I won’t be nearly the first to say it, but it’s so important. The biggest takeaway of the recent Ashton Kutcher vs CNN vs Oprah vs Shaquille O’Neal Twitter Coverage is that real-life celebrities will always best the superstars of “social media” the very moment they decide to. Kevin Rose, Guy Kawasaki, Robert Scoble and other early adopters of Twitter that spent years racking up their follower counts, blogging, asking for re-tweets and working hard to find good content are now suddenly just extras in their own movie.

The Web is a medium that is now so engrained in the fabric of our everyday lives, that it’s dangerous to treat it as its own ecosystem. It’s an enabler, not a standalone product. We now see that Twitter is a way for people to feel one step closer to knowledge, fame and entertainment they already consume. No “social media” expertise required - just like gossip, interesting content will propel itself from one person to another. It’s important to be on Twitter, not to have many followers. People will find you when the time is right.

There are no shortcuts to lasting success and Twitter certainly isn’t one either. Instead, things like passion, hard work and a good portion of old-fashioned luck seem to do the trick. Take it from Shaq.

When telling a story, it’s very important to keep the details hidden, slowly unveiling the plot lines one by one. This build-up turns a simple fact (”X happened”) into an experience for the listener (”Once upon a time…”).

All of us have been in the situation when an important call, text message or email was supposed to come in. Waiting seems to take forever and the time between getting an alert and perceiving the message unleashes a range of emotions in a second or two.

Even when nothing particular is expected, anticipation is fun. Clicking buttons of various mobile views on the iPhone I wonder what great articles got posted. Go to the AppStore to see if new cool apps are available. Click Mail to find out whether anybody tried to get in touch.

When anticipation is taken out of the process, things can get tedious, real fast. You know those red circles that appear in the iPhone app buttons to indicate incoming messages? My impulse is to “make them go away”, to clear the queue, returning my home screen to a collection of possible experiences. In fact, I don’t really want to know the outcome before I select one of them.

Anything that brings more anticipation (without a disappointing result) is a positive experience. Anticipation is the reason people like downloading and updating apps - it’s incredibly inefficient compared to Web surfing, but fun to watch. That’s why “splash” screens and fake progress bars still matter.

As we create a new generation of mobile experiences, let’s make sure we tell the story right, without rushing forward.

There are moments that make every little challenge of running a start-up worth it. Today is one of them!

I am writing this on a bus from Boston to New York City. Since I left Vancouver two weeks ago there’s never been an idle minute - always a crucial presentation to prepare, email to write or meeting to go to. I’ve barely taken pictures, which kind of sucks. Still, it’s humbling how many amazing things happened during these two weeks. Presentations of Mobify at Waterloo and MIT, meetings with old friends and amazing new ones, even an Oscar nominee sighting at a cafe (while having lunch with a Harvard professor, no less). We’re working incredibly hard, yet it’s the kind of work that brings pleasure. Every deal can be the breakthrough and that makes every morning worth waking up for.

One of many amazing moments was co-paneling with Rolf Assev, Chief Strategy Officer for Opera Software, at the ThinkMobile conference that Matt put together. Some background - I got into mobile in 2006 after being blown away by the possibilities Opera Mini offered on my shiny new Motorola L6. Three years later, I am on a panel with the person who’s been in charge of that strategy for the last decade, presenting a vision that’s shared by Opera and our team at Mobify.

Where will be in another three years? I don’t know. For sure though, we’ll have a say in defining this future. Right now though, is time to catch the sunset at Central Park…

Sometime super-early this Monday I am taking off to Toronto, then NYC. Mostly for work, though catching up with some dear old friends is definitely in order.

VanCity, I I’ll miss ya!