Penny Mobiles – Mobile phone news, reviews & information

There is just no way to escape advertisements these days. We all know that Apple is implementing the new iOS 4’s iAds feature (expect to see more of this once the whole antenna debacle has toned down a notch), but aside from the more obvious advertising features, there is one other factor that tends to influence consumer’s decisions: social networking.

We all know how effective word of mouth advertising can be. While the average person does not need to listen to the recommendations of his or her friends, a few words from a choice individual among peers who a person truly admires or respects is more than enough of an endorsement to give a purchase a reason.

Now imagine that scenario on with the element of social networking on your mobile phone. Receiving a quick message or Tweet from close friends saying how nice it is to visit a certain establishment or to purchase a certain product will be a very strong influential factor for many people.

This is not just a one sided influence either. As effective as social networking can be, it is the accessibility that smart phone technology (as well as WiFi and 3G network access) gives that makes this a very potent element for marketing. And of course, the social network gives the messages more potency than standard mass forwarded content on mobile phones. After all, receiving spam messages on a mobile phone is never good, but reading about updates directly from friends is considered enjoyable.

Research firm Gartner has been gathering data on how people’s social networking habits tend to influence and affect their purchasing decisions. This influence is a crucial factor that has to be considered by marketers if they want to successfully advertise a product in this day and age. The study covered about 4000 consumers across various territories in the world during the last quarter of 2009.

It comes as to no surprise that when people are asked to give an example of effective use of telecommunications technology, many point out the recently coordinated efforts to help out the victims of the earthquake in Haiti. Thanks to SMS, Twitter, blogs and the internet, many people found themselves able to easily take part and contribute to the relief efforts.

The nature of the internet is that it provides real time, near-instantaneous updates of information. Combined with mobile phone technology, this can prove to be a very powerful tool in coordinating the efforts of thousands all over the world towards a single point of interest. This is what happened with Haiti and in many other events prior.

Back in 2007, Kenya had a very eventful election that saw many reports of violence. These reports would have been forgotten in time if not for the efforts of a certain Ory Okolloh who used her blog, the Kenyan Pundit, to keep track of all the reports. However, her blog alone was not able to sustain the task at hand; thanks to the combined efforts of developers and other bloggers in Kenya, they were able to establish the Ushahidi, a web based crisis information hub.

When used as a tool for coordinating efforts, the Ushahidi proved to be invaluable as it allowed people to instantly see when and where trouble spots would appear. Emergency response personnel are able to coordinate their efforts more efficiently, saving them precious time and effort in getting to the people who need help the most.

The site also tracks wildlife in Kenya, crime rates in Atlanta, various elections in many countries as well as major conflicts such as wars and xenophobic attacks.

Learn more about the impact of the internet and modern technology in major human events at the Guardian UK.

Social networking has certainly blurred up a lot of lines on the internet.

Technically, the internet is media. But since everyone and anyone can publish information on the internet, control of content is not as well sanctioned as what we will find on TV or on printed material. Back then, when people had personal opinions, jokes, rumors and hearsay, they were all free to post it on their personal websites, blogs, forums and bulletin boards.

With the advent of social networking sites, people were able to string one personal update after another. Now, the micro blogging tool Twitter has shown how powerful hearsay on the internet can be.

Despite Twitter being a place of personal accounts, many people cannot help but take Tweets for canonical truth. Defining news updates from jokes is something that some people are not able to do properly, and when you have over a thousand followers, it only takes a handful few of those to misunderstand your Tweet before things get ugly.

Take the case of Aude Baron, a well noted online French Journalist. While users of the internet lose all markings such as military rank, press badges, doctorates and more in the cloak of anonymity, there are those who, intentionally or not, still retain their real life identity online. Baron has over a thousand followers who follow her Tweets –so when she jokingly retweeted a comment about the French President and his wife, many took the news to heart.

Some news blog sites even took the information to heart. In a matter of hours, rumors turned into assumed fact and President Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife found themselves the target of a very ugly rumor that has reached even the tabloids.

Get to know more about how one single Twitter “joke” has caused uproar for the French media at the Times Online UK.

Many people were concerned last weekend that the Twitter account for Vodafone may have been hacked. This was after an offensive post from the account appeared online.

“Vodafone UK is fed up of dirty homos and is going after beaver”

The post was visible only momentarily as Vodafone’s employees were quick to respond by deleting the post and immediately addressing the concern. Amid the apologies, they also assured people that this is not a hacking incident.

Instead, the post was done by an employee of the company who has decided to break the rules. The employee is assigned to the customer service center in Stoke and is currently suspended indefinitely. As to why the individual was not immediately terminated, Vodafone has given no explanations other than stating that the matter is being handled and investigated internally.

Vodafone currently has over 8,000 subscribers on Twitter and the number is still growing. The account is used to handle customer inquiries and complaints and has served as a very important online hotline.

This misuse of social network tools is not an isolated case. This has already happened to other companies such as the Telegraph and Virgin Atlantic. While Twitter and Facebook does allow companies to connect directly with their clients, this also opens up a new channel that should be safeguarded carefully lest another errant employee decides to have some fun.

Several Virgin Atlantic cabin crew members have been fired for posting racist remarks and unfounded claims on Facebook -they were lucky that they were not slapped with libel. The Telegraph newspaper on the other hand was a victim to the lack of foresight in using tags without moderating the entries during April of last year.

For more details on the misuse of Twitter on the Vodafone account and other related news, head straight to the Guardian UK.