October 2008
links for 2008-10-31
Time to Leave the Laptop Behind - WSJ.com “roughly 52% of respondents to the In-Stat survey said they could envision using a smart phone in the future as their sole computing device, provided handset companies make improvements like better keyboards, expandable screens and applications that work as well as they do on PCs.” (tags: mobile iphone mobility in-stat survey)
Gmail ...
EventBox
I want to like EventBox — a desktop client to collect all the streams of my life — but I can’t.
EventBox, originally uploaded by Stowe Boyd.
It does aggregate Twitter and Flickr (although I couldn’t get the Flickr login to work). Nice so far. But it won’t import my existing Google Reader RSS feeds or an OPML file.
Second, it’s too boxy and there is too...
Social Network Subscription At Dopplr
Marko Ahtisaari at Dooplr pinged me this morning, and asked me to look at something they are calling Social Network Subscription. Instead of a one time import of your contacts from other services, Dopplr can now subscribe to other services, polling them on a regular basis for contacts who have joined Dopplr.
[from Keep your network up to date using Facebook, Flickr or GMail by Matt ...
links for 2008-10-30
econalypse - Google Search “Econalypse” is the term that Kara Swisher and company at WSJ are using for the financial meltdown. (tags: word+of+the+moment)
Workspaces & LinkedIn ~ About ~ Huddle Huddle announces its integration with Linkedin. You can add an application to your Linkedin account and immediately begin collaborating with your Linkedin contacts. (tags: huddle...
Gmail Appointment Reminder
I complained earlier today about the new Gmail Gcal gadget not having a delete capability, so I need to counter that with a feature I just stumbled upon. There is a reminder capability built in. This is what appeared in the bottom right of my Gmail window, reminding me about an upcoming call:
Gmail appointment reminder, originally uploaded by Stowe Boyd.
Nice!
What I Am Up To
I have been in a swirl for weeks, it seems, and while I have had time to reflect on various topics — the subject of the various talks I have given at Shift (Lisbon) and Web 2.0 Expo (Berlin) in the past weeks, and the upcoming presentations at Defrag (Denver) and BlueKiwi Partners Conference (Paris) — I haven’t really taken much time to muse publicly on what it is that I am...
Gmail/Gcal Bug: No Delete?
I found an annoying glitch in the newly announced Gcal gadget in Gmail (see Google Adds Gadgetry To Gmail). When you select a Gcal appointment from the gadget embedded in Gmail, there is no means to delete the appointment.
Gmail/Gcal Bug, originally uploaded by Stowe Boyd.
Above, you see the window that opens when you select ‘more options’ in the Gmail gadget for a specific...
Google Adds Gadgetry To Gmail
I actually stumbled across the new gadgets in Gmail yesterday inside my Gmail settings, not by reading the Official Gmail Blog.
[from Official Gmail Blog: New in Labs: Calendar and Docs gadgets by Dan Pupius]
[…] we’ve worked with the engineers from the Calendar and Docs teams on two highly requested features: a simple way to see your Google Calendar agenda and get an alert when...
YouAre: Yet Another Twitter Clone
I got an email informing me that YouAre — yet another Twitter clone — is opening its doors, and that I could get an account. I signed up, and candidly saw no reason to fool with the app. Just another knock off of Twitter.
Digging into the blog there, I discovered that the founders have coined a term for this class of tools: Dayflow.
[from Social Networks: The “Dayflow” Era...
links for 2008-10-27
Stowe Boyd and “WE”
Video interview in Berlin by Ulrike Rheinhard about social tools and their impact
(tags: we+magazine interview stowe+boyd social+tools)
Flows All Over: Friendfeed, Flickr, Slideshare,...
I am having a hard time keeping up with the explosion of flow apps, or new views in existing services that are pure flow.
I noticed today that Slideshare.net presents a flow panel at the topmost level. I don’t know how long it has been there but it feels new: SlideShare Flow, originally uploaded by Stowe Boyd.
I had stopped using Friendfeed a few months ago, because I didn’t...
10 tags
Better Social Plumbing For The Social Web
My recent talk from the Web 2.0 Expo in Berlin, which I retitled “Better Social Plumbing For The Social Web” instead of ‘Better Media Plumbing…”. I include the notes that I prepared, with minor tweaks.
My topic is not new — in the sense that I started writing about it a year ago. But I think it is of growing importance.
The basic premises that underlie...
links for 2008-10-24
russell davies: patina Russell Davies opines that sites that feel used — have a patina — suggest that the underlying design is informed by the passage of millions of mouseclicks, not just a top-down design. (tags: patina soul design web+design)
Web 2.0 Expo Berlin
The Web 2.0 Expo in Berlin is done. The crews have dismantled the booths (perhaps a bit hastily, since the conference was still officially open), the last after party is done, and people are leaving town.
This year was much better than last: much better venue, and in a more interesting part of Berlin. I didn’t wind up attending very many sessions — because of meetings, telcons,...
links for 2008-10-20
Where’s the Money In Casual Web Game Development? - GigaOM “Most web-based games are still being made by enthusiasts; their investments aren’t money, but time. Mochi Media CEO Jameson Hsu tells me that most games, and some of the best ones out there, are made by a single hobbyist, working less than full-time over a course of about four months. So if you assume a base pay of about ...
links for 2008-10-19
Online Fandom » Fan Labor: Exploitation or Empowerment? <blockquote>There is a critique of Web 2.0 that argues it is based on free labor done by users from which others profit. We argue that this critique has some merit, but undervalues the rewards fans get from doing this kind of work. We identify the costs fan laborers pay and the rewards they receive. In the end, the tension...
Twitternomics: How Will Twitter Make Money, Not...
I don’t think that Fred Wilson’s comment about Twitter’s future revenue potential was that stupid. He was quoted saying
It’s like the stupidest question in the world: How’s Twitter going to make money. It’s like ‘How was Google going to make money? Eventually Google was going to make money and they figured out how to do it and they figured out a...
Pukka: A Bookmarklet For Multiple Delicious...
I have a problem: I use multiple Delicious accounts, because I want to accumulate bookmarks for different blogs — /Message, /Ground, and /Mind — and have automatic posts generated everyday for these three blogs. However, Delicious does not support logging into different accounts, so when I first started with multiple accounts I would constantly have to log out of one and log in to...
Life & Death - The Web 2.0 & Voice 2.0 Continuum
I have been unwell, so not as feisty as usual. I didn’t rise to the bait when Michael Arrington decided that Web 2.0 is dead because of some vacation Video that Dave Morin and other glitterati created on a recent trip to the Mediterranean. But then Arrington turned his back on the term years ago, even though he was one of the founders of the Web 2.0 Working Group. He’s starting to...
A Social Interaction Design Primer
guest post by Adrian Chan
Current business conditions are unforgiving, and seem to be taking their toll on the social media industry, whether it’s in the mood on Sand Hill, in the decline of online advertising, or even in the prognosis for Web 2.0 at large. I penned a reflective piece yesterday in which I suggested that companies in this space do more to enhance the user experience, or...
Darwin Days Are Here Again, Or, The Lead Balloon
guest post by Adrian Chan
In this Mother of all Meltdowns, tech talk is bound to turn to matters of survival and endurance. While the market may have let out a sigh of relief today, fundamentals are grim all around. A world-wide economic contraction is under way, and any pause in the financial market’s panic is likely to be only fleeting.
But as I like to say, mother is the necessity...
links for 2008-10-13
NewsTrust.net - Blog: NewsTrust Founder Fabrice Florin named Ashoka Fellow Florin named an Ashoka Fellow: well-deserved, although I think NewsTrust is designed in a backwards way (tags: ashoka fabrice+florin newstrust)
Mainstream News Outlets Start Linking to Other Sites - NYTimes.com <blockquote>Embracing the hyperlink ethos of the Web to a degree not seen before, news organizations...
David Cushman Interviews Clay Shirky
guest post by David Cushman
I was lucky enough to sit down with Here Comes Everybody author Clay Shirky in London at the end of last month.
We talked for 35 minutes - all of which you can watch in the video displayed below. It’s on googlevideo which means you can download it (recommended for best quality) to play back on your pc, ipod, whatever.
Questions were crowd-sourced from...
links for 2008-10-12
11 troubled Web companies: The next Kozmos? | Webware : Cool Web apps for everyone - CNET I don’t agree that Twitter is rickety, but the other ten are dog meat. (tags: rafe+needleman shake-out)
Don’t Shoot The Messenger <blockquote>We are not spreading the contagion of gloom and doom. It’s all about acting responsibly and making sure we all survive to fight...
links for 2008-10-11
Memeorandum Colors: Visualizing Political Bias with Greasemonkey - Waxy.org Baio and Schachter create a greasemonkey script and some smart analysis technology to hack the Memeorandum interface red or blue, depending on each blogger’s political leanings. (tags: andy+baio joshua+schachter memeorandum gabe+rivera political+architecture)
Calacanis: Apple to release networked HDTVs - Nate...
I needed GooseGrade in 1995 ...
Let your readers copy edit your content., originally uploaded by Stowe Boyd.
For some reason I find the idea of having blog readers helping out with copy editing a bit odd. First off, you are a blogger, so presumably you have some calling towards writing, story telling, criticism, whatever. Presumably, you have a grammatical brain in your head, and after all, when you hit the post button,...
links for 2008-10-10
Zoho-Mail-Offline - Zoho Writer The app factory that is Zoho continues to roll, launching Zoho mail, which looks like a knock off of Gmail, and which includes offline support via Gears. (tags: zoho email)
EXCLUSIVE: Apple to launch $800 laptop New info suggests a $800 mac laptop is coming in the next few weeks: I hope it is a subnotebook. (tags: apple mac brick)
Life According to...
The Now Web: Not Now, Or Not Yet?
guest post by Adrian Chan
I have my Stanford reunion coming up tomorrow. At the risk of dating myself, it’s my twentieth. I wrote my thesis at Stanford on an Apple Macintosh, which required swapping out floppy discs in order to run Microsoft Word (on one) with my ever-expanding tome on the other. Drafts were printed on a dot matrix printer, and in the final weeks of each quarter...
American Express Members Project: 5 Days, 5...
There are only five days left to cast your vote for one of the final five projects vying for funding from American Express Members Projects (as I reported at /Ground). They will be giving away $2.5M to various projects, and you do not have to be a cardholder to vote:
Members Project, originally uploaded by Stowe Boyd.
Please go and cast your vote!
links for 2008-10-07
The Virtues of a Three-Headed Business Plan - GigaOM Daniel Meyerov argues for having three business plans — overnight success, slow-but-steady, and survival. (tags: business+planning entrepreneurialism the+big+chill)
iChart's Seymour Dunker at Techcrunch 50
I had a chance to chat with Seymour Dunker, the CEO of iCharts, at Techcrunch 50. I saw their presentation in the sessions, and thought that the idea of shared charts, online, was a very catchy idea.
iCharts’ Seymour Dunker at Techcrunch 50 from stowe boyd on Vimeo.
/Aviso is a coproduction of The /Messengers and FW Studios, and is sponsored in part by Version 1.0, a GlobalLogic...
links for 2008-10-06
Unclutterer » Archive » Backpack: A digital version of a miscellaneous drawer I explain my mode of personal use of Backpack as a guest contributor to Unclutterer. (tags: backpack personal+information+management 37signals)
Expensify's David Bennett at Techcrunch 50
I had a chance to speak with David Bennett at Techcrunch 50 about Expensify, a new take on managing your business expenses with a “shadow” debit card.
/Aviso is a coproduction of The /Messengers and FW Studios, and is sponsored in part by Version 1.0, a GlobalLogic business
I only realized after the conversation that using a debit card in lieu of a credit card causes some...
Yammer's David Sacks Interviewed By /Aviso's...
Alison spoke with David Sacks, the CEO of Yammer, at the recent TechCrunch50 show. Yammer, you may recall, won the top honors at the event for its workstreaming application.
Yammer’s David Sacks at TechCrunch50 from stowe boyd on Vimeo.
/Aviso is a coproduction of The /Messengers and FW Studios, and is sponsored in part by Version 1.0, a GlobalLogic business
links for 2008-10-04
Layoffs: Valleywag cuts 60 percent of staff Trimming the fat at Valleywag in anticipation of ad slowdown. (tags: the+big+chill valleywag ad+slowdown)
UpTake And Nombray Are Hiring
Despite my gloomy post earlier today, apparently a bunch of folks are still scrambling for talent. Just a few of the pings I received:
UpTake is hiring engineers: [from their blog]
We are looking for extraordinary individuals who enjoy working in collaborative, results-driven teams. If you are creative problem-solver, collaborative and eager to push the edge on where web search and travel...
Conway: Calling The Big Chill
The chief pajandrums of Silicon Valley are singing in near-perfect harmony that the go-go days are behind us, and a nuclear winter may be descending on us following the melt-down of the US financial markets:
[from Credit Crisis Spreads a Pall Over Silicon Valley by Brad Stone and Claire Cain Miller] Ron Conway […]
The main drivers of Silicon Valley’s growth are start-up companies...
links for 2008-10-03
Online Matchmakers Introduce Entrepreneurs to Investors - NYTimes.com Crowdsourcing investments (tags: crowdsourcing younoodle venture+capital zopa raisecapital lending+tree cambrian+house growthink)
Word Of The Moment: Scenius
Kevin Kelly has taken a concept from Brian Eno — scenius — and amplified it.
[Scenius, or Communal Genius.
Scenius is like genius, only embedded in a scene rather than in genes. Brian Eno suggested the word to convey the extreme creativity that groups, places or “scenes” can occasionally generate. His actual definition is: “Scenius stands for the ...
Ellen Miller on Washington And The Web
[via cnewmark]
[from Ellen Miller: Make Washington More Like the Web]
The Web is a haven of messy democracy. (Want to see voter engagement and healthy debate? Read any Digg comment thread.) But the ideal of transparency and participation hasn’t yet infiltrated another messy democracy — the US government. That insight led Ellen Miller to cofound the Sunlight Foundation in 2006. The...
Wink People Search Map
The nice folks at Wink have aggregated a map based on the users’ locations:
Wink People Search map, originally uploaded by Stowe Boyd.
The idea is that social tool use is spreading out of the metopolitan centers, but it still looks hottest there.
The Tube Debuts
I remember how the Nokia execs at the World Mobile Conference press conferences would hem and haw about touch becoming the central metaphor of phone user experience, based on the cataclysmic design of iPhone. But Nokia is a fairly inventive company, and the much anticipated Tube, or 5800 XpressMusic, has been officially launched, as has been noted, elsewhere.
Tube, originally uploaded by...
Timo Hanney on Social Not Working [In Science]
After a detailed recapitulation of the principles underlying Web 2.0, Surowiecki’s Wisdom Of Crowds, Chris Anderson’s Long Tail, and the promise of social media, Timo Hanney concludes that the world of science has not yet been infiltrated by these revolutionary tools:
[from Nascent: Social Not Working?]
Personally, I’m optimistic about the potential of the web to...
Alice Marwick, Webthropologist
I have recently taken to calling myself a ‘webthropologist’ when asked what I do. Last night, at the Mashable party, I met Alice Marwick, who is a PhD candidate at NYU, who is living amongst the digital natives here in San Francisco as part of an anthropological study into the way that status accrues in our technorati world: a true card-carrying webthropologist.
[from...
