For those who may not know, Adobe Apollo was the code name for the cross-operating runtime developed by Adobe that allows developers to create Rich Internet Applications for the desktop. There's a myriad of possible use cases for this technology, from productivity applications that work both online and offline, to music players such as Finetune that can be accessed via the desktop.

Adobe is attempting to streamline the process of building Apollo applications, in the hope it increases adoption rates. The challenge in introducing a web development platform is making it simple enough for developers to test drive, yet valuable enough for the end user. Adobe competitor Dekoh (see our profile here), is using an open-source model and community to increase adoption. In many ways, the Adobe strategy is similar to that of Facebook, which recently opened up the Facebook platform. Most web teams can easily develop a Facebook app in a weekend, as it is simple for the development team to create apps for that platform. In turn, the Facebook team hopes that it's valuable enough to the end user, which then encourages more application building and innovation from developers at other websites.

Although not exactly identical situations, Adobe is making it easier for all the developers out there to play around with the platform - and opening it up to HTML developers seems like a smart move. Backed by a $100 million venture fund and tons of corporate investment, Adobe needs to also do a better job of showcasing successful implementations of Apollo; and convince end users why they need to have online and offline support. That is probably the major goal behind the Adobe Bus Tour, also announced today, in which Adobe is traveling to 18 cities to perform demos and spread the word on the platform.

Despite the bus tour, my mother and father (average Internet users) need to be convinced that there are many instances in their lives where they need a desktop application of some of their favorite Internet sites/applications. It's still early in the process but, coupled with the open sourced Flex 3, Adobe is taking a very active approach to being more nimble and inclusive about engaging early adopters.

In a big move for Web Office vendor Zimbra, Comcast has teamed up with Zimbra, Plaxo, and HP to announce the SmartZone Communication Hub - a tightly integrated web-based communication app that will merge email, voicemail, IM, and an address book. Comcast is the second largest ISP provider in the US, after AT&T and larger than AOL. It is also one of the largest providers of cable television, entertainment, and digital communications in the U.S. So this a big coup for Zimbra and Plaxo (more on that below). As for HP, they will be assisting in integrating the data, voice, and video services on the SmartZone platform.

SmartZone homepage

Comcast will provide this new web based application at no charge for their customers, through Comcast.net. It is scheduled to be released towards the end of this year. This is part of the new generation of Comcast’s consumer triple play (voice, data, and video) services. For Zimbra, it is their largest partnership to date.

• Listen to voice mail online and forward messages via e-mail - including the ability to listen to your voicemail within an email, without launching a new program
• View, save, and print call history
• Merge contacts via an address book that syncs with multiple devices
• Send video or traditional instant messages to friends or contacts
• Add customization, including RSS and the ability to layer in video clips
• Apply safety and security controls utilizing Bizanga‚Äôs email anti-abuse system, Cloudmark‚Äôs email anti-spam and anti-phishing tools and Trend Micro‚Äôs anti-virus software

SmartZone Voicemail

What it means for Zimbra and Plaxo

Zimbra, a leader in the open source messaging and collaboration space, recently announced the Zimbra Desktop along with a milestone of 6 million paid mailboxes. In this deal with Comcast, Zimbra provides the email and voicemail communications platform. Plaxo, the web-based address book used by over 15 million users, will be powering the address book for the SmartZone Communication Hub. Here's what both Zimbra and Plaxo get out of it:

• Proof of concept
• Both can leverage this partnership to work with other bigcos
• First-mover advantage for this type of platform
• Substantially larger reach
• Revenue (terms of deal not yet disclosed)

What it means for Web Office

After a recent Forrester Research report that executives are wary of using enterprise Web 2.0 start-ups, this may be a shot in the arm for companies like Zimbra. The benefit of using the likes of Zimbra or Plaxo is that they are nimble and so they can quickly provide value added tools for bigcos like Comcast - enabling customized software integrations, amongst other things. Unless Microsoft implements skunk works solutions for web-based office integrations, I think this partnership announcement could be the first of many Web 2.0 integrations in the near future for consumer or enterprise-facing applications.

The Comcast deal suggests that web companies that provide best of breed applications can have a viable business model, by partnering and licensing their apps to bigcos - who can then make their own custom office app suites. The Comcast deal also means that more mainstream consumers will be exposed to the web 2.0 solutions of Zimbra and Plaxo.

If there is one remaining issue, it lies in getting executives more comfortable in leveraging the innovation created by these enterprise web 2.0 start-ups - which the Forrester report clearly showed isn't happening fast enough.

By open sourcing the technology, Adobe is realizing the potential of embracing the developer community. By providing open tools they are helping to foster a developer environment that can result in the creation of cool features and functionality and further developer the framework to suit developer needs. Other open source projects from Adobe include the contribution of source code for ActionScript Virtual Machine to the Mozilla Foundation and the open source WebKit engine in the Apollo project.

With their latest open source release, developers are able to download and contribute to source code for the Flex compiler, components, and application framework. What is not included in the release is Flex Builder and Flex Data Services. Flash itself will also remain closed. Because some companies may not want to use the open source framework, Adobe still offers its commercial licenses with variable terms. I suspect that not many will opt for the paid license route, however. Adobe Systems has set up internal processes to ensure that security and stability remain core elements of Flex, knowing that any security breaches could be disastrous.

In the end, what this means that Adobe is further feeding the Apollo ecosystem to support applications and developers in creating and deploying Rich Internet apps that will benefit the end user. They have a $100 million venture arm to support the development of Apollo applications and with the Adobe Media Player. Going open source is a way to galvanize support within the developer community, though it remains to be seen what kind of uptake and flexibility it will actually provide. Adobe is certainly going "all in" with its software. Often times, big corporations will aim to emulate the openness and idealism of the new Internet economy, but fall short in the execution.

In terms of a timeline for its release, Adobe projects a pre-released version of their Flex product "Moxie," posting daily software builds of the Flex SDK for public download and we should expect the full open source Flex to be released during the second half of this year. The source code for the framework itself is already available in the Flex 2.0 SDK.

Analytics

Adobe gives content owners advanced tools to learn more about the ways that end users consume their media. It is all permission based via cookies, but I think Adobe is counting on a majority of the people enabling this feature. Most probably won’t be aware of the implications of enabling the cookies. The key innovation here is that it will track the media consumption both online and offline.

Content protection

Adobe offers streaming encryption, content integrity and identity based protection. This will make content publishers happy, because they'll have innovative tools that will allow them to build a legitimate business and not feel that their content is stolen. This is great for the small video producers of the world, who don't want to spend a lot of money protecting their content.

More enhanced montetization

Adobe gives content owners more flexible options over advertising and monetizing the media. Adobe Media Player heavily leverages RSS - content owners can feed ads via RSS and overlay ads or branding in many different ways. In seeing a demo, I saw a couple of ads that appeared. I was surprised at how non-intrusive they were and how it didn’t disturb the flow of my video experience.

Customization

One of the cool things I was able to see was a great deal of skins and customization that gave publishers an opportunity to really enhance their brand equity. Going from channel to channel, the level of detail and difference between the channels was impressive.

Conclusion

Adobe is getting into the Desktop Media Player business, which means they are competing with Microsoft's Windows Media Player directly. It is also a major opportunity for Adobe to feed the Apollo ecosystem and show people the limitations of traditional desktop software.

Launched in private beta at the end of February, Dekoh is a cross-platform development framework for deploying Java, Flash, and Ajax applications. Dekoh itself was built using Java. The public alpha launch of Dekoh is April 15th at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco.

While Apollo has the benefit of huge financial backing and pre-existing developer support, Dekoh is aiming to attract developers by providing more features. Which actually makes it hard to describe what Dekoh is in a sentence. When Ryan Stewart covered the private beta release of Dekoh, he implied it was like the WebOS products that we've profiled before on R/WW. Anyway here's a table showing the main differences between Dekoh and Apollo (courtesy of the Dekoh blog):

A full (and very technical) explanation of the differences, at least according to Dekoh, is on their blog. 

Dekoh: Open Source and has Social Networking features

Possibly the main point of difference is that Dekoh offers an open source license - unlike the proprietary license of Apollo. This is because Dekoh aims to create a community around their platform and, because they don't have the resources or developer mind share of Adobe, Dekoh has to approach this differently. What they've done is offer social networking aspects to its developer community. As a Dekoh user you can invite other developers in, create profile pages and share photos. There are also "web 2.0 features" like sharing, tagging and commenting. This may hint at a new trend, of deploying an open source development community around a social networking platform. If properly executed, this could be enticing and empowering for the developer community. 

An example of a Dekoh app, a music app

Google Calendar Integration

In speaking with the co-founder of Dekoh, Vijay Pullur, he informed me that for the alpha they will show at Web 2.0 Expo in April, will include a Google Calendar offline integration. This product will allow users to synch events from the desktop with Google calendar. Therefore, you can add events on the go and have them automatically synched when you are online. It will be part of Dekoh's range of applications that can be, with one click, installed on the desktop portal. 

Another interesting feature of this app is the ability to record a personal alert that will play from the system tray icon, by showing a bubble with the event description. This is extremely interesting because of the ability to use devices and the online/offline possibilities we are likely to see in the near future.

Conclusion

Overall, the main challenge that both Adobe and Dekoh face is to create a value proposition for the developer community, in order to attract developers onto their platform - and build a wide array of applications for end-users.

We're interested in the thoughts of R/WW's more technical readers, on Dekoh - how does it compare to Apollo in your eyes?

Included in the Alpha release is:

• Free SDK (in English) with command line tools for developing and deploying Apollo Applications;
• The runtime is available for both the Windows and Mac operating systems.

A new feature in this alpha release is multi-window support, which means that all apps can talk to each other.

However there are still a number of things missing in the Alpha release. They include:

eBay and Adobe

In the press release eBay's Max Mancini, Senior Director of Disruptive Innovation, is quoted as saying:

"Our work with Apollo is an example of one of the many ways eBay is delivering a fun, immersive experience outside of the browser. In this case, the eBay.com marketplace is brought straight to users' desktops with improved caching, real-time product availability notifications, and auction updates."
(emphasis ours)

It's clear then that Apollo enables users such as eBay to complement (or bypass?) the browser.

The bottom line

This is an alpha version, so we have to expect some bugs and usability issues. But it's great that Adobe is getting this out as soon as possible - and really engaging developers and bloggers in the roll-out process. I recently had the opportunity to attend the Adobe Engage event; also last Friday Adobe reached out to Ajax, Flex, and Flash developers for Apollo Camp.

Adobe does have some challenges ahead - in my previous post, I questioned Apollo's capability to build applications that cater towards the mainstream web user. Creating value for the average user will probably be more difficult than it was getting adoption of Flash back in the 90's. However Apollo will be compelling for the early adopter.

Security will in my opinion be the number one concern, so let's hope that Adobe puts out all the fires before it reaches the mass market.

After attending Adobe’s Engage event, where Adobe peeled the covers off Apollo, I began to wonder how compelling this offering is for the mainstream user; and what is the most likely diffusion scenario (i.e. how it will be accepted by the market).

During the presentation, Adobe mentioned that their Flash Upgrade 8 reached an 85% penetration rate within 9 months, which is amazing. The diffusion rate was aided tremendously by social network sites, which helped prompt people to upgrade their players. So does Apollo have a compelling application opportunity that can deliver that same market penetration? Is the ability to blur the lines of offline and online, as well as the ease of starting an application on your desktop, important enough for my mother or brother to want to download a desktop version of one of their favorite sites?

Safety and Security issues

It is often difficult to get viral reach with desktop applications, unless they are packaged up with another product (e.g. Google Pack). Often when I hear of a new start-up that involves a downloadable application, I immediately think they have more of an uphill battle to achieve user take-up. Outside of all the compatibility issues that can come up, consumers are apprehensive about downloading applications because of viruses and malware - even if an indicator states that it’s safe. My non-tech friends often state that even with these indicators, in the back of their head they worry that someone has circumvented the process and attached spyware. Others are wary about installing applications on their computers that are in the beta stages, because they are worried about it crashing their system. So Adobe needs to educate the mainstream user about the safety and security in their software. They should make this their top priority, while techies are testing and developing on top of Apollo.

Immediate Value Proposition

Tim O’Reilly once mentioned how he’d love for applications like Google Calendar to automatically display via his desktop, because of how often he uses them. For others, this may not be compelling enough - because typing in calendar.google.com and logging in is not painful enough to want a desktop application.

But my bet is that many productivity applications will arise that use Apollo; and these will be the early ecosystem that keeps Apollo moving forward. Those who use productivity applications use them often and are are often on the move, so there is a lot of value to be gained in desktop/web hybrid software here. 

Can anyone think of web applications in which they’d like Apollo desktop-web functionality? Perhaps, for example, offline widgets with internet capability.

Favorite demo using Apollo

The demo of eBay using Apollo was very impressive (it was also presented recently at the Demo Conference). The application was very seamless, allowing tremendous offline functionality and synching once the user logged back in to the network. With drag and drop features, it seems like the perfect tool for the eBay Power User. The value in this application is that it makes it easier to list items on eBay - even easier than using the eBay website. So if I'm a Power User and have to go to eBay a hundred times a day, it makes perfect sense to just launch it from my desktop. But we have to remember that the eBay Power User is a minority in the eBay community.  

Image credit: Ryan Stewart

Other demos that I enjoyed getting a live view of was Brightcove’s AfterMix, which provides online video editing tools and video sharing. It is easy to use, but the catch is that it uses commercial partners to provide "quality" sources to mix and re-mix content. I also enjoyed yourminis, which is a slick start page and widget platform that allows great customization and sharing. Online organizer Scrybe also showed some great Apollo functionality. 

Conclusion

Overall, the Engage event was very interesting and had some compelling applications on show. I’ll be curious to see the iterations and applications that are built off the Apollo platform - and how they will 'engage' the average user. 

Photo credit: Mike Downey (nb: not taken at Engage, but at Adobe MAX 2006)

Widgets are becoming increasingly important in sharing and displaying content over the web. Recently we chatted with two companies, Pickle and Cellblock, that provide photo and video widgets. Each service allows multi-user contributions to their widgets - forget user-generated content, these are user-generated widgets!

The widgets can be placed nearly anywhere on the web - blogs, social networks, etc. You can send photos and videos to your widget, directly from your computer or mobile phone - sharing your media with the world instantly. The kind of functionality these services offer is really taking viral media to another level; and what’s more both Pickle and Cellblock have launched some pretty important features in the past 24 hours.

Pickle

Pickle has re-packaged several of their features, creating a widget media player that will operate on MySpace. It works by streaming photo and video content from users desktops or mobile phones.

"We've taken some of the capabilities that have been available with Pickle for a while, and recombined [them] to put some of those features more front and center", John Funge, CEO of Pickle, told Read/WriteWeb.

• the ability to share content from a cell phone or computer desktop to a "channel";
• each channel displays photos and videos back to back;
• one-click full screen player opens directly from the widget (unlike YouTube, which re-directs you back to their site)

Users can contribute content to a Pickle channel in several ways, depending on the privacy levels determined by the channel's owner. Users can click the "add to contribute" button found on the player, which opens up an upload page; or they can email their content.

Cellblock

Cellblock has been developing a multifaceted application for the sharing of media content. They recently released an embeddable widget, which has an offline desktop component as well. Their experience building social network Gloto, where users enjoyed real-time collaboration, encouraged Eric Conn (co-founder of Cellblock) and his team to create a specialized tool that enables real-time collaboration in widgets too. Cellblock’s widgets include:

• desktop component, allowing inclusion of media direct from users computers;
• inclusion of media from a broad range of devices (PDAs, cameras, mobile phones, etc);
• the ability to create a cellblock from your mobile phone;
• a Skype Cellblock plugin

Cellblock's drag-and-drop function was just released yesterday, and should make for very easy additions to users Cellblock widgets.

Conclusion

As the world of social networking has exploded in popularity over the past year or two, the viral nature of the Internet has taken hold of the world. YouTube took one huge aspect of social networking and made it portable, by allowing users to embed videos on other sites. Photobucket took another aspect of social networking and enabled users to import images from one huge site to another. Cellblock and Pickle are bringing the viral nature of media to another level, by making it instant and collaborative as well as portable and mobile.

Written by Jay Fortner and edited by Richard MacManus

We’ve all been there. You’re in a rush, you need to find a parking spot - and there's nothing available! Well, how about finding a parking spot on your mobile phone; or maybe even reserving a spot from home via your browser? This kind of Web-based car parking solution is in its infancy, but we think this solution is going to change the way people park their cars - especially when in a rush!

So far, the early leaders in this space are the UK based Findacarpark.com, parkatmyhouse.com, peasy.com, the highly touted spotscout.com, and the Chicago-based ParkWhiz.com (although ParkWhiz has yet to fully launch their service).

Can these services disrupt the parking industry?

As a resident of a downtown metropolis, agonizing over parking spots is a re-occurring theme. I would find tremendous value in being able to secure and reserve parking, rather than driving around the block hoping for an open spot to appear. Additionally, I see great value in aggregating the costs of parking from various lots in similar areas, providing more transparency in the industry - especially if someone is relatively new to a city. Why park at one lot if you knew you could save a couple of bucks parking across the street? This could force parking lot owners to compete more smartly over parkers, providing lower prices to consumers. 

So yes, online or mobile parking solutions could be very disruptive to the existing parking industry.

Monetization

These services aim to take a small percentage of the parking marketplace and/or provide targeted advertising through the mobile phone and web browser. Also I think that layering in sponsored events and activities with searches, could be very powerful - if they can better target me by my previous search history. In addition, I expect these online parking services to be mashed in to e-vite services and event 2.0 sites, as an added-value tool - like we commonly see with Google Maps. For example I’d love to get a classified listing on Craigslist, and click a link to see a Google Map and nearby parking in that area.

SpotScout process

Potential pitfalls

Enforcement: As with any service that allows user-generated content, it is easily prone to gaming and fraud. I suspect that the feedback and comments features that have made eBay so successful, is also necessary on online parking sites - to maintain the integrity of transactions. Those with long histories of ethical transactions should get promoted to the top of search results for a given area, and power users need to be supported so that they continue to frequently offer parking inventory.

Use of mobile phone: If I’m in a rush, do I have time to type in coordinates on my mobile phone? Would it be too distracting to try and find the address to a parking spot and drive at the same time? Long-term to get around this pitfall, we may need these services to be integrated into the navigation systems in cars.

Where is the true value?

Does the value lie in the market, or the aggregation of information? I’ve been tossing back and forth for a while on this question. I think the true value that will make this service viral is empowering every home in a high traffic area to have the potential to make money. By matching up parking spots with consumers and making it easier for them to make reservations in areas where it seems impossible to find a spot, this is where the hidden value lies in this market. What do you think?

Can GYM enter this space?

If GYM (Google, Yahoo, Microsoft) doesn’t enter this space by developing their own solutions, then they will probably enter through acquisition. So in the US at least, ParkWhiz and Spotscout have to move fast - because my local search would be enhanced significantly if I knew where to park too!

The New York Times has an interesting report about companies that offer customized video advertising, such as Spot Runner and Visible World. Marketers are excited about this technology, because it means they can utilize demographics to deliver targeted advertising across several platforms - including television and the Internet. It's also less expense than traditional TV advertising and in some cases means they can route around traditional ad agencies, by creating the ads themselves using the tools offered by services like Spot Runner and Visible World.

So what does this all mean for the advertising world, the media industry and the ever expanding Internet?

What Spot Runner and Visible World do

Not only is it becoming far cheaper to produce video ads, it is also becoming cheaper to distribute and customize them. This effectively is making videos easily stored and re-used, much like digital photos and music have become in recent years. It removes a large chunk of production costs, as marketers no longer have to film the commercial themselves - Spot Runner allows you to mash-up an ad from their ad library. It also allows the creator of the content to reap the rewards for each customer that chooses their ad.

Spot Runner

How the technology is being used

This simplified process of targeted advertising is ideal for small companies that want to appear big, and for big companies that want to appear small. In that sense, the world becomes a little flatter. Small businesses can operate within their budget to get a professional ad; while large companies can tailor their ads to appeal to consumers across the board, varying the product they sell or the spin their ad takes.

The format of these commercials makes them easily spread via television, or the internet - and I'm sure mobile devices aren't too far behind in becoming another mainstream platform for distribution.

A Ford commercial from Visible World

The Long Tail of Video Commercials

Services offered by companies such as Spot Runner and Visible World cater to a broad base of marketers, and create a platform for creativity and replicated data. The ability to operate over the Web makes editorial accessibility an afterthought and increases the number of niche markets an advertiser can display their product for. The media world has departed from so many traditional models; and the Internet has enabled the majority of those changes. Now the world of video marketing is following suit, catering to the long tail of social networks and specific demographics - fragmenting themselves in the same manner.

Essentially this allows marketers to take advantage of targeted marketing in ways they've always dreamed of.

Implications

What's the larger picture here? And what does it really mean for marketers to not only gain increased access to demographic data, but to use it for more and more targeted advertising?

Privacy issues are and will continue to be raised regarding the use of targeted marketing. Much of our activity on the web, and even with our television's remote control, gives companies data to feed their advertising strategies. Also the advertising job market will shift in reaction to the oncoming automation options, which are becoming more available to marketers.

The Internet and mobile devices will become extremely important for the future of this type of advertising. It will also become integrated within the widening Internet video culture, and probably closely associated with user-generated content. This means consumers may have a larger role in the distribution of these commercials; perhaps customizing ads to be played along with their own videos, even becoming the most powerful channel by which these commercials are distributed.

What are your thoughts on customized video ads -- are we in the midst of a sea change in video advertising, enabled by Web services like Spot Runner and Visible World?

Written by Jay Fortner and edited by Richard MacManus

MySpace has some hard decisions to make, as last year they entered into an advertising relationship with Google and now they find themselves unable to make similar deals with other companies. An alliance between MySpace and Google last year, where Google became the sole provider of text ads on MySpace, guaranteed News Corp's media darling $900 million in shared ad revenue over the course of three years. The deal, made six months ago, has not been finalized but it has already taken effect. A Google search bar and ads are already present on the site and MySpace is receiving payments from those. 

But now MySpace is looking to partner with eBay, to allow MySpace users to sell items using eBay's PayPal. And like a jealous lover, Google is protesting. The Wall St Journal is reporting (full article behind paywall) that MySpace's dalliance with eBay is holding up finalization of the ad revenue deal between MySpace and Google. You can imagine the Google ultimatum: it's either him or me! :-)

• MySpace wants to empower their user base and become more of a centralized hub, by allowing "peer commerce" with eBay's PayPal mechanisms.
• eBay is facing negative backlash from investors, who are looking not only for growth, but to stay ahead of competition from Google's new payment system Checkout. 
• Google has a hard time sharing ad space. They certainly don't want to share MySpace with eBay, when they're trying to steal market share with Google Checkout.

So what we have here is three companies trying to grow revenue through partnering with other industry powerhouses. The Wall Street Journal pointed out that while Google and eBay say they have entered into their own advertising partnership, the general concern is that each company is competing for the attention of MySpace users and so neither maximizes their revenue on MySpace.

Then there is Google Checkout, a direct competitor to eBay's Paypal. That can only make the relationship between eBay and Google (and now MySpace) that much more strained. It's a classic case of what happens when companies take the easier road to growth, which is partnerships, but then one of the partners gets big enough to want to do everything on their own.

The Solution

Well, for MySpace, the solution is easy. Use Google Checkout instead of PayPal. It will become widespread enough to not have to worry about brand recognition (or lack thereof).

But this love triangle speaks to a larger issue at hand - can Google continue on their path to media monopoly? They've effectively used their search method of gathering data to impede on nearly every kind of business imaginable. Some stick, like Gmail and Checkout. Others the average person has never heard of, like Orkut and Froogle. But Google's power tactic is reminiscent of Wal-Mart's industry dominance, because they increasingly leave little room for partnerships between other companies. In this case, eBay may end up being the jilted party.

After the Super Bowl and the defeat of my team the Chicago Bears, I checked my inbox to see how many Evite invitations I'd received for Super Bowl parties. Evite has been around for a relatively long time (1998), with very little competition. For example all my friends use Facebook or Evite to send out electronic invitations. But what competition is out there for Evite? In this post I check out a few of the 'web 2.0' sites that could one day usurp Evite. They are all promising, but have some way to go before they appeal to the average person and not just early adopters.

Planyp.us

This Chicago-based Evite system is meant for casual events. Currently the user interface is not aesthetically pleasing, but the service offers a wiki-like product to enable gatherings big or small. With some refining of the UI, they have a chance. I like the navigation and their emphasis on sharing and aggregating information for invites. Currently, the site has no clear monetization strategy.

Mypunchbowl is like an advanced Evite, in that it sticks mainly to features that are similar to Evite's - such as customized templates. They make it simple and easy for registration and have integrated message boards, updates, and the ability to edit your RSVP status to increase the pre-event conversation. After you have planned an event, they give recommendations of party stores and other places of interest. This could be of major interest and I expect Mypunchbowl to strike many deals with local retailers, with the goal of being a data mine of sponsored local listings. Over time, this may be a compelling business model.

Renkoo 

I really like Renkoo, although it feels kind of "geeky". You can use Renkoo to begin the organization of an event and reach a consensus on the next meeting place. The conversation can be tracked in many different formats - including instant messenger, email, SMS or on Renkoo's website. Their 'Comet' technology enables two-way, real time communication for all people taking part in the discussion. If someone isn't logged in, the conversation will be displayed in full the next time they go to their Renkoo account. All in all, Renkoo has a shot because of their management team, use of technology on multiple platforms, and they are well funded.

Conclusion

There are other evite sites out there, such as Goovite and Socializr. But in general the online invite space has a long way to go. In order to build the necessary critical mass, these sites have to find a way to encourage the average person to send out a couple of invites a week - and not just for major events like the Super Bowl. These sites can provide tremendous value to review and local sites, as well as provide recommendations on events in the area. 

Note that the major difference between events 2.0 sites, such as upcoming.org, and the sites we've profiled here, is the emphasis on pre-event planning. But along with pre-event planning, the above services need to be smarter and suggest events that I would like to attend - based on my previous history. Additionally, they should make it easy for me to send out a quick invite to my group, without going through the pains of creating a formal invite off a template. If we all want to meet up for lunch, it should take me less than a minute - and integrate with all of our mobile devices - so that we can meet up quickly. Until this happens, and is simple enough for mainstream people, Evite will still reign supreme in the online invitation arena.