Holtzbrinck Online

Web 2.0 Expo

Growing up, the only type of conventions and expos I heard about were for Science Fiction/Fantasy fans - Star Wars, Star Trek, comic books, etc. Now that I'm a grown up ::waits for snickering to stop::, I've heard of other types of conventions for various interests and have been coerced into attending a few of them by some enthusiastic pals.

On a very short list, I've gone to a tech expo, comic book convention, and a car show. Let's just say I was a little disappointed with the amount of awe and entertainment the displays provided. Rather than getting sneak peeks of developing and innovative projects, spacious rooms were filled with neatly arranged products already out on the market. Suffice to say, I feel a bit jaded. Then lo and behold I came across an ad for the April 2007 San Francisco Web 2.0 Expo, apparently a new event. Targeting marketing, design, technical, and business professionals, their homepage boasts a attending list of personnel from some well known companies. While terms like "Wow!" and "Jiminy Jilikers!" may or may not be bellowed by the mass, this is an event I would probably learn something from. Let's hope they make plans to come to New York.

Read a lengthier description about the Web 2.0 Summit here.

Double Clicking Goodness

My incredible discovery of the day, which is apparently not "new" in any way, is that you can double click any word in any article on NYTimes.com and instantly receive thesaurus and dictionary entries for that word in a pop up window.

I think what amazes me about this functionality is that this is exactly the sort of thing I want to see eBooks doing, and here it is on the NYTimes website right under my nose!  It's simple, elegant, and extraordinarily helpful to users. 

But ultimately it also shows a different attitude towards how we interact with text than most books or websites do - the very fact that they do not trumpet this feature shows it as something that we should be able to take for granted, and hearkens back to times when it was unthinkable that one should read a book without other books to reference or writing materials to make notes in the margin.    When did the act of reading become so passive? 

Already browsers are including search bars that will allow you to quickly choose a search engine or website (e.g. Google, Yahoo, Wikipedia, IMDB) and jump directly to the search results for a phrase, how long before we can select text on the screen, right click, and choose from a drop down menu whether we want to see what sort of response that selection brings up in Dictionary.com, Google, or Wikipedia?    It seems more and more likely that the answer is "not that much longer".  I'm looking forward to it.

A Wiki Novel

Back in November, Meredith wrote a post on We Are Smarter Than Me, an anticipated Pearson publication that is a collaborative effort of thousands of authors registered on WeAreSmarter.org. Today, Penguin UK launched a similar effort - its first wiki novel A Million Penguins.

Using MediaWiki technology, anyone who registers on www.amillionpenguins.com is able to edit and/or add onto this web-based tale for the next 5 weeks. Already, there are 500 posts (some by return users), four chapters, and an interlude. While there are no definite plans to publish a print version, the site has quickly developed a decent web community during the first day of launch. By opening registration to any willing participants, it’s questionable whether the material spawned will be quality ficiton, but this is surely beneficial to Penguin’s brand recognition, site traffic, and their entry to social networking.

Read about Penguin UK's wiki novel in this Reuter article.

Yahoo's Flickr Snafu

You may have heard about this already, but if you don't then the Wired article will get you up to speed.   The crux of it is that Yahoo, in building a portal page about the Nintendo Wii decided to stream Flickr photos tagged with "wii" onto the page.   

Flickr users got snarky and decided to tag a bunch of photos "wii" photos that have nothing to do with Ninendo's game console (e.g. the "I'm with stupid" image to the left, which points at Yahoo's logo).   

Yahoo can't filter out the non-Wii photos because tagging is obviously the only metadata they are using to parse through Flickr's photos and since Flickr's license allows users to retain copyright over the photos they load on to the service Yahoo can't get the tags themselves changed.   

I feel some sympathy for Yahoo here.  It is unbelievably tempting to try to tap into the popular web2.0 sites (such as Flickr, YouTube and MySpace).   Doing so grounds a corporate project in the lives of real people and quickly generates content that should be appealing to users.  And having your photo featured on a Yahoo portal is pretty much the definition of 15-minutes of fame. 

One can't help but wonder, if it had been a small internet start-up that chose to use Flickr this way, would they be getting lauded by users for their innovative idea? Or would they be harassed for the temerity of using someone else's content? 

Paid Wikipedia?

Wired has an AP article today about companies paying for Wikipedia articles. From the article:

When a blogger revealed this week that Microsoft Corp. wanted to pay him to fix purported inaccuracies in technical articles on Wikipedia, the software company endured online slams and a rebuke from the Web encyclopedia's founder for behaving unethically.

The initial controversy was about this incident, but the bulk of the article deals with MyWikiBiz, a company that exists to write wikipedia entries for businesses, a practice that Wikipedia founder James Wales was extremely unhappy about.

While I can completely understand the reason for not allowing a company to request specific changes to their article (a clear violation of Wikipedia's neutrality goals), I can not help but feel that Wikipedia is hobbling itself by not allowing a company like MyWikiBiz to have other companies commission neutral articles.

The only way to be featured on Wikipedia is to have an article that the editors feel is an exemplary piece of work - neutrality being one of the most important aspects of this consideration.  Therefore, an intelligent business will not want a paid writer to put up thinly veiled advertising content, but to write a genuine, factual, and unbiased article.  If anything I feel that this might result in higher quality content than usual as the people writing the articles will be quickly gain experience in sticking to Wikipedia's standards.   

Google keeps a strict line between its paid content (advertising) and non-paid content (search results), but it still places both kinds of content on the same page.  Perhaps accounts for paid Wikipedia writers should tag all of their articles so that readers are aware that the content was solicited and editors can pay extra attention to make sure that neutrality is not compromised, but putting a blanket ban on such articles is almost certainly turning away some perfectly acceptable content in areas that have so far been thinly covered by Wikipedians.

The Power of Community

Featured as the Entrepreneur of the Week on Yahoo finance is Threadless.com.  I first heard of Threadless.com when a friend mentioned it on Facebook a few months ago. I paid no attention to the fact that it attracted a huge web following, all I focused on were their laid-back, yet fashionably hip t-shirts. If I had to describe the website in two words, it would be “T-shirts galore”. 

Threadless.com is a retail business that heavily relies on consumer judgments. A majority of t-shirt designs are submitted by registered users via the website and are voted on to determine which designs will go into production. Every registered user has a blog and posts or comments on shirts for sale are cross-referenced on the respective product page. The brilliance of it all is that the community built by this website ensures a constant supply of fresh and original merchandise and then sells it to the same crowd. By passing on production decisions to the site users, calculating the equilibrium on the pesky supply & demand graph is probably avoidable.

Creators of Threadless.com, Nickell and DeHart, have accredited their success to the intricate web community they’ve built. Where else can one reach an international audience and bypass the dilemmas of assorted time zones? Nowhere.

Words For Sale

Recently I was reading an article online when I encountered a word with a curious double-underline. So, I decided to investigate. What I expected was to click on the word and zoom over to another place on the website where I could learn more about that topic. Little did I know that as soon as my cursor moved across the word, a pop-up advertisement would appear over the text! Although I’ve since discovered that this type of advertising has been around since 2004, the ad was a surprise. What I found out was that this is called “in-text” advertising, a form of promotion that is steadily spreading across the web. Previously found only on niche sites, in-text advertising is cropping up more and more as publishers experiment with various types of online advertising to see what works best for readers and advertisers. In-text ads have even made their way onto mainstream sites such as FoxNews.com. Since you are probably wondering by now … yes – in-text ads have been controversial since the day they were launched because, essentially, they violate the publishing equivalent of separation of church and state. As the Wall Street Journal reported recently, among other problems, in-text ads mark “a departure from a long-observed tradition in the print medium of keeping editorial content separate from advertising.” The ads are not like a “special advertising section” you’d see in a magazine, because they’re embedded in editorial content, with only that subtle double-underline to distinguish them. So, concerns that the ads present ethical problems or have the potential to corrode ‘‘journalistic quality and credibility’” seem well-founded. If the trend grows, could writers be tempted to sprinkle their pieces with keywords for advertisers? Publishers who run in-text ads say there’s no problem since their news departments don’t know what keywords advertisers purchase. And purveyors of in-text ads argue that editorial departments are responsible for maintaining good editorial judgment in the face of any type of advertising. Spending on online advertising is increasing, and in-text advertising offers advertisers and website owners another opportunity to serve highly targeted ads that I’m sure is difficult to pass up. Plus, providers of in-text advertising are gaining a better and better understanding of where, and how, and how often to serve the ads. My sense is, keep an eye out for those double-underlines.

Pileus is not a cloud…

Before all the angry meteorologists start leaving rebuttals as comments, give this post a chance.

The term Pileus is known to Romans as a hat and to forecasters as a sign of stormy weather. From the same culture that brought us squid-ink pizza and Power Rangers, the Japanese will tell you that Pileus is the name of the coolest umbrella - ever. To out perform this umbrella, the challenger must beat the following list of unexpected features:

1) Wi-Fi enabled 

2) Integrated digital camera 

3) Handle with a built-in projector 

4) Automated picture and video uploads to Flickr and YouTube (respectively) 

5) Last, but not least – rain resistant.

Developed in the Okude laboratory of Tokyo's Keio University, a Pileus prototype showed up early in the year at the Ubicomp 2006 conference. Accounts were also set up on Flickr and YouTube with photos and videos uploaded. The Pileus’ design has been improved into a sleeker version since then and features a twistable grip for file navigation. Although I question the practicality of this invention, I still find it an extremely innovative creation. By debuting at a conference on ubiquitous computing, it’s further evidence that soon no one will be able to escape YouTube – even if it’s just you, the rain, and your umbrella.

The Wisdom of We

Last week, UK publisher Pearson announced plans to publish a book next fall that will have thousands of authors. Tentatively titled We Are Smarter Than Me, the book will examine how Web 2.0 technologies such as social networks, blogs, and wikis can benefit businesses. Collaborators on the project, Pearson, The MIT Sloan School of Management, and The Wharton School have invited more than a million business professionals and faculty, students, and alumni from the business schools to collectively write the book on business best practices in the age of Web 2.0. Starting with chapter headings and some initial content, contributing authors will be asked to provide real examples of businesses that are trying to harness the power of communities and explore what works and what doesn’t. The project will use wiki technology to allow authors to add and edit contributions through the WeAreSmarter.org website. Then the material will be turned over to ghostwriters who will turn it into a 120-page book whose profits will be donated to a charity. Contributing authors won't be compensated, but they will be credited in the book and on the website. Inspired by Wikipedia, a wiki-produced, not-for-profit online encyclopedia, the project builds on the idea (presented in James Surowiecki’s book The Wisdom of the Crowds) that large groups of people working together can be “smarter,” make better decisions, and come up with better solutions and predictions. Read more about this publishing project here and here.

Brooklyn Style Pizza?

While reading Slice the other day I saw that Domino's is now offering "Brooklyn Style Pizza".  While I am appalled by this notion on basic principles I am particularly unsettled by the Brooklyn Style Pizza Website.

Ok, if you visited the site I'm going to encourage you to take a few deep breaths to clear your head.   I can't decide if I'm more offended by the awful Brooklyn stereotype or the terrible web design that's at work here.  I'm not a Brooklyn native, but the part that I live in now certainly lacks many of the elements Domino's nightmarish Bizzaro-Brooklyn.   So that's appalling because I have grown to love my neighborhood and its hard to imagine anything being further from my home than this website.   

On the other hand, the terrible decision to embrace such an obnoxious web design philosophy only compounds the problem - a company like Domino's does not get a website this bad by accident.  So at some point someone sat down and said "this will make an excellent website". 

If you want more grisly details you can read the NY Times article.