Werner Vogels:“Always think about the impact your words or images have.”

Fifteen years ago, in 1996, I lived as an academic in a relatively small town dominated by its big university (Cornell). E-mail and mailing lists were the main communication tools for academics. The web was mainly a one-way communication medium. I had no cell phone, and although I did have a laptop, it had no wireless network. So networked mobility was non-existent. Most social interaction took place outside of the office, but a lot of it was still at or near the university campus.

I think I am as equally social as I was before ‘social’. But the digital tools, timelines and reach have changed dramatically. I am a user of most general-purpose social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. – more active on some and more passive on others. I am also a member of several dedicated social networks around location, music, art and lifestyle and I maintain a number of blogs. One major technology one is all things distributed and a number of smaller ones are http://werner.ly and http://werner.fm.

Social Media Week is the world’s largest simultaneous Social Media event and it’s different because: it’s free, it is an international multi-city crowd-sourced event and it is concerned with the impact that social media and mobile communications are having on economy, society and culture. Toby Daniels, CEO of Crowdcentric: “SMW is one of the world’s most unique global platforms, offering a series of interconnected activities and conversations across the world on emerging trends in social and mobile media.”

SMW is hosting events in LA, Chicago, Rio, Milan, Vancouver, Berlin, Glasgow and more. In all 12 cities, many events are being streamed live to a global audience. Daniela Castrataro, co-founder and Director of Twintangibles, reflected on citizenM as a perfect match for Social Media Week: “It was the obvious choice! Not only is it the most digitally engaged hotel in Glasgow, it’s immensely stylish. SocietyM offers a perfect location for intimate events, and for visitors to the city, the location and connectivity are perfect.”

Hundreds of events will take place throughout the week, and will include major names like Nokia, BBC, Google and Mashable.

Amazon’s motto is to be the earth’s most customer-centric company. I don’t use social for business, but do help people having trouble with Amazon. I believe my openness on social networks has increased the trust people have in me.

I find social a part of my lifestyle: searching for the right channel with the right information is easier now. I have always been really good in finding moments of solitude to think and reflect, and social hasn’t impacted that.

Darwin’s survival of the fittest was not about who is the strongest, but about who is the most adaptable. Only those who are able to adapt and adopt will survive in the long run. Companies, who still claim social has not proven itself or does not work, will never be the strongest. In the same way, I cannot understand why companies do not put their customers first. Only in that way can you prosper in the long run – everything else is short-term thinking that will come back to bite you.

Continuous interaction with a much larger group of friends, acquaintances and customers in every time zone – that is what social brings me. It connects you with a broader group of people, most of them sharing the same interests. For example while I am away from Amsterdam I have a reasonably good idea of what is going on amongst friends without being closeby. It is not a substitute for being local, but it does allow you to maintain connections over distance at different timescales. Real bonding still happens in real life. I believe social is a unique experience for each and every individual, and whether some tools and techniques resonate well depend on your personal needs.

My social device is:Learn to let go of control and to enjoy riding rollercoasters as you ain’t seen nothing yet.

I need to maintain a very strict separation between personal-private and personal-public. Although I walk a fine line in pushing what I can share, at the same time I realize that there are many people who would love to take a tweet out of context and make it the basis for a newspaper article. In the early days of social, I was sharing information more freely, but since then, I have been burned several times – such as the time when a major reputable newspaper wrote an article about Amazon’s internal expansion plans based on my travel tweets.

You cannot always control what others post about you, but there is the matter of taking responsibility for your own actions as well. My network is aware of my need for control of what goes out into the general public, and takes it into account.

Richer interactions in more places and a deeper integration into our lives are the value of social, and also of the future. How new social interaction will develop is something that we have no inkling about yet. But one direction is certain – more devices, like your car, your treadmill, your sound system, will get the opportunity to be socially enhanced.

A finer-grained set of controls will slowly arrive, and new innovations in the area of security and access control will allows us to more easily share with only those we want to share with.