Quote
"I can’t think of anything that demonstrates the sovereign nature of the self better than a blog.” - Doc Searls
About the Author
Stowe Boyd is a well-known media subversive,
and an internationally recognized authority on real-time, collaborative
and social technologies. His new blog is Message.
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Monthly Archives
January 31, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
For those reading Get Real... you should definitely take a look at my new blog, /Message, for the most frequent and up to date of my writing.
Comments (28)
+ TrackBacks (0) | Category: Media
January 16, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Check out /Message, my new solo project. Among other things, I finding out how fast you can go from zero on Technorati, back to something like what I have achieved here at Get Real.
Comments (163)
+ TrackBacks (10) | Category: Technology
January 12, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Spread throughout my recent writing, a certain latent idea is lurking, incompletely articulated, which I summarize in the title: the individual is the new group.
About a decade ago, the one of the then-current terms of art for social tools was groupware, and the term was intended to impart the core metaphor: groups need to collaborate, and tools need to be defined with that in mind. As a result, we saw the rise of application platforms like Lotus Notes, intended to counter the flaws of operating systems and applications that were organized around an earlier, less group-oriented metaphor of use.
The central motif of groupware solutions was the need for groups to have a shared repository for online documents, and a collection of communication and collaboration tools to enable a distributed team to collectively accomplish goals. These tools included email, group calendaring, discussion forums, shared to do lists, and real-time support, in the late 90s and early 00s, for instant messaging, chat rooms, and web conferencing.
This model of group collaboration has become the basic form factor of work in many large organizations. However, I have come to believe that this model is being eclipsed by a new epicenter of social context: the individual, rather than the group.
Contrasting group forums with blogging is a good example in which to make the distinction between group- and individual-oriented social tools. In group forums, members of a closed group can post threads and comment on them. It is a closed model. When individuals blog in the open web, trackbacks and comments allow discussions to take place that are -- in many cases -- logically equivalent to forums, but since each individual blogger decides where to turn their focus, and what other blogs to comment on, bloggers are members of many groups at the same time. More importantly, the structure of blogging supports that model directly. In a group forum, you are a member of that one group, and not a member of any others: the fact that you may be a member of other groups is not explicitly supported.
Another driver of this change toward the individual is the rise of instant messaging. I have said many times recently that "the buddy list is the center of the universe 2.0" -- meaning that the presence and real-time proximity of the most critical individuals in our lives is the center of our social interaction. The fact that a particular contact on my buddy list is the member of several groups in my life is less relevant that our social connectedness, individual to individual. While I am IMing a buddy about work related issues, I may veer off into personal issues. I am constantly switching context while in communication with individuals, and real-time communication supports that directly: its natural to do so.
So the groupware model of collaboration, where neatly partitioned worlds are created, and individuals are made to shift context in order to shift from one social thread to another, seems unnatural to me. The primacy of groups and group membership in old-school groupware is outmoded.
The shift to the individual changes everything, and in revolutionary ways. Moving from groupware premises to "soloware" shifts the dialog about standards and interoperability. In the old groupware model, a company would buy a groupware platform and applications, and roll it out across all the users. It was standardized because everyone was using the same rev of the same product. When the issue of interoperability and standards were brought up, it was approached from the perspective of inter-company communication, or different sites within the same company. But in the "soloware" model, individuals may be using completely different tools, and share nothing in common but certain standards. But the glue that connects the dots in the "soloware" world are standards like RSS, IM interoperability, and blog trackback conventions: standards that allow individuals to do their thing, but to allow bottom-up aggregation of their artifacts along social connections. The groups are there, but latent, implicit in the gestural relationships of crosslinking, tags, comments, and blogrolls.
I envision a time where even in the largest organization, our lives as individuals will define the norm for computer-assisted work. The model of "soloware" will displace the 90s ideals of groupware in exactly the same way that the pre-groupware assembly line models were dethroned in the 90s. In our work lives, even in the largest, most conservative companies, we are instantaneously involved in dozens of projects, with teams of people that are constantly changing, with outside consultants and partner companies, and there is no end in sight. When everything fractures away from stable, long-lasting, closed teams toward the exact opposite, what is left are individuals in contact with each other, through soloware: individual needs first, group needs second, by extension.
We are, first and foremost, individuals. The concept that whenever we do something it should be intentionally in the context of a specific well-defined group is outmoded, and was always an approximation of what is really going on, socially. We are involved in social relationships, and what we do with others is always social, but not necessarily part of a group, or only of one group. So, let's put aside groups, and focus on the individual. The groups will follow.
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January 11, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
I stumbled upon 1000tags.com today (pointer from Tech Crunch), and I think there is something interesting going on there. The company is experimenting with a commercial tag cloud: people can pay to claim a tag exclusively, or can pay much less to share a tag.
[from the FAQ]
Why should I book (buy) a tag?
1000tags.com is - that we know - the very first project that offers booking and buying tags from a "tag cloud". Or in other words, it is the first commercial tag cloud. That means that it could be the proof of concept demonstrating that folksonomies can be an effective way to advertise.
As I understand, 1000 Tags will stop at 1000 tags, so it will be an artifically limited tag cloud -- along the lines of the Million Dollar Page, which was limited to a specific number of pixels.
Hmmm. This seems to hinge on the notion that people would go to 1000 tags as the starting point of a search, which seems strange to me. Perhaps if the people who pay for the placement also present the tagcloud at their websites, if might lead to traffic.
But even if the experiment doesn't directly work, I am sure that tag-based advertising -- either directly, like 1000tags.com is trying to do, or something more implicit, like a tag analysis service that serves up contextual ads -- is something destined to happen.
Comments (38)
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
A thought provoking article on decision making in technology design by Richard Devon, which suggests that technology should be designed more democratically if it is to actually serve many constituencies:
[from SPT v8n1: Towards a Social Ethics of Technology: A Research Prospect by Richard Devon]
Taking a social ethics approach means recognizing not only that the ends and means of technology are appropriate subjects for the ethics of technology, but also that differences in value systems that emerge in almost all decision-making about technology are to be expected. The means of handling differences, such as conflict resolution processes, models of technology management, and aspects of the larger political system, must be studied. This is not to suggest that engaging in political behavior on behalf of this cause or that is what ethics is all about. That remains a decision to be made at the personal level. Rather, the ethics of technology is to be viewed as a practical science. This means engaging in the study of, and the improvement of, the ways in which we collectively practice decision making in technology.
[Pointer from Anne Galloway, who has more to say.]
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Another page in the on-going hoo-ha about the evils inherent in online social networking, from the New York Times, where Nancy Hass reports on the ways that universities are starting to try to shut down the Facebook because of the fear of cyberstalking, or students posting pictures of themselves that show them drinking, or acting sexually provocative:
[ from In Your Facebook.com - New York Times]
"Every girl I know has had some sort of weird experience," says Shanna Andus, a freshman at the University of California, Berkeley. "Someone gets on a 'friend list' of one of your friends and starts to contact you. They met you at a party or checked out your picture online or went to high school with someone you barely know. It's just a little creepy."
Some colleges have taken action: in October, the University of New Mexico banned access to Facebook on its campus system, citing numerous concerns, including student privacy. Campus officials say they will restore the service for this semester. Mr. Hughes, the Facebook spokesman, says that when the site could not be accessed via the university's networks, half the users continued to sign on through outside networks.
Apropos of this cyberstalking thread, the US has recently enacted legislation that makes cyberstalking a criminal act punishable by up to two years in prison (see Anonymous Trolls, Beware: You Are Breaking Federal Laws). These are more manifestations of the growing conservatism of the web, a trend that has me worried.
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January 10, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Michael Kinsley writes a funny, but dead-on piece about the dumb process of making newspapers and delivering them to our doors, and why people are opting out:
[from Black and White and Dead All Over
by Michael Kinsley]
And so, at last, there are two piles of paper: a short one of stuff to read, and a tall one of stuff to throw away. Unfortunately, many people are taking the logic of this process one step further. Instead of buying a paper in order to throw most of it away, they are not buying it in the first place.
[...]
But it is hard to believe that there will be room in the economy for delivering news by the Rube Goldberg process described above. That doesn't mean newspapers are toast. After all, they've got the brand names. You gotta trust something called the "Post-Intelligencer" more than something called "Yahoo" or "Google," don't you? No, seriously, don't you? Okay, how old did you say you are?
Aggregation of many, many individual voices a la Google or Yahoo does become the new force to be reckoned with as the old school media titles have lost their luster. Even though Google and Yahoo don't have an editorial policy, per se, they are delivering the info soup that people are slurping up on the web, and are probably the replacement of the old stuff, in the long term.
In the near term, the newspapers continue to decline, losing money, readers, and perhaps their reason for existence. As someone pointed out recently, why do we have this strange combination of junk called a newspaper? Horoscopes, ads, classifieds, legal postings, politics, sports, bridge, and comics? Who wants all that junk? Not me.
One of the powers of the Web is this ability: to select the stuff you want, and drop the rest.
The younger generation have turned away from newsprint, to TV, and now the web. Older folks will continue to expect the dumb 3 pounds of newprint to hit their driveway every morning, until the end of time, but I bet that somewhere in the very near term that will become unaffordable, and will seem as quaint as the milkman leaving the cream for your breakfast on the front step.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Apparently, it is now against federal law to anonymously "annoy" people on the Internet. So if you want to call me a lunatic, or basically just disagree with something I write, remember to use your real name, or you might get busted!
[from Create an e-annoyance, go to jail | Perspectives | CNET News.com by Declan McCullagh]
Buried deep in the new law [the Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act] is Sec. 113, an innocuously titled bit called "Preventing Cyberstalking." It rewrites existing telephone harassment law to prohibit anyone from using the Internet "without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy." To grease the rails for this idea, Sen. Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, and the section's other sponsors slipped it into an unrelated, must-pass bill to fund the Department of Justice. The plan: to make it politically infeasible for politicians to oppose the measure. The tactic worked. The bill cleared the House of Representatives by voice vote, and the Senate unanimously approved it Dec. 16.
This is rich, obviously a case of unintended consequences, and yet another example of the paralyzing impact of inherent social conservativism smooshing into the Web. In the interests of trying to stop "cyberstalking," the US Legislature may have created a means to quash one of the last means available to individuals who wish to state their opinions online without the fear of repercussions. Note that the EFF has recommended that employees who wish to state their personal opinions about anything that is controversial should do so anonymously, to avoid the possibility of losing their jobs or other reprisals.
And "annoy" is a flabby term. Anyway, I am certain that this is unconstitutional, or at least I hope it is.
[pointer from Jeff Jarvis, who notes "The way we’re headed — from the PC left and the religious right — it surely will soon be a crime to offend, too."]
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
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January 09, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Guy Kawasaki continues his streak of killer posts with The Top Ten Lies of Entrepreneurs. At the heart of Guy's list is the strange dynamic that goes on in the entrepreneur/VC dance. VCs are in business to make investments, which is risky. But they must take risks to get the kind of returns they are looking for, which are BIG returns. At the same time they know that not all their investments can be big winners: that's why they have a portfolio and distribute their risk over a bunch of companies. But they have to judge companies relative to the idealized model of a winning company.
Guy's Ten Lies cuts to the heart of this by trying to straighten out the preconceptions of entrepreneurs, which, to cut to the chase, means that you shouldn't tell lies:
- Don't lie about yourself and your team. If you dropped out of college because this fleabag company is your dream, just say so. If you were a billionaire, you wouldn't be asking for money.
- Don't lie about competition. Don't say it doesn't exist, that no one else can do what you do, that no one else could ever dream this stuff up, or that you have an unshakeable lead on other, larger competitors.
- Don't lie about growth rates. Sure, by all means you have to predict growth rates in your market, and uptake of your product. And you have to base those projections on the assumption that your product or service will find willing customers. But don't fall back on "if we only get 1% of ..." or a strategy based on getting every breathing mammal on the planet to buy.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Ken makes some good points in this post about avoiding blog burnout:
[from TECHNOSIGHT » 7 Ways to Avoid Blogging Burnout]
6. Schedule some time off
Yes, there is a real world outside of the blogosphere! Go enjoy nature, check out a movie, visit a museum, be inspired by some architecture, or take in a play, concert, or sporting event. Get involved in your community or spend some much needed time with family and friends.
I think I'll go take a walk...
But Ken's post misses a couple of things I rely on, not necessarily with burnout in mind, but just to make blogging fresh:
- Build a network of people who send you stuff they stumble upon -- new eyes see the world differently.
- Wander around -- don't just read the same people all the time, or rely on the same sources.
- Read your old stuff, and rehash it -- many folks looking at your blog today didn't read something you wrote 3 months ago. Dig it up, and extend the theme.
- Write an post about blog burnout -- haha!
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Fred Stutzman, a PhD candidate at UNC, wrote an interesting analysis of adoption of Facebook by freshmen at that school. Amazingly quick adoption, and potentially sheds some insight into what goes on in the freshman year: people gain a lot of friends.
[from Student Life on the Facebook - chimprawk.blogspot.com]
While the actual number of nodes (the freshmen) in the network did not grow substantially over the course of the semester, the number of edges (friendship connections) in the network did expand remarkably. As the freshmen made friends over the course of the semester, their social network size grew from 144,319 to 373,651 connections. The average number of friends a freshman on the Facebook had on day one was 46, and at the end of the semester, he or she had 111 friends. This might give us a picture of how many friends a freshman might make the first semester of college: 65.
Gets very close to the so-called Dunbar constant (after author Robin Dunbar, of the inestimable Gossip, Groomin, and the Evolution of Language) of 150, the number of people we can maintain relationships with and not forget who are second cousins.
[pointer from Tola Oguntoyinbo]
tags: dunbar+constant, fred+stutzman, facebook, social+networks
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January 08, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Peter Saint-Andre joins my call:
[from one small voice]
Boycott Microsoft!
The rebrobates [sic -- reprobates?] of Redmond and the butchers of Beijing.
The New York Times is reporting that Microsoft has, at the behest of the Chinese Communist regime, removed the weblog of Zhao Jing (who blogged under the pen name "An Ti") from its MSN Spaces service, without even providing him with the deleted files. A while back Microsoft was keen on calling Linux and other open-source software a form of communism -- I guess now we see who the true communist sympathizers are (perhaps it's because both Microsoft and the Communist Party are dinosaurs). Does Microsoft think that its much-touted freedom to innovate implies the freedom to censor? Stowe Boyd is right: it's time to boycott Microsoft.
Update: 8 Jan 2006 9:40am -- Found another advocate of boycotting Microsoft, Peter Wall. I guess I am still amazed that there isn't a demonstration in front of the company's headquarters.
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January 07, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Considering the changes I have been going through lately, I am very sensitive to nuance. But You do not have to be Zato Ichi or the Daredevil to read someting into Jeneane Sessum's declaration of independence:
[from ALLIED by Jeneane Sessum: I'm Not at The Content Factor]
Although my name and bio currently appear on the site, I am no longer associated with The Content Factor. As I've indicated previously, information relative to my business can be found on my current sites: www.jsessum.com and www.sessum.com, and the number of blogs and other publications I write for.
I wish J success and happiness in whatever she turns her hand to.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
I noticed the "Lotus Notes Sucks" meme has resurfaced and is actively being pushed under by various Notes stalwarts (see here and here), principally because of the Lotus Notes Sucks website:
[from Lotus Notes Sucks]
Why does Lotus Notes suck? Except for security, the reasons include:
- The user interface is by far the worst there is for professionally written software. This doesn't mean every other email application is good, just that Lotus Notes is terrible. Having used about a dozen email applications over the years, I can authoritatively state that Lotus Notes is the worst. Which email applications have I used?
- Unix mail
- Zmail
- Pine
- Some ancient WordPerfect product from the early 1990s
- Outlook
- Outlook Express
- cc:Mail
- And others I can't remember.
- It displays useless and incomprehensible error messages.
- Lotus Notes is slow, ugly-looking and violates all sorts of GUI conventions.
- It deletes mail messages when you don't expect it to.
It a confusing, horrible mess. It is truly awful. I don't use Lotus Notes for anything but email—and only because I have to. I avoid using Lotus Notes as much as possible. Its scheduling, calendar, messaging, to do list—everything about it just sucks. Don't take my word for how much it sucks. Go to the examples! The examples show flaws from Lotus Notes version 5.0.8.
The author is purportedly an employee of some company where he is forced to use Lotus Notes, and it really, really irks him. Bad.
The defense of Lotus Notes is jui-jitsu-like, requiring agility and indirection. The argument runs like so.
Lotus Notes is a great technology/product. It was designed to be a platform on which collaborative applications can be developed, to do all sorts of things. It, as a result, has a very complex and sophisticated core, which is truly a marvel to behold, if you are the sort of person -- tool developer, for example -- who can appreciate such things. It isn't fair to evaluate Lotus Notes, the platform, based on the email and calendar applications that run on that platform. They may be less than wonderful, but Lotus Notes is great.
This is a lot of mealy-mouthed bait-and-switch.
First of all, Lotus Notes is a hog. It is huge, an application platform with pretensions of being an operating system. Ozzie, the architect behind Notes, clearly decided that the operating systems in wide use at the time of its design, just before the rise of the Web, were based on the wrong model, and he decided to rectify that (like he tried to do again, later, with even less success with Groove... although he managed to sell that to Microsoft. Go figure.). What were the flaws he wanted to fix? In a computer network, people will naturally create local files on their PCs, and this is an impediment to collaboration. But the operating systems know nothing about human striving toward collaborative goals, and they make it difficult to share files and the information within them effectively. And so, the answer? A big collaboration platform, that will support collaboration by putting a big, fat, slow abstraction layer above the operating systems being used.
And oh, by the way, let's stick an email solution on there too. And a calendar.
The problem is, in the world of the 90s and into the present day, email was the centerpoint of everything, even for people using Notes... because most people in the world don't have Notes, and you need to collaborate with them, too.
So, naturally, Notes The Platform is judged by comparison with alternative solutions that allow you to communicate and coordinate with anyone, anywhere... not just with other users of the same collaboration product you are using. The point that is missed by the Lotus Notes advocates is that people want to be able to communicate, collaborate, and coordinate with anyone, not just those who are using the same programs as them. That's why email was the killer app of Web 1.0 -- it worked that way. And Notes has fallen by the wayside, an asterisk in the collaboration chronicles, but all being said, not really very successful -- aside from the acquisition by IBM as a counter to Microsoft's enterprise email dominance.
[An aside: I happened to be in the IBM headquarters the day that the Lotus acquisition was announced, walking around with a Lotusphere PC bag, and I didn't understand for several hours why people where giving me the thumbs up as I walked around.]
Ozzie was right and he was wrong. Yes, the OSes of the day were badly designed with regard to our need for collaboration; but building a big, fat, slow platform to build collaborative apps on is the wrong approach. Even building a small, not so slow platform is the wrong approach. The right thing to do is to build collaboration into the apps that people are using. Or build small, focused collaborative apps that do one thing right. This is one of the lessons of Web 2.0.
Of course, today, we have the modern web infrastructure to exploit, and better OSes, and more bandwidth, and faster PCs. So I am willing to cut the Notes guys some slack since they were developing back in the pleistocene, but I still think they took the wrong fork in the road. That's one of the reasons that something as uncollaborative as Outlook kicked their ass, no matter how much "better" of a platform Notes was.
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January 06, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
OpenBC, the professional social networking solution, today announced that Skype is now integrated into each user's contact page, if they have created a Skype account and entered that information into their profile. This mechanism enables all Skype communication: IM, voice, but not video as far as I can see.
However, I couldn't get the Skype call to work. I even reinstalled the most recent version of Skype for Mac OS X. Everytime I hit the 'chat' or 'call' button I was taken to a download page within OpenBC, and when I clicked to download the 'Skype Setup' file, it turned out to be a MS DOS exec. Obvious Windows bias, but I presume it works for Windows users.
Looks like this is major theme: the integration of real-time communication capabilities into social platforms. I just wrote about the Newsvine blogging community that includes real-time chat on every blog post. Expect to see more of this.
[update: Only a few minutes later, I am reading about Nuvvo, a new AJAX-based learning management system, and it has announced Skype integration as of 4 Jan. Wow. It's happening everywhere. tags: nuvvo]
[Update: 7 Jan 2006 -- Bill Liao of OpenBC left this comment:
Hi Stowe,
Couple of points;
We love macs and I am a MAC user and we have a mac in the devcentre.
Skypes Mac Client is behind the PC one so there will be updates to the site for mac once we lay our hands on a later version and figure out how the mac client works for external calls.
The video for skype video is automatic once you are in a voice call there is no separate video call call function that is in the skype: call.
The video does not yet work for the skype Mac or Linux builds and I am told it is coming soon.
Hope that clarifies what is going on.
Bill
My point is that OpenBC should clearly state the situation re: Mac users, so other won't go through the fruitless attempt to try to use Mac Skype with OpenBC.]
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
I was invited to the beta of Newsvine, an extremely interesting and fully-featured blog community.
The basic concept is to harness the swarmocracy of infovores and put it to work. Users are given the ability to vote on the importance of any stories that they read, either from syndicated news sources, users posts, or 'seeds' -- references to stories or posts outside Newswire. This screenshot is a 'seed' that I created:
The most popular stories work their way to the top, like the model at Always-On-Network, which is the community that this is most likely to be compared to.
I created a post in my new blog in only a few seconds, and fooled with the embedded chat rooms, which is an idea that I think is long overdue. However, since I had no one visiting the post, I was merely talking to myself. But the notion has real merit in a situation with more readers.
As I suggest in the post at Newsvine, I was worried about the business model. Do Newsvine users own their posts? Are the going to get a share of the action? So I went and looked at the user agreement:
[from Newsvine - Newsvine User Agreement]
User Content
By transmitting or submitting User Content to the Site, you hereby (a) grant Newsvine a non-exclusive, irrevocable, royalty-free, perpetual and fully sublicensable and transferable right to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, translate, distribute, publish, create derivative works from and publicly display and perform such User Content throughout the universe in any media, now known or hereafter devised; (b)grant Newsvine, its affiliates and sublicensees the right to use the name, identifier, or any portion thereof, submitted in connection with such User Content, if they so choose. You represent and warrant that (i)such User Content is either original to you, or all third party rights have been fully cleared for use as contemplated by this Agreement; (ii)the User Content does and will not, in any way, violate or breach any of the terms of this Agreement or the Code of Conduct, and (iii)Newsvine shall not in any circumstance be required to pay or incur any sums to any person or entity as a result of its use or exploitation of the User Content unless otherwise agreed by Newsvine.
Without limiting the foregoing, Newsvine reserves the right to use the User Content as it deems appropriate, including, without limitation, deleting, editing, modifying, rejecting, or refusing to post it. Your submission of User Content is subject to the terms our Code of Conduct. Newsvine may, but is under no obligation to, offer you any payment for User Content that you submit or the opportunity to edit, delete or otherwise modify User Content once the it has been submitted to Newsvine. Newsvine shall have no duty to attribute authorship of User Content to you, and shall not be obligated to enforce any form of attribution by third parties.
If it is determined that you retain moral rights (including rights of attribution or integrity) in the User Content, you hereby declare that (a) you do not require that any personally identifying information be used in connection with the User Content, or any derivative works of or upgrades or updates thereto; (b) you have no objection to the publication, use, modification, deletion and exploitation of the User Content by Newsvine or its licensees, successors and assigns; (c) you forever waive and agree not to claim or assert any entitlement to any and all moral rights of an author in any of the User Content; and (d) you forever release Newsvine, and its licensees, successors and assigns, from any claims that you could otherwise assert against Newsvine by virtue of any such moral rights.
Hmmm. Seems fairly draconiam. They have rights to use everything, for ever, and the right to censor you or block you altogether. But that might be acceptable if they are paying me. Are they? It looks like they are:
[from Newsvine - Newsvine User Agreement]
Advertising Payments
Advertising Revenue. Our services may permit registered users to post User Content to a portion of our Site that is identifiable by a third level domain name selected by the user (username.newsvine.com) called a "Subdomain". [this is the user's blog, although not named as such] As with other areas of our Site, we may post advertisements in the Subdomain ("Ads"). In the event that we post Ads of a third party to a user's Subdomain, we will pay users as follows:
- ninety percent (90%) of the Net Advertising Revenue derived from a Subdomain that we receive from third parties (the "User Earnings") will be paid to the registered user of that Subdomain;
- ten percent (10%) of the Net Advertising Revenue (the "Referral Earnings") will be paid to the registered user (if any) that the Subdomain's user listed at registration or that we have otherwise identified as the party that referred the Subdomain's user when the account was set up with Newsvine.
In the event that a referring party is not identified, Newsvine will retain the Referral Earnings. For purposes of this User Agreement, "Net Advertising Revenue" means (a) the amount actually collected by Newsvine from a third party for each page view or impression of an Ad, (b) less any allocated overhead costs, commissions, fees paid to third parties, taxes, bad debt, returns, discounts, royalties, credits, and any other costs and expenses arising from the sale and placement of such Ads.
Payment Terms and Conditions. Within 45 days of a user's request, we will pay the User Earnings and Referral Earnings that have accrued to a user's account for any period in excess of 30 days. In other words, a user is not eligible to receive payments for an Ad displayed in a Subdomain until at least 30 days follows the display of the Ad and we receive payment from the advertiser for that Ad. Further, we shall have no obligation to pay User Earnings or Referral Earnings until and unless such earnings exceed $10 in the aggregate. All payments will be made in U.S. dollars by PayPal where possible or otherwise by check or other method selected by us. Checks will not be issued for amounts less that $50. As a condition of payment, you agree that if you fail to cash any check or otherwise collect any amount payable to you within one hundred eighty (180) days of the date payable, then our obligation to pay such amount shall be void and such amounts shall vest in Newsvine. You should regularly access and review your account to monitor accrued and payable amounts.
Only active user accounts are eligible to receive payments. If a user does not log in to his or her account for a year or more, the user account will be terminated and any accrued earnings will be forfeited. If a user terminates his or her account for any reason or if we terminate the account for cause (including violations of this User Agreement or our Code of Conduct), any accrued earnings that the user has not yet redeemed or requested for redemption will be forfeited. Once an account is terminated, any correlation between the terminated user account and any other existing user account is terminated so no further Referral Earnings will be paid.
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All of a sudden it looks a little more interesting. If I post within Newsvine, and thousands of people a day come to my site, I could potentially get 90% of the ad revenue. Just as important, it's a referral game: if I bring others into the fold, I make 10% of their ad revenue (if I read the legalese correctly).
A fully featured, web 2.0 era blogging community that includes reputation, ranking, real-time chat, tagging, and 'seeding', on top of a business model that encourages people to add their value to the swarm and to bring others in... looks like it is hitting many of the important buttons.
The challenges for Newsvine?
- The cost of transitioning if you are already blogging 'in the wild' on Typepad or Wordpress -- in my case, I have thousands of posts that I don't want to abandon. They would have to develop an import capability to convince others like me to come inside.
- The possibility of censorship -- a real problem.
- Changing people's way of doing things -- I buy in on the unified field theory of active readering, where you read, tag, bookmark, and post all in one unbroken context, but this is one of those cases where you have to 'move' into the community to get the benefits it offers, even while you are already invested in the community outside Newsvines walls.
[An interesting idea occurs to me: what if Newsvine were willing to provide a context in which blog networks could operate as independent companies? They would in essence be acting as a landlord and business partner, since they would be driving the marketing and ad network side of things, and then the blog networks could simply leverage their blogging and develop an independent brand identity under the Newsvine tent. They would have to modify things somewhat, and perhaps provide some specific tools to support the networks, like branding of networked blogs, but otherwise it would assist the growing number of blog networks that are springing up on all sides.]
At any rate, I am going to watch Newsvine closely. I have come to really like the tech.memeorandum style of blog 'piling on' although I do agree with Nicholas Carr's recent criticism of the too tight and too narrow selections of stories there. Shouldn't there be hundreds of tech stories of interest, not just a dozen or so? But the fact that memeorandum readers can't rate what they are reading explicitly is a real flaw, from my perspective. So, I favor the Newsvine model in that regard, although the contributors at memeorandum are those with big reputations, and no small fry... which has both positive and negative characteristics.
This then may turn out to be a question of democratic and open sourcing versus autocratic and closed. On one side, we have memeorandum, Corante Hubs, and other solutions that start with a roster of highly successful writers and then use a closed algorithm or editorial decisions to determine what's hot or not, while on the other side we will see Newsvine and other swarm-based communities, where everyone -- in principle -- starts on an equal footing and everyone -- before the karma gets baked in -- has an equal voice in deciding what's interesting or not. The power laws suggest that relatively soon it might not matter, since karma will accrue, and the best writers will rise to the top. But when the system is open, and is based on collective decision making, the results are likely to not only be different, but better.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
I let the poll run a few weeks, in a sense hoping the tide would turn my way, or that we would at least get a majority for on side or the other, but here's we we stand:
A little more than half of the respondents to the poll think we should drop the term "Web 2.0" but I don't care, I still plan on using it anyway. As I said at the outset, it is a useful abstraction.
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January 05, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Susan Mernit notes that the upcoming O'Reilly eTel conference has, you guessed, zero women speakers:
[ from Susan Mernit's Blog: O'Reilly eTel conference: Dinosaurs say Women extinct?]
There's been some surprise among friends of mine this past week that O'Reilly's Emerging Telephony conference, which runs Jan. 24-26 in the Bay area, has no--and that means zero--female speakers on the line-up. As in not even one of the moderators is female.
I wonder how many women will go? I wonder how many men will notice?
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Om Malik cut right to the chase regarding the Microsoft CES announcement of partnership with MTV on URGE:
[from Om Malik on Broadband : » In Digital Music, Its Gates Vs Jobs]
So in the end it will boil down to what is by now a familiar story: Bill versus Steve, Microsoft (add partner name here) versus Apple, windows media versus iTunes, some device (add brand name here) versus iPod. Justin Timberlake versus the Gorillaz! Dominatrix in pin stripes versus Diva in a black turtleneck.
Who will win? Not sure, but here is one thing which works against Bill G: coolness is not part of his company’s DNA, I mean Justin Timberlake for god sake! Even old farts like me know, he is sooooo over! What works against Apple? Steve being Steve; keeping the ecosystem closed. Come on, even the toughest bouncer outside the hottest club, once in a while lets the plebs in. How about some love for Sony and Sonos? Nothing for nothing, 2006 is shaping up to be a great year: there are skirmishes everywhere and since this is a sequel, well, let the popcorn pop, and enjoy the show!
2006 will be a bad, bad year for Microsoft. This will be another fizzle, since the iTunes/iPod dominance can't be shaken up by partnering with a tired TV channel. On other fronts, Microsoft's partnership with Palm has led to a annoyingly designed Treo (see David Pogue's review: A Marriage Not Made In Heaven) for another place where Microsoft partnerships come up with a mule, not a racehorse.
The imminent Kaliedoscope (the souped up Mac Mini that will become the entertainment hub for the living room) is going to sideswipe Microsoft like a velociraptor tearing into the side of a much larger, less agile T. rex.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
"Eskimos agree, Ice 2.0 provides a rich user experience." - Doug Hatfield
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Courtesy of Tom Coates, I stumbled across Technoranki:
[from technoranki.com - blog rankings - home]
What is technoranki?
Technoranki is a blog ranking service. We make a range of measurements for all the blogs in our database (which currently holds over 3000 blogs), calculate a score for each one, and then order and rank them. Our ranking results are available to third-parties via our web service API, and will soon be published live too.
Technoranki is more of a scientific experiment than anything else. Current blog ranking systems all have failings; we hope to work out a way to rank blogs fairly and accurately.
To summarise, this service is experimental and still in development. There is still a little bit to do behind the scenes, and then we can start work on this public-facing side of the service.
I have been been hoping for a service that allows the user to determine what is more important in blog rankings. Are you more interested in finding an authority that has been blogging on a topic for a long time? Or someone with many comments or trackbacks? Or someone extremely focused on a particular subject? Weed out those associated with traditional media outfits? Bloggers in a particular geography?
It would be great if Technoranki, or someone else, would just expose the factors on a dashboard and let me turn the dials.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Nobleizer of Clogger is on a one man tirade against the Nokia N90 blogger marketing campaign. He has berated Andy Abramson, Loic Le Meur, and me, among others, for our complicity in a campaign that to him is threatening Western civilization. An ex-journalist who writes in a curmudgeonly fashion about the evils inherent in the anti-journalism that we bloggers practice, Nobleizer recently got in a snit in some comments her at Get Real (see I'm Very Worried, and The Part That YOU Are Missing), where he asserts, among other things, that "no blogger has credibility." He also disapproves of my contention that journalistic impartiality is a myth. Now he is suggesting that I am crazy:
[from clogger | blogging the corporate bloggers: Tools down?]
Take that normally awesome Stowe Boyd at Get Real (it's true - who can wear a beret and still look cool and not be awesome?) - he seems to have lost his mind in the comments to this post. And the folks over at Nokia seem to be continually and blissfully unaware of the mechanism that normally presides over the product review process and protects consumers for willful and unbridled chequebook journalism. And Loic? He doesn't get it at all, but then he's busy filming himself ski down hills on his freebie Nokia phone.
Actually, it is a cap worn backwards, not a beret.
Nobelizer -- who blogs only in this nom-de-blog, so I don't know his actually identity -- is a professed ex-journo whose loathing of the new world order in social media drips from every pore. First of all, of course bloggers have credibility -- that's what comes of solid blogging: people respect your perspective, and are influenced by your writing. I am sure there is a constituency for every point of view on the web, even Nobleizer's... although a Technorati rank of 132 thousand is not the greatest endorsement that it is a large constituency. Second of all, I have consistently and openly professed my belief for years that journalistic impartiality is a myth, and I believe that an increasingly large number of knowledgeable media-savvy adults would agree.
That does not means that all elements of journalism are evil, or unsuitable for the new world. It just means that some of the premises of journalism are based on faith rather than scientific truth. And it also means that some of the conclusions of journalistic reasoning will be incorrect, such as the idea that aspiring to being unbiased leads to better reportage. Baloney. The basis of all knowledge is our beliefs about what is true and what is false, and our connection to the world is formed by our self-identification with such knowledge.
I believe that gonzo is a better way to approach writing because it is authentic, based in self awareness, and is not filtered through the mumbo jumbo of religiousity that underlies old school journalism.
Anyway, we will just have to let the people decide. They have lost faith with the self-annointed priesthood of writers preaching the sanctity of organized journalism. People are opting out of those publications, and finding more meaning in the rantings of wildeyed lunatics from the blogger fringe. So if that is madness, then I am crazy. But don't call it a beret.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
A pointer from Steve Rubel led me to Clipfire, a social search shopping app that helps users find good deals:
[from About Clipfire
]
Clipfire is powered by you.
Clipfire searches websites and products submitted by users. Users can search submitted sites and products and "clip" the ones in which they are interested. It is easy to find the best deals because clipped products show up higher in search results than those that have not been clipped.
As I have said many times (see here), in the future, all ecommerce will be socialized. Clipfire is another example of how we will be able to harness our own collective knowledge to take advantage of variability in the markets for goods and services.
I glanced at the service, and it has a very minimal and clean interface, but it is difficult to judge how good the results are without comparing it with other deal-finding solutions. The benefit of the social approach to search is that as more people join the service and use it, the better it will get. Until that time... who knows?
I already noticed one problem: costs of various products are not normalized to the end users currency. I saw deals for London hotel stays provided in pounds, for example. And the cost of goods are embedded in the text associated with the deal, not pulled out as a primary attribute. There is as a result no way to sort by price, which seems an obvious thing to do.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Interesting conclusions from an eMarketer piece on various research studies looking at advertising to young adults. The unnamed author suggests traditional media will continue to lose advertising revenue in this important demographic:
[from Marketing to Teens]
Significant percentages of consumers in the US and Canada between the ages of 12 and 21 are owners and users of entertainment-related consumer electronics, according to Forrester Research. Over two-thirds of people in this age group own PCs, DVD players, home stereos, mobile phones or handheld devices. Additionally, one-quarter own MP3 players and Internet-enabled or camera phones. But gaming presents the best opportunity for marketers who wish to reach this audience. Over 90% own a gaming device, and three-quarters play online and offline games on their PC.
Two main avenues are open for advertising through games: in-game advertising and advergaming.
In-game advertising is just like product placement on TV; advergaming is the creation of promotional games.
Young adults average 11 hour per week on the Internet, versus 8.5 for other adults. These folks represent the future, so pay attention. They still watch TV (#2 most important media) and read magazines (#3), but according to a study from BIGresearch, word of mouth is the #1 most influential medium for making electronic purchases in the 18-24 age group, and Internet is now #4.
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January 04, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
Jason Fried of 37signals swore me to secrecy a few months back when I interviewed him for the upcoming New Visionaries series. One of the secrets was Sunrise, the company's now-announced but as yet unreleased CRM solution:
[from Sunrise: 37signals' CRM tool for small business is coming soon - Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)]
Sunrise is a CRM-ish tool for small businesses. We’re aiming to change the small business CRM market with Sunrise in the same way we changed the small business project management and collaboration market with Basecamp.
What exactly do we want to change? Well, from our vantage point the current CRM offerings for small business are 1. Too complex, 2. Too confusing, 3. Overkill, 4. Detached from the real experience of a small business (aka too “enterprisey”), and 5. Ugly. We’re on the case.
I predict, just based on 37signals history and Jason's handwave during our meeting that Sunrise will have a similar impact on the CRM space that Basecamp has had on project-based collaboration: monumental.
And, oh, we chatted about Campfire, too, but I can't talk about that yet. Huge.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Robert Tebbutt referred to a recent piece of mine (see Living In The Shadow Of Clogs) as being apocalyptic in tone, when I was concerned with the inherent conservatism of corporations with regard to public speech of their employees.
Tebbutt goes on to zoom in on the role that Robert Scoble has played for Microsoft, but suggests that perhaps its time for Robert to move on to other things:
[from Teblog: Corporate blogging: stifling the individual]
Robert has acquired significant personal power. A 'wrong' word now can have a serious impact on his employer or on anyone else he sets his sights on.
Such is Scoble's power just now that Microsoft would have to be extremely careful how it handles him. He is spending lots of time travelling and glad-handing and being the star of 'geek dinners' (ugh!) Perhaps this is Microsoft's way of "letting him go" - encourage the guy to build such a huge personal brand, that he will decide that "outside" is better than "inside".
Problem solved.
Scoble doesn't agree, which is little surprise even if were contemplating a new career outside of Microsoft.
Robert has become a celebrity -- no offense intended -- based on the unique and pivotal role he has had in the 'opening up' of Microsoft, to the extent that he has been able to do that. His fame and influence are not principally derived from his great writing, deep expertise in software development and design, or a unique genius in marketing, like other highly regarded tech bloggers. As a result, Robert is unlikely to use the fame he has gained to take a full-time editorial/writing gig at The New York Times, a teaching job at Columbia, or launch a new Web 2.0 start-up. He could stay on the road, flogging his new book, and capitalizing on his notoriety in that age-old American fashion: the speaking circuit. He has done a lot of that over the past years, although I believe it has largely been done gratis, subsidized by Microsoft largesse.
Robert is a bright guy, very hard working, and has enabled great things in the world of blogging. It's a shame -- from my viewpoint -- that he works for Microsoft, and that he will be typecast for decades to come, if not forever, as the 'Microsoft blogger' instead of whatever he will be doing for the next 20 years... which I can't believe will be blogging for Microsoft.
And don't forget the newest flap -- Microsoft censorship of MSN Spaces Chinese Bloggers -- where Scoble was initially outraged, and now chastened for acting like a blogger:
Working in a big company is interesting cause there are lots of moving parts. Tracking them all down is difficult, especially when you have a full day of meetings and other things to do and when the stakeholders of the decision you’re trying to find out about are on the other side of the world in a time zone opposite of ours.
Blogger time isn’t that easy to live with when you work in a big company. That’s not an excuse, but just a fact. Already there are plenty of people who took me to task for reacting like a blogger and not waiting until I had checked with all the parties. Truth is this thing was going supernova already (it was on Instapundit before I even knew about it).
I have been talking to lots of people today, though, inside and outside of Microsoft. In every instance they asked me to keep those conversations confidential. Why? Cause we’re talking about international relations here and the lives of employees. I wish I could go into it more than that, but I can’t. Not yet. See, it’s real easy as Americans to rattle the door and ask for change, but we don’t live there. Saying “give them the finger” isn’t that easy when there are real human lives at stake. And I don’t need to spell out what I’m talking about here, do I?
One thing I’ve heard is that we spell out our terms of service very explicitly on MSN Spaces. Here in the United States we pull down stuff too at government request, like child pornography or other illegal content.
Being in the content business is not an easy one, that’s for sure.
I’ll pass more along as I can.
Sounds like a corporate-speak post, to me. Yesterday, I said this episode might be the one where Robert gets crushed. It is starting to sound like something like that is happening, or at least he is getting squelched.
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January 03, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
I was exploring the Blog Network List :: The Comprehensive Blog Network Rankings which has a very interesting blendo model of developing blog rank based on a large number of measures:
The blog rank index consists of the following metrics: Technorati rank, Technorati blogs, Technorati links, MSN Search pages indexed, MSN Search links, Yahoo! inlinks, Yahoo! pages indexed, Google backlinks, and Google pages indexed.
In the event of a tie with the blog rank index, we use the Technorati rank as a tie breaker.
I discovered that Get Real is ranked 51 of all blogs that are part of networks! Cool!
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Rebecca reports on some very, very horrible news. Apparently, MSN Spaces -- not the Chinese government mind you -- is censoring Chinese language MSN-hosted blogs worldwide. Even those hosted in the US with US authors. They have made users' Spaces 'not available', such as those written by Zhao Jing, aka Michael Anti, one of the most outspoken Chinese bloggers. But Rebecca goes on to describe how she set up a MSN hosted blog, and was able to have that blog censored and then made 'not available' simply by using various inflammatory terms like "Falun Gong" and "Tiananmen massacre." Apparently, a competitor of MSN Spaces called Bokee has been clamoring to have Michael Anti taken down, because he formerly blogged there, and his leaving has led to loss of significant readership.
[RConversation: Microsoft takes down Chinese blogger]
Now, It is VERY important to note that the inaccessible blog was moved or removed at the server level and that the blog remains inaccessible from the United States as well as from China. This means that the action was taken NOT by Chinese authorities responsible for filtering and censoring the internet for Chinese viewers, but by MSN staff at the level of the MSN servers.
I did similar tests with five other Chinese blog-hosting services. They all work differently when it comes to censoring user content, but they all engage in some form of filtering or censorship of user content. Interestingly, I found that Bokee had no mechanism preventing me from posting anything in the titles or text bodies of the posts. But eventually, blogs with politically sensitive words in them (like “Falun Gong,” “Tiananmen massacre” and “Tibet independence”) were taken down in what appeared to be a human screening process, perhaps assisted by some kind of keyword search or alert system. Other blog hosting services use a combination of automated systems and human procedures similar to MSN’s, although MSN was definitely #1 when it came to full takedown response time. At least one of the services allows you to post anything, but replaces politically sensitive words with “****” when they appear. I have decided not to go into a detailed naming of names and specifics about who censors more strictly and who censors more loosely than whom, since that will only result in some people getting in trouble – or as the Bokee editorial against MSN shows, some blog-hosting companies trying to curry favor with the authorities may try to sic the goons on those who take a lighter-handed approach to, er, user content management…
It's a terrible thing to imagine: Microsoft agreeing to censor Chinese language blogs, globally, in exchange for some unknown quid pro quo with the Chinese government. This must not be allowed. If there was ever a reason to boycott Microsoft (I mean, aside from the products themselves), this is it.
Robert Scoble is royally pissed, and is using his considerable juice to find out what is going on. But this might be the time when Robert's public persona might get crushed by the backroom deal worth billions for Microsoft. Robert says he knows the consequences of stating that Microsoft has become "the agent of a government", but when he lists the consequences he omits getting dooced.
Robert is not likely to call for a boycott of Microsoft, but I am the perfect one to do it. Boycott Microsoft!
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Wil Shipley wrote an interesting post that invites other programmers to join him in getting WINE (an open source implementation of the Windows API) to run on Mac OS X. He predicts that with the coming combination of Intel-based Macs and a working WINE implementation, people that stick with Windows because of specific Windows apps -- especially games -- will be able to switch:
[from Call Me Fishmeal.: I invite you to wine.]
When Wine for OS X comes out, it is going to be the end for Microsoft. The actual end. Because nobody is going to want to pay for Microsoft's increasingly draconian licensing for Windows even as Window gets crappier and crappier. What's the average time from plugging in a Windows machine to it getting its first virus? 7 minutes? Windows has kinds of viruses Mac users have never even dreamed of.
His post reads like a recruiting poster: "Get on this project now. Get it headed in the right direction (dump X11, run under Finder/CoreGraphis). Get the glory. Get the job. Get the girl."
But I have to admit, after trying to run Virtual PC on my Mac for the last few months JUST to run Quicken Professional I would certainly welcome running it as a WINE app instead. And it would be the final answer to all those people -- like Russell Beattie, who just switched back to Windows -- who argue that the hot apps are released on Windows first. I am going to keep my eyes on this one.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
Boston globe story about Massport -- they run Logan airport and other transportation sites -- attempting to monopolize wifi spectrum at the airport. This has much larger ramifications: who owns wifi?
[ from Sides chosen in Logan WiFi battle - The Boston Globe by Peter Howe]
Soon after activating its own $8-a-day WiFi service in the summer of 2004, the Massachusetts Port Authority, which runs Logan, ordered Continental and American Airlines to shut down WiFi services in their Logan lounges. Massport also ordered Delta Air Lines Inc. not to turn on a planned WiFi service in its new $500 million Terminal A that opened last March.
WiFi, which is short for wireless fidelity, offers Internet access at speeds of up to 11 megabits per second over unlicensed airwave channels, within ''hot spot" zones up to 300 feet in radius covered by small Net-connected transmitters. At Logan, subscribers get some free content, including flight and weather information, but have to pay $8 for a 24-hour access to the full Internet.
Massport has consistently argued its policy is only trying to prevent a proliferation of private WiFi transmitters that could interfere with wireless networks used by airlines, State Police, and the Transportation Security Administration. WiFi service providers are free to negotiate so-called roaming deals, Massport officials say, that would let their subscribers who pay for monthly access use the Logan network. But major providers including T-Mobile USA have balked at Massport's proposed terms, saying the airport authority seeks excessive profits.
''What Massport is trying to do is create a monopoly on unlicensed spectrum in the airport, and we think it's blatantly contrary to federal law," said Joe Farren, a spokesman for CTIA, which represents wireless carriers including Verizon, Cingular, and Sprint Nextel. CTIA recently disclosed that it has begun informally lobbying the FCC to overturn the Massport WiFi ban, and is preparing to step into the FCC case officially this week, Farren said.
The FCC has been reviewing the Continental-Massport case since July, but has given no indication of how soon it might issue a ruling.
Closer to home, Massport's position has also prompted opposition from Partners HealthCare System, parent organization of Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital. Partners is rolling out many new wireless-based systems for doctors and nurses to check patient records, enter medical chart data, and order prescriptions. Rickey L. Hampton, Partners's wireless communications manager, said the hospitals are worried that if the FCC upholds Massport's ban on airport tenants offering WiFi, it could set a precedent for landlords who lease space to Partners. ''We believe the impact could extend far beyond the aviation industry [and] have a chilling effect on unlicensed wireless technologies as a whole," Hampton said, by empowering virtually any landlord to shut down tenants' wireless networks.
And not just landlords, but perhaps any other property authority? Like my housing association?
This is a terrible precedent, and pushed us directly in the wrong way. I am an ardent believer in free municipal wifi as probably the single best investment that American can make in its future. It will remove one of the most basic barriers to access for the poor, as well as sparking local involvement through ubiquitous access. But where are the visionary leaders who will push this to a national discussion? Municipal wifi will make these sorts of issues moot. Why doesn't the Mayor of Boston join this discussion, or the Governor?
And, more important, as we look back on Katrina and other disasters, a well designed wifi mesh (with redundant cells, battery and generator backups) could allow all sorts of grassroots disaster recovery. But, oh I forgot, talking about disaster preparedness is so last year already. At least until the next one hits.
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January 02, 2006
Posted by Stowe Boyd
I stumbled across a link to a post of mine, from a site called osviews.com. I clicked through from Technorati, and here's what it looks like:
But the whole piece is lifted from Get Real. The problem is that it's not really attributed to me. There is a link, sort of randomly assigned to one phrase in the piece, that links back to my post, but that's it. So it looks like they wrote the story. And they seem to do that to all the stuff posted there. That sucks.
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
MacDailyNews has more dope on Apple's Kaleidoscope:
[from MacDailyNews - Apple and Mac News - Welcome Home
Apple’s .Mac service has increased the data transfer capacity from 10GB per month to 1024GB (a terabyte!) per month for select users in what may be a methodical rollout to all .Mac users and a sign of something(s) to come at Macworld Expo.
MacDailyNews reader "Snapper" has informed us of the change to his .Mac account as of December 31, 2005.
.Mac user "alphamatrix" has a screenshot of the new .Mac bandwidth capacity here. [Attribution: Om Malik]
Om Malik writes, "The increase in bandwidth for transfer perhaps has been inspired by people wanting to back-up their videos (purchased at iTunes store) or perhaps this is the beginning of something new: like an online PVR?" Full article here.
Apple's .Mac features list does not currently show the increase, it still states: 10 GB of data transfer per month.
Think Secret recently detailed how the new Kaleidoscope online storage approach will satisfy nervous media execs about the security of their content:
[from Think Secret - Road to Expo: Apple's new media experience coming soon
In an effort to appease media companies wary of the security of digital rights management technology, Apple's new technology will deliver content such that it never actually resides on the user's hard drive. Content purchased will be automatically made available on a user's iDisk, which Front Row 2.0 will tap into. When the user wishes to play the content, robust caching technology -- for which Apple previously received a patent -- will serve it to the user's computer as fast as their Internet connection can handle. The system will also likely support downloading the video content to supported iPods but at no time will it ever actually be stored on a computer's hard drive.
This also circumvents some of the flaws in the current iTunes purchasing model. I buy music on iTunes, but if for some reason I lose the downloaded files -- through a hard drive crash, for example -- I might have to buy it all again, unless I have backed it up somewhere. Ultimately, Apple and others moving into the online PVR space will be well-served to rent us low-cost online storage, as well as simply keeping track of what we have licensed. Shows that we have licensed, but have not viewed for a long time could simply be deleled locally, in out online iDisk storage, only to be replaced on-demand when users seek to access them.
[pointer from Judge Bork]
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Posted by Stowe Boyd
I found that Kawasaki's brand new blog is already helpful, in a backhanded way. I have been working with a number of startups in the past decade, and I continuously struggle with founders about their powerpoint addictions: too many bullets, too many slides, too many words, too many metaphors, too many taglines... just too much.
Kawasaki comes to my aid in this post (“Let the Good Times Roll” by Guy Kawasaki: The 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint), and specifically supports the thesis I have promoted that decks should be 10 slides:
[...] I am trying to evangelize the 10/20/30 Rule of PowerPoint. It’s quite simple: a PowerPoint presentation should have ten slides, last no more than twenty minutes, and contain no font smaller than thirty points. While I’m in the venture capital business, this rule is applicable for any presentation to reach agreement: for example, raising capital, making a sale, forming a partnership, etc.
Ten is the optimal number of slides in a PowerPoint presentation because a normal human being cannot comprehend more than ten concepts in a meeting—and venture capitalists are very normal. (The only difference between you and venture capitalist is that he is getting paid to gamble with someone else’s money). If you must use more than ten slides to explain your business, you probably don’t have a business. He also goes on to make the case that although you have an hour, supposedly, fiddling around, delays and whatnot will eat away at least 20 minutes of that. But there is a more important truth lying at the heart of the 20 minute rule: you should be able to reduce the complexity of the most audacious business plan to a small set of core issues, and relate that to a knowledgeable stranger in 20 minutes.
He lays out what the ten slides should be, in his view:
The ten topics that a venture capitalist cares about are:
- Problem
- Your solution
- Business model
- Underlying magic/technology
- Marketing and sales
- Competition
- Team
- Projections and milestones
- Status and timeline
- Summary and call to action
I agree with this in principle, although I believe that the exact 10 slides and their order may vary with different companies, although some -- Marketing and Sales, Team, Business Model -- will always be there. I favor a slide called Co-opetition instead of Competition, because that allows a way to integrate all the market players -- competitors and potential partners -- into one slide.
So now I can point at Kawasaki's 10/20/30 Rule when I am next confronted with a 50 slide deck, with twelve bullets (and subbullets!) on each slide, all in 12 point font.
I think I will suggest one modification: it should be the 1/10/20/30 Rule. The 1 refers to the basic notion that each slide should make one element of the plan clear.
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