Full disclosure: I still subscribe to the paper version of the paper.
When I snapped open the Metro section today I was surprised to see a long-time Mind & Media client staring back at me. Dr. Matt Friedman, the Executive Director of VA’s National Center for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, was profiled by the Partnership for Public Service as part of a series about career civil servants.

I say we’ve been working with NCPTSD a long time, but it’s a blip compared to how long Dr. Friedman has been committed to helping Veterans with PTSD. As the article says, he’s been working with Veterans since before there was such a diagnosis as PTSD; 40 years, to be exact. His dedication to Veterans is captured in this bit from the article:

“There is something so compelling and worthwhile and so important about trying to help people whose lives have been changed by their willingness to make a sacrifice,” said Friedman of his primary work with veterans. “Some have suffered greatly because of this willingness and are no longer the same person that they were. I just wanted to help them pick up the pieces.”

Amen to that! Mind & Media is proud to have provided multiple online multimedia presentation to the National Center for PTSD, including a professional educational series and three presentations created to help families learn about and deal with PTSD. Our Veterans deserve the best, indeed.

Mind & Media recently completed a video for the Center for Neuroscience and Regenerative Medicine (CNRM). The video, “Meet the Researchers” was created for potential volunteers to get to know the center’s researchers. You can watch the video at CNRM’s You Tube channel:

Some interesting events are taking place over the next couple of weeks…events that you might want to attend (right?):

FotoWeek DC 2010 Festival: Nov 6 – Nov 13

Founded in 2008, FotoWeek DC has evolved from a city-centric photography festival to a multi-season tribute — with international appeal– to photography in all its forms.

FotoWeek DC celebrates the transformative power of photography through the exhibition of inspiring and provocative images, diverse programming, and collaboration with the local and international community.

Whether through photojournalism, fine art photography, or the work of emerging artists, FotoWeek DC provides a dynamic, evocative, engaging experience for photographers, cultural institutions, galleries, curators, schools, area residents and tens of thousands of visitors to the Nation’s Capital.

In just three short years, FotoWeek DC is Everywhere You See.

Find out more about this event here.

PodCampEDU 2 – Washington, DC : November 15

The PodCamp for educators and those interested in education and multimedia.

Find out more about this event here.

Meet the New Media: November 16

In 2010, the Washington region witnessed a rebirth in local media. We experienced a complete changing of the editorial guard at the region’s alternative weekly, a new business newspaper from the Washington Post and an entire new online local news enterprise from Albritton Publications.

Capitol Communicator invites you to Meet the New Media on November 16. Find out what the reporters and editors at the Washington City Paper, Capital Business, TBD, Washington Business Journal and Citybizlist DC Edition have to say about the future of media in Washington and the convergence of traditional news and social news media.

Find out more about this event here and RSVP if interested.

The Government Video Expo 2010: Nov 30 – Dec 2

If you are a video professional in the federal space or working with federal clients, you might want to attend the Government Video Expo.  Vendors will be present to tout the latest and greatest gear, seminars and presentations abound, and networking events will give you the opportunity to mingle with peers and potential clients alike.

Find out more about this event here.

Today in the Washington Post, Columnist Stephen Barr, laid out some survey results indicating that roughly a third of young Americans would consider working for the federal government if they were encouraged to by folks close to them, like parents or teachers, but also if such a request came from our next president of the U.S. That sounds like great news in light of the retirement wave that is getting under way as baby boomers exit civil service. Except that the critical phrase is “IF they were encouraged to.” Apparently no one is asking America’s new workers to join federal service.

At first that seemed like an easy problem to fix; start encouraging them. But with what and how. I mean after that parent or teacher or president says, “Hey, you should check out working for the federal government,” then what? Where will that person look? What will s/he find? How will s/he be engaged?

What moves someone from consideration to motivation? And on the flip side, how does a particular government agency convince that now motivated person to pursue that one agency over any other? We can try to think of our government as one giant employer, one big happy team, but when workforces get thin agencies will absolutely be competing against each other for good employees. So how do you get yours?

Barr quotes Patricia McGinnis, president and chief executive of the Council for Excellence in Government, who dropped one hint as to how to move beyond encouragement to inspiration. She says 18-to-29-year olds are “more responsive to interactive communication and personal attention than people have realized.” Time to start realizing it people.

Social networks, live chat customer service, user-generated content, they all fall into that category of interactive communication and personal attention. Young Americans, certainly well-educated, tech-savvy young Americans (AKA prime job candidates for federal agencies) rely on interactive communication as much as other generations came to rely on the evening news or the morning paper. Remember when PR was getting mention in the op/ed section of the paper? Or maybe even a mention on the news? What a coup! It moves a bit faster now. It happens a little lower in the weeds now. It’s person to person, or may I suggest employee to potential employee.

Based on the survey results Barr references, it sounds like the federal workforce stands to benefit from at the least some encouraging words, from parents, teachers, and even Mr. or Mrs. President, to explore a career in federal service. Beyond that, it’s up to each agency to shoulder the load and move young Americans from curiosity to engagement. How will you do it? Well for starters you can check out a white paper written by some of my friends here at Mind & Media, “Recruiting the Next Generation of Government Using Web 2.0”.

On February 12, Microsoft will be pushing an automatic update to PCs far and wide that will transform Internet Explorer version 6 into version 7. The blogosphere is abuzz about how to avoid the update if you want to and is asking how Microsoft can tuck a software update into what should be security updates. That’s neither here nor there to me. Why folks would purposely avoid the update is outside my lane. I leave that to IT units at individual offices and agencies. I’m actually kind of psyched to see it; perhaps less cross-browser testing is on the horizon!

See, browsers are not like televisions. Different brands don’t all work the same. Imagine being a video producer and delivering your product to a broadcaster, then stopping by Circuit City for the big debut. Wouldn’t that be a surprise if one TV shifted the picture out of frame while another resized the image to bizarro dimensions, and a third finally displayed the video correctly. Well, you could just produce three versions of your show, right? One for each kind of TV. That’d be a hoot. We may not have to generate completely separate products, but web developers do wrestle with a similar scenario.

Despite the best efforts of organizations like the WC3, browsers just don’t all work the same way. They don’t display content the same way. Pieces move or resize or disappear completely. Depending on the goals of your organization, those differences can have large impact.

The latest stats show Internet Explorer 7 holding 21 percent of the market. IE6 holds 33 percent, Firefox 36 percent, and then a steep drop down to Safari, Mozilla, and Opera. Notice the name Netscape isn’t even tracked anymore! Depending on your goals and audience, you may need to test your websites/applications on all of those browsers (not to mention platforms like Mac or PC) to make sure everyone is seeing the same thing and enjoying the same experience.

So how do you decide how much time and effort to put into cross-browser and platform testing? That depends on what you’re doing. If you’re facing a closed audience with predictable systems, you may be able to cut down on testing. For example, a DoD agency targeting an internal audience can feel pretty good about things as long as they’re targeting Internet Explorer 6 (until Feb 12?) and Windows XP. Meanwhile, that same agency may have a public-facing website, one offering critical information or training, one that could reflect on their image and mission. In that case, how accommodating should it be? Is it OK to serve up content that may look wacky on a Mac because it holds such a small share of the market? I’m happy to say that’s not my call. But I could help you think through it. And would you believe it comes down to time and money? I know you’ve never heard that before.

I will say this: There are standards out there, and if we stick to those when building, our chances for success are good from square one. Further that, simply having the experience and awareness of cross-browser/platform issues is another big advantage. Finally, it’s about paying attention your audience and making educated decisions. My decision would be to dump IE6. One version of that browser is enough for all of us.

I recently read about the legal action taken by the National Federation of the Blind against Target for having an inaccessible website. Web accessibility refers to the practice of making webpages understandable to people with disabilities. They have to use a wide range of user agent devices instead of standard Web browsers. This case has been with the California District Court for more than a year, and was recently granted class-action status.

The World Wide Web revolutionized how people get information—but it doesn’t always work well for everyone. As Communication Architects, we need to be sensitive to the needs of those with disabilities—and respond with various techniques that make our websites more accessible.

With our government clients, Web accessibility isn’t just an option—it’s the law.

In 1973, Congress passed the Rehabilitation Act, which guarantees:

No qualified individual with a disability in the United States…shall, solely by reason of her or his disability, be excluded from the participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance or under any program or activity conducted by any Executive agency or by the United States Postal Service.

Section 508 is a 1998 amendment to the Workforce Rehabilitation Act of 1973 requiring electronic and information technology developed or purchased by the federal government be accessible by people with disabilities. This amendment created binding, enforceable standards that were incorporated into the Federal Procurement procedures complete with compliancy procedure and reporting requirements.

While accessibility tends to get attention in the government world—via Section 508—it should be on every organization’s mind.

The ruling by the California District Court has made it painfully obvious for Target! Making sites accessible takes more time and effort, effort that is often not seen in the final site, but is still important for all audiences.

What remains to be seen is how this case will affect the future of Web accessibility. Will accessibility get the attention it deserves in the corporate world, or will it go into settlement without a final court decision?

Let me know where you think this will go and what you think needs to be done to bring more attention to the world of Web accessibility and 508 compliancy.

Sony has recently announced that they plan to sell the first OLED TV during the holiday shopping period this year. OLED stands for Organic Light-Emitting Diode. That’s right, I said organic! This new technology uses a film of organic compounds that emit colors. The new technology doesn’t require back-lit LED and uses way less power.

Will Wheaten, my buddy from Star Trek: TNG (although I liked him better in Stand By Me), explains it better than I can:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ufs9Wx0VXQ]

It’s not all sunshine, though. OLEDs have limited lifetimes and are easily damaged by water. But maybe the coolest thing about OLED TV is you can bend it like Beckham! Get ready to trade in that old plasma screen. That’s already old school compared to the emerging OLED world.

A few weeks ago I took a jab at Google for diluting their brand. In that post I alluded to Yahoo!’s similar moves that came years before Google’s. In this month’s Fast Company, Robert Scoble starts off recalling how Yahoo!’s VP of communications admitted, about a year ago, that the company had a “thin layer of investment spread across everything we do, and thus we focus on nothing in particular.”

Scoble continues by describing how Yahoo! is trying to right the ship. Jeff Yang is back as CEO and focusing on, as Scoble writes it, filling the “cool stuff supplier” role he once did. That new focus is good. Sure, they once concentrated on searching, but now they seem high on Web applications. Give search to Google and rebuild around Web apps if that’s what’s cool today.

Scoble mentions three Yahoo! applications specifically, all centered on community building and content sharing. What I like about the applications he describes is that they are not locked to a particular site.

All three—Flickr (photo sharing), del.icio.us (Web bookmark storage and organization), and Upcoming.org (a calendar of events tool)—offer a way to syndicate content to other locations, like to your blog or organization’s website.

Die, static website, die!

Big-budget organizations may certainly buy applications like those for the sake of customization, privacy, and accountability, as part of a larger content management system install or whatever.

But what gets me excited is how these free applications can help the small-budget folks. Imagine you’re leading a little nonprofit running long on cause but short on funds. With these three applications as part of your site, you can very easily keep your calendar of events up to date, promote other sites/pages, and publish photos—AND you can make all of that content available to others via syndication.

And you can get free help. With the Flickr app, your supporters can populate your Flickr application by tagging their pix with a tag you specify. Del.icio.us and Upcoming let you create networks that promote and syndicate content from your supporters. Let the people talk for you!

Yahoo! fearlessly continues to revise its brand, which can help you build yours.

Today is a day that will go down in history — or is it infamy? At 6 p.m. you’ll be able to buy the Apple iPhone, the cellphone and computer and music player and more that will change the world! (At least that’s what Apple wants you to believe.)

The marketing engines have been working overtime at Apple. I first heard about the iPhone more than a year ago. Sure, it looks good; that’s a given. But what makes the darn thing so cool is the “look Ma, no buttons” factor. You do everything by touch.

My prediction is that we are about five to 10 years away from a time of no more keyboards or mice. Everything will use touch screens or touch pads. We’ll be like people in the movie Minority Report; they wired up their fingers and moved through computerized interactive environments with fluidity and grace. Like them, we ‘ll put on some classical music and be conducting on our computers.

I’m looking forward to it. Think of all the people saved from Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. Between the iPhone and Microsoft Surface, the days of keystrokes and mouse clicks are fading fast. I only have two questions now: What will we call the new “syndrome” caused by touch screen usage? And will it be covered by workman’s comp?