Next2.us provides place-based, topic-driven social network by SMS in the United States and Kenya. The solution allows users to connect together around place and common topics of interests. Text messages are automatically exchanged based on user's location, overlay of sharing circle between users and message keywords. Please see SMS Instructions Page (above) to register your mobile phone and start your Next2.us account.
If you have already registered your mobile phone you can use Next2.us mobile version to send text messages, change your settings or post content to your account http://m.next2.us
Thank you for promoting Hungry Garden and Twitter at your local farmers market. I am not surprised to hear as I have had similar experience that most farmers do not tweet -- yet. But, I am thinking maybe the problem is in trying to sell them on Twitter when there is no direct ROI (return on investment) of either time or money. As you and I both know this is really not true. And, as many farmers on Twitter like Kubileya, Rosemont Farm, Podchef can attest. There is ROI from proper use of social media. It just takes time and money and only over time could direct correlation to sale be revealed.
Nevertheless, I think a solution that will work for farmers markets and farmers must have two things;
Its got to be drop-dead simple to use
goal must be understood and measurable.
If a system addresses these two key points it has a hope of up-take by customers.
DId you know that Twitter works with SMS messaging? And, did you know that since Hungry Garden #want, #have and #discuss work with Twitter, farmers and farmer markets can USE SMS to send and receive #want #have #discuss (with another hashtag) messages with customers near to them!!!!
Lets forget telling them about twitter and ask them if they have a phone that sends and received text messages. The convenience, low cost and prevalence of inexpensive phones makes it more understandable and easier to use.
Twitter already lets you setup Twitter account using SMS so having CUSTOMERS and FARMERS and FARM MARKETS use sms to trade want/have offers is possible today.
And, by June, I hope to have a SMS short code that farmers and customers can use to directly enroll in Hungry Garden without the need for Twitter.
What I am looking for is marketing opportunities where farmers, farm markets and customers actually send SMS request and get response AND TAKE THAT STORY TO LOCAL MEDIA!
You are half way there in talking it up at the market. I think I am going to target Farmers Markets. They talk to both farmers and customers. They could benefit from encouraging communication between farmer and customer and arrange physical pick-up at the market
I have a real affinity for Chris Raines of @ITweetMeat wtih both being Penna. state boys with luv of hunting, I've learned to appreciate his thoughtful, friendly and accurate tweets. I know he is respected academic in meat processing science as such he has shown himself to be an impartial advocate for better food choices especially as it impacts processed meat and poultry products.
Therefore, I was surprised (and chagined) to learn of his experience in talking with small regional food processors about using online tools to better connect with their customers and colleagues.
"They won't do it." Chris claims.
iTweetMeat@hungrygarden
Many will refuse to do this out of fear from animal rights groups.
They're fear animal protectionist stymies their participation in online discourse and commerce.
Now Chris is smart dude and after asking him impact of explanation that they can control the privacy of their actual physical location WHILE participating in online discussions.
iTweetMeat@hungrygarden
Have tried sharing that, but they just won't bite. Scared folks.
This is the nub of the "privacy" problem we got in this country.
Without commenting on the effectiveness of animal rights groups, this is still A TECHNICAL PROBLEM in sense that really small meat processors DO NOT UNDERSTAND HOW SOCIAL MEDIA WORKS and therefore they are making it hard FOR THEIR CUSTOMERS that ARE USING SOCIAL MEDIA to find them.
Privacy raises its ugly head and stomps progress once again. I was just reminded that when you walk near someone that is listening to the radio you can ACTUALLY HEAR WHAT THEY ARE LISTENING TOO! Can you believe the amazing infringement of personal space that someone might be able to actually hear what you are hearing, at the same time, you are hearing it.
Wow, what if you actually both like what you are listening to and break into DANCE!
I know its far fetched but imagine the concerns when radio and radio waves where first invented.
Today, we still worry about privacy. And, it makes a HUGE DIRECT impact on our productivity and the types of productivity tools we will use tomorrow. If you think about it a minute; the juxtaposition of Location and Privacy, are as crucial and germaine to human engineering as silicone and circuitry.
That is a powerful statement that I believe is true. Over the weeks and months to come I am going to be exploring the issue of Privacy as it relates to advanced telecommunication services.
I hope you'll join me and participate in this discussion with ideas, thoughts for discussion, examples of companies doing privacy right and wrong. Until we figure out privacy and specifically people's impression of privacy, how it works and how it impacts their behaviour, acceptance and use of geolocation features in social media software.
The lonely tag cloud. Relegated to minor use at even the best blogs. The Folksonimy of just entering a word and there by "tagging" it's definition freed up time and did away with "structured lists" that could be used to index data so it could be quickly and easily found. What was lost in specificity was gained in ease of use.
The problem is they have become useless with larger sets of data and totally useless in a real-time firehouse like twitter. What does a tag word, in twitter case, a #hashtag really do for you.
There is a lot of people like Stowe Boyd and Chris Messina (now of Google) that have been thinking about "payloads" attached to short packets of content that then can be acted on in some manner.
I think there are some easy things like tweeting with #have #want or #discuss and another #hashtag that real users can start to use today.
For example you can go to Hungry Garden, register once, mark you location on a map and set a range in miles from your location and then login to TwitterID once. After that you can start tweet with #have #want or #discuss and once a day Hungry Garden will read and exchange your tweets and SAVE THEM to your Hungry Garden vanily url at http://dev.hungrygarden.com/user_name.
Help me test this new software by signing up, using it and telling your friends about it.
Check out Hungry Garden's listing on Onefortyfor Twitter apps. The listing has some great screen shots of the Hungry Garden software for your to review. We would appreciate it if you would use the url http://14t.me/1Lr0Kg to share a link to Hungry Garden with family or friends by Twitter or Facebook.
Hungry Garden lets you automatically exchange messages and discover new followers and neighbors based on location and privacy radius each user sets and controls using the Hungry Garden software. With Hungry Garden software YOU control your location on a Google Map; YOU control the distance in miles that Hungry Garden will share your content (from 1/4 mile to 3000 miles) with other users. If you want to discover new followers that are close to you, or only interact with your neighbors, set a small radius. Hungry Garden restricts your content to only users that have set their location within your privacy radius. Or if you want to discover more followers select a wider radius around your location to share your content. This way more users will be able to find you by your interests.
With Hungry Garden you can also hide, your location, street address or email address or all three. You have complete control over you privacy.
create account name with immediate access to all software features
Set you location on Google Map
Set you privacy/radius (to share content in circle around location)
Sign-in to your Twitter Account using the Twitter Tab Menu in Hungry Garden.
You're all set. Now return to Twitter.com or your favorite Twitter application and start your Tweets with #want, #have or #discuss AND you favorite #hashtag.
Hungry Garden will check your Twitter account once a day, and;
Read and SAVE tweets that start with #have, #want or #discuss to your Hungry Garden Map.
Match tweets with other users based on keyword, location and privacy/radius.
Exchange tweets automatically with other users that match your message. Messages are sent to your @twitterID.
Hungry Garden hashtags #want(a), #have(b) and discuss(c) work with each other AND any other hashtag. The matching logic is as follows
a = b (#want matches with #have)
b = a (#have matches with #want)
c = c (#discuss matches with #discuss)
Remember Hungry Garden #hashtags #want, #have and #discuss WORK WITH ANY OTHER HASHTAG. To match the first and second hashtag have to match (per above). For example #want #bike matches with #have #bike and #discuss #tennis matches with #discuss #tennis. You can include descriptive text after the hashtags. The full message with be exchanged between users when match is made.
