web 2.0 - ReadWriteWeb

Check Out the Companies That Make ReadWriteWeb Possible

Admin — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 10:00:45 -0800

Our mission at ReadWriteWeb is to explore the latest Web technology products and trends. We're fortunate to have a great group of sponsors who support this goal. So, once a week, we write a post about them; about who they are, what they do, and what they've been up to lately. Pay them a visit and show your appreciation of their sponsorship of this site. Pay them a visit or tweet them a "Thank you" (see link below each sponsor) to show your appreciation for their sponsorship of this site. Or you can follow all of our sponsors at once using our Twitter list.

Interested in being a ReadWriteWeb sponsor? ReadWriteWeb is one of the most popular blogs in the world and is read by a sophisticated audience of thought leaders and decision-makers. We have several innovative new features in our sponsor packages that we'd love to tell you about. Email our COO Bernard Lunn for all the details.

]]>Sponsor

]]> Ready to learn more about the smart companies that support this site you love to read? Read on...

Crowd Science

Crowd Science gives online publishers reports on the demographics and attitudes of their audience. We at ReadWriteWeb have signed up to this new service, because demographic data is something we've struggled to get in the past. It's important for any online business to know their audience, so Crowd Science is a welcome addition to the stats armory that most of us in the Internet biz use.

Thank Crowd Science on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Mashery

Mashery is a platform for Web services, allowing companies to manage their APIs using Mashery's expertise. At the "Business of APIs" conference, Mashery CEO Oren Michels explained to the audience that while APIs are a technology, their use is a business decision. He went on to say that Mashery has helped customers such as WhitePages.com, Thumbplay, Compete.com, and Calais. Check out the white paper "Five steps to scaling your business development using Web services" to discover how you can use APIs for your business.

You can find out more about APIs and their business use at www.mashery.com.

Thank Mashery on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Rackspace

Rackspace is one of the world's largest hosting providers, but it's also competing in the cloud computing arena. Rackspace Cloud Hosting offers a suite of services which combines a scalable web and application hosting platform (Cloud Sites) with a cloud storage solution (Cloud Files) and on demand server instances (Cloud Servers). The addition of SliceHost a popular cloud computing and hosting provider and JungleDisk, a favorite online backup service that supports Cloud files, makes the Rackspace Cloud a powerful cloud hosting solution.

Explore Rackspace's hosting and cloud computing solutions.

Thank Rackspace on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Aplus.net

Aplus.net offers a variety of services relating to Web hosting, including shared hosting, Web design, marketing and online advertising services, search engine optimization, e-commerce solutions, and domain registration.

You can register for Aplus.net here.

Thank Aplus.net on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Hakia

Hakia is a semantic search engine. It delivers a new search experience based on focus, clarity, and credibility. You can compare Hakia to Google and Bing here.

Hakia currently powers the contextual advertising link engine at ReadWriteWeb with its semantic advertising module, Contexa. Contexa provides page-level contextual analysis (in this case, of blog posts) on the fly and outputs keywords that represent the meaning of the page along with their meaning score. The Contexa system then matches ReadWriteWeb sponsors' requirements with the contextual representation of the page to provide relevant ads for readers. Contexa is offered as a service and can be integrated into any ad system.

Learn more about Contexa.

Thank Hakia on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Domain.ME

.Me is a true phenomenon among TLDs. With its unforgettable meaning and limitless word combination possibilities, .Me gives a truly personal tone to your domain name. If you are looking for a name that speaks for itself .Me is your best choice. Let .Me speak for your online business or personal blog.

.Me potential is enormous and it simply asks for you to be creative and coin the name that suits you best. If you have a great, original idea for a domain name, register .Me before it's taken. To check out other ideas, explore the world of .Me.

Thank Domain.ME on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Codero

Codero is a former division of Aplus.net. Codero became a separate entity focusing on dedicated and managed hosting solutions after the acquisition of Aplus.net's shared hosting, web design, and domain registration services by Hostopia. "Codero" stands for collaboration, engagement, focus, reliability, and flexibility. It means a more secure computing experience for email, shopping, and data transfer.

Codero is a dedicated and managed hosting company focused on the real needs of today's small and mid-sized businesses. The company believes in supporting robust websites, storefronts and online communities that will grow and adapt.

Groupsite

Groupsite.com is a self-serve platform for creating social collaboration communities called Groupsites. Groupsites combine the most useful features of social networking and collaboration tools enabling groups large and small to communicate, share and network. Groupsites are currently in use by more than 30,000 groups as user communities, intranets, member communities, team workgroups and social networks. Each Groupsite can be branded and customized and includes discussion forums, calendaring, file sharing, member profiles (professional or social), activity feeds and full-featured sub-groups among other group-centric features.

Thank Groupsite on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

NaviSite

NaviSite is a leading provider of enterprise hosting and application services for a diverse client base. Leveraging a diverse network of 16 enterprise-class data centers across the US and UK, NaviSite offers a predictable technology environment and a complete suite of infrastructure and application solutions.

NaviSite's product and service offerings include:

Vast custom application development capabilities, including SOA solutions, eCommerce, and Web 2.0 applications.
Full stack of enterprise hosting services for mid-market companies, including shared, dedicated, and complex hosting, SaaS enablement, and colocation.
Best in class managed hosting, such as virtualization and utility computing.

Thank NaviSite on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Faroo

Faroo is a peer-to-peer Web search engine that has no centralized index and crawler. Each web page visited by users is automatically included into the distributed index. Search results are ranked based on distributed usage statistics of Web pages visited by Faroo users, which leads to more democratic, user-centric ranking.

Faroo protects the privacy of users by encrypting search queries and anonymizing its distributed architecture. The decentralized peer-to-peer architecture scales with Internet growth and requires no infrastructure or operational cost.

Thank Faroo on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

MyDomain.com

MyDomain is a leading ICANN-accredited provider of domain name registration and online business solutions. For over 10 years, MyDomain has offered low-cost domain names and free domain services including complete DNS management. Today, sub-$10 domains without the constant upsells you'll find at some competitors are the norm at MyDomain. MyDomain's complete range of solutions include Web hosting and VPS hosting, email, SSL Certificates and more.

Search Engine Strategies

From social media to local search to video SEO, Search Engine Strategies Chicago puts you in front of the experts who will help you sort which technologies and channel will take you to the next level and which are just hype.

Search Engine Strategies is the pioneer of educational conference series in search engine marketing. It's the venue where the industry visionaries and thought leaders gather each year to discuss the newest trends, share insights and present the strategic action plans you need to grow your business.

Thank Search Engine Strategies on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Backupify

Backupify provides reliable online backup services for a range of products, including Twitter, WordPress, Facebook, Delicious, Basecamp, Google Docs, Gmail, Zoho, Flickr and Photobucket. Backups are secure, automatic and easy to set up.

Thank Backupify on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Our Gracious Hosts and Blogging Software

ReadWriteWeb is hosted by Media Temple and is published using SixApart's Movable Type.

If you've ever wondered what ReadWriteWeb looks like behind the scenes, or if you've never seen the Movable Type publishing interface - that's it on the left. We recently upgraded to MT 4.23, which is the latest version. We got onto this release as soon as it was available - in fact our contacts at Six Apart emailed the actual code to us before it was up on their website. That's customer service for you!

Thank Media Temple and SixApart on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

The companies above pay our rents or mortgages and we appreciate it. We hope you'll stop by their sites and see what they've got to offer.

Have you got a smart company that could use some more visits by the sophisticated readers of a blog like ReadWriteWeb's? Drop us a line and let's talk.

Thanks to all our sponsors and our readers for your support!

]]>Discuss

ReadWriteWeb Events Guide, 21 November 2009

Andrew Lobo — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 08:05:49 -0800

Here is this week's ReadWriteWeb events guide. As always, you can download the entire event calendar in iCal format or import it into your Google Calendar. You can also import individual events using the link beside each entry. This events guide is a weekly feature here on ReadWriteWeb. We publish it every weekend, as good a time as any to review your conference plans.

Know of an event taking place that should appear here? Let us know in the comments below or contact us.

]]>Sponsor

]]> 19 November 2009: Mountain View, California

Under the Radar

Featuring the most cutting-edge mobile startups from around the globe, Under the Radar will get you dialed in to what the 2010 mobile innovation marketplace will look like. It's a must-attend event for dealmakers from global carriers, brands, media companies, and handset manufacturers responsible for helping their companies leverage new mobile technology and innovation in the fast-evolving digital landscape.

Save $200: book by 2 October 2009, and get the early-bird rate.

30 November 2009

New Way to Work

Do you have a great story about your work environment? Job marketplace Elance and Vator.tv have partnered to host the "New Way to Work" competition, with a grand prize of $10,000 in cash or health insurance for the most compelling story. You can tell your story on Vator.tv, the premier platform for entrepreneurs to broadcast their voice, by uploading a video, posting an update, linking to a blog entry, or sharing a photo. Hurry, the competition ends on 30 November 2009.

1 – 3 December 2009: London, England

Online Information & IMS 2009

Online Information and IMS together create the largest event dedicated to the information industry. Consisting of an exhibition delivering over 9,000 visitors from 70 countries, a conference and a show-floor seminar program, the event provides an annual meeting place for the global information industry.

Online Information is once again set to play host to thousands of information professionals, information end-users and publishers from around the globe, meeting suppliers of online content, e-publishing, and library management solutions. IMS provides a forum for IT, business, and information management professionals to find unlimited, relevant advice, educational content and compare solutions under one roof. Attend IMS and meet suppliers of content management, search solutions, and Web 2.0 technologies.

1 – 3 December 2009: Boston, Massachusetts

Gilbane Conference Boston

Join us at the sixth annual "Gilbane Conference Boston: Content, Collaboration and Customers."

Your content is your business, and you need to make your Web content part of an integrated platform for customers. You need to know solutions and technologies that are ready to be implemented today. Gilbane Conference Boston is built around the four major areas of how enterprises use Web and content technologies:

Web business and engagement;
Managing collaboration and social media: internal and external;
Enterprise content: searching, integrating and publishing;
Content infrastructure.

Visit www.gilbaneboston.com for conference details. ReadWriteWeb readers, use the discount code "GILBANE" to save an additional $200. Register today!

1 – 3 December 2009: San Francisco

Supernova

The Supernova Conference is the thought-leadership forum for the network age. It brings together over 500 business, government and technology influencers to understand how decentralization and pervasive connectivity are changing our world. It's the only conference to focus on how networks have become the main instruments of change from both business and social perspectives. An ever-evolving network itself, the conference has become the place for highly interactive and spirited debates, making significant business connections and revelations on new innovation. ReadWriteWeb readers get a discount of $700 off the regular price when registering by 16 October 2009. Use code "RRW09". After October 16th, the discount changes to $200 off the regular price. Register here.

7 December 2009: San Francisco

SF MusicTech Summit

The SF MusicTech Summit brings together 600+ visionaries in the music/technology space, along with the best and brightest developers, entrepreneurs, investors, service providers, journalists, musicians and organizations who work with them at the convergence of culture and commerce. We meet to discuss the evolving music/business/technology eco-system in a proactive environment, highly conducive to deal making. Register with a great ReadWriteWeb 15% discount.

7 – 11 December 2009: Chicago, Illinois

Search Engine Strategies 2009

SEO Through Blogs and Feeds
Duplicate Content and Multiple Site Issues
What's the Link Between Search and Social?
Online PR: Where to Next?
Search Analytics

See more at www.SearchEngineStrategies.com/chicago. ReadWriteWeb readers receive a 15% discount when registering here using RWW15 code.

11 December 2009: Mountain View, California

Add-on-Con

Add-on-Con is a single-day conference focused on the future of the browser and its emergence as a platform.

Developer sessions will cover best practices, cross-browser development and mash-ups. Marketing sessions will focus on monetization opportunities, distribution strategies and stats. Join 200+ individuals involved in add-on development to help define an emerging new market in the Web's eco-system.

ReadWriteWeb readers save $50 by using the discount code "addoncon09RRW."

11 January 2010: Nashville, Tennessee

Social Fresh Nashville

This is the social media conference that comes to you. Social Fresh is a one-day, case-study-rich conference targeted for marketers. Social Fresh Nashville will have 30+ speakers, including Jason Falls of Social Media Explorer, Gavin Baker of Ruby Tuesday and John Andrews of Collective Bias (formerly of Walmart).

ReadWriteWeb readers get a 15% discount with the code "RWW15".

27 – 28 January 2010: Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Enterprise Social 2.0: Rip or ROI?

This senior executive event will bring together decision makers from the Top Fortune companies to discuss innovative strategies on how to maximise business performance through social media engagement. The event will include keynote speeches, best-practice presentations as well as interactive discussion sessions.

The summit will provide excellent opportunities for you to hear international experts discuss best practices on how to drive business performance using Web 2.0 and social media. Key issues to be discussed include:

How to integrate social media programs successfully into business strategies?
Building business momentum, visibility and market growth through social media
Measuring success and influence using metrics and analytics: what are the tools and techniques
Integrating viral marketing and social media into traditional marketing mix
Developing and activating audiences using social media channels such as Twitter, Facebook, blogs

8 February 2010: Tampa, Florida

Social Fresh Tampa

This is the social media conference that comes to you. Social Fresh is a one-day, case-study-rich conference targeted for marketers. Social Fresh Tampa will have 30+ speakers, including Chris Barger of GM, Maggie Fox of Social Media Group and John Andrews of Collective Bias (formerly of Walmart).

ReadWriteWeb readers get a 15% discount with the code "RWW15".

18 February 2010: Silicon Valley, California

Future of Funding

Active limited partners, top rated venture capitalists, and successful entrepreneurs are invited to Silicon Valley on February 18, 2010 to discuss the Future of Funding. The venture capital bubble has burst, and change is coming. Now is the time to have a constructive dialog about the future with all of the stakeholders at the table.

Don't miss the opportunity to partake in this exclusive event hosted by TheFunded. Please visit www.futureoffunding.com to see speaker and event details.

ReadWriteWeb readers use the code "RWW" and get 10% off.

15 – 16 March 2010: London, England

2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum — London

The 2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum takes place at the Olympia Conference Centre in London. The two-day event features four dedicated conference streams:

Social Networking World Forum
Enterprise social media
Social TV World Forum
Mobile Social Networking Forum

The event features key speakers from global brands, organizations, social networking publishers and developers, pioneering social media leaders, top agencies, content producers, and more.

Full workshop program within exhibition area
Evening networking reception
Pre-show online meeting planner for delegates
Free pass for exhibition only

Download this entire events calendar in iCal format.

]]>Discuss

Weekly Wrapup: Google Chrome OS, Obama's Twitter, Blogging Statistics, And More...

Richard MacManus — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 05:00:00 -0800

In this edition of the Weekly Wrapup - our newsletter summarizing the top stories of the week - we report on President Obama's (non)-use of Twitter, take a look at the past decade in the media industry, review the latest statistics about blogging, question if Oxford Dictionary should've chosen "unfriend" as its word of the year, and more. We also check in on our two main channels: ReadWriteEnterprise (devoted to 'enterprise 2.0' trends and products) and ReadWriteStart (dedicated to profiling startups and entrepreneurs).

]]>Sponsor

]]> Subscribe to Weekly Wrapup

You can subscribe to the Weekly Wrapup by RSS or by email (form below).

RWW Weekly Wrap-up Email Subscription form:

Web Trends

Obama: "I Have Never Used Twitter"

Barack Obama spoke to a group of Chinese students this week at a town hall in Shanghai. The meeting was streamed live, worldwide on the Whitehouse website and on the Whitehouse's Facebook page. He was asked a limited number of questions by the audience and one was about Twitter, which has been blocked in China since July. President Obama has never used Twitter, despite his account being the most followed there.

Top Internet Trends of 2000-2009: Democratization of News Media

It's November 2009 and we're nearing the end of a decade. It's been a tumultuous time of change for many industries, much of it driven by the Internet. The newspaper industry has been particularly affected by the Web. Over the past 10 years, news media has undergone a seachange akin to the invention of the printing press in 1440.

How Blogging Has Changed Over The Last 3 Years (Stats)

Reader engagement with blogs has changed dramatically over the last three years, primarily because of the rise of online social networks, according to new numbers released by analytics firm Postrank. Postrank published an analysis based on metrics for signals like comments, trackbacks, shared links and online bookmarks for the top 1000 most-engaging feeds online and for 100,000 randomly selected blog posts in each year since 2007.

Unfriending: Are People Online Shedding Friends? (Debate)

The New Oxford American Dictionary announced its Word of the Year this week. Its selection? unfriend - verb - To remove someone as a 'friend' on a social networking site such as Facebook. Has Oxford Dictionary made the right selection? ReadWriteWeb's Founder Richard MacManus thinks not. Marshall Kirkpatrick disagrees with him. Both make their cases in this post and invite you to cast your vote in a poll.

Do You Think "Unfriend" is a Good Word of the Year?(online surveys)

The Top 10 Mobile Applications of 2012

Research firm Gartner has put out a list of the top ten mobile applications of the future. Well, not the distant future, but the far off year of 2012. Nothing on the list is all that surprising or, in many cases, even all that new. Instead, the list includes the sorts of technologies that are just now coming into their own and haven't yet seen widespread adoption as well as the already common technologies that are still experiencing growth.

SEE MORE WEB TRENDS COVERAGE IN OUR TRENDS CATEGORY

ReadWriteEnterprise

Our channel ReadWriteEnterprise, devoted to 'enterprise 2.0' and using social software inside organizations.

Google Sites Offers Templates; Claims It's Easier Than Sharepoint

Google Sites is getting an upgrade. Starting this week, Google will provide templates that make it possible for users with no technical background to create web sites with a degree of functionality that includes page layouts, adding links for navigation and embedded gadgets. Templates are available for intranets, project sites, team sites, employee profile pages and other sites that people would use within the enterprise.

ReadWriteStart

Our channel ReadWriteStart, sponsored by Microsoft BizSpark, is dedicated to profiling startups and entrepreneurs.

Future of Music Coalition's Brian Zisk: The Do's of Streaming Music

In 2008 the idea of another subscription-only music service was enough to get your knickers in a torrent. Sure Rhapsody was doing well, but they'd been around for forever and in 2008, freemium was the music model du jour. With a year to reflect, co-founder of the Future of Music Coalition and longtime San Fran Music Tech Summit organizer Brian Zisk tells us what it takes to survive in today's music environment.

SEE MORE STARTUPS COVERAGE IN OUR READWRITESTART CHANNEL

Web Products

The Google Chrome OS Press Event

Google held a press event this week outlining more details about its Google Chrome OS. Google plans to launch Chrome OS next year. Google is positioning Chrome OS as "just a browser" - that is, all of your data is in the cloud. Chrome OS will be focused on speed, simplicity, security; every application on Chrome OS will be a web application. Google sees Chrome OS as targeting 3 trends: netbooks, cloud (everything is a web app today), phones getting computing capabilities.

Twitter.com Is Still the Most Popular Twitter Client - TweetDeck a Distant Second

Twitter's own homepage is still the most popular tool for users to update their status on Twitter. Around 46% of all updates are made directly on the site. Social media analytics and monitoring service Sysomos analyzed 500 million tweets it collected over the past 5 months and found that TweetDeck is the most popular third-party client. TweetDeck has a comfortable lead with a 8.48% share of the market, followed by Tweetie, Twitterific and Seesmic.

A Central Nervous System for Earth: HP's Ambitious Sensor Network

HP Labs has joined the race to build an infrastructure for the emerging Internet of Things. The giant computing and IT services company has announced a project that aims to be a "Central Nervous System for the Earth" (CeNSE). It's a research and development program to build a planetwide sensing network, using billions of "tiny, cheap, tough and exquisitely sensitive detectors."

Microsoft Launches Pivot, A Radically New Visualization of Online Objects

Microsoft Live Labs' latest creation has just launched. Pivot is a fun, powerful discovery tool, built on Seadragon and powered by Silverlight, that runs in Vista or Windows 7 with IE8. It looks impressive and allows for truly intuitive exploration of information.

Droid Becomes Fastest-Selling Android Phone to Date

The Motorola Droid is the newest smartphone on the market to compete for the iPhone's crown. Released by Verizon Wireless on November 6th, the Droid's advertising campaign has been a full-frontal attack on the popular Apple smartphone with a heavy focus on what the iPhone doesn't do. "iDon't run simultaneous apps, iDon't have a real keyboard, iDon't take 5-megapixel pictures," taunts Verizon's Droid ad.

SEE MORE WEB PRODUCTS COVERAGE IN OUR PRODUCTS CATEGORY

That's a wrap for another week! Enjoy your weekend everyone.

]]>Discuss

Expert Labs: Can an Outside Incubator Turn Government Tech-Savvy?

Marshall Kirkpatrick — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 12:21:42 -0800

Long-time blogger and tech executive Anil Dash announced today at the Web 2.0 Expo New York that he's leaving publishing software company SixApart and will head a new technology incubator called Expert Labs. Expert Labs will be dedicated to connecting technology innovators ready to build tools with government officials who can put those tools to use in the public interest. It's a vision that differs from what some other technologists are focused on with regards to the government.

Dash is best known as a blogger for his articles like this 2007 explanation of LOLCat grammatical structure and this 2009 explanation of the real-time web. Can the man who's explained so much to the rest of us help the US government adopt new online technology? That's quite a task.

]]>Sponsor

]]> The organization's website reads in part as follows:

Expert Labs is non-profit and non-partisan but we're moving with the speed and passion of true believers. We're providing funding and resources to help create some of the coolest new technology on the web, and as part of the largest general scientific society in the world, we have access to the smartest minds around. Put those together with your help, and we'll be making our country better in no time.

Expert Labs will be a part of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and funded by the MacArthur Foundation, Caroline McCarthy reports at Cnet.

Dash wrote this Summer that "I think the most promising new startup of 2009 is one of the least likely: The executive branch of the federal government of the United States." We've been far more critical here at ReadWriteWeb of the Obama Administration's efforts. The much anticipated Data.gov, for example, was so unexciting in its implementation that watchdog group the Sunlight Foundation launched a competitor to it.

The web changes very fast and government tends to change very, very slowly.

Dash's Vision Appears Different From Tim O'Reilly's

The organization will aim to facilitate production of applications to serve government. Those apps will be cloud-based. This is a different kind of approach, I'd say, than the one that Web 2.0 Expo founder Tim O'Reilly is taking in trying to build a "government as a platform."

Expert Labs says it has "a mandate to help policy makers in the U.S. Federal Government tap into the expertise of their fellow citizens."

O'Reilly, on the other hand, advocates a "government as platform" that would supply raw digital data and other forms of support for private sector innovators to build on top of. "How do you think like a platform provider?" O'Reilly asked in an interview with us this Summer.

"We've moved our government from a lean vehicle for collective action, and over the last 200 years it has become so strong that it's now 40% of GDP. I want to go back to the original vision of the role of government: a convener of things that we as individuals and companies can't do alone. Standard setting, pilot programs; government providing enabling technologies for citizens to serve themselves."

Dash's incubator will help technologists help the government; O'Reilly's vision is to help the government help technologists. These two visions may be complimentary, but they certainly seem different. Which will be more effective at changing the world? Government can be a slow enough mover that it's hard to say. Both are thought provoking, but neither vision will be easy to make real.

Photo graciously licensed as Creative Commons by Joi Ito.

]]>Discuss

Check Out the Companies That Make ReadWriteWeb Possible

Admin — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 10:00:13 -0800

Our mission at ReadWriteWeb is to explore the latest Web technology products and trends. We're fortunate to have a great group of sponsors who support this goal. So, once a week, we write a post about them; about who they are, what they do, and what they've been up to lately. Pay them a visit and show your appreciation of their sponsorship of this site. Pay them a visit or tweet them a "Thank you" (see link below each sponsor) to show your appreciation for their sponsorship of this site. You can also start following some or all of our sponsors on Twitter with a few clicks on this TweepML page.

]]>Sponsor

]]> Ready to learn more about the smart companies that support this site you love to read? Read on...

Crowd Science

Thank Crowd Science on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Mashery

You can find out more about APIs and their business use at www.mashery.com.

Thank Mashery on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Rackspace

Explore Rackspace's hosting and cloud computing solutions.

Thank Rackspace on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Aplus.net

You can register for Aplus.net here.

Thank Aplus.net on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Hakia

Hakia is a semantic search engine. It delivers a new search experience based on focus, clarity, and credibility. You can compare Hakia to Google and Bing here.

Learn more about Contexa.

Thank Hakia on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Domain.ME

Thank Domain.ME on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Codero

Groupsite

Thank Groupsite on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

NaviSite

NaviSite's product and service offerings include:

Vast custom application development capabilities, including SOA solutions, eCommerce, and Web 2.0 applications.
Full stack of enterprise hosting services for mid-market companies, including shared, dedicated, and complex hosting, SaaS enablement, and colocation.
Best in class managed hosting, such as virtualization and utility computing.

Thank NaviSite on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Faroo

Thank Faroo on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

MyDomain.com

Search Engine Strategies

Thank Search Engine Strategies on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Backupify

Thank Backupify on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Our Gracious Hosts and Blogging Software

ReadWriteWeb is hosted by Media Temple and is published using SixApart's Movable Type.

Thank Media Temple and SixApart on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

The companies above pay our rents or mortgages and we appreciate it. We hope you'll stop by their sites and see what they've got to offer.

Have you got a smart company that could use some more visits by the sophisticated readers of a blog like ReadWriteWeb's? Drop us a line and let's talk.

Thanks to all our sponsors and our readers for your support!

]]>Discuss

ReadWriteWeb Events Guide, 14 November 2009

Andrew Lobo — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 20:51:45 -0800

We've added a couple of more events to this week's events guide. You can download the entire event calendar in iCal format or import it into your Google Calendar. You can also import individual events using the link beside each entry. This events guide is a weekly feature here on ReadWriteWeb. We publish it every weekend, as good a time as any to review your conference plans.

Know of an event taking place that should appear here? Let us know in the comments below or contact us.

]]>Sponsor

]]> 18 – 19 November 2009: San Francisco

GreenBeat 2009

VentureBeat, the leading innovation-focused business blog, will host the seminal conference on The Smart Grid, November 18-19 in San Francisco. GreenBeat 2009 brings together the nation's 500 leading entrepreneurs, investors, utility and technology executives, policymakers and press to affect accelerated development of a leaner, more efficient electrical grid. With participation by Al Gore, former Vice President and Nobel Prize Winner; John Doerr of Kleiner Perkins; and industry leaders, including from Cisco, Tendril, PG&E, expect lively discussion and power networking. The program will highlight new technologies and explore the opportunities afforded by the stimulus package. For more, visit www.greenbeat2009.com.

ReadWriteWeb readers, save 20% on regular price tickets with discount code GREENRWW09 here.

19 November 2009: Mountain View, California

Under the Radar

Save $200: book by 2 October 2009, and get the early-bird rate.

30 November 2009

New Way to Work

1 – 3 December 2009: London, England

Online Information & IMS 2009

1 – 3 December 2009: Boston, Massachusetts

Gilbane Conference Boston

Join us at the sixth annual "Gilbane Conference Boston: Content, Collaboration and Customers."

Web business and engagement;
Managing collaboration and social media: internal and external;
Enterprise content: searching, integrating and publishing;
Content infrastructure.

Visit www.gilbaneboston.com for conference details. ReadWriteWeb readers, use the discount code "GILBANE" to save an additional $200. Register today!

1 – 3 December 2009: San Francisco

Supernova

7 December 2009: San Francisco

SF MusicTech Summit

7 – 11 December 2009: Chicago, Illinois

Search Engine Strategies 2009

SEO Through Blogs and Feeds
Duplicate Content and Multiple Site Issues
What's the Link Between Search and Social?
Online PR: Where to Next?
Search Analytics

See more at www.SearchEngineStrategies.com/chicago. ReadWriteWeb readers receive a 15% discount when registering here using RWW15 code.

11 December 2009: Mountain View, California

Add-on-Con

Add-on-Con is a single-day conference focused on the future of the browser and its emergence as a platform.

ReadWriteWeb readers save $50 by using the discount code "addoncon09RRW."

11 January 2010: Nashville, Tennessee

Social Fresh Nashville

ReadWriteWeb readers get a 15% discount with the code "RWW15".

27 – 28 January 2010: Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Enterprise Social 2.0: Rip or ROI?

How to integrate social media programs successfully into business strategies?
Building business momentum, visibility and market growth through social media
Measuring success and influence using metrics and analytics: what are the tools and techniques
Integrating viral marketing and social media into traditional marketing mix
Developing and activating audiences using social media channels such as Twitter, Facebook, blogs

8 February 2010: Tampa, Florida

Social Fresh Tampa

ReadWriteWeb readers get a 15% discount with the code "RWW15".

15 – 16 March 2010: London, England

2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum — London

The 2nd Annual Social Networking World Forum takes place at the Olympia Conference Centre in London. The two-day event features four dedicated conference streams:

Social Networking World Forum
Enterprise social media
Social TV World Forum
Mobile Social Networking Forum

The event features key speakers from global brands, organizations, social networking publishers and developers, pioneering social media leaders, top agencies, content producers, and more.

Full workshop program within exhibition area
Evening networking reception
Pre-show online meeting planner for delegates
Free pass for exhibition only

Download this entire events calendar in iCal format.

]]>Discuss

Ad-Driven Content - Is it Crossing The Line?

Richard MacManus — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 05:00:00 -0800

Yesterday we wrote about how Demand Media produces 4,000 new pieces of content every day - and whether it can sustain quality at that scale. There was vigorous discussion about the quality issue in the comments, including from some of Demand Media's thousands of freelance writers.

In this follow-up post, we look at the type of content that Demand Media outputs. It turns out that much of it is driven by advertising demand. Again we feel compelled to ask: is this good or bad for the Web's future?

]]>Sponsor

]]> Demand Media is one of the largest producers of content on the Web today and is ranked among the top 15 Web properties in the United States. It's also syndicating content to large media sites like Yahoo. All of this means that the type of content Demand Media is producing will get more and more common on the Web.

Service Journalism

Demand Media claims that its content is not journalism. However, it does compare its model to service journalism (a.k.a. "news you can use"), a concept rooted in the 1960s and common in lifestyle magazines such as Good Housekeeping. This is content such as tips and feature articles about fashion, food and travel.

Demand Media told us that it aims for "useful, usable content." The content it produces has an "evergreen quality" to it, they say.

CEO Richard Rosenblatt told me at the Web 2.0 Summit last month that Demand Media will be syndicating content more to traditional media properties in 2010 and beyond. They see 'service journalism' content as being complementary to not only magazines, but large portal sites like Yahoo.

An interesting observation from Rosenblatt was that Demand Media content is "very similar to Associated Press content." In other words, it "helps fill the pages" for newspapers, magazines and other media properties.

Matching Content With Ads

What may be more controversial is that Demand Media makes no bones about their content being produced in order to put ads around it. OK, almost every online publisher has a similar objective: to make money with contextual ads. ReadWriteWeb makes most of its revenue from online advertising.

What's slightly different here is that Demand Media is custom producing content in categories where there is strong advertiser interest. A specific example of that is a YouTube ad program with Target that is currently running. In this channel based around holiday consumerism, content created by Demand Media is featured side-by-side with advertising. Below is a screenshot showing an eHow video entitled "How to Make Cornbread Stuffing," with a Target ad to the right.

Demand Media told us that advertisers are crying out for new content to advertise against. If a large media network like Yahoo is looking to "create content with ads," the next step for Demand Media is enabling their customers to "order content with ads." An example might be something like this: Demand Media produces a how-to article on playing tennis; then sells it to a Yahoo sports site accompanied by tennis equipment adverts placed around it.

Conclusion

Is what Demand Media is doing much different from mainstream media publications or blogs?

One difference is that ReadWriteWeb (along with many other online publications) is a journalism business, so we strive for editorial independence and there is a 'church and state' line with advertising. Demand Media isn't journalism in the traditional sense - that isn't the reason for its being and the company freely admits that. Demand Media produces content to make money, it's as simple as that really.

What do you think: is what Demand Media is doing just a natural extension of contextual advertising? Or is it crossing a line where content is too married to advertising?

]]>Discuss

Waveboard 2.0 Will Offer Push Notifications for iPhone

Sarah Perez — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 06:59:44 -0800

If you're not one of the fortunate few to have gotten your hands on a Google Wave invite, then you probably don't have too much use for Waveboard, an iPhone-ready interface for Google's new real-time collaboration system. However, if you've recently become a member of the Google Wave cult, you may have already forked over the 99 cents for this mobile app so that you could create, browse and respond to "waves" while on the go.

While some early testers of the Waveboard app complained that it didn't do anything more than what the iPhone optimized website already offered, the next release of Waveboard may have those naysayers changing their mind. Waveboard 2.0 has a few new features, but the one that will grab everyone's attention is its ability to offer "push" notifications on the iPhone.

]]>Sponsor

]]> According to a post on the GetWaveboard blog, the next edition of the Waveboard application (iTunes link) has been submitted to Apple and is now awaiting App Store approval. This process usually takes a few weeks, but in the meantime a couple of video previews let us see what's to come.

Quick Inbox

One of the new features of Waveboard 2.0 is something called the "Quick Inbox" view. Since Google Wave loads a little slowly on the iPhone - something developer Dirk Holtwick says is out of his hands - he's come up with a workaround for a speedier launch. The new "quick inbox" feature offers a fast-loading overview that displays the waves that have changed, as you can see in the following video:

Push Notifications

Even more exciting, perhaps, is the push notifications feature. In addition to displaying a badge on the app's icon showing the number of new waves, the push notifications feature will tap into the iPhone's ability to display pop-up alerts on your device. As new text is entered into a wave, the iPhone will display the additional text in a push notification message:

Of course, depending on the number of waves you're involved in and how heavily they're used, this feature could easily become an annoyance. Unfortunately, Google offers few control mechanisms for managing the waves you belong to at the moment - something that could lead to serious information overload for Wave users. For example, anyone can add you to a wave - even without your permission. This can lead to an inbox crowded with waves that you don't really care about following. For some, this feature is a key selling point for Wave, but for others it's just a chaos-inducing mess. That may change in future, though, when Google implements the "whitelisting" feature, which will allow users to create an approved list of fellow wavers, and only people on that list will be able to contact you.

There's no word yet on if or how you'll be able to manage the new push notifications feature in the app's settings. If there were configuration options that let you exclude some waves (like public ones, for example), then it would be even more useful.

In any event, the app will now have some value-added features that make it worth the $0.99. Stay tuned to the GetWaveboard blog in the coming days for more details on the new features and how they work.

]]>Discuss

How Demand Media Produces 4,000 Pieces of Content a Day

Richard MacManus — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 03:10:00 -0800

In August we reviewed Demand Media, one of the largest producers of content on the Web today. Wired Magazine recently compared Demand Media's content business to Henry Ford's production line for cars. Demand Media currently produces 4,000 new pieces of content a day. What's more, it's increasingly syndicating this content to media sites outside of its own network of vertical websites. In other words, Demand Media is becoming a very large content production factory for third party sites such as Yahoo.

In this follow-up post, we dive deeper into Demand Media's content production model - and ask questions about the quality of the output.

]]>Sponsor

]]> This article is based on an interview I conducted with several Demand Media executives, including founder Richard Rosenblatt, at the Web 2.0 Summit in September.

Will Demand Media Soon be a Household Name?

In our previous posts, we've noted that Demand Media is rapidly rising up the comScore list of the top 50 web properties in the U.S. - in July it was #24, in September it was #15. At this rate, Demand Media will soon be one of the top 10 Web properties in the U.S. - right up there with Amazon, eBay, Apple.

Think about that: how many of you had heard of Demand Media before this year? Amazon, eBay and Apple are all household names. Demand Media (along with another fast-growing mega content site, Answers.com) could be a household name soon too, if its current growth rate continues.

Behind this remarkable growth is a very large output of content each and every day, fueled by thousands of freelance writers and content creators.

So how does Demand Media produce so much content every day? 4,000 new articles a day is a quantum leap above the 20-30 new posts a day that the most feverish of professional blogs pump out.

About Demand Studios

Demand Media produces so much content with a system it calls Demand Studios. It's a proprietary editorial system which is part human-processed and part automated.

The system starts with an automated process, crunching data and running it through an algorithm to identify story ideas that have the best chance of success. The algorithm factors in audience type, ability to attract advertising and potential for traffic.

For a written piece of content, human editors will then check the top story contenders. Potential titles are placed into a pool for writer selection. Once a writer picks up a story, it gets written up, goes through a fact checking and copy editing process (including a plagiarism check), and finally the editorial team approves the completed article. The article is eventually published and the writer gets paid.

This is a simplification of the Demand Studios process, which happens 4,000 times every day! The system appears to be an efficient mix of automation and human labor. As we'll see on Page 2 of this post, the editorial process isn't foolproof. But even so, the scale of this system is impressive.

As at the end of October, Demand Studios had created more than one million original pieces of content, both text articles and videos. There are more than 6,000 active Demand Studios freelance creators - including writers, filmmakers, title proofers, copy editors.

In my meeting with Demand Media executives at the recent Web 2.0 Summit, I was told that an average of 11 people - and 15 unique roles - touch a piece of content as it flows through Demand Studios. The company argues that this, along with community rating of content, produces quality content.

But does it, actually?

Next Page: The Quality Question...

Demand Media: Is This Really Quality Content?

Demand Media is sensitive to criticism of the quality of its content. It's a question that ReadWriteWeb has raised a few times and which Wired picked up on in its October profile.

At the end of that article, Wired noted that Demand Media is "trying to place a new emphasis on quality." However it concludes by saying that Demand Media is "not moving far from [the] Henry Ford model."

I asked Demand Media CEO Richard Rosenblatt about this criticism. Bristling, he responded by pointing to two things.

Firstly Rosenblatt claimed that many of Demand Media's content creators are professionals. He said that 75% of them have been published in magazines or newspapers, 25% have written a book, and 25% have held professional marketing roles.

Example of Demand Media content, on Yahoo! network site 'Shine.'

Secondly, Rosenblatt noted that Demand Media content creators have choices in the market - but they choose to work for Demand Media.

What's more, Rosenblatt said that "quality is based on relevance" - a quote he attributed to Wired editor Chris Anderson, who wrote the books The Long Tail and Free.

Who then are these people that write and shoot video for Demand Media? They're professional freelancers and they're paid anywhere from $15-30 per piece of content. This isn't a great deal of money for a freelance article. But according to Demand Media, there are hundreds of such freelancers earning thousands of dollars per month from Demand Studios (although this would be the top of the range).

4,000 New Articles Per Day - What Percentage is High Quality?

The trouble with the term 'quality' is that it's both variable and subjective. I've seen examples of Demand Media work that are poor - e.g. this eHow article about how to get Twitter followers.

Step 3 reads as follows:

"Engage in discussions. If someone on your timeline says something interesting or says something that you can put input into, do it. There's nothing worse than Twitter followers who follows for no reason. Even if you don't get responses some of the time, it doesn't hurt to try and the people you're following will know you're attemption to converse and are more likely to follow you back."

There are a couple of bad typos in that paragraph ~~(where were the copy editors?)~~, but worse is that the advice is mediocre. It's relevant content to many people, but is it good content? Apparently it was to the people who've read it, as it has 5 stars...

UPDATE: Demand Media contacted us to explain that above article is what they call a "user-generated article." This is marked in the screenshot below as "user submitted article," whereas a Demand Studios article would have "eHow Contributing Writer" as the attribution. Demand Media advised that "this UGC does not flow through the full Demand Studios editorial process - and is not counted in our 4,000 pieces of content."

The bigger question is: there are surely many examples of good Demand Media content on the Web, but how many of the 4,000 articles it produces every day aren't?

As we posited in our previous article, the concern with fast-growing content factories like Demand Media and Answers.com is that quality is taking too much of a back seat to quantity. Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

In our next post, we will look into the type of content that Demand Media is producing - and what it plans to do with it next.

See also: our follow-up analysis of Demand Media, Ad-Driven Content - Is it Crossing The Line?

]]>Discuss

Twitter Data Dump: InfoChimps Puts 1B Connections Up for Sale

Marshall Kirkpatrick — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 21:57:12 -0800

Data extracted from 500 million Twitter messages was released today by a tiny Texas startup company that forward-looking geeks have been watching for a year. Austin-based Infochimps announced this afternoon that it is now selling two important and very large sets of Twitter data. Limited samples of the data are available for free and a third, most important, set of data still won't be ready for a few more hours.

"What we want is to see people use this to build web apps," Infochimps co-founder Flip Kromer told us today. "You take this data, mash it up with any other very large corpus of data with timestamps - and you've got a web app."

]]>Sponsor

]]>

This is particular, extracted data though - not the full text of Tweets. "We're trying to be careful," Kromer says, "we are not yet exposing the contents of tweets." And this data isn't cheap if you want the numbers broken out by the hour instead of the month.

This is a very big move because most developers struggle to get access to a large quantity of data from Twitter.

Here's what InfoChimps is putting on sale:

Tweet #38 in the History of Twitter: "oh this is going to be addictive" - by @dom

Hashtags, links and smiley emoticons used across Twitter on an hour-by-hour basis.

@ messages, RT and favorites and who they came from: 1 billion relations, making what the company calls a "conversation metric."

A useful if less exciting set of data that will help developers map user ID numbers from search.twitter over to the different ID numbers used in the primary Twitter API. These systems were never merged and it can require a lot of API calls to merge user data.

The company believes it is capturing about 10% of the total data on Twitter right now, but Kromer says that he believes he can ramp that up to 30%.

Data as a Pot of Gold

InfoChimps is a bulk data marketplace with more than 5000 data sets in its catalog so far. The vast majority are free and were added by the company's own staff, but not all. The decades-old polling firm Zogby International, for example, is selling some Iraqi polling data through InfoChimps. Cross-reference that polling data with publicly available data about civilian casualties in Iraq and you can see some interesting patterns, InfoChimps' PR rep Josh Dilworth told us. (Dilworth is known as the most data-savvy PR guy in the Web 2.0 world and also represents Wolfram Alpha and Twine.)

The company hopes that it can sell the data derived from sitting on the Twitter API as a demonstration of the value that this and other data sets have. InfoChimps says it can help companies monetize data that they'd otherwise be paying to serve up through repeated API calls, if at all.

From sentiment analysis (not yet an option with the current InfoChimps data set) to social graph discovery (definitely an option), we've written extensively here before about the impacts that social data could have on business, social and political policies in the future.

John Zogby, founder of polling firm Zogby International, spoke to us at length (in a separate phone interview several months ago) about the value of using online social networks to measure public opinion. "We've been particularly known for innovating and polling new technologies," he said.

"83% of all households are online today and 92% of likely voters, so with online polling we are today about where the country was with telephone penetration when telephone surveys started. Social networking is not as representative as online access [in general] yet, but I'm comfortable with caveats: that you can do a random sampling, so long as you claim that's what your universe is, as long as you don't extrapolate to all Americans, etc. It has tremendous, tremendous value.

"I know that the landline era is coming to an end - not today or tomorrow but we've got to find new and different ways of doing our work. It's the same kind of crossroads as the '70s, when we moved away from the door-to-door and mail-in results to the landlines.

"Online, frankly just like telephone, doesn't have the minority population, but for market surveys you may be looking for a different kind of consumer.

"We know that the landline phone is pushing us away; we know that we can't use the cell phone in the same way; and we know that we've got to reinvent this industry [of measuring public opinion]. What's happening are simultaneous new technologies and at the same time growing penetration of these new technologies. We're riding a bucking bronco."

Use Cases

The conversation metric data that InfoChimps is selling is the most exciting to me. Imagine a third-party app using historical social-conversation data to filter Twitter or other messages based on the strongest social connections that I or other people have. Imagine, for example, social Q&A service Aardvark combining the Twitter Lists API with this InfoChimps data set for a scenario like this: "You have a question about stock options? How would you like us to find a person who knows about that, is regularly conversed-with by people on Robert Scoble's Twitter list of Venture Capitalists and is available right now?" That sounds pretty great to me.

The possible applications are many. "I see Twitter as a data acquisition device for what people talk about and how they relate to each other," InfoChimps' Kromer says.

Right now InfoChimps is selling the hashtag and link dataset for $8,000 and the social metric data set for $9,500. Eventually the company will likely move to a subscription model.

How They Got the Data

How did InfoChimps get the data? The company hits the Twitter Developer API 20,000 times an hour (the standard for developers) but takes big swaths of data each time it does. "I have a priority queue," Kromer told us.

"I can set a search term, and for each search term I can get 1500 tweets per API call. If I get 1500 tweets at a time, then the number of wasted tweets at the end of a series of searches is the smallest. If I'm searching for a term and get less than 1500 results back, then I forecast how long it will take to fill that number of results back up to the maximum and move it down the priority queue accordingly. On the lowest priority I have searches for RT or http. There will always be 1500 results for that. It's only API calls that limit me. As is, it's like a fisherman setting nets: what matters is that dinner is tasty."

Does that sound so hard? Worth thousands of dollars? Here's what Kromer says:

"It's not magic. If you talk to people who use Hadoop and do social networking analysis, this is underwhelming. You take 30 million users, 1 billion links, adorn each link with info at the end of the link and acrue it with the person at the head of the link. That breaks conventional databases; the plumbing is hard. The math is easy but when you do it a billion times, it starts to get interesting. You have to be careful and clever. We plan to do stuff that is structural - a clustering co-efficient true pagerank."

Ultimately it's about specialization and data as a service. "The people we need to come in and connect this info with human beings," Kromer says, "aren't the people who should be wasting their time on the math. And the guys who are good at doing these things should not be building Web apps."

But Can They Get Away With It?

There's some question whether Twitter will allow InfoChimps to sell data based on Twitter data. Kromer says he'd much rather resell the data on a commission than have to do all the work he's done to set up the extraction system. But it was a year ago that InfoChimps caught the eye of people who love data: by releasing a large collection of scraped Twitter data.

The InfoChimps blog post for that read: "Big huge thanks to twitter.com: they have given us permission to share this freely. Please go build tools with this data that make both twitter.com and yourself rich and famous: then more corporations will free their data."

But then Twitter founder Evan Williams asked InfoChimps to take those data sets down until a Terms of Service for them could be figured out. That never happened, and communication between the two companies hasn't progressed very far over the last year.

InfoChimps does not have Twitter's permission to do what it did today, but Kromer says Twitter hasn't contacted them either. No one from Twitter headquarters has responded to our request for comment yet.

"We talked to our lawyer about this a lot," Kromer told us, "we are on absolutely solid ground with regards to copyright, user privacy and use of the API. This is clearly for the benefit of their community."

That's nice that Kromer feels so assured, but his attitude seems a little unrealistic.

We asked technology journalist Robert Scoble what he thought of the dilemma, and his opinion is pretty clear. "If Twitter wants to be a platform, they have to behave like a platform," he said. "Don't be king-makers. Let the marketplace choose the winners. If they are going to say nobody should study the data because we're going to sell that, that's not being a platform. Twitter tries to pick the winners and it pisses me off. They admit that they are king-makers. All that does is make everyone vote against them and hope a competitor comes around."

Perhaps time will tell. But these are very early days in what looks to be an era of widespread innovation built on top of social data analysis.

]]>Discuss

Top Internet Trends of 2000-2009: Online Music

Richard MacManus — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:22:08 -0800

It's November 2009 and we're nearing the end of a decade. It's been a tumultuous time of change for many industries, much of it driven by the Internet. With that in mind, over the coming weeks ReadWriteWeb will look back on the defining Web trends of the past 10 years. From the dot com boom, to the nuclear winter after, to the passion and enthusiasm of the pre-Web 2.0 innovations (such as RSS and podcasting), to the highs and hype of Web 2.0, to the current era of the real-time Web, to the near future of the Internet of Things. We'll explore all of this and more.

We're starting with online music. No industry, except arguably the newspaper one, has been rocked (pardon the pun) more by the Internet than the music industry.

]]>Sponsor

]]> Napster & Kazaa: Online File Sharing

The online music decade started with Napster, a music file sharing service created by Shawn Fanning that operated between June 1999 and July 2001. Napster enabled people to freely share MP3 files over the Internet; however it quickly ran into major legal trouble. Napster was the subject of lawsuits in 2000 by touchy metal band Metallica and others. It was eventually shut down by court order, after several major record labels went after the service.

After Napster's demise, a P2P application called Kazaa became the most popular service for music file sharing. But it too eventually succumbed to record industry attacks.

Curiously, both Napster and Kazaa were recently reincarnated as law-abiding services. After years of re-launch attempts, Napster was acquired by Best Buy in September 2008 and was born again in May 2009. Meanwhile Kazaa turned into a legit music subscription service in July this year.

iTunes / iPod: Digital Music Goes Commercial

While Napster and Kazaa tried to skirt around the commercial imperatives of music, like paying artists, Apple took on the record industry in an entirely legal way. In January 2001, Apple launched a digital music player for music called iTunes. Then in April 2003, the iTunes Store was launched. It offered the ability to buy songs for 99 cents each, which had a major impact on the music industry.

Soon after Napster's demise in 2001, Apple launched what was to become a revolutionary device in the music industry. The iPod was launched in October 2001 and it became the most popular portable music player since the Sony Walkman in the 1980s.

Fast forward to 2009 and iTunes continues to evolve. In January Apple announced that iTunes would go DRM-free. In September 2009 Apple launched version 9 of iTunes, which included a Genius-like recommendation feature for apps and 'iTunes LPs' - a feature that brings liner notes and artwork to digital albums.

MySpace: Music & Social Networking

MySpace was launched in August 2003 and soon became a popular hangout for local bands, especially indie rockers. MySpace provided a way for those bands to promote their music and reach a wide network through social networking.

As ReadWriteWeb's Sarah Perez wrote last month, it was a virtuous circle for MySpace. The bands' presence on MySpace "began to attract a young, hip crowd of users who were interested in following pop culture, and, in particular, the up-and-coming artists they discovered while browsing through the network. Only eight months after its launch, MySpace began to experience exponential growth, as its users created profiles and friended others who would then, in turn, invite more users to join the social network. Thanks to the "network effect," MySpace soon became the place to be online. Everyone was there."

However by 2008, MySpace had ceded the social networking crown to Facebook. In 2009, MySpace is once again trying to reclaim its heritage as a music service. In October MySpace launched "Artist Dashboards" and integrated its music video vault with recent acquisition iLike.

Pandora & last.fm: Online Music Discovery

Online music services have flourished in the 'web 2.0' era, when the ability to find new music and share it with others via the Web became increasingly sophisticated.

Two services in particular stand out. One is Pandora, a free online music discovery service. Pandora was founded in 2000 and continues to grow, despite various legal issues over the years. As ReadWriteWeb's Frederic Lardinois noted earlier this year, Pandora derives its revenue from targeted audio advertising in its music streams and affiliate sales through Amazon's MP3 store and iTunes.

Last.fm is another online music discovery service. It was founded in 2002 and was sold to CBS in 2007. It continues to innovate in 2009, for example in May this year last.fm announced combo stations, allowing a user to create a station with up to three artists or tags.

Conclusion

This post and series was inspired by one of my favorite blogs and podcasts, NPR's All Songs Considered. They're currently looking back at the decade in music and much of the discussion is about how the Internet helped define it.

And it's true, when you think of music at the end of 2009 you think of iTunes, Pandora and last.fm - MySpace even. The record industry is still coming to terms with these and other changes.

Tell us your online music memories of the past 10 years. What's been your favorite online music product or service during that time?

]]>Discuss

Sponsor Post: 10 Killer Tools for Small-Business Success

Admin — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:45:03 -0800

Editor's note: we offer our long-term sponsors the opportunity to write 'Sponsor Posts' and tell their story. These posts are clearly marked as written by sponsors, but we also want them to be useful and interesting to our readers. We hope you like the posts and we encourage you to support our sponsors by trying out their products.

If you have discussed social media with small-business owners, you almost always get two questions:

How do I manage all these social networks without going nuts?
Are any tools out there that can help me be more productive and save time?

]]>Sponsor

]]> The first answer that any good social media thinker would offer a small-business owner would be to pick two or three networks where you can reach the majority of your customers or potential customers and concentrate on those, thus eliminating some of your stress. Fortunately, the second answer is "Yes": tools are out there to help you manage your time and workflow if you plan to spend some time and energy on the social Web.

I polled a few folks who know a thing or two about social media, especially for small businesses, and collected a list of 10 tools, technologies and platforms that can help your small business succeed in social media and Internet marketing. These experts in the field include John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing, Becky McCray of Small Biz Survival, Mack Coller of The Viral Garden, Drew McLellan of Drew's Marketing Minute and Kyle Lacy, author of the upcoming book "Twitter Marketing for Dummies."

Based on their favorites (and some of my own), here are 10 killer tools for small-business success.

1. Jott
Have you ever called yourself and left a voice mail so that you wouldn't forget something? Jott takes that idea a step further, transcribing the voice mail and sending it to your inbox. Instead of sending a quick memo to yourself to remember to email your vendor, you can dictate the email and save time. Upgrade to Jott Assistant and you can dictate to-do lists, automatic Web postings to your social networks, calendar items and more. Jott is a subscription-based service, and it starts at only $3.95 per month for a small Assistant account. For small-business owners on the go, it can be a life-saver.

2. Grasshopper
Grasshopper not only gives your business its very own toll-free 800 number, but it allows your customers to reach you even when you're on the go. Voice mails are delivered to your inbox, as are faxes (in PDF), so you can stay connected everywhere. You can have multiple extensions and extend the service to your employees as well. The service starts at $9.95 per month (plus a $25 activation fee) for 100 minutes. Other plans are $49 and $199 per month.

3. Monitter
If your small business is on Twitter, keeping an eye on the conversations related to your product or service there makes sense. But if you're geographically focused like most small businesses, you probably hate having to weed through similarly named companies and mentions of your industry from folks 1,000 miles away. Monitter lets you search Twitter for keywords, but filters them by specified distances from a zip code. You get tweets about your category, industry and company from within your home territory, where it matters. Monitter is free to use.

4. HootSuite
For anyone who runs a Twitter account for business, a tool like HootSuite can be a productivity boon. Not only can you manage multiple people contributing to the same Twitter account (so that one person isn't solely responsible for tweeting), but you can manage multiple accounts with ease. The software has a bookmarklet for quick link-sharing and offers some cursory stats on your Twitter account as well. It's free to use.

5. Survey Monkey
Perhaps the one luxury that many small businesses can't afford is market research. Survey Monkey enables you to conduct your own online surveys to gain insight into your customer base for free. The tool is easy to use, looks professional and produces a bevy of charts and graphs to help you understand your results. If you have trouble with online tools, Survey Monkey has several video tutorials that make it a snap to tap into customer insights.

6. Simple Online Accounting Solutions
McCray told me about a number of good online tools for bookkeeping and accounting, two really stand out for her. She recommends Outright.com for single-person businesses and WorkingPoint.com for more complex companies. The reason? Simplicity. Speaking as a business owner who is math-averse myself, I'll just say, "Amen!" The simpler, the better. Both of these are outstanding in that category. Outright is free to use. WorkingPoint is free for one user, $10 per month for two and only $80 per month for 10 users.

7. ReQall
Never before has a smart phone app been so incredibly useful! ReQall is a memory aide that enables you to record voice memos via a smartphone or regular phone, have those messages transcribed and then sent to you via email (a la Jott). But wait! There's more. The software uses natural-language processing and some additional analysis to determine whether you're dictating a calendar item or to-do list entry. It then adds those items to your calendar or to-do list. If you say, "Pick up milk at Circle K on Belmont Avenue by 4 pm," you'll get a calendar entry, probably with a Google map link, and a reminder beforehand. For the small-business owner on the go, this app is a must-have.

8. Milog (iPhone App)
While I hate to recommend an application that is limited to iPhone users, this one is worth mentioning. Milog, from SymplySoft, allows you to track your mileage simply, then email yourself neatly organized reports to print or send to your accountant for tax papers. When my CPA told me, "No one tracks their mileage well," I decided to prove her wrong. Milog helps me do that in literally a few seconds per day. The app stores locations for easy trip entry and allows you to add fields for parking, tolls and more. The full version is just $2.99 at the iPhone app store.

9. Minggl
This tool is new (the beta was released two weeks ago) but is very promising. A browser sidebar plugin, Minggl allows you to post status updates across six major social networks (Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Flickr, Digg and Delicious) but, unlike other broadcast services, also allows you to check your inboxes, notifications and public updates from friends on those networks. Add a Google Sidewiki-style annotation service and you've got a pretty useful tool that you won't have to change your habits much to use.

10. Backupify
Whether you're dabbling in social media for your business, conducting full-scale sales calls via Twitter or Facebook or running everything you do through project management software like Google Docs, Zoho or Basecamp, you'd probably get mighty frustrated if one of those services went down and lost your data. Backupify.com serves as a daily or weekly (you decide) backup service for a variety of social media and Web 2.0 services that many small businesses depend on. The service is available at a low cost (accounts start at $4.95 per month) and backs up your important company data (Gmail, Google Docs, Basecamp, Zoho), plus your entire database for services like Flickr, Twitter and even WordPress. (Disclosure: Backupify is a ReadWriteWeb sponsor and a client of mine.)

These applications, programs and platforms only skim the surface. I'm sure you have favorites of your own. Please share them in the comments for your fellow readers and help make this post a one-stop shop for killer small-business tools.

Jason Falls is a social-media consultant based in Louisville, Kentucky. He blogs regularly at SocialMediaExplorer.com. He is also chief evangelist for Backupify.com, a ReadWriteWeb sponsor.

]]>Discuss

5 Years On: ReadWriteWeb's 2004 Interview With Tim O'Reilly

Richard MacManus — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 01:53:59 -0800

Five years ago I interviewed tech publisher Tim O'Reilly about a new term that his company had just coined: Web 2.0. The first Web 2.0 conference had been held the previous month, October 2004, and O'Reilly had graciously agreed to give an interview to yours truly - "an unknown blogger from New Zealand," as I put it back then. The interview ran in a 3-part series (see also part 2 and part 3) and covered Web 2.0, new business models, social software and eBooks.

I've always been a big believer in learning from history as we look to the future. So let's re-visit this interview from five years ago and see how prescient the father of Web 2.0 was.

]]>Sponsor

]]> Microsoft and Web 2.0

In 2004 the leading Web 2.0 companies were Google, Yahoo! and Amazon. But what of the dominant software company of the previous generation, Microsoft? I asked Tim O'Reilly back in November 2004 whether Microsoft's core strategy of software lock-in would survive in web 2.0?

O'Reilly argued that Microsoft would have to change: "I think that the business of Microsoft, the company of Microsoft, is going to continue to succeed. But I think the business model of Microsoft is going to have to change."

This has turned out to be the case. Over the past 5 years, Microsoft has slowly rolled out a "software plus services" strategy under the catch-all phrase 'Live.' While the Windows OS and desktop software such as Office continue to be Microsoft's mainstay products, some of the functionality gradually moved into the cloud - e.g. syncing over devices. Vista, the current generation of Windows, began that transition. In 2009, Microsoft is even taking steps to put Office online.

With the benefit of hindsight, I think O'Reilly nailed it in 2004 with this statement: "Microsoft will continue to dominate on the PC, but the PC is going to be a smaller and smaller part of the entire business."

The Mobile Web, for one, has taken attention away from Microsoft. Which is where Apple comes in...

Apple and Web 2.0

At the inaugural 2004 Web 2.0 Conference, Apple was a no-show. In talking about Apple's position in the Web industry back then, O'Reilly said that "Apple is in a position they've been in a lot of times before. They're like Moses showing the way to the promised land, but they don't actually go there."

Although Apple never did open up, as O'Reilly foresaw, nevertheless they went on to create the most successful new gadget of the past decade: the iPhone. Apple also created a thriving iPhone app ecosystem.

So in the case of the Mobile Web, Moses (a.k.a. Steve Jobs) actually did lead us to the promised land!

Facebook and Data Lock-in

In 2004 I noted that "a lot of what Web 2.0 is about is users producing content and not just consuming it." I pointed to O'Reilly's own example at the time: Amazon compared to the Barnes & Noble website. However, I said that "the other side of that coin [...] is the 'data lock-in' of users, where users may not necessarily have control over their content." I asked O'Reilly if that was something for users to be concerned about?

O'Reilly replied, in November 2004, that "there are companies that are trying to use data lock-in as a competitive tool - and there will eventually be a recognition that this is a problem."

This has indeed happened - and data lock-in is nowhere more of a problem than on the world's most popular social network circa 2009, Facebook. Over the past few years we at ReadWriteWeb have written many articles about Facebook's 'walled garden' approach to user data. Users can't take their personal data elsewhere. What's more, there have been bungled attempts to use that data for commercial means.

Remember that Facebook had just launched in February 2004 and was confined to some selected American Universities (Harvard, Stanford, Columbia and Yale). It had yet to reach the 1 million users mark. While O'Reilly couldn't have known that Facebook would turn into the juggernaut it now is, he did accurately predict that data lock-in would become a major issue:

"I believe that data lock-in of various kinds is going to be one of the key tools of business advantage in the internet era. I think that as companies realize this, they will figure out how to be evil - so to speak (to use Google's terminology) - and I predict that we will in fact have some major battles in that area."

Conclusion

It is remarkable how much can change in the Web industry in five years. Back in 2004, Facebook was a baby and Twitter wasn't even a glint in the milkman's eye. Among the big companies of that time, Apple hadn't yet given birth to the revolutionary iPhone and Microsoft was entering its mid-life crisis.

On reflection, Tim O'Reilly did extremely well in his 2004 predictions - considering how fast the Internet evolves. And I'm still grateful to him for giving an interview to an unknown New Zealand blogger. How times change...

Image credits: Niall Kennedy; Shht!; Alex Eckford

]]>Discuss

Life360 Protects Your Family & Property Via Web, Mobile, & More

Jolie O'Dell — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 21:18:19 -0800

Life360 is often described as an "OnStar for life," providing its users with tools to track and protect people and things through a variety of interfaces.

The company offers IRL services such as child identification paraphernalia, medical IDs, and credit and identity protection; but they also have a cool suite of features that revolve around Internet and mobile tracking of people, objects, and even pets. Their Android application for tracking and securely messaging people even netted them a seed round from Google

]]>Sponsor

]]> The concept for the company, which was founded in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, revolves around disaster preparedness and emergency messaging. Currently, the available features include an emergency messenger that uses email, web, SMS, and phone to get messages through to emergency contacts; a thorough, web-enabled ID service that gives first responders instant access to critical information; a service for cataloging and tracking valuable items via coded tags; and identity protection services.

The mobile tracking feature - which got the company a $300,000 investment from Google - allows users to locate family members using the web interface or the mobile application. Custom privacy settings allow users to find loved ones in an emergency, check their locations, see their statuses, and retrace their previous locations. While the company states this will not make family members feel stalked, we see this app as Cheaters fodder as well as a great way to keep track of the ones you care about most during times of crisis.

The Android app allows users to access all their Life360 services from their phones. Right now, Android devices are supported, with a BlackBerry app coming soon and an iPhone app stuck in App Store purgatory.

Another "coming soon" service we thought was cool - and also excellent Cheaters fodder - is a GPS-enabled tracking dongle that can be thrown in a bag, duct-taped to the underside of a car, tossed onto a pet's collar, stapled to a child - you name it. Life360 founder Chris Hulls told us in an email that he hopes to roll out the hardware within the next six months. "There will be an additional fee, probably in the neighborhood of $100 for the device and $10 per month for each tracked person," he said.

Some other GPS- and mobile-enabled features Hulls plans to release within the next year are a Curfew 2.0 app, a check-in system for "distributed" families to touch base, and customized alerts for emergency notifications in a user's specific location.

]]>Discuss

Check Out the Companies That Make ReadWriteWeb Possible

Admin — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:14:31 -0800

Our mission at ReadWriteWeb is to explore the latest Web technology products and trends. We're fortunate to have a great group of sponsors who support this goal. So, once a week, we write a post about them; about who they are, what they do, and what they've been up to lately. Pay them a visit and show your appreciation of their sponsorship of this site. Pay them a visit or tweet them a "Thank you" (see link below each sponsor) to show your appreciation for their sponsorship of this site. You can also start following some or all of our sponsors on Twitter with a few clicks on this TweepML page.

]]>Sponsor

]]> Ready to learn more about the smart companies that support this site you love to read? Read on...

Crowd Science

Thank Crowd Science on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Mashery

You can find out more about APIs and their business use at www.mashery.com.

Thank Mashery on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Rackspace

Explore Rackspace's hosting and cloud computing solutions.

Thank Rackspace on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Aplus.net

You can register for Aplus.net here.

Thank Aplus.net on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Hakia

Hakia is a semantic search engine. It delivers a new search experience based on focus, clarity, and credibility. You can compare Hakia to Google and Bing here.

Learn more about Contexa.

Thank Hakia on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Domain.ME

Thank Domain.ME on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Codero

Groupsite

Thank Groupsite on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

NaviSite

NaviSite's product and service offerings include:

Vast custom application development capabilities, including SOA solutions, eCommerce, and Web 2.0 applications.
Full stack of enterprise hosting services for mid-market companies, including shared, dedicated, and complex hosting, SaaS enablement, and colocation.
Best in class managed hosting, such as virtualization and utility computing.

Thank NaviSite on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

MyDomain.com

Search Engine Strategies

Thank Search Engine Strategies on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Backupify

Thank Backupify on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

LeapFish

The Web has evolved. It used to be a place where people came to just search for simple information. Now it's a place where people come to also share information: information that is multi-media, complex, real time and social; recommended by people who know, and people you know. LeapFish calls this new place The Living Web, and it has designed an evolved engine to help you get the most from it - a service to help you live the new Web.

Thank LeapFish on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

Our Gracious Hosts and Blogging Software

ReadWriteWeb is hosted by Media Temple and is published using SixApart's Movable Type.

Thank Media Temple and SixApart on Twitter for making ReadWriteWeb possible.

The companies above pay our rents or mortgages and we appreciate it. We hope you'll stop by their sites and see what they've got to offer.

Have you got a smart company that could use some more visits by the sophisticated readers of a blog like ReadWriteWeb's? Drop us a line and let's talk.

Thanks to all our sponsors and our readers for your support!

]]>Discuss