Auto manufacturer Toyota recently announced its new series of six mobile videos to help promote the new Camry. The campaign will target 20 and 30-year olds and is believed to be one of the first branded entertainment series specifically created for mobile devices.

The mobisodes aren't just a television spot converted for the small screen -- they include self-contained, miniature stories designed for entertainment value. Of course, the product is prominently featured in the episodes, but Toyota also understands the power in bringing its products to life through engaging stories that resonate. (Disclosure: Toyota is a GH client)

Mobile marketing is truly "brand-in-hand" communications and holds amazing potential for public relations. The US is still playing catch-up in the wireless marketing space compared to Europe and Asia, though the gap is closing fast. While SMS (text messaging) campaigns are now common in many marketing programs, rich media campaigns delivering full motion video to wireless devices are beginning to take hold in the US, too.

As traditional media consumption continues to decline, savvy marketers will increasingly look to wireless and on demand channels to share their stories directly with audiences. To succeed in this arena, branded messages must be compelling enough so that the intended target makes the decision to watch or listen to it.

What's different about mobile and wireless marketing from e-mail and other electronic communications channels is that (for now) it's entirely permission-based. That's right: the audience you intend to reach must permit you to communicate with them.

The implication for PR practitioners using wireless communications is clear: your message must be appealing and creatively presented, or your audience won't agree to watch or listen to it.

Our job as professional communicators has always been rooted in storytelling.

And storytelling is an art that will grow in importance over the next 50 years as the consumer maintains more control of the messages he or she receives.

Whatever happened to the service economy and the Age of Customer Service? It has occurred to me that the Internet and the steady advance of technology have diminished, rather than improved, those core attributes that can truly distinguish a company from its competition. Al Golin, in his book Trust or Consequences, has said the danger of high technology is that it causes us to forget "high touch," or the personalization of service.

I'll use a high-end appliance manufacturer headquartered in the South as an example. We called to report that our refrigerator was overheating because of a faulty light switch. Five months later, this expensive built-in device remained broken and without lights because our appliance maker, incredibly enough, had no replacement switch to remedy the problem - on what it characterized as a "lifetime" appliance. When I called the company's customer service department to complain about the long delay, they couldn't find any prior record of our contact on this problem and said their computer records could not cross-reference or search in ways that are standard today in all companies. The woman who took my call was congenial and most embarrassed. So was I - for this appliance maker.

We are being reduced to numbers - with our genetic coding, blood type, health, financial records, credit history, employment records, personal habits, birth record, Internet viewing habits, purchasing preferences and so much more being collected, catalogued and archived in preparation for a digitial chip or device that some will carry with them in the future. Yet with all this information now readily available and "Googlized," we have failed to advance the art of serving those who matter most - you and I as customers. There is scant follow-up to customer complaints, problems are difficult to resolve, and no one, save the customer, seems concerned if communication is delayed or incomplete.

This "de-personalization" of the great brands we've known will ultimately be the undoing of companies as consumers, whose ranks increasingly are swelling with a new generation of men and women more discriminating in their choice and loyalty, turn from merchants who are indifferent and undifferentiated in their customer service ethic.

What is the answer? The answer comes in the form of a question I heard from a brand manager with a global credit card company: "How do we get our telemarketing people to better live the values of our brand?" In today's world, those companies that create alignment among their front-line managers and employees with their business strategies and customer service ethic, will win greater allegiance among their customers and prospects.

We are entering a new era for what those of us who lead employee communications know as internal branding. In sum, internal branding is the process of aligning and mobilizing employees to deliver on the promise of what a brand represents externally. Internal branding was first popularized five years ago, dimmed in relevance and now has returned as a new generation of leaders and managers realize that "high touch" can only happen through the men and women who truly live the brand.

Lots of companies are talking about innovation and some are actually doing something about it.

In July, as reported in BusinessWeek, IBM hosted an Innovation Jam with 100,000 customers, consultants and employees. A couple of 72-hour, online brainstorming sessions focused on finding new technology ideas that the company could convert into business builders. All people had to do was log and add their thoughts to an endless stream of suggestions in the areas of transportation, health, the environment and commerce.

A month later, the most promising concepts will be posted on the site and everyone will be invited back to pick the best ones. CEO Sam Palmisano has promised to invest $100 million to develop the winners.

This is such a good idea that certainly other companies will copy it. Maybe they won’t have the sophisticated infrastructure to manage such a massive event, but the technology doesn’t really matter. The beauty of the program is that it actively engages employees in the company’s mission.

After all is said and done, even if IBM doesn’t have a single idea worth pursuing (I bet it will) the effort will be a success because it will have demonstrated to its workforce that it is serious about innovation and that everyone can participate.

In the future, the companies that are best able to harness the ideas and passion of their employees will be the ones that drive innovation. It is rarely senior management that develops the big ideas. Their job is to find foster an environment that allows others to. And with today’s technology that is easier than emptying a Suggestion Box.

I still remember the day in 1999 that Dayton Hudson made a fateful decision to stop making Frango mints in the windowed kitchens of its historic Marshall Field's State Street store in Chicago, choosing to outsource production of the mints to a Pennsylvania confectioner that could make the candy more cheaply. The decision resulted in the layoff of 150 workers, many of them women who had toiled in the legendary Field's kitchens their entire career. The resulting news coverage criticized Dayton Hudson, and the decision brought a stinging public rebuke from Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, who had taken a keen interest in nurturing and growing the confectionery sector in the city.

Often, we seize upon icons that define what a great brand means to us - its dimensions, its "feel," the memories a brand evokes, the experiences we have with a brand as consumers. Where Dayton Hudson stumbled as owner of Marshall Field's, the new owner of the Marshall Field's chain, Federated Department Stores, recently took the very icon of the retailer - Frango mints - and turned a former public relations debacle to its advantage in announcing its plans for the new Macy's store on State Street.

Chicago has ruminated for months now over Federated's plans to convert the Marshall Field's chain to its Macy's brand. More than 60,000 people signed an online petition in an effort to preserve the Marshall Field's name - to no avail. If not for the foresight of Federated CEO Terry Lundgren, the wrangling over the name change would have continued. Lundgren knows shoppers and retailing. In a recent piece on Federated, The New York Times reported that Lundgren understands that consumers care more about symbols and traditions than they care about the names behind them. So when he spoke to a Chicago audience recently, he defused some tensions by announcing that major investments will be made to retain and restore historic traditions and features of the State Street store. And he closed his remarks by announcing that Macy's would begin manufacturing Frango-mint-flavored cheesecakes in Chicago. The following day, his announcement dominated local headlines. The little mint that could thus returned as an important symbol of respect and tradition, linking Marshall Field's to the new Macy's.

I came to know the late Stanley Marcus, the legendary retailer of Neiman-Marcus fame, in the 1980s during my years in Dallas. I had the pleasure of writing speeches for him and working with him to document an oral history of Neiman-Marcus, during which time he told me that great retailers "walk the floors" of their stores and truly understand their associates and their customers. "Consumers are statistics," he once said. "Customers are people." A younger Terry Lundgren led Neiman-Marcus at an earlier time in his career, when Stanley Marcus was chairman emeritus, and he learned well the lessons of building a great brand.

The real challenge for Federated and Lundgren will be how the company proceeds in mobilizing its employees to live the new Macy's brand as it renames several venerable retail chains representing more than 400 stores in 11 regional chains. That challenge of aligning the external brand of the company with the internal brand - the Insidedge concept of creating "One Voice, One Look" - will be formidable. More than a decade of work with leading multinational corporations has taught our consulting team that mergers often fail because companies are unsuccessful in melding together disparate cultures and in communicating how the new organization will benefit employees and the customers they serve. Through their words and actions, CEOs take center stage in determining how their organization will meet the challenges that come with change.

Companies today grapple with a host of issues - downsizing and right-sizing; offshoring jobs in world markets; adopting new organizational models; paring compensation and benefits programs; globalizing in distinct new cultural markets; wrestling with the constraints of today’s ethical and corporate governance standards; diversifying employee populations to meet societal and customer expectations; adopting new performance standards that challenge historic employee covenants; marshaling employees to “live the brand” with the attending priorities of customer service and corporate social responsibility, to name several that spring to mind. Given these challenges, is it any wonder that 60 percent of Fortune 500 CEOs enjoy a tenure of less than six years?

Great leaders know the importance of creating a clear business strategy and compelling message platform to bring employees together to drive a new corporate culture for the purpose of establishing shared beliefs, shared values and a commitment to new performance standards. Newspaper morgues and Internet archives are littered with example after example of spoiled mergers and transformation efforts resulting from a failure to learn these lessons. In many cases, those who led these unsuccessful efforts have fallen and their legacies have been tarnished.

Time will tell how Macy's fares in its transformation. I recently visited a new Macy's outlet to buy a shirt, and the transaction required the use of two different credit processing systems - one for the former Marshall Field's, the other for Macy's - to complete my purchase. I asked the salesperson when the systems would converge to make the purchase process simpler, and he didn't know. "We're waiting to be told," he responded. "We want to make the buying process easier for our customers."

So it goes.

On this day of remembrance for our nation, I've been struck with how we as a society now commemorate major events in America's history.

I won't address the topics of terrorism, the politics of our government's prosecution of the "War on Terror" nor will I share my personal memories of 9/11 here. There are many better places to look both online and off for dialogue on these topics.

Instead, I'd like to explore – just briefly – how we as a society are remembering 9/11 from a communicator's perspective, and examine how new media channels and technologies are changing the way we look back, as well as forward.

In the years following major milestones in our country's history – be it the bombing of Pearl Harbor, the assassination of JFK, or the landing on the moon—we’ve traditionally looked back and commemorated these events by sharing our personal experiences with one another (largely verbally and in person), and by replaying the public records of these events, primarily the stories which dominated the popular media channels of the day.

Do you remember the early days of space exploration through the skillful reporting of Walter Cronkite?

Or the well-known footage of the President's motorcade that fateful day in Dallas in 1963?

Or the newspaper headlines of December 8, 1941?

When I compare the way we've historically looked back at major milestones with how we're remembering 9/11 today, I see significant changes being fueled by the new ways we're sharing information and communicating as a society.

The Internet and digital communications channels have made our collective memory of watershed events more vivid and more long-lasting.

Mainstream media now makes it easy for citizen to relive events. CNN offered a full day of its 9/11 broadcast feeds to online subscribers of its Web-based video channel “Pipeline” today. Users can logon and watch minute-by-minute as the events unfolded 5 years ago from their desktops.

Consumers are playing a more active role in remembering, too. Indeed, many of the most riveting images and videos we recall from that fateful day in September came from citizen journalists—the real people who found themselves thrust into one of the most significant world events of a generation. Armed with portable video cameras and photo-enabled mobile phones, those on the ground helped form our collective consciousness. And, of course, the then-nascent bloggers found themselves sharing their experiences from Ground Zero with a worldwide audience through the click of a mouse.

The speed and ease by which historical events can be shared and relived is amazing. Truly, the Internet has transformed the way we remember into a sort of “digital consciousness” stored on hard drives, web sites, blogs and photostreams which will live in perpetuity.

For professional communicators who manage the reputations of organizations, this societal memory has far-reaching implications, too. Companies who find themselves in the midst of scandalous events – be it accounting irregularities, products malfunctions, etc. – find it harder than ever to move beyond missteps and erase the collective memory of society in today’s digitized world.

Our founder, Al Golin, talks a lot about trust. In the future, it will be increasingly important for companies to consistently build trust with constituents through honest dealings and socially-responsible business practices. In our digitized world, past sins may be forgiven but they’ll never be forgotten.

So too will we never forget the horrible events of 9/11/01. They’re only a click away and embedded into our “digital consciousness”.

Well, well, well...sometimes validation comes from the strangest places. Maybe I've just been watching the PR flack's "Director's Cut" of the classic flick, Miracle on 34th Street, where in a fit of charity and bonhomie Macy's starts sending customers to Gimbels, but I was gratified to read that Fleishman-Hilliard just recently stumbled upon an insight that GolinHarris discovered, documented and has been tracking for four years now, since 2003:

When it comes to business earning its stripes as a good corporate citizen, Americans believe that the litmus test and job #1 is how a business values and treats its employees!

Preposterous you say? Well, if you don't take my word for it, then take Fleishman-Hilliard’s and the National Consumers' League, as reported by the Grey Lady herself in a business story slugged, “Corporate Conscience Survey Says Workers Should Come First,” (NYT, 31 May 2006).

Here's the wood: "Far more American consumers consider the way companies treat their employees a good indicator of their social conscience than their philanthropy.”

Isn’t that interesting.

GolinHarris' annual "Doing Well by Doing Good" corporate citizenship survey discovered way back in 2003 that "how a business values and treats its employees" is one of the top two drivers of corporate citizenship, right up there with "ethical, honest, transparent and accountable executives and business practices," so sayeth nearly two-thirds of Americans.

More importantly, "how a business values and treats its employees" is no random blip on the corporate citizenship radar screen, a reputational UFO of little consequence to the traffic controllers of corporate social responsibility, charitable giving, strategic philanthropy, cause marketing, community relations, issues management and SarOx compliance.

Quite the contrary: The trend is significant, stable and sobering.

The chart below is a trend analysis from all four GolinHarris "Doing Well by Doing Good" corporate citizenship surveys...including a sneak peak at our just completed and - ssshh - not yet released 2006 study.

"Values and Treats Employees Well and Fairly"

2006 (5,000 Americans)

Importance: 69% - Rank: 1 of 12 corporate citizenship drivers

Excellent/Good Brand Performance (150 brand average): 48% - Gap: -21%

2005 (3,500 Americans)

Importance: 66% - Rank: 1 of 12 corporate citizenship drivers

Excellent/Good Brand Performance (108 brand average): 51% - Gap: -15%

2004 (1,000 Americans)

Importance: 64% - Rank: 2 of 12 corporate citizenship drivers

Excellent/Good Brand Performance (75 brand average): 52% - Gap: -12%

2003 (500 Americans)

Importance: 61% - Rank: 2 of 12 corporate citizenship drivers

Excellent/Good Brand Performance (30 brand average): 54% - Gap: -07%

Gee, think there’s a pattern here?

Not only is "values and treats employees well and fairly" consistently at the top of heap in importance, but Americans perceive business performance as anemic. . .and weakening year to year!

And if I were a betting boy, I'd double-down on "values and treats employees well and fairly" continuing its upward trajectory as more and more businesses begin to rethink, rework and retreat from the "Social Contract" that - arguably - has been the engine of American economic prosperity since World War II.

I know it sounds counter intuitive to place "values and treats employees well and fairly" to high in the Maslovian corporate citizenship hierarchy of needs because we’re conditioned to think in artificial boxes and silos of “charitable giving,” “strategic philanthropy,” “community relations,” “issue management” “EHS/sustainability,” “corporate social responsibility” and “cause marketing” -- not the holistic and integrated character of the brand’s reputation, value proposition, and stakeholder relationships that GolinHarris advocates.

That's why in this year's corporate citizenship survey we decided to push the issue front and center. We asked all 5,000 Americans if they agreed or disagreed with the following statement, allowing them to position themselves on a 10 point scale of "Very Strongly Agree" to "Very Strongly Disagree."

"A company's relationship with its employees is fundamental to a company's corporate citizenship.

Agree 73%

Strongly Agree 42%

More Agree than Disagree 30%

Mixed 22%

Disagree 05%

More Disagree than Agree 03%

More Agree than Disagree 02%

So, as we think about the Next 50 Years of Public Relations, let's not accept the old "RCA Victor" dog look that 9 out of 10 of our clients give us when they eyeball "treats employees well and fairly" high priority topic for discussion developing in corporate citizenship strategies.

(Perhaps some of you are old farts like me and can remember the venerable RCA Victor logo of the dog tilting its head in befuddlement upon hearing his master's voice bellowing from the victrola's horn).

But then, I'm just the numbers guy, pledged to confuse and confound through obfuscation and obtuseness through the fine art of lies, damn lies and statistics.

What say ye PR practitioners, professionals and pundits?

Did Fleishman-Hilliard award GolinHarris a supreme compliment and prove that old saw, "imitation is the greatest form of flattery" in concluding "far more American consumers consider the way companies treat their employees a good indicator of their social conscience than their philanthropy," or do we both have our statistical heads stuck way up in that place where the sun don't shine?

The line between mainstream media and consumer generated news is about to become more blurred.

The New York Times reports that beginning tomorrow, both Reuters and Yahoo will begin a renewed push to solicit and integrate reader submitted content into their news products both online and off.

CNN and other major news organizations have already been romancing their audiences to play a contributing role in news reporting through products like CNN Exchange, in which citizens all over the world who witness newsworthy events can upload photos and video to help tell more balanced, authentic stories.

What's unique about these new offerings is that consumers who submit content and serve as defacto journalists can actually benefit financially from their efforts (albeit it in a small way at first). Reuters will pay consumer journalists when their photos or videos are syndicated to Reuters clients.

With incentives in place, it's safe to assume more "casual journalists" will get involved in shaping the news we consume every day.

Companies and brands who have the most loyal followings have the best chance to benefit from this new model of news reporting. Imagine a mainstream article about the launch of a new car being supported by consumer-submitted video showing a happy customer driving off in their new wheels talking about the great buying experience and love of the new model.

And with all individuals being potential journalists, companies will need to focus harder in the future to ensure better customer service and consistently satisfying experiences. One consumer with a bad experience and a mobile phone has access to a global audience with unimaginable ease. Small slip-ups can have a huge impact.

As communicators, we'll need to stay on our toes to identify opportunities for encouraging our clients' loyalists to tell their own positive stories and to stay watchful for potentially damaging stories contributed by individuals.

Our jobs in PR are about to get a lot more interesting.

In another example of information going portable and on demand, auto giant Ford Motor Company announced today that it will begin offering Microsoft's mobile data system in its cars beginning early next year.

Just when you thought a multitasking driver clutching a Blackberry was all you could handle... (Full disclosure: guilty, your honor.)

The new system, called "Sync" will let motorists download information to car-based and mobile computing devices including music, email, real-time traffic data and more.

Think of it as a lightweight mobile internet access point built right into your car with extreme ease of use, similar to some of today's hands-free bluetooth audio systems for mobile phones. It reportedly creates a mini wireless network for digital devices to talk to each other inside your car.

If it's simple enough to use, mobile data systems in-car could make it big. Imagine downloading new albums or time-shifted radio shows on demand to your car stereo on a long road trip. Or (eventually) grabbing the latest Disney animated flick for the kids to watch in the back seat. Or even hunting down the cheapest gas prices nearest to your location.

Once these new mobile pipelines to audiences are installed and operational, we can bet that marketers will soon follow. The next time you drive by your local Taco Bell, you could be hit with an instant mobile message offering discounts off products along with a gentle reminder that it's lunch time (and that their products are, above all, safe to eat).

As always, it's up to us to figure out creative uses for new technology that add value to consumers. If marketers push too hard or too fast with these new channels without adding something audiences want or need, technologies like this might die on the vine before they ripen. The best applications of this new potential access to audiences will see companies provide a valuable service to consumers -- not just unwanted, pushed marketing messages. They have to be tailored to individual interests and needs.

Years ago, many wrote that email would fundementally change direct marketing. And in some ways, it did. But ever since email hit the mainstream, over-zealous marketers stumbled over themselves to bastardize it without adding value. They sold consumer lists for unsolicited email to spammers far and wide, starting "phishing" for bank account information illegally, and partially detroyed email marketing's potential as an effective marketing communications channel.

Still, it's an exciting time when new technologies like this continue to make information -- and those we try to reach with it -- more and more accessible.

As we keep a close eye on the devices, technologies and channels consumers use to get information and entertainment, today's announcements by Apple, Inc. should help give us a better indication of how audiences might get information in the future.

It's all about convergence.

Today, Steve Jobs -- the pop culture icon credited with ushering in the personal computer revolution and bringing portable media to the masses (via the iPod), announced a handful of new products aimed at making it easier for consumers to make information portable and shared between the devices at their fingertips.

While not entirely unexpected, Apple's big announcement today centered around the iPhone -- a handsome all-in-one device that melds together the ease of use of the iPod, with a high resolution screen, a quad-band mobile phone, and the ability to get email, download and listen to music, movies, television shows, take pictures and surf the Web. All from a slim micro-device that syncs up to your PC or Mac and shares information seamlessly. This isn't the ROKR -- quite clearly, a bungled rushed-to-market iPod/phone MESS developed with Motorola in years past. It's a full-fledged Apple device, running their UNIX-based OS X operating system and completely controlled by a novel new touchscreen system called Multi-touch that lets you navigate everything on the device with your fingers. No keyboard. No stylus. All interaction is dictated by the software and based on how you need to input data. Elegant and easy.

Great-- yet another gadget to buy. But if history is an indicator, this device might mark the beginning of an even bigger shift for the masses. The mobile component of a fully-integrated digital lifestyle.

The second piece of this converged media puzzle discussed today was Apple's new set-top-box device, dubbed Apple TV. The idea is simple: a hard-drive based, wirelessly-networked box that connects to America's big screen televisions and makes all your media available (from up to 5 computers on your home network) in your living room. That's right -- the place where we now watch local news and interest-specific cable shows.

The third piece of the puzzle, Apple's already had in existence: the personal computer. It's the piece that goes with you to the office, adorns your den, and helps manage your personal and professional lives. It now stores your photos, holds your entire digital music library, downloads time-shifted newscasts in the form of audio and video podcasts, and even lets you grab full-length motion pictures.

All these pieces will now work together, fairly seamlessly. As with all new technologies, widespread adoption is largely a function of ease of use. And Apple's hallmark is taking complex technologies and making them user-friendly.

The big shift here is that the control and flow of information is entirely in the consumers' hands. You download a new album from U2 or a video podcast from Disneyland, and it's automatically available to view on your PC, your iPod or iPhone, and now your television with Apple TV. You choose what, when, where and how to consume the information.

The gatekeeper of this information becomes Apple. Make no mistake about it -- they're a media company now, not a computer manufacturer (which explains why they've officially changed their name to Apple, Inc., from Apple Computer). Consumers who purchase these interconnected devices will get their information directly from the source, so Apple's control over what people see will grow exponentially.

These new technologies have a number of implications for those of us who are tasked with telling our clients' stories ... A few considerations:

1.) Traditional media relations isn't dead. In fact, it may see an uptick in importance. How many times have you made it home from work too late to see NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams? Now, just subscribe to NBC News' video podcasts and you can watch it when you want. On the train, in your living room, on your laptop. It doesn't matter. Placements in these trusted, mainstream media channels which increasingly make their content available on demand will gain importance in the future.

2.) We need to build relationships with the content distributors, like Apple. A few years ago, we were calling on their iTunes managers to discuss how to build visibility for clients' podcasts in the iTunes Music Store. As Apple and other information distributors play a bigger role in deciding what you can choose to see on your devices, we communicators need to be able to work closely with these distributors to get our clients' messages out through their digital pipelines.

3.) We must remain dedicated to creative storytelling. In addition to content providers selected by distributors, most of these new media technologies allow consumers to get information directly from 3rd party sources. iTunes, for example, let's anyone with an audio or video podcast submit it to their directory for potential consumption by consumers. But only the best, most creative, most valuable content gets regularly downloaded and enjoyed.

As I bang out this blog entry on my Macbook, I'm excited about what the future might hold for converged media. Today's announcements marked another big step.

Now if only I can figure out how to convince my wife to spring for these new devices.

Are you twittering yet?

If not, this Sunday's premiere of "Drive" on FOX might be a reason to give it a look.

What's Twitter, you may ask? It's a way to share quick thoughts with a global audience through your cell phone, mobile device or instant messaging application. Think of it as blogging, only with much smaller entries. Users typically Twitter where they're at at any given time, what they're doing, or commentary on something they're thinking about at that particular moment.

While Twitter may not be for everyone (who needs to know that I'm standing in the grocery aisle at this moment looking at baby food?), it's definitely capturing attention. The technology just won the SxSW WebAward at the popular South by Southwest convention in Austin. It's another example of how open consumers are to sharing their thoughts and ideas with the masses, and their desire to self-publish anywhere, any time.

Want to see a sample Twitter page and entries? Click here to check out Robert Scoble's Twitter page (Scoble is a technology evangelist, and was one of Microsoft's first bloggers.)

Marketers are already figuring out how to apply it in their craft. When "Drive" premieres on FOX this Sunday, viewers will be able to follow along with Director Greg Yaitanes' commentary posted via Twitter during the show's first airing. Think of it as your companion guide to the show delivered to your mobile phone. Pretty handy for TV buffs. If you want to join in the fun this weekend, just text "FOLLOW FOXDRIVE" to 40404 from your wireless device.

As technology companies continue to figure out ways for devices to work together, look for more simple self-publishing tools to materialize. While Twitter is only text, one can assume an easy-to-use successor with video can't be far behind. Our own personal "Truman Show".

Worth a look.

Like many people in the communications field, I'm a news junky. I'll take information wherever and whenever I can get it. Cable networks, a few printed newspapers, talk radio, select magazines, and Web-based sources are all part of my daily intake.

The Internet is easily the most important single source in my mix today -- and I'm not alone. In a previous post I referenced a recent survey indicating half of Americans now view the Web as the can't-live-without information channel. And while we still have much to learn, communicators have made big strides in the past few years adapting to changing modes of news gathering and improving our storytelling techniques online.

As we continue focusing energy and resources on Web-based channels, it's important not to miss the next opportunity. There's another revolution underway that's likely to stir up the marketing mix all over again: the move to wireless devices for news.

So far, getting answers on a mobile device has been clumsy, at best. Text-driven pages, slow load times and limited news content. But things are changing, fast.

First, the gadgets are improving significantly. Apple's iPhone, for example, has the processing power, user interface, and connectivity for a news gathering experience that rivals PC use. The device already holds a 71 percent marketshare for US mobile browser use, besting mobile Web offerings from Microsoft and Palm that have been around much longer. Clearly, there's an appetite for information seeking on mobile platforms and some of the hungriest news seekers are flocking to drastically improved devices which enrich the experience.

Second, mobile software and content is more readily available, with major media companies creating better offerings for wireless devices.

Today at CTIA (a wireless industry convention), Yahoo! unveiled a slick new application for wireless platforms called "OneSearch" allowing you to verbally submit any search query through a Blackberry (or other supported smartphone) and get nearly instant results pushed directly to your wireless handset. (Disclosure: Yahoo! is a GH client)

I asked, "What's the Chicago Cubs score?" and Yahoo instantly served up the dismal news of another loss on my BB Curve.

Advances like this will make consumers think twice about powering up a PC for news gathering at home or on the go. Increasingly, eyeballs will move from computer screens to wireless devices for basic news and communication.

Time for PR to expand its focus again. The battle for for wireless consumers is heating up and practitioners who become conversant in mobile content delivery will become increasingly valued in the future.

My wife often tells me I talk too much.

She jokes about my constant phone calls, texting, emailing, instant messaging, video chatting, etc., to communicate with friends, family and colleagues. Even during "down time" in the evenings long after our son has gone to bed, I'm catching up with others from coast to coast.

"Shut down, already, honey!" she frequently asks.

I've always been the kind of guy who loves good conversation, and technology has only made it easier. The only problem is, I now find myself wasting precious time "syncing up" my digital life across multiple properties to share similar information with different groups of people.

If I upload a terrific photo of my son to Facebook, a good portion of my family won't see it because they aren't signed up. And if I email that photo just to family members, close friends might miss it.

As digital communications tools and properties have evolved, they've done so largely "disconnected" from one another. The information you share online usually doesn't move across all your personal online touch points, as you create it. Basic syndication goodies like RSS have helped, but it's only been a rudimentary first step.

This week ends with some encouraging news. MySpace and Facebook have each announced new initiatives to help make the information you post on their properties more portable, and more easily shared across the many tools and channels which represent you online.

Yesterday, Myspace shared news of its wide embrace of data portability and special deals with Yahoo!, eBay, and Twitter to help make digital omnipresence a bit more possible.

And today, Facebook followed suit, announcing "Facebook Connect", a set of tools, enhancements and standards which will allow consumers to share their identity, content, friends and privacy preferences with other 3rd party Web properties.

This is a big deal for professional communicators for a couple reasons:

1.) It's removing another barrier from posting content, sharing ideas and exchanging information online. I have plenty of friends who have shied away from social communications tools because they think of them as too rigid with limited reach. That's beginning to change. Expect advances like these to stimulate even more digital dialogue by the masses, not just the "geek" crowd.

2.) The voices of individuals gain even more potential to build brands or tear them down. If you've had a bad experience at a restaurant and share it on your social networking page, data portability might also allow your quip to appear as a restaurant review on Yahoo! Local (if you permit it). The same goes for raves. Word of mouth can travel farther, and even faster than it does today!

I'm excited by the convenience and time savings these advances may bring. Who knows? With all this extra free time, maybe I'll be able to heed my wife's call to disconnect some night soon.