you
found interesting from every reading or online activity. You should also be prepared with at
least one question every class.
Honesty
Do not lie. Do not cheat. We will meet each other 30 times during this semester. Each
time,
you are representing your family, your country, and yourself. I am very good at finding out
who
is being dishonest. You will not be happy with the results if you are caught being dishonest
or
cheating in my class.
During your LGC days you will have the opportunity to meet many foreign professors from
around the world. Each of us have many professional connections both in Korea and in
other
countries. If you work hard and prove to have a good character, we will write letters of
recommendation to help you get a job after graduation. Professors communicate with each
other about who is not being honest in classes. It is not wise to destroy your reputation by
making bad choices. Is that clear?
Attitude
We are going to have a fun class. I love teaching at LGC. I love learning new knowledge,
and I loved learning about organizational behavior during my career and during graduate
school. We are going to learn many things that will help you both at LGC and after
graduation. The world is changing. We can not predict the future. Yet one skill has been
the key to success in any economy in any country. That skill is Communication. I will help
prepare you for a successful career of identifying and using communications skills. I also
9

10. think you will find this class to be exciting if you come to class with a positive attitude and
open mind every time.
Communication
I have many years of experience. I have learned from some great people and have had
some great experiences. I have lots of passion and energy to help good people learn.
However, I am not perfect. If you have suggestions on how to improve the class or any
project, I am willing to talk about possible alternatives. But you must communicate your
concerns or I can not help you.
There will be some times when you have a true excuse for why you can not be at class or
why you are not available to do your best work on homework. Your future managers will
need you to communicate with them. I am very fair to students who plan ahead and
communicate their concerns. I am not very flexible to students who are not willing to.
Unfortunately, sometimes managers view a lack of communication as laziness, disrespect,
or worse. Practice using your communication skills during this course. I am here to help.
There are many ways to contact me: Before/after class, Face-to-face meetings at my
office, our class website, phone calls before 7pm, email, or hand-written notes. If you
choose not to communicate in any of these ways, I will probably assume that you do not
care.
Please do not contact me about class-related questions on Facebook or Yahoo
Messenger. Also, I often have many windows open on my computer. So I may not see a
chat request on our class website. The best way to contact me on our class website is by
sending a message. You can try to chat any time that you see my name as ‘active’. But if
I don’t respond, please know that I am not ignoring you.
Conferences
I encourage students to go to conferences to expand their network and get experience in a
global atmosphere. Choose your conferences wisely. I will allow you to go to two
conferences during this semester. Choose them wisely. These will count toward your
three (3) excused absences. I feel this is fair. During my advertising career, I was allowed
to miss 4 days of work per year for conferences. I will allow you to miss two classes in 15
weeks. This is a fair balance between class responsibilities and possible opportunities for
building your future. I will have specific steps that you must follow to receive an excused
absence.
This is your bus
I accept, appreciate, and encourage creativity. This class can be a bus where you learn,
have fun, meet new students, and prepare for an exciting career after graduation. As long
as you communicate with me, I will allow some freedom in planning your projects. One of
my favorite college professors always said, “Ken, this is your bus. You are the driver. How
can I help you get to where you want to go.” It is crucial that you communicate. As long as
you are applying the new information from class with real situations in the outside world, I
encourage you to adapt these projects to meet your personal, academic and professional
goals. However, you must communicate these desires with me in advance.
10

11. Please keep in mind that the university follows this grading chart:
Hannam University (like other Korean Universities) has a curved grading policy
I can give up to 30% of you a A- or higher
I can give up to 40% of you a B-, B, or B+
I must give at least 30% of you a C+ or lower
Quizzes from Homework Reading (10%)
I give quizzes to reward the students who do their homework and come to class on time.
You do not have to be the expert of your reading homework assignment, but you will need
to be able to clearly and quickly communicate (via writing) that you have done your
11

12. homework. Quizzes are given during the first 10 minutes of class. If you are late for class,
you can not take the quiz. I do not give make-up quizzes for any reason. This is another
reason why you must come to class. I am pretty generous in grading your quizzes. If it is
clear to me that you did your homework and tried to understand it, you will not get below a
75% on a quiz.
Weekly Blogs (15%)
You will need to write 20 sentences each week to share with me what you have learned
during the week. Deadlines will be very important in your future career. You may also be
required to give reports of your projects. Your required weekly blogs are a good way for
you begin documenting what you do during the week. These blogs will be seen by your
classmates, so do your best. These blogs will be very helpful for you and others in
preparing for your midterm test, final test, and final projects. The deadline is every Friday
at 5pm. However, you do not have to wait until after Friday’s class to write your blog. You
will probably have enough to write about after the first class, and your homework to write a
blog. You can also write about your progress of your long-term projects, or how our class
material relates to other things you are learning in other classes or observing in the world
news.
Attentive Points (formerly known as “Attendance Points” (15%)
As stated above, you are not guaranteed attendance points by just showing up. I give
Attentive Points, not attendance points.
Participation (5%)
These are basically extra credit points for the students who spend the whole semester
finding ways to lead and participate. The best way to earn points is by participating in
class and online in our class website. Our class website has a unique way of measuring
who is participating the most. Again, these are only for the leaders in the class. It is a
competition to earn these points.
Personal Projects (35%)
I believe in giving students control to earn their grades. I also know that spending four or
more years in college is a waste of time if you can not show what you have learned. That
is why 35% of your final grade will be determined by personal projects.
Midterm Test (10%)
My tests are not easy, but they are fair. My tests are mostly short answer and essays.
They take one hour. Most students use all 60 minutes.
Midterm Test (10%)
My tests are not easy, but they are fair. My tests are mostly short answer and essays.
They take one hour. Most students use all 60 minutes.
Cell Phones:
There is a new policy this semester at LGC’s Global Communications and Culture
department that says that students can not use cell phones at any time during class.
Class Conduct
The goal of this course is to provide a stimulating environment for learning. Course
material includes both theory and application, with an emphasis on application to real
world problems and situations. Written and oral reports are required because these skills
12

13. are needed in the work environment in general, and in digital communication,
management, and consulting in particular. Students are required to comment and
collaborate as these are practical skills.
Classes always start on time. Being late three times is equal to one absence. In other
words, don’t be late. We will strictly observe the university rule that students absent for
more than 25% of class periods will receive an automatic “F.” In the same way that I
prepare for every class, you should do the same by reading the assigned references and
submitting your homework on time. Cheating or any other form of academic dishonesty will
not be tolerated in this course. Any student caught plagiarizing will automatically receive a
failing grade for the course. In order to avoid being accused of plagiarism, please do not
forget to cite your sources. Before turning in your work, please edit and proofread it.
Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any problems related to the course. You
may send me an email, leave a comment in my blog or drop by my office. I reserve the
right to revise this syllabus. Should I decide to do so, I will post an updated copy on the
class website and tell you in class.
Be aware of some schedule challenges. I will make all reasonable efforts to get your
questions answered. I need you to plan ahead so that I can help you in best way possible.
I will return all phone calls and emails and website posts within 24 hours. It will be a rare
situation when you actually wait 24 hours during the week, but that may happen. This is
similar to many managers’ policies in the working world. So remember to plan ahead.
Grade Negotiation
After you receive your final grade, HNU allows one week for changing grades. This is
only to change mathematical errors. It is not for students to ask professors to change for
any reason other than mathematical errors. You will have many opportunities during the
semester to earn a high grade.
Keeping Your Scholarship
Did you earn a scholarship from HNU/LGC? GREAT! That means that HNU and LGC
have invested in you. They think that you are the type of young person who will spend
four years taking classes seriously. They think you will be a leader in your classroom and
on campus. They think that you will be the type of young person who will get a good job
and represent HNU/LGC in a positive way by doing more than what is expected by your
professors or your boss. A scholarship is like the stock market. It is an investment, but
not a guarantee. If a company stops performing well, people stop investing. If a student
stops performing well, the university may take away a scholarship. If you need to have a
specific grade in this class to keep your scholarship, it is up to you to earn it....two times
every week. It is your choice. I believe that you can do great things. I am here to help
you learn. If you communicate clearly, I will do everything I can to help you continue to
earn your scholarship.
Citation:
This site helps you with citations: http://citationmachine.net/index2.php
This site helps you understand the rules for using citations: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/
owl/
A FEW WISE QUOTES FROM WISE PEOPLE:
“Begin Classes on time. End classes on time. Homework for every student every class.
Professors and students attend every class. Christian atmosphere.”
-- 1960 June, President W.A. Linton
Practice does not make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect.
13

14. --Vince Lombardi
I do not expect you to be perfect. I do expect progress from you every day.
--Jim Morrison (my Father)
The only people who become truly great are those that do what they love to do
--Malcolm Gladwell
The difference between the almost right word and the right word is equal to the difference
between a lightning bug and lightning
--Samuel Langhorne Clemens
Ask yourself the easy questions and you'll have a hard life, ask yourself the hard questions
and you'll have an easier life!
— Peter Thomson: U.K. strategist on business and personal growth
Seriously Ken, Why be average?
--Nancy Touil (8th grade teacher)
Dear God, Your will, nothing more, nothing less, nothing else. Amen.
--Bobby Richardson
Date last updated: March 1, 2012
I encourage you to join the official LGC Facebook Page by clicking the like button at:
<--LGC Facebook Page
<--Professor Morrison’s Scoop.it Page
Please see class website for future revisions. All revisions will be announce in class.
14

15. New Media Technology Course will help you through:
-Learning Key People Who Are Changing our World
-Learning Key Terms That Tech Leaders are Passionate About
-Learning programs that can help you at LGC, at home, and in your career.
Through readings, videos, lecutres, and personal projects, you will become much more aware at
how New Media Technology plays an important role in Education (Scool & self-learning), Business
(buying/selling, marketing), and Society (behavior, social, politics, parenting, lifestyle, and even
how our brains are wired)
This video should get you excited about this course:
http://documentaryheaven.com/networked-society-on-the-brink/
Print out Blank Graphic Organizers here:
http://www.scoop.it/t/new-media-technology/p/166585387/
printable-graphic-organizers-for-teachers-grades-k-12
15

16. The Great Tech War Of 2012
retrieved from http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/160/tech-wars-2012-amazon-apple-google-facebook on
March 6, 2012
Apple, Facebook, Google, and Amazon battle for the future of the innovation economy.
BY Farhad Manjoo | 10-17-2011
From left: The late Apple cofounder Steve Jobs, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Larry Page,
and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. | Photos courtesy of David Paul Morris/Getty Images (Jobs); Justin Sullivan/
Getty Images (Zuckerberg); Chip East/Reuters (Page); Mario Tama/Getty Images (Bezos).
Gilbert Wong, the mayor of Cupertino, California, calls his city council to order. "As you know,
Cupertino is very famous for Apple Computer, and we're very honored to have Mr. Steve Jobs come
here tonight to give a special presentation," the mayor says. "Mr. Jobs?" And there he is, in his
black turtleneck and jeans, shuffling to the podium to the kind of uproarious applause absent from
most city council meetings. It is a shock to see him here on ground level, a thin man amid other
citizens, rather than on stage at San Francisco's Moscone Center with a larger-than-life projection
screen behind him. He seems out of place, like a lion ambling through the mall.
Fast Company is tracking developments in The Great Tech War of 2012 for 30 days
after this story's original publication to show just how quickly competition between
Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon is heating up. Follow the updates here.
"Apple is growing like a weed," Jobs begins, his voice quiet and sometimes shaky. But there's
nothing timorous about his plan: Apple, he says, would like to build a gargantuan new campus on a
150-acre parcel of land that it acquired from Hewlett-Packard in 2010. The company has
commissioned architects--"some of the best in the world"--to design something extraordinary, a
single building that will house 12,000 Apple employees. "It's a pretty amazing building," Jobs says,
as he unveils images of the futuristic edifice on the screen. The stunning glass-and-concrete circle
looks "a little like a spaceship landed," he opines.
Nobody knew it at the time, but the Cupertino City Council meeting on June 7, 2011, was Jobs's last
public appearance before his resignation as Apple's CEO in late August (and his passing in early
October). It's a fitting way to go out. When completed in 2015, Apple's new campus will have a
footprint slightly smaller than that of the Pentagon; its diameter will exceed the height of the
16

17. Empire State Building. It will include its own natural-gas power plant and will use the grid only for
backup power. This isn't just a new corporate campus but a statement: Apple--which now jockeys
daily with ExxonMobil for the title of the world's most valuable company--plans to become a
galactic force for the eons.
And as every sci-fi nerd knows, you totally need a tricked-out battleship if you're about to engage in
serious battle.
"Our development is guided by the idea that every year,
the amount that people want to add, share, and express
is increasing," says Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
"We can look into the future--and it's going to be really,
really good."
To state this as clearly as possible: The four American companies that have come to define 21st-
century information technology and entertainment are on the verge of war. Over the next two years,
Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google will increasingly collide in the markets for mobile phones
and tablets, mobile apps, social networking, and more. This competition will be intense. Each of the
four has shown competitive excellence, strategic genius, and superb execution that have left the rest
of the world in the dust. HP, for example, tried to take a run at Apple head-on, with its TouchPad,
the product of its $1.2 billion acquisition of Palm. HP bailed out after an embarrassingly short 49-
day run, and it cost CEO Léo Apotheker his job. Microsoft's every move must be viewed as a
reaction to the initiatives of these smarter, nimbler, and now, in the case of Apple, richer companies.
When a company like Hulu goes on the block, these four companies are immediately seen as
possible acquirers, and why not? They have the best weapons--weapons that will now be turned on
one another as they seek more room to grow.
There was a time, not long ago, when you could sum up each company quite neatly: Apple made
consumer electronics, Google ran a search engine, Amazon was a web store, and Facebook was a
social network. How quaint that assessment seems today.
Jeff Bezos, who was ahead of the curve in creating a cloud data service, is pushing Amazon into
digital media, book publishing, and, with his highly buzzed-about new line of Kindle tablets,
including the $199 Fire, a direct assault on the iPad. Amazon almost doubled in size from 2008 to
2010, when it hit $34 billion in annual revenue; analysts expect it to reach $100 billion in annual
revenue by 2015, faster than any company ever.
Remember when Google's goal was to catalog all the world's information? Guess that task was too
tiny. In just a few months at the helm, CEO Larry Page has launched a social network (Google+) to
challenge Facebook, and acquired Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion, in part to compete more
ferociously against Apple. Google's YouTube video service is courting producers to make original
programming. Page can afford these big swings (and others) in the years ahead, given the way his
advertising business just keeps growing. It's on pace to bring in more than $30 billion this year,
almost double 2007's revenue.
Why Apple Will Win
The iPhone, iPad, and iEverything else will keep it merrily rolling along.
Continue >>
17

18. Facebook, meanwhile, is now more than just the world's biggest social network; it is the world's
most expansive enabler of human communication. It has changed the ways in which we interact
(witness its new Timeline interface); it has redefined the way we share--personal info, pictures
(more than 250 million a day), and now news, music, TV, and movies. With access to the "Likes" of
more than 800 million people, CEO Mark Zuckerberg has an unequaled trove of data on individual
consumer behavior that he can use to personalize both media and advertising.
Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google don't recognize any borders; they feel no qualms about
marching beyond the walls of tech into retailing, advertising, publishing, movies, TV,
communications, and even finance. Across the economy, these four companies are increasingly
setting the agenda. Bezos, Jobs, Zuckerberg, and Page look at the business world and justifiably
imagine all of it funneling through their servers. Why not go for everything? And in their
competition, each combatant is getting stronger, separating the quartet further from the rest of the
pack.
Everyone reading this article is a customer of Amazon, Apple, Facebook, or Google, and most
probably count on all four. This passion for the Fab Four of business is reflected in the
blogosphere's panting coverage of their every move. ExxonMobil may sometimes be the world's
most valuable company, but can you name its CEO? Do you scour the Internet for rumors about its
next product? As the four companies encroach further and further into one another's space,
consumers look forward to cooler and cooler products. The coming years will be fascinating to
watch because this is a competition that might reinvent our daily lives even more than the four have
changed our habits in the past decade. And that, dear reader, is why you need a program guide to the
battle ahead.
1) The Road Map
Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google do not talk about their plans. Coca-Cola would tweet its
secret formula before any of them would even hint at what's next. "That is a part of the magic of
Apple," says new CEO Tim Cook.
That secrecy only fuels the zeal of those bent on sussing out their next moves. And it is certainly
possible to decode the Fab Four's big-picture strategic ambitions: Over the next few years, each will
infiltrate, digitize, and revolutionize every corner of your life, taking a slice out of each transaction
that results. This is a vision shared by all four, and it hinges on three interrelated ideas.
First, each company has embraced what Jobs has branded the "post-PC world"--a vision of daily
life that is enabled by, and comes to depend on, smartphones, tablets, and other small, mobile, easy-
to-use computers. Each of these companies has already benefited more than others from this
proliferation of mobile, a shift that underlies their extraordinary gains in revenue, cash reserves, and
market cap.
The second idea is a function of the fact that these post-PC devices encourage and facilitate
consumption, in just about every form. So each of these giants will deepen their efforts to serve up
media--books, music, movies, TV shows, games, and anything else that might brighten your lonely
hours (they're also socializing everything, so you can enjoy it with friends or meet new ones). But
it's not just digital media; they will also make the consumption of everything easier. The new $79
Kindle, for example, isn't just a better reading device; it integrates Amazon's local-offers product.
The Fire will be accompanied by a tablet-friendly redesign of Amazon.com that will make it easier
for you to buy the physical goods that the company sells, from pet food to lawn mowers. Wherever
and whenever you are online, they want to be there to assist you in your transaction.
18

19. All of our activity on these devices produces a wealth of data, which leads to the third big idea
underpinning their vision. Data is like mother's milk for Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google.
Data not only fuels new and better advertising systems (which Google and Facebook depend on)
but better insights into what you'd like to buy next (which Amazon and Apple want to know). Data
also powers new inventions: Google's voice-recognition system, its traffic maps, and its spell-
checker are all based on large-scale, anonymous customer tracking. These three ideas feed one
another in a continuous (and often virtuous) loop. Post-PC devices are intimately connected to
individual users. Think of this: You have a family desktop computer, but you probably don't have a
family Kindle. E-books are tied to a single Amazon account and can be read by one person at a
time. The same for phones and apps. For the Fab Four, this is a beautiful thing because it means that
everything done on your phone, tablet, or e-reader can be associated with you. Your likes, dislikes,
and preferences feed new products and creative ways to market them to you. Collectively, the Fab
Four have all registered credit-card info on a vast cross-section of Americans. They collect
payments (Apple through iTunes, Google with Checkout, Amazon with Amazon Payments,
Facebook with in-house credits). Both Google and Amazon recently launched Groupon-like daily-
deals services, and Facebook is pursuing deals through its check-in service (after publicly retreating
from its own offers product).
It would be a mistake to see their ambitions as simply a grab for territory (and money). These four
companies firmly believe that they possess the ability to enhance rather than merely replace our
current products and services. They want to apply server power and software code to make every
transaction more efficient for you and more profitable for them.
2. The Inevitable War
Hardware. Media. Data. With each company sharing a vision dependent on these three big ideas,
conflict over pretty much every strategic move seems guaranteed. Amazon, for example, needs a
better media tablet to drive more customers to its Kindle, MP3, and app stores. But how to avoid an
HP-like disaster? The Kindle Fire has just a 7-inch screen, rolls up all of Amazon's streaming
services, and retails for a mere $199, thus slotting into a price and feature niche just between an
iPhone and an iPad. Who knew there even was a niche there? Apple doesn't believe that niche exists
(see the next section), but you can bet it will if the Kindle Fire succeeds.
Why Facebook Will Win
Everything is social--and Zuckerberg hasn't even gone public yet.
Continue >>
When Google introduced its new social network Google+, it was seen, rightly, as a challenge to
Zuckerberg's Facebook. But at its core, Google+, along with +1, Google's version of the like button,
should be understood as a product that will generate more data about what users like. Those data
improve search algorithms and other existing services, and can even lead to new products. So
Google's search for self-improvement is what has brought it into direct competition with Facebook.
Why did Zuckerberg flirt with a "Facebook phone" earlier this year? (HTC released a handset called
the Status that included a built-in button that let users post to the social network with one click.)
While Facebook is the most-downloaded app on the iPhone and acts as a central contacts repository
for millions of Android, Windows, and BlackBerry devices, its rivals all have competing social
networks that could siphon away users. Most strikingly, Apple has integrated Twitter throughout
iOS 5, letting you tweet from any app, a feature clearly aimed at dulling Facebook's mobile growth.
Page now has Google+. Amazon's Kindle has a social network that connects readers of the same
19

20. book. Zuckerberg needs to maintain a direct line to the pockets of Facebook members, and that's
why you can discount his repeated dismissal of rumors that he'll enter the hardware business.
The torrent of news and rumor surrounding these companies and their initiatives is already
overwhelming, and it's only going to grow stronger. But viewing their moves through the lens of
hardware, media, and data is the first step toward understanding their strategies.
3) The Profit Game
Late in 2010, Jobs made a surprise visit to Apple's quarterly earnings call. The purported
reason was to celebrate Apple's first $20 billion quarter, but Jobs clearly had something else on his
mind: Android. At the time, Google's free mobile operating system was beginning to eclipse the
iPhone's market share, and Jobs was miffed. He launched into a prepared rant about Android's
shortcomings. "This is going to be a mess for both users and developers," he said, citing the
inevitable complications that arise from the fact that Android phones look and work differently
from one another. As for the crop of 7-inch Android tablets being developed to take on the iPad?
"DOA--dead on arrival," Jobs asserted. (Jeff Bezos, for one, has ignored Jobs's perspective.)
What Jobs didn't say in his outburst, though, was how little Android's market share matters to
Apple. According to Nielsen, Android now powers about 40% of smartphones; 28% run Apple's
iOS. But here's the twist: Android could command even 70% of the smartphone business without
having a meaningful impact on Apple's finances. Why? Because Apple makes a profit on iOS
devices, while Google and many Android handset makers do not. This is part of a major strategic
difference between Apple and the other members of the Fab Four. Apple doesn't need a dominant
market share to win. Everyone else does. The more people who use Google search or Facebook, the
more revenue those companies can generate from ads. Amazon, too, depends on scale; retail is a
low-margin business dependent on volume.
Apple, on the other hand, makes a significant profit on every device it sells. Some analysts estimate
that it books $368 on each iPhone. You may pay $199 for the phone, but that's after a subsidy that
the wireless carriers pay Apple. Google, in contrast, makes less than $10 annually per device for the
ads it places on Android phones and tablets. That's because it gives away the OS to phone makers as
part of its quest for market share. Google's revenue per phone won't go up after the Motorola
purchase closes--Motorola Mobility's consumer-device division has lost money the past few
quarters. So despite Google's market-share lead, Apple is making all the money. By some estimates,
it's now sucking up half of all the profits in smartphones.
Making a lot of profit on every device has always been Apple's MO, but in recent years it has added
something extra to this plan. In the past, Apple's profit margins were a function of higher prices--the
company sold computers at luxury price points and booked luxury profits. But in smartphones and
tablets, Apple has managed to match mass-market prices and still make luxury profits. This neat
trick is the work of new CEO Cook, who, during his years as COO, mastered the global production
cycle. He did so by aggressively using cash to bolster the power of Apple's considerable scale;
several times over the past few years, he's dipped into the company's reserves to secure long-term
contracts for important components like flash memory and touch screens. Buying up much of the
world's supply of these commodities has one convenient added benefit: It makes them more
expensive for everyone else.
One of Cook's great challenges will be to maintain this edge. While Amazon will continue to pursue
audience at the expense of profit margins, Google (and eventually Facebook) will try to make like
Apple and increase profits. When Google's only goal was to proliferate Android software, it could
live with that sawbuck per phone, per year. But with Motorola, Google now has a direct stake in the
20

21. profitability of Android devices. Developing, marketing, and distributing attractive phones and
tablets requires a much more substantial investment than selling software. Google has pledged to
run Motorola as a separate entity, but its shareholders won't stomach a series of money-losing
quarters that could depress Google's earnings or stock. In short, now that Page is in the hardware
business, he's going to have to start thinking about phones the way Cook does.
The Dangerous Decoys
For a onetime agricultural hub that's been turned into suburbia, Silicon Valley is home to an
awful lot of talk about moats these days. Warren Buffett deserves credit for the metaphor, which
describes the companies he's most interested in pursuing--ones with huge revenues (a castle of
money) whose businesses are protected by unbeatable competitive advantages (or very wide moats).
The Fab Four all have moats to rival those at Angkor Wat.
As a result of these wide moats, these companies generate so much money that they can spend
freely on new ventures; and in some cases, they're willing to do so even if the business won't ever
bring the kinds of gains they're used to. Look at Apple's efforts in e-books: Does the company really
want to overthrow Amazon or is it simply trying to offer one more reason to buy iPhones and iPads
and, thus, guard its cash cow? When Google invests billions to build smartphones and a new social
network, is it really trying to topple Apple and Facebook--or is it simply building a wider moat to
protect its core interest, search revenue? "We don't do things that we don't think will generate really
big returns over time," says Larry Page. But if a possibly unprofitable social network beefs up
search revenue? That's just fine.
These ventures are decoy threats that tax a rival's resources. Google+ will be hard-pressed to ever
match Facebook's global reach, but it will certainly keep Zuckerberg and his engineers on their toes.
Indeed, it already has. Facebook has clearly copied the most-lauded Google+ features, such as fine-
grained privacy controls and smart groupings, and pushed new ideas such as Timeline and auto-
sharing. Zuckerberg has to do this--he simply must eliminate any incentive for leaving Facebook.
And Page knows that the more time Zuckerberg worries about Google+, the less time and fewer
resources Facebook has to build a search engine that will threaten Google. Such is life in Silicon
Valley, especially when companies have money to burn. Every offensive move is also a defensive
move--and every move has potential. You never know what's going to hit big in tech. So if you can,
why wouldn't you try everything?
The Living Room
In the spring of 2010, Rishi Chandra, a Google product manager, took to the stage at the
company's developer conference to announce Google's next victim: the TV business. Chandra
described television as the most important mass medium that hadn't yet been breached by the digital
world. Four billion people watch TV; in the U.S. alone, the medium generates $70 billion a year in
advertising revenue. Google, Chandra promised, was going to "change the future of television." He
turned on a prototype of Google's new device, a set-top box called Google TV that would bring the
web to the tube--and that's when things got awkward. His Bluetooth remote didn't work. Chandra
and his team called for the guys backstage, who blamed the problem on all the phone signals
floating about the room. Several minutes passed while engineers fiddled furiously with the device,
the scene playing out like the worst Curb Your Enthusiasm episode ever. Engineers fixed the
problem, but like a racehorse stumbling out of the starting gate, Google TV never recovered.
Released a few months later, the product was panned and sold quite poorly.
21

22. Why Google Will Win
Its CEO is daring, decisive--and willing to wait for his big bets to pay off.
Continue >>
Each of the Fab Four believes that it can somehow define the future of television, when that flat
panel in your living room (and every other device you own) is connected to the web, pulling in the
video you want at the moment you want it. With the universe of choice now available, the moribund
channel grid will need to be revolutionized with a fresh interface for finding programs. Social
signals--such as indications of what shows your friends are watching and hints as to what shows
you might like given those friendships--will be part of the mix, as will live conversations with
friends watching the same show. And the advertising will be more targeted and relevant. Each of the
Fab Four wants a piece of this. The honey pot? Not only that $70 billion in domestic ad revenue but
also $74 billion in cable-subscriber fees.
That's the idea anyway. So far the Fab Four is the Failed Four when it comes to TV. There are many
reasons for this, starting with the fact that they are trying to unseat entrenched players who are
fiercely protective of the business model they've relied on for decades. Network execs, for example,
had no intention of handing Google the right to give Google TV customers access to the full-length
shows that are currently available for streaming only on their own network websites. Not without a
lot more money, anyway, given that their online ad revenue is a fraction of their TV take. Google
approached its negotiations with the networks with arrogance, and the networks responded by
blocking access.
Then there's the fact that none of the Fab Four want to think of itself as being in the TV business--
rather, each sees television as a means to an end. For instance, Amazon offers free streaming movies
and TV as an incentive to join Prime, a service that offers a year's worth of free two-day shipping
(on most purchases) for $79. Bezos has recently made deals to bolster his video library. He paid
CBS a reported $100 million to offer old Star Trek and Cheers episodes, among other things, for 18
months. And he made a similar partnership with Fox. "We're just getting started," Bezos said at the
Kindle rollout event in late September. But on balance, Prime is not a way to give the people lots of
great TV; TV is a way to get people to Prime.
And creating next-generation television hardware has proved difficult. Apple TV, a box that first and
foremost connects your iTunes video library to your TV, has been remade several times since its
2007 debut and is still a product for early adopters. Even Jobs and Cook have dismissed it as "a
hobby" for the company.
Still, the massive, old, and profitable business of television does seem ripe for disruption, perhaps
through the invention of some magical device. Cook had barely erased "interim" from his CEO title
before analyst and media speculation began that his first bravura move as CEO would be an honest-
to-goodness Apple-branded television set, perhaps as early as Christmas 2012 (cue fanboy
swooning). The dreamers note that Apple could create an Internet TV that would merge web
services and standard broadcasts; it does, of course, already make the world's best remote controls
in the iPhone and iPad.
But don't hold your breath for iTV. Of all four companies, Apple is the one that provokes the most
rumors. That's been the case for years; iPhone whispers started around 1999, but the product didn't
go on sale until 2007. And selling TV sets is almost a commodity venture, so Cook will either have
to master a new supply chain or deliver so much magic that customers will pay a significant
premium.
22

23. While Apple is the focus of all the next-gen TV rumors, the most interesting player in this space
might be the most overlooked: Facebook. CEO Zuckerberg has made deals with several studios to
release streaming movies and TV pilots on the site. But Facebook's real strength is in facilitating the
conversation surrounding TV. Every show and star has a fan page, and Facebook knows exactly
what each of its 800 million users like and don't like. Millions of people watch TV with a computer,
tablet, or smartphone beside them, so they can chat with friends around the globe about the show
they're watching. At Facebook's f8 developers conference in late September, it integrated Hulu and
Netflix (the latter in 44 countries, though not in the U.S.) and made it seamless to share what you're
watching. Sure, this will allow Facebook to create an even more engaging experience for its users,
but this also taps a new gold mine of data that's invaluable to advertisers and the entertainment
studios. Why not make it easy for Facebook users to click like during their favorite moments of a
show, and monitor that activity? Nielsen, whose 61-year-old TV ratings are the linchpin of its $5
billion global research business, is built on extrapolating information from small samples, so what if
advertisers and studios could pay to get actual data on actual individuals? With one trivial
technological shift, Facebook could remake the TV business without even touching the remote.
The Next Steve Jobs
In 2005, Google bought Android, a tiny company led by Andy Rubin, who at his previous startup
created a proto-smartphone that was marketed as the T-Mobile Sidekick. At that point, the Android
team had spent two years working on what it thought would be the next killer mobile platform; it
spent two more years building out its vision at Google. In 2007, a few images of Android hardware
and software leaked online. They landed with a thud. Android's revolutionary phone smacked of a
BlackBerry knock-off--hard buttons on the bottom, a small screen on top, ugly all over. There were
no touch gestures; to point to something, you used a hardware direction button. There was nothing
novel about the on-screen user interface--to choose something, you navigated through nested
menus, a concept that harked back to Windows 95. Android circa 2007 is the nightmare vision of
tech: It's what smartphones would look like if it weren't for Steve Jobs.
"A big piece of the story we tell ourselves about who we
are is that we are willing to invent," says Amazon CEO
Jeff Bezos. "And, very importantly, we are willing to be
misunderstood for long periods of time."
Today's Android--the touch gesture, app-enabled operating system that's helped make smartphones
the majority of all new phones sold in the United States--is testament to Google's engineering
prowess and marketing acumen. But it is also, obviously, a direct descendant of the iPhone. After
Rubin and his team saw what Jobs had cooked up, they remade Android in Apple's image. And they
weren't alone: Almost every smartphone that's come along since borrows major and minor features
from Apple. (Ironically, the most original mobile platform is the one developed by Microsoft, of all
companies--Windows Phone.) Apple's brilliant reinvention of the cell phone, and its equally
brilliant invention of the modern tablet, are the reasons Amazon built an app store, the reasons
Facebook is rumored to be flirting with making a smartphone, the only reason that any company is
competing in those particular hardware businesses. This is what has been amazing about Steve Jobs:
Nurturing the next great thing in tech wasn't simply the most important thing for Apple. It has been
the most important thing for the entire tech industry.
And that is why the industry's next Steve Jobs is . . . Steve Jobs. Thanks to its founder, Apple has a
long-term product road map in place--keep making better iOS products, keep bringing innovations
it discovered in the mobile world to the Mac--and you can bet that Cook and his rivals will follow
23

24. Jobs's path for the foreseeable future. We know Cook is an operational genius. Anyone who claims
to know if he is a visionary is lying.
Over the next two years, Bezos, Page, and Zuckerberg will gingerly start to vie for Jobs's innovator-
in-chief mantle. (One way to consider this battle among the Fab Four is as a fight for this honor.) Of
them, Bezos has the best record with new products. Amazon Web Services and the Kindle were true
innovations that changed and inspired the rest of the industry. (According to some reports, even
Apple relies in part on Amazon's cloud infrastructure for its iCloud service.) Bezos also seems the
most temperamentally attuned to the creation of Next Big Things. "A big piece of the story we tell
ourselves about who we are is that we are willing to invent," he told investors at Amazon's annual
meeting this summer. "We are willing to think long-term. We start with the customer and work
backward. And, very importantly, we are willing to be misunderstood for long periods of time."
Page, too, has the "think different" gene, and his CEO stint has been characterized by swift, decisive
action to reinvigorate the company. He has impressively bet on Android, YouTube, and Chrome,
and "we have some new businesses--Google+, Commerce, and Local--that we are really excited
about and are pretty early stage," Page told analysts over the summer. There is another way of
looking at this, though--as an example of Page's reactive streak. In the past, when Google offered a
new take on an old thing--see Gmail or Google Maps--the search company's version was so
radically novel that it instantly rendered the incumbents obsolete. That's not true of Google+, for
example. Google's social network has earned praise for an elegant interface and some innovative
features, but it clearly mimics Facebook and Twitter, rather than offering something wholly new.
Page has tied every Googler's bonus, even those not working on social, to Google's ability to beat
Facebook. So while the Google CEO can be seen as making big, bold moves, he might also appear
to be spending an awful lot of time fretting about beating something old.
As for Zuckerberg . . .
The Age Of Zuck
In some ways, it's unfair to compare Facebook to Amazon, Apple, and Google. While
Facebook's growth is impressive, its actual numbers barely register next to the other three:
Facebook is reported to have made $1.6 billion during the first half of 2011 (about double what it
made in the first half of 2010), but Apple makes that much in nine days. Facebook's only direct
competition with these companies is Google in the global $24 billion online display-advertising
business, an arena that Google believes will be a $200-billion-a-year market in the next few years.
As a private company, Facebook can shield itself from scrutiny (an advantage that Bezos, Cook,
and Page would dearly love), but being private has also hampered Facebook. It lacks the capital the
others have to make major strategic acquisitions, or to finance the production of factories that would
make a Facebook device.
Why Amazon Will Win
Its retail engine keeps humming, and its ambitions feed the beast.
Continue >>
Zuckerberg's ambitions will only be fully realized after Facebook goes public. Its path will then
likely mirror Google's post-IPO trajectory--it will evolve from a company with one product into a
many-tentacled beast that uses its newfound capital to disrupt all of its rivals. Zuckerberg isn't given
to Jobsian rants, but when he discusses how the web will shift over the next few years, he can sound
like a hoodie-burning revolutionary. "Just like Intel with Moore's law, our development is guided by
the idea that every year, the amount that people want to add, share, and express is increasing," he
24

25. proclaimed at f8 in late September. "We can look into the future and we can see what might exist--
and it's going to be really, really good." Zuckerberg is even maturing into a capable presenter.
Compared to Bezos, Cook, and Page, he's most adept at mimicking Jobs's singular skills, and comes
off as infectiously visionary when unveiling a new product.
From search to ads to phones to tablets to TV to games, Facebook aims to be in everything. In some
cases, as with music or gaming, it will partner with others to serve its massive audience. But over
time, look for Zuckerberg to build his own products. Search is the most provocative example.
Facebook's partnership with Bing already shows off links that your friends liked; Facebook Search
could go even deeper, sorting the web according to your social interactions. It would use everything
it knows about you to decipher your queries in a way that Google can't muster. Type in "jobs" and
FB Search would know you're looking for news on the Apple founder and not employment. (It
knows you have a job; it even knows how often you goof off there.)
Zuckerberg's app strategy is also ambitious and intriguing. At f8, he debuted a new class of
Facebook media apps that let Facebook users read, watch, and listen to content without ever leaving
the site--and share it seamlessly. He's lured impressive media partners such as The Wall Street
Journal, Spotify, and Netflix. If Zuckerberg can bring those apps to the social network's mobile
product, he'll have a winner on his hands: an app ecosystem that works on every phone and tablet,
rather than on just one company's devices, and one that captures the next generation of mobile
developers (not to mention all those Facebook credits). Watch out, Apple: Zuck is coming for you.
The Phone Barrier
One industry stands directly between the Fab Four and global domination. It's an industry that
frustrates you every day, one that consistently ranks at the bottom of consumer satisfaction surveys,
that poster child for stifling innovation and creativity: your phone carrier. And your cable or DSL
firm. For Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google, the world's wireless and broadband companies are
a blessing and a curse. By investing in the infrastructure that powers the Internet, they've made the
four firms' services possible. But the telcos and cable companies are also gatekeepers to customers,
and Amazon, Apple, Google, and Facebook would love to cut them out of the equation. In the long
run, they actually stand a shot at doing so.
While Google has historically had a difficult relationship with the telcos, that will have to change as
the company keeps pushing Android into the market. That leaves Apple as the thorn in the carriers'
side. Before the iPhone, carriers routinely prevented smartphone users from installing their own
apps, and they regularly disabled hardware features that competed with their revenue streams.
(Verizon once crippled BlackBerry's GPS system because the carrier sold its own subscription
location plan.) The iPhone forever changed this culture: It conditioned phone users to expect to
download any apps they choose (actually, any app approved of by Apple). Carriers can no longer
tell you that you can't run, say, Skype, or an app that gives you free text messages. Buy a
smartphone, and you've earned that right. Apple's move to expand its carrier lineup in the U.S. is the
next great front in the battle with communications companies. Now that you can get the iPhone on
AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint, carriers will be forced to compete with one another on network speed,
price, and customer service. This will be a first: Back in 2009, when Apple unveiled "iPhone
tethering"--the ability to use your phone's network connection to surf the web on your computer--
AT&T took a year to implement the service, while other carriers around the world launched it
instantly. But if AT&T dithers now, you can go somewhere else.
25

26. The best tech companies stay at their peak for a decade
at most. Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google have
the potential to be exceptions.
That's small potatoes compared to some potential breakthroughs. All but Amazon have a
videophone service: Apple's FaceTime, Google+ Hangouts, and Facebook's Skype integration.
Apple's iMessage and Facebook's Messenger, which offer text, photo, video, and group messaging,
intend to get people to route all of their communications through the Internet rather than the
carriers. If either takes off--and, given that iMessage will be built into the next iPhone and
Messenger will be available to every Facebook user on iPhone and Android, they both seem sure to
be hits--they'll stand a good chance at replacing SMS, which is highly lucrative for carriers, as the
standard for mobile conversations.
In a larger sense, all these companies have devalued the idea of talking on the phone; paying for
minutes is passé when you can text, IM, and video chat instead. Now we all just pay for data,
delivered via high-speed networks that might be built around and between what the carriers offer.
(Of course, the Fab Four seems to assume retailers and municipalities will build those networks to
enable their vision--anyone but them.) Verizon is a $100 billion company built on dumb pipes, and
dumb pipes may not make for a smart business model for the long run.
The Bank Heist
The other outfit standing between you and the Fab Four is one that barely registers: your credit-
card company. When you buy something through iTunes, the Android Market, Amazon, or
Facebook, the credit-card company gets a small cut of your payment. To these giants, the cut
represents a terrible inefficiency--why surrender all that cash to an interloper? And not just any
interloper, but an inefficient, unfriendly one that rarely innovates for its consumers. These credit-
card giants seem ripe for the picking.
While this attack is less mapped out than the one on your phone and cable company, here's how the
scenario would play out. The first step is getting consumers used to the idea of paying by phone.
The second step is to encourage consumers to link their bank accounts directly to their devices, thus
eliminating the credit-card middleman. For example, Google just launched Wallet, a service that
allows you to pay for purchases by waving your phone at a merchant paypad. Google is not billing
the system as a credit-card killer; in fact, it's partnering with MasterCard and Citi on Wallet. But if
customers embrace Wallet to make payments, Google could add services that make it the central
repository of all our coupons and other special deals, taking a bite out of the likes of Groupon and
LivingSocial (in which Amazon is a major investor). The move is so ambitious that it's already
rattled the leader in online payments: PayPal sued Google just hours after the Wallet announcement,
back in May, claiming that Google stole its intellectual property when it poached Osama Bedier, a
former exec who now runs Google's payment project.
Both Amazon and Facebook could transform their online-payments services into similar walletlike
mobile apps, while Facebook could create a significant PayPal rival in web commerce if it rolled
out payments as part of Facebook Connect. Apple has a very different, but potentially more
disruptive, shot at this market. The company has long been rumored to add near-field-
communication chips--which allow for waving your phone to pay--into its phones. If it does, an
Apple payments system would have two advantages over everyone else. First, the iTunes database
of customers is huge. Second, there's the iPad, which is fast gaining traction as a next-gen cash
register in small businesses around the country. This sets up Apple to own both sides of potentially
millions of transactions: Go to your coffee shop, wave your iPhone against the cashier's iPad, and
26

27. voilà, you're done. Multiply that by every hipster in America and you see the scale of Apple's
ambition.
The Hit Men
So who could derail these best-laid plans? Well, let's start with the lawyers, of course. Over the
past year, the tech industry has become an increasingly ugly place, with Apple, Google, Microsoft,
Amazon, and just about every handset maker joining a legal scrum over patents. Everyone is suing
everyone else, while the government, spurred on by the likes of, yes, Microsoft, is considering an
antitrust suit against Google. None of this bodes well. Over the summer, Apple succeeded in getting
Samsung's Galaxy tablet (which runs Android) banned from release in Germany and delayed its
launch in Australia. This is part of a global fight about design and Android, complicated by the fact
that Samsung is Apple's largest component supplier.
The Samsung suits were also the most significant sign that Google may have a problem with the
intellectual property underpinning Android, since its "free and open" operating system is forcing its
device makers into expensive courtroom battles over their Android phones and tablets. This, in turn,
has set off a buying frenzy of global patents that might have anything to do with transmitting
mobile data. A coalition that included Apple and Microsoft spent $4.5 billion to outbid Google for a
stash of 6,000 mobile-related patents from Nortel. Page responded by spending $12.5 billion for
Motorola and its slug of 17,000 patents, and by then making two deals with IBM for more than
2,000 patents in all (the purchase price was not disclosed).
All these patent suits could stifle innovation. Most new devices are so complicated--touching on so
many specialized areas, from intricate chip design to battery placement to touch-screen dynamics--
that it's impossible for any company's devices to be wholly original. Tech companies used to let
minor patent violations slide, but the rise of patent-hording trolls has changed this. Now everyone's
instinct is to sue.
It's almost as if they'd never studied Microsoft's decline in relevance. The software giant never
resumed its place as an agenda setter after its antitrust trial in the late 1990s. The suit consumed so
much time and brainpower that the company fell behind on a decade's worth of trends. That's the
risk in today's patent wars: The more time Page spends defending Android, the less effort he puts
into making sure Google is actually inventing new stuff.
Tech companies are ephemeral enterprises, with a built-in obsolescence much like their products.
The best firms stay at their peak for a decade tops; most get snuffed out before anyone even notices
them. Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google have the potential to be exceptions to this rule. Their
CEOs are driven, disciplined, and relatively young (Cook, the oldest, will be 51 in November). All
but Cook are founders, and their personalities are such that they seem unlikely to get tired or bored
by their empire building. Their market caps and strong revenue growth should allow them to
neutralize other would-be rivals--witness Bezos acquiring Zappos and Quidisi (Diapers.com) before
either could become a threat.
As our modern oligarchy, and as individual companies, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google will
not last forever. But despite this oncoming war, in which attacking one another becomes standard
operating practice, their inevitable slide into irrelevancy likely won't be at the hands of one of their
fellow rivals. As always, the real future of tech belongs to some smart-ass kid in a Palo Alto garage.
27

28. infographic retrieved from http://alltopstartups.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/fab-four-
infographic.jpg on March 6, 2012
Mission Statements of the Fab Four
Apple: Apple is committed to bringing the best personal computing experience to students, educators,
creative professionals and consumers around the world through its innovative hardware, software and
Internet offerings.
Facebook: Facebook’s mission is to give people the power to share and make the world more open and
connected.
Google: Google’s mission is to organize the world‘s information and make it universally accessible and
useful.
Amazon: Amazon’s vision is to be earth’s most customer centric company; to build a place where people
can come to find and discover anything they might want to buy online. (They list this as their mission as a
combination mission/vision on their site).
28

29. SOCIETY
29

30. Is Social Media Actually Making Us Less Connected?
Retrieved from http://mashable.com/2012/03/01/social-media-less-connected/?
WT.mc_id=en_my_stories&amp;utm_campaign=My
%2BStories&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_source=newsletter on Marrch 1, 2012
LONG BEACH, Calif. – Checking email during meetings. Shopping on your smartphone in
the middle of class. Texting at funerals. These are a few of the examples that MIT
professor Sherry Turkle offered during her TEDTalk on Thursday, in which she argued that
“technology is taking us places we don’t want to go.”
Turkle, a psychologist who leads MIT’s Initiative on Technology and Self, believes that
while our constant communication and social media engagement does make us more
connected, it’s coming at the sacrifice of real conversation.
And she thinks that will have some serious consequences for our relationships, our self-
perceptions and our emotions.
One major issue, she said, is that when we text, email or post to a social networking site,
we’re able to project ourselves as we want to be seen. “We get to edit, we get to delete,
and that means we get to retouch.”
Inversely, Turkle notes that a face-to-face conversation “takes place in real time and you
can’t control what you’re going to say.”
Further, with our phones at our constant disposal, Turkle says we’re only paying attention
to the things we want to pay attention to. And that leaves us increasingly disconnected
from our friends, family and co-workers as we simply turn to our devices when a
conversation no longer interests us.
This creates a situation that Turkle said makes us, “expect more from technology and less
from each other.” In the long run, she thinks technology is ultimately headed towards
creating a Siri-like program that can offer “companionship without the demands of
friendship.”
There’s certainly plenty of data that supports Turkle’s argument. Surveys showing that
we’re increasingly texting and social networking during meal time or in the bedroom have
become commonplace.
But what’s to be done about it? Turkle isn’t calling for a return to the dark ages of pre-
smartphone life. Rather, she says it’s time for us to have a more self-aware relationship
with technology. And in turn, we should do things like create sacred places at home and at
work where we leave the devices out.
Turkle’s remarks drew an emphatic standing ovation from the TED crowd. But we want to
know what you think: Does technology threaten the quality of our relationships and
personal development, or are such fears an overblown perception of a generation that
didn’t grow up with digital? Let us know in the comments.
30

31. Monday, Mar. 27, 2006
genM: The Multitasking Generation
By Claudia Wallis
Retrieved From http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1174696,00.html on March 5, 2012
It's 9:30 p.m., and Stephen and Georgina Cox know exactly where their children are. Well, their
bodies, at least. Piers, 14, is holed up in his bedroom--eyes fixed on his computer screen--where he
has been logged onto a MySpace chat room and AOL Instant Messenger (IM) for the past three
hours. His twin sister Bronte is planted in the living room, having commandeered her dad's iMac--
as usual. She, too, is busily IMing, while chatting on her cell phone and chipping away at
homework.
By all standard space-time calculations, the four members of the family occupy the same three-
bedroom home in Van Nuys, Calif., but psychologically each exists in his or her own little universe.
Georgina, 51, who works for a display-cabinet maker, is tidying up the living room as Bronte
works, not that her daughter notices. Stephen, 49, who juggles jobs as a squash coach, fitness
trainer, event planner and head of a cancer charity he founded, has wolfed down his dinner alone in
the kitchen, having missed supper with the kids. He, too, typically spends the evening on his cell
phone and returning e-mails--when he can nudge Bronte off the computer. "One gets obsessed with
one's gadgets," he concedes.
Zooming in on Piers' screen gives a pretty good indication of what's on his hyperkinetic mind. O.K.,
there's a Google Images window open, where he's chasing down pictures of Keira Knightley. Good
ones get added to a snazzy Windows Media Player slide show that serves as his personal e-shrine to
the actress. Several IM windows are also open, revealing such penetrating conversations as this one
with a MySpace pal:
MySpacer: suuuuuup!!! (Translation: What's up?)
Piers: wat up dude
MySpacer: nmu (Not much. You?)
Piers: same
Naturally, iTunes is open, and Piers is blasting a mix of Queen, AC/DC, classic rock and hip-hop.
Somewhere on the screen there's a Word file, in which Piers is writing an essay for English class. "I
usually finish my homework at school," he explains to a visitor, "but if not, I pop a book open on
my lap in my room, and while the computer is loading, I'll do a problem or write a sentence. Then,
while mail is loading, I do more. I get it done a little bit at a time."
Bronte has the same strategy. "You just multitask," she explains. "My parents always tell me I can't
do homework while listening to music, but they don't understand that it helps me concentrate." The
twins also multitask when hanging with friends, which has its own etiquette. "When I talk to my
best friend Eloy," says Piers, "he'll have one earpiece [of his iPod] in and one out." Says Bronte: "If
a friend thinks she's not getting my full attention, I just make it very clear that she is, even though
I'm also listening to music."
The Coxes are one of 32 families in the Los Angeles area participating in an intensive, four-year
study of modern family life, led by anthropologist Elinor Ochs, director of UCLA's Center on
Everyday Lives of Families. While the impact of multitasking gadgets was not her original focus,
Ochs found it to be one of the most dramatic areas of change since she conducted a similar study 20
31

32. years ago. "I'm not certain how the children can monitor all those things at the same time, but I
think it is pretty consequential for the structure of the family relationship," says Ochs, whose work
on language, interaction and culture earned her a MacArthur "genius" grant.
One of the things Ochs' team of observers looks at is what happens at the end of the workday when
parents and kids reunite--and what doesn't happen, as in the case of the Coxes. "We saw that when
the working parent comes through the door, the other spouse and the kids are so absorbed by what
they're doing that they don't give the arriving parent the time of day," says Ochs. The returning
parent, generally the father, was greeted only about a third of the time, usually with a perfunctory
"Hi." "About half the time the kids ignored him or didn't stop what they were doing, multitasking
and monitoring their various electronic gadgets," she says. "We also saw how difficult it was for
parents to penetrate the child's universe. We have so many videotapes of parents actually backing
away, retreating from kids who are absorbed by whatever they're doing."
HUMAN BEINGS HAVE ALWAYS HAD A CAPACITY to attend to several things at once.
Mothers have done it since the hunter-gatherer era--picking berries while suckling an infant, stirring
the pot with one eye on the toddler. Nor is electronic multitasking entirely new: we've been driving
while listening to car radios since they became popular in the 1930s. But there is no doubt that the
phenomenon has reached a kind of warp speed in the era of Web-enabled computers, when it has
become routine to conduct six IM conversations, watch American Idol on TV and Google the names
of last season's finalists all at once.
That level of multiprocessing and interpersonal connectivity is now so commonplace that it's easy
to forget how quickly it came about. Fifteen years ago, most home computers weren't even linked to
the Internet. In 1990 the majority of adolescents responding to a survey done by Donald Roberts, a
professor of communication at Stanford, said the one medium they couldn't live without was a
radio/CD player. How quaint. In a 2004 follow-up, the computer won hands down.
Today 82% of kids are online by the seventh grade, according to the Pew Internet and American
Life Project. And what they love about the computer, of course, is that it offers the radio/CD thing
and so much more--games, movies, e-mail, IM, Google, MySpace. The big finding of a 2005 survey
of Americans ages 8 to 18 by the Kaiser Family Foundation, co-authored by Roberts, is not that kids
were spending a larger chunk of time using electronic media--that was holding steady at 6.5 hours a
day (could it possibly get any bigger?)--but that they were packing more media exposure into that
time: 8.5 hours' worth, thanks to "media multitasking"--listening to iTunes, watching a DVD and
IMing friends all at the same time. Increasingly, the media-hungry members of Generation M, as
Kaiser dubbed them, don't just sit down to watch a TV show with their friends or family. From a
quarter to a third of them, according to the survey, say they simultaneously absorb some other
medium "most of the time" while watching TV, listening to music, using the computer or even
while reading.
Parents have watched this phenomenon unfold with a mixture of awe and concern. The Coxes, for
instance, are bowled over by their children's technical prowess. Piers repairs the family computers
and DVD player. Bronte uses digital technology to compose elaborate photo collages and create a
documentary of her father's ongoing treatment for cancer. And, says Georgina, "they both make
these fancy PowerPoint presentations about what they want for Christmas." But both parents worry
about the ways that kids' compulsive screen time is affecting their schoolwork and squeezing out
family life. "We rarely have dinner together anymore," frets Stephen. "Everyone is in their own
little world, and we don't get out together to have a social life."
Every generation of adults sees new technology--and the social changes it stirs--as a threat to the
rightful order of things: Plato warned (correctly) that reading would be the downfall of oral tradition
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33. and memory. And every generation of teenagers embraces the freedoms and possibilities wrought
by technology in ways that shock the elders: just think about what the automobile did for dating.
As for multitasking devices, social scientists and educators are just beginning to assess their impact,
but the researchers already have some strong opinions. The mental habit of dividing one's attention
into many small slices has significant implications for the way young people learn, reason,
socialize, do creative work and understand the world. Although such habits may prepare kids for
today's frenzied workplace, many cognitive scientists are positively alarmed by the trend. "Kids that
are instant messaging while doing homework, playing games online and watching TV, I predict,
aren't going to do well in the long run," says Jordan Grafman, chief of the cognitive neuroscience
section at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS). Decades of
research (not to mention common sense) indicate that the quality of one's output and depth of
thought deteriorate as one attends to ever more tasks. Some are concerned about the disappearance
of mental downtime to relax and reflect. Roberts notes Stanford students "can't go the few minutes
between their 10 o'clock and 11 o'clock classes without talking on their cell phones. It seems to me
that there's almost a discomfort with not being stimulated--a kind of 'I can't stand the silence.'"
Gen M's multitasking habits have social and psychological implications as well. If you're IMing
four friends while watching That '70s Show, it's not the same as sitting on the couch with your
buddies or your sisters and watching the show together. Or sharing a family meal across a table.
Thousands of years of evolution created human physical communication--facial expressions, body
language--that puts broadband to shame in its ability to convey meaning and create bonds. What
happens, wonders UCLA's Ochs, as we replace side-by-side and eye-to-eye human connections
with quick, disembodied e-exchanges? Those are critical issues not just for social scientists but for
parents and teachers trying to understand--and do right by--Generation M.
YOUR BRAIN WHEN IT MULTITASKS
ALTHOUGH MANY ASPECTS OF THE networked life remain scientifically uncharted, there's
substantial literature on how the brain handles multitasking. And basically, it doesn't. It may seem
that a teenage girl is writing an instant message, burning a CD and telling her mother that she's
doing homework--all at the same time--but what's really going on is a rapid toggling among tasks
rather than simultaneous processing. "You're doing more than one thing, but you're ordering them
and deciding which one to do at any one time," explains neuroscientist Grafman.
Then why can we so easily walk down the street while engrossed in a deep conversation? Why can
we chop onions while watching Jeopardy? "We, along with quite a few others, have been focused
on exactly this question," says Hal Pashler, psychology professor at the University of California at
San Diego. It turns out that very automatic actions or what researchers call "highly practiced skills,"
like walking or chopping an onion, can be easily done while thinking about other things, although
the decision to add an extra onion to a recipe or change the direction in which you're walking is
another matter. "It seems that action planning--figuring out what I want to say in response to a
person's question or which way I want to steer the car--is usually, perhaps invariably, performed
sequentially" or one task at a time, says Pashler. On the other hand, producing the actions you've
decided on--moving your hand on the steering wheel, speaking the words you've formulated--can be
performed "in parallel with planning some other action." Similarly, many aspects of perception--
looking, listening, touching--can be performed in parallel with action planning and with movement.
The switching of attention from one task to another, the toggling action, occurs in a region right
behind the forehead called Brodmann's Area 10 in the brain's anterior prefrontal cortex, according
to a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study by Grafman's team. Brodmann's Area 10
is part of the frontal lobes, which "are important for maintaining long-term goals and achieving
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34. them," Grafman explains. "The most anterior part allows you to leave something when it's
incomplete and return to the same place and continue from there." This gives us a "form of
multitasking," he says, though it's actually sequential processing. Because the prefrontal cortex is
one of the last regions of the brain to mature and one of the first to decline with aging, young
children do not multitask well, and neither do most adults over 60. New fMRI studies at Toronto's
Rotman Research Institute suggest that as we get older, we have more trouble "turning down
background thoughts when turning to a new task," says Rotman senior scientist and assistant
director Cheryl Grady. "Younger adults are better at tuning out stuff when they want to," says
Grady. "I'm in my 50s, and I know that I can't work and listen to music with lyrics; it was easier
when I was younger."
But the ability to multiprocess has its limits, even among young adults. When people try to perform
two or more related tasks either at the same time or alternating rapidly between them, errors go way
up, and it takes far longer--often double the time or more--to get the jobs done than if they were
done sequentially, says David E. Meyer, director of the Brain, Cognition and Action Laboratory at
the University of Michigan: "The toll in terms of slowdown is extremely large--amazingly so."
Meyer frequently tests Gen M students in his lab, and he sees no exception for them, despite their
"mystique" as master multitaskers. "The bottom line is that you can't simultaneously be thinking
about your tax return and reading an essay, just as you can't talk to yourself about two things at
once," he says. "If a teenager is trying to have a conversation on an e-mail chat line while doing
algebra, she'll suffer a decrease in efficiency, compared to if she just thought about algebra until she
was done. People may think otherwise, but it's a myth. With such complicated tasks [you] will
never, ever be able to overcome the inherent limitations in the brain for processing information
during multitasking. It just can't be, any more than the best of all humans will ever be able to run a
one-minute mile."
Other research shows the relationship between stimulation and performance forms a bell curve: a
little stimulation--whether it's coffee or a blaring soundtrack--can boost performance, but too much
is stressful and causes a fall-off. In addition, the brain needs rest and recovery time to consolidate
thoughts and memories. Teenagers who fill every quiet moment with a phone call or some kind of e-
stimulation may not be getting that needed reprieve. Habitual multitasking may condition their
brain to an overexcited state, making it difficult to focus even when they want to. "People lose the
skill and the will to maintain concentration, and they get mental antsyness," says Meyer.
IS THIS ANY WAY TO LEARN?
LONGTIME PROFESSORS AT UNIVERSITIES around the U.S. have noticed that Gen M kids
arrive on campus with a different set of cognitive skills and habits than past generations. In lecture
halls with wireless Internet access--now more than 40% of college classrooms, according to the
Campus Computing Project--the compulsion to multitask can get out of hand. "People are going to
lectures by some of the greatest minds, and they are doing their mail," says Sherry Turkle, professor
of the social studies of science and technology at M.I.T. In her class, says Turkle, "I tell them this is
not a place for e-mail, it's not a place to do online searches and not a place to set up IRC [Internet
relay chat] channels in which to comment on the class. It's not going to help if there are parallel
discussions about how boring it is. You've got to get people to participate in the world as it is."
Such concerns have, in fact, led a number of schools, including the M.B.A. programs at UCLA and
the University of Virginia, to look into blocking Internet access during lectures. "I tell my students
not to treat me like TV," says University of Wisconsin professor Aaron Brower, who has been
teaching social work for 20 years. "They have to think of me like a real person talking. I want to
have them thinking about things we're talking about."
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