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Just face it; your title and rank is not important anymore, what matters is your social influence. Or how much impact you have on your friends and followers in the social media. PR- and marketing companies are increasingly targeting individual bloggers, ignoring the big media. In both business and politics methods are being developed to identify the persons with the greatest influence on people in their area. According to new research, blogs are now the third-most influential digital resource (31%) when making overall purchases, only behind retail sites (56%) and brand sites (34%). In fact, blogs were found to be the fifth-most trustworthy source overall for information on the internet. Yet, no one has so far come up with a useful idea on how to turn "likes" into hard cash.

"The disconnect between brand marketers and influencers is a result of a challenge they both face - a lack of uniform metrics to effectively measure the success of influencers marketing campaigns."

Technorati Media

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Founded over a decade ago, Technorati Media has grown into one of the largest social media ad networks, with an advertising reach of approximately 130 million US unique users/month. Technorati sit in the middle of a remarkable social media nexus, possess a wast amount of data and has a unique perspective on what's driving the major mega trend of our time. The new report - "2013 Digital Influence Report" - is based on a survey amongst the 6000 most influential persons in the social media world, 1200 consumers and 150 top brands. The funny thing is; in spite of the extremely effective technology, the participants seems to have trouble communicating.

According to brand marketers, social media spending will increase substantially in 2013 , but will still not make up for more than 10 percent of the company's total digital budget.

And that's quite understandable. They keep counting Facebook-likes, but the money just won't follow.

The "2013 Digital Influence Report" offers an answer to this long-time mystery - there are other stuff that are more important to the consumers when deciding to make a purchase.

* "The disconnect between brand marketers and influencers is a result of a challenge they both face - a lack of uniform metrics to effectively measure the success of influencers marketing campaigns. At present, brands primarily look to comScore/Nielsen ranking for identifying and selecting influencers first, yet influencers are not well represented in these indices."

* "Furthermore, when gauging the success of campaigns, where influencers are monitoring traffic/page views, brand marketers are measuring Facebook likes."

Additionally, the report shows that the so-called influencers has the greatest impact amongst consumer, the smaller area they operate in. You won't find these people by looking at the number of Facebook-likes. And consumers don't necessarily use the same media for seeking information on product, as they do for deciding to by it.

The survey findings also indicate that many of those consumers are turning to blogs when looking to make a purchase. Blogs were found to be the third-most influential digital resource (31%) when making overall purchases, only behind retail sites (56%) and brand sites (34%).

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While YouTube, Facebook and Google+ are the most popular social properties for consumers, bloggers now rank as the fifth-most trustworthy source, overall, for information on the internet.

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But here's the list that really matters if you're a marketer or an advertiser:

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But blogging is still a non-profit activity, for most of them, the report points out

That may change in near future.

SUMMARY:

• Facebook and Twitter are the most popular social platforms for bloggers, which are the platforms that generate the majority of blog referrals and shares, as well as those from which bloggers are generating revenue.
• For consumers, YouTube, Facebook and Google+ are the most popular platforms.
• As for brands, 90 percent have a presence on Facebook, closely followed by Twitter and YouTube, but Google+ was not as popular a platform.

Download a copy of "2013 Digital Influence Report" here.

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The world is probably changing a lot faster than most of us realizes, the US National Intelligence Councilpoints out in their report "GLOBAL TRENDS 2030: ALTERNATIVE WORLDS". The US Intelligence Council identifies four major trends - so-called mega trends - that are about to make tectonic shifts in the way we live and organizes our lives. The number one driving force is (naturally) the technology. According to the intelligence community is the common use of advanced communication technologies creating more individual power. Among the consequences is the formation of international networks consisting of powerful individuals, all working for their special causes.

"Enabled by communications technologies,power will shift toward multifaceted and amorphous networks that will form to influence state and global actions."

US National Intelligence Council

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"By 2030, no country-whether the US, China, or any other large country-will be a hegemonic power. The empowerment of individuals and diffusion of power among states and from states to informal networks will have a dramatic impact, largely reversing the historic rise of the West since 1750, restoring Asia's weight in the global economy, and ushering in a new era of "democratization" at the international and domestic level. In addition to individual empowerment and the diffusion of state power, we believe that two other mega trends will shape our world out to 2030: demographic patterns, especially rapid aging; and growing resource demands which, in the cases of food and water, might lead to scarcities," the National Intelligence Council writes.

THE MEGA TRENDS

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MEGA TREND #1: INDIVIDUAL EMPOWERMENT

"Individual empowerment will accelerate substantially during the next 15-20 years owing to poverty reduction and a huge growth of the global middle class, greater educational attainment, and better health care. The growth of the global middle class constitutes a tectonic shift: for the first time, a majority of the world's population will not be impoverished, and the middle classes will be the most important social and economic sector in the vast majority of countries around the world. Individual empowerment is the most important mega trend because it is both a cause and effect of most other trends-including the expanding global economy, rapid growth of the developing countries, and widespread exploitation of new communications and manufacturing technologies. On the one hand, we see the potential for greater individual initiative as key to solving the mounting global challenges over the next 15-20 years. On the other hand, in a tectonic shift, individuals and small groups will have greater access to lethal and disruptive technologies (particularly precision-strike capabilities, cyber instruments, and bioterror weaponry), enabling them to perpetrate large-scale violence-a capability formerly the monopoly of states."

MEGATREND #2: DIFFUSION OF POWER

"The diffusion of power among countries will have a dramatic impact by 2030. Asia will have surpassed North America and Europe combined in terms of global power, based upon GDP, population size, military spending, and technological investment. China alone will probably have the largest economy, surpassing that of the United States a few years before 2030. In a tectonic shift, the health of the global economy increasingly will be linked to how well the developing world does-more so than the traditional West. In addition to China, India, and Brazil, regional players such as Colombia, Indonesia, Nigeria, South Africa, and Turkey will become especially important to the global economy. Meanwhile, the economies of Europe, Japan, and Russia are likely to continue their slow relative declines."

"The shift in national power may be overshadowed by an even more fundamental shift in the nature of power. Enabled by communications technologies, power will shift toward multifaceted and amorphous networks that will form to influence state and global actions. Those countries with some of the strongest fundamentals-GDP, population size, etc.-will not be able to punch their weight unless they also learn to operate in networks and coalitions in a multipolar world."

Well, Facebook have already claimed a few governments….

THE TECTONIC SHIFTS

These are the highly critical changes we'll have to face - like it, or not:

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THE OUTCOME

And finally, here are the four most possible outcomes the US Intelligence Council are able to see based on the above:

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"Based upon what we know about the mega trends and the possible interactions between the mega trends and the game-changers, we have delineated four archetypal futures that represent distinct pathways for the world out to 2030. None of these alternative worlds is inevitable. In reality, the future probably will consist of elements from all the scenarios."

You can download a copy of the report here:

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During a debate at the DLD 2013 conference last week, the two internet gurus, Eugene Kaspersky (Kaspersky Labs) and Mikko Hypponen (F-Secure) made some rather disturbing comments on the development of cyber weapons. Kaspersky has said that the new cyber weapons may be "cleaner" than traditional weapons but they are "much worse". Hypponen added that what set cyber-weapons apart from traditional weapons was the fact that anyone could get their hands on one of these weapons, unlike a nuclear bomb, missiles or tanks which only armies would have access to. Both experts believe the situation is critical.

"We are not ready to limit their functionality, we cannot consume less IT, like oxygen or water."

Eugene Kaspersky

(click to enlarge)At the DLD 2013 conference, Kaspersky warned that humanity is not ready to deal with the dangers of cyber weapons and is still very vulnerable. He believes that it's just a matter of time before a serious incident happens. And, what may be even worse, anyone can get their hands on them. Kaspersky also put forward the idea limited access to certain technologies, because we simply cannot control them, He and the situation to the tragic stories of the Zeppelin and the Concorde, two technologies which were discontinued because of inherent dangers in their original constructions.

According to Mikko Hypponen are we at the moment in the "first stages of a cyber-arms race," and we are beginning to see many other countries trying to "jump on the same bandwagon" as the US and Israel, who were behind the original cyber-weapon - Stuxnet. Adding that like the nuclear scientists in a similar way lost their innocence in 1945 with the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, computer scientists lost their innocence in 2009 when Stuxnet infected a Siemens PLC device in the Natanz nuclear enrichment facility in Iran.

Both Kaspersky and Hypponen agree that the next major military engagement will involve a major cyber element, and while the battle won't be completely online, it will be a major aspect of the war.

"I think we've only seen the very beginning of these problems," Hypponen says.

Weapons of Mass Destruction - Download here!

"Attribution is one of the biggest challenges in this area - and one of the strengths for governments as they can launch a cyber-weapon]and then deny it. The difficultly of attribution is that it is very easy to leave false flags, or false leads," according to the head of F-Secure, Mikko Hypponen. Adding that what set cyber-weapons apart from traditional weapons was the fact that anyone could get their hands on one of these weapons, unlike a nuclear bomb, missiles or tanks which only armies would have access to.

The conference in Munich took place just one week after the Kaspersky Labs announced the discovery of Red October, a highly complex piece of malware which was used by the owners to spy on embassies, diplomats, scientific organizations and other government organizations for five years without being detected.

It is unclear who is behind this attack.

Kaspersky says that in his opinion there are three possible creators of the Red October software:

Read more at econoTwist's TWISTED

Kaspersky: "Humanity Not Ready To Deal With The Dangers of Cyber Weapons