Clue

Bridging the Enterprise Gap for a new level of literacy —

An email was sent to a bunch of leads the other day about the progress of our new document management server.

At the end of the email it said to pass this information on to our teams.

Need to Know - Scattered and Slow - Private by default

The way I see it each lead will send a version of this email to their teams, and then they will all have silo’d conversations.

Then certain leads will want clarification or have a question to ask, but will not include all the other leads on that email.

Then back to their teams again….

Back and forth, back and forth…the same topic being conversed in different groups…the scattered and slow approach.

On some occasions some of the leads will not pass on the message, or maybe the lead didn’t get one of the emails, and maybe the lead will slip passing on your feedback…and if they do you may not be attributed.

Then one day the change comes and people say why wasn’t I communicated about this…this initiative doesn’t even factor in how we work…if they consulted us the change could at least reflect to make the way we work easier and more productive. They don’t have a clue about ground zero. This is the enterprise gap!

Worker: Resist…ignore new process, use my backdoor workaround.

Manager: How come this change is being resisted…email the change management guy we need to "push" this.

Yuck, the word "push"…anyway this shows how a lack of visibility, co-creation, and bottlenecks that managers have the potential to be, lead to ineffectiveness…need a KM Flow Doctor!

Actually this takes me back to my corporate plot post.

Good to Know - Contained and Quick - Public by default

Here’s how I would have done it.

Believe it or not we actually have a Community of Practice (CoP) for this initiative.

I would have written a blog post instead of an email

• Our blogs have an email address, so we can publish a post by emailing the blog
• Since not all these people may subscribe to the blog I would have emailed these people the link to the blog post
• In the email I would mention to them to leave a comment on the blog if they had any queries
• I would also mention in the email for them to subscribe to the blog to get further comments (unfortunately our platform doesn’t have post level subscriptions like a "Watchlist")
• When you are subscribed you get emailed new posts and comments, and can use the email reply button to have comments conversations
• Basically you don’t even have to visit the blog itself to read and interact

Now each of these people can just pass on the link to the people in their teams.

Subscribers and browsers to the blog will also be informed.

And everyone can have ONE conversation in the ONE spot.

Inbox 2.0

Basically email becomes the vehicle for having the conversation, but yet no-one is personally sent an email; instead every email is sent to the blog object (social object), which people subscribe to ("pull" approach).

And at the end the blog object also stores the information.

Naturally we begin to think that the whole idea of the email client needs to be evolved…something like Tweetdeck, but more of an email client look, hello Lotus Notes, the "business inbox". Fuser and others have being doing this on the consumer web for years.

What results from using social tools

1. Transparency (communicating progress in the open…"public" by default)
2. Less distorted message (no interpretations, straight from the source, less gossip/rumors, access to raw facts allows you to re-mix and re-frame content)
3. Workers can offer feedback in discussions they normally would not be a part of (co-creation helps make the initiative more relevant to people who will actually use it…therefore less need for change management)
4. Diverse input (people not involved in either end of the change initiative may come across the conversation and add valuable input)
5. Workers feel engaged that they are included in discussions (happy workplace, build an influence by reputation)
6. Everyone is informed of the "know-why" (rather than just reading a report, they now know of, and can take part in the raw conversations…all the decisions that led to the final product)

This will help solve the fundamental issue that all organisations seem to face…the silo syndrome, communication and awareness breakdown, scattered and slow dialogue.

NOTE: Silos are natural and strong, and we need them. It’s just that each silo is not the enterprise, so to be effective we need to be aware and collaborate across silos…so we bridge silos, not smash them.

A support tool, a new literacy

Social computing (or KM) is not a strategy, it’s a support tool, a sense-making tool, a way of being…just like the phone, email, IM…

We can use these tools to improve sales, improve brand awareness, improve customer service, fix a problem, fix a process, etc…are these strategies/tactics, or simply using tools to achieve (support) your job tasks…difference to the past is that these tools (there use) can have a cultural impact in a deeper way…they challenge the dynamics of relationships, openness, power, routines, habits.

You could say we could use new social tools for everything, that’s why we see HR 2.0, Sales 2.0, Marketing 2.0, etc…that’s why existing products are starting to get features like blogs, social networks. So really it’s a way of being or a literacy, rather than a strategy. But yes, to get buy-in you may go the strategy route; but that’s just to get your foot in the door, and it’s also to help the blank faces when they are given tools that aren’t designed to do a specific thing…and what it takes to get adoption (the difference between transactional and interactional).

Obstacles

Visibility, connectedness (not just a horizontal slice of the org, but a network), and conversations are key.

What’s stopping this at the actioning or "doing" level (in relation to the anecdote I shared at the start of this post):

1. Design (have to visit the blog, rather than quickly shoot an email…but the blog does have it’s own email address, just need to remember to put it in your email contacts, and if you subscribe you can get new posts emailed and replying will publish a comment)

2. Habit and routine (this needs to be facilitated…rinse and repeat)

3. The message may want to be filtered for the masses (in this case the message was quite general)

4. Us and them syndrome (I have worked up my way in the hierarchy to be privy to these types of conversations…part of my status is to pass messages up and down the chain)

Going even more deeper the mass use of these tools could lead to a transformation that companies don’t see appropriate, not ready for, feel as a threat…the list goes on.

Subject Matter Networks

Another way of looking at the sense-making perspective is saying that we are moving from Subject Matter Experts to Subject Matter Networks. In the sense that it’s not about in-house gurus, it’s about people connecting in the network to do their work…much more normal, practical and resilient.

Mark Oehlert on this:

"…we needed to be thinking differently…if we just used social media to build more ways to get to SMEs, then we wouldn’t fix what was broken…our ability to access the expertise that we need, when we need it - either in order to answer a question, provide input into a course design or for some other purpose - we didn’t need better access to Subject-Matter Experts…we needed access to Subject-Matter Networks. (SMNs)

Eric Davidove shares the details:

"Some key conclusions from the research: Activities and interactions that occur in blogs, wikis and social networks naturally provide the cues that are missing from current expert locator systems. A search engine that mines internal blogs, for example, where workers post updates and field queries about their work, will help searchers judge for themselves who is an expert in a given field. Wiki sites, because they involve collaborative work, will suggest not only how much each contributor knows, but also how eager they are to share that knowledge and how well they work with others. Tags and keywords, which are posted by employees and serve as flags for search engines, can reveal qualities in an expert that are far from transparent in any database or directory. I like this study because it demonstrates the hidden value of blogs and wikis. This study also helps us further understand that the formal organizational chart and company designated experts are not necessarily the best “maps” for finding expertise or the most qualified experts in the company. Social media such as blogs and wikis will help us to identify the established and emerging experts and to go beyond the “usual suspects.”

And I like Simon Bostock’s touch:

"The reasons that other people approach those experts has as much to do with approachability, generosity and perspicacity as it does with expertise."

Rex Lee talks about removing barriers:

"Enterprise 1.0, would suggest that only specialized, trained individuals with the resources knew how to find pearls… Enterprise 2.0 suggests that we can simplify and remove some of the "specialization" barriers to enable more people to search for pearls

Tune processes of engagement

Just to quickly go off on a small tangent (which relates to my previous post on ad-hoc processes). Rex suggests that the tools are not enough, in that we need to tune processes and attitudes. He gave the example of sales people using a wiki rather than Marketing, as the Sales people were more agile on this type of information. But existing processes are not going to bring fruit to this good idea; why would sales people contribute when hoarding gets them ahead, when it means less time spent selling.

I asked similar questions in my post, I don’t want to share, that’s counter to meeting my objectives…and reward!! (hehehehe, just noticed I quoted Rex in that post)

Rex says:

"Without social engineering and modifying processes, models, policies and education, the initiative was doomed to fail before it even started. There seems to be a belief that by just letting all conversation flow in blogs, tweets, forums, wiki’s, etc…, that corporations will find great nuggets of insight, that people will connect and come up with great ideas, that agility and holistic understanding will be natural outcomes. Although this may be true, we don’t need to leave it at that. Proper social engineering in leveraging social technologies can enable organization to focus the potential of their employees & business partners to drive specific business value of higher quality and in shorter time frames. This requires and understanding the engagement factors (motivation, opportunity, capability) and taking initiative to design and facilitate within the environment."

Resulting in:

"Enterprise 2.1 would suggest that rather than "serendipitously" finding pearls, that we coordinate our efforts to actually create pearl farms."

Let’s finish off

Simon Bostock gets to the reality of it (just substitute KM for social computing/networks):

"At some point, when a skill becomes so important, it ceases to be somebody’s job but becomes a literacy. We no longer have scriveners (or many secretaries for that matter) because we’re all expected to write. At what point will we face up to the fact that Knowledge Management is no longer a respectable job (or PR or HR or marketing?) but a literacy?"

Delicious Founder Joshua Schachter Leaves Google —

Shared by mangini
Esse título do post ficou gay, hein? :-)

Over a year after joining Google, Joshua Schachter, the founder of Delicious and a Yahoo exec until June 2008, is leaving the search giant, according to a Tweet he just sent out. Schachter sent out another Tweet shortly after the first message stating that he has “no clue what he’s doing next.” Schachter confirmed to us that he is in fact leaving Google.

When asked why he was leaving Google, Schachter told us that he “Felt like doing something new,” but apparently doesn’t know what that new project is. Yet. Schachter joined Google last January as an engineer and also continued his role as an independent angel investor. He tells us that he may slow down his investments in this next stage of his career.

Schachter of course is best known for founding bookmarking service Delicious, which was acquired by Yahoo in December of 2005. Schachter has been fairly vocal about his displeasure with the direction of Delicious and even launched his own threaded Twitter conversation application last Summer while at Google.

Schachter’s angel investments include Foursquare, SimpleGEO, Square, DailyBooth, Bump Technologies and most recently BlockChalk and 4chan founder Moot’s new startup Canvas Networks.

The internet is constantly, relentlessly public. Post something and it's there, for everyone, all the time.

Acar has come up with a clever idea, a small idea that makes things just a little protected. Trick.ly is a url shortener with a twist. You can share a URL but hide it behind a question that only insiders can easily answer.

So, for example, you could tweet, "Here's the source for my world-class chili: http://trick.ly/2L5". Anyone can go there, but only people who can figure out the clue can discover the site you were pointing to.

It's not secure. It's sort of private. Neato.

How Private is Facebook? —

How Private is Facebook? is a post from Chris Pirillo

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Are you leaving Facebook? With all of the concern over privacy lately, many people are choosing to close their accounts. Others are educating themselves with the changes Facebook has made and making the best choices for their profile pages. Still more people are clueless… they don’t realize what is being shared and with whom. They have no idea how to fix this problem once they do learn of it. They just keep going along with their heads in the sand, and hope for the best. This isn’t the way things should be, folks. You shouldn’t have to be so afraid of what the wrong person might see. The fact is, if you put something online then someone will see it. I have come up with the perfect two-step plan to help solve this problem.

Step 1: STOP SHARING SHIT ONLINE THAT YOU DON’T WANT THE WORLD TO KNOW.

Step 2: Repeat step 1.

It’s that simple, really. I know you think it’s cool to say nasty thing online when you’re a teenager. I know that it’s hilarious when you trash someone on your Facebook page or Twitter account. After all, no one is going to see it, right? Think about this, though… you’re 22 years old, and you just graduated college. You’re looking for the perfect job. However, there are firms out there who make a LOT of money to investigate you – including your online presence. Even when you delete that bad tweet or the Facebook comment you regret, it’s still there somewhere. The damage will have been done. Someone will have been hurt by what you said, or another person will have archived a screenshot of it. It can – and often will – come back to bite you in the ass.

As I already said, many people are confused about Facebook’s privacy changes. The kids on the site are the ones who concern me the most. Many of them truly don’t have a clue. Case in point: my assistant Kat heard about a friend’s teenage daughter who had gotten into trouble with a group of her friends for something they had done at school. Kat logged into Facebook, and went to the girl’s Facebook page, forgetting that they aren’t “friends.” Low and behold, she could read everything on the child’s Wall anyway. What she saw astounded her… there were the other girls who had been caught… posting away on her Wall. One girl bragged about how she is not in trouble with her parents because of the elaborate lies she came up with. True story, folks. And by the way? That girl’s parents now know exactly what their sweet little princess had done, thanks to a screenshot and an email.

Just because you’re sitting in the privacy of your own home doesn’t mean that things you share online won’t be seen by people you don’t want to see them. You could stay offline, certainly. You could quit Facebook if you wanted. Or, you could be just a tad more selective as to what you share. There is such a thing as over-sharing. Do you really think that you’ll be the same person in ten or twenty years that you are now?

The gestures you make online… just assume the world will see them. This isn’t really Facebook’s problem. I’m not saying that they shouldn’t change their policies. I’m saying that at the end of the day, the burden for keeping your information private lies on your own shoulders. You are the one ultimately responsible for what others do – and don’t – see.

Don’t push the responsibility for your privacy onto anyone else. Period. End of story.

• Facebook for Parents: Answers to the Top 25 Questions
• The Truth About Facebook – Privacy Settings Every Facebook User Should Know, and Much More – The Facts You Should Know
• Facebook Fanatic: Explode Your Popularity, Secure Your Privacy and Buzz Your Band on Facebook
• 60 Minutes – The Face Behind Facebook (January 13, 2008)

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• How to Protect Your Privacy Online
• What Place Does Social Media Have in our Schools?
• How To Introduce a Child to Social Media
• Search Your Public Facebook Updates
• Facebook and Privacy: Will the Twain Never Meet?
• Facebook Serves Up Unwanted Apps
• Why Do You Need Social Media?
• Leave Your Privacy at the Door
• How do You Fall Asleep?
• Tweet Your Way to a Divorce

Reflections before surgery —

I learned last Wednesday that I will have open heart surgery this Tuesday, May 11. There really hasn't been much to do since then. There's a few details: I need a new bathroom, and if I am going to use my computer outside during recovery I need a new patio umbrella.

Support from friends, particularly on Twitter has been astounding, just astounding. It has come from all over the world. I've written a lot about how twitter is best in a crisis, how communities of support form and make a difference. I did not have a clue that I would experience it first hand and in such significant numbers. It has allowed me to spend time chatting, often with humor and always with someone wishing me well. It has been a distraction and it has buoyed my spirits and trust me, that isn't so easy to do in a situation such as this.

I had written about Connie Reece in Twitterville. She's a spunky, compassionate, charming communications officer in Austin Texas who started what was the first Twitter-based health support meme when Susan Reynolds, a Virginian she had never met, discovered she had breast cancer. Connie has had health problems of her own but she doesn't talk that much about her own stuff.

Yesterday, Jeremiah Owyang started a  #Hearts4Shel hashtag supporting me on Twitter. Connie added the cute, downloadable icon for people to use as their avatar. For some reason, when I saw it, tears came to my eyes and I choked up. It is the only time in this entire experience that I got teary.

This experience is nothing at all like it is so often portrayed in the movies. There is no light surrounding my head, no archipelago  choir singing in divine harmony off camera. You just like to do the stuff you always do, speak with the people who give you pleasure and make you smile.

My best friend Charlie O'Brien was dead by the time he was my age. When his time was growing short,  he told loved ones that all he wanted was to have as many good days as he could before he had to leave.

I have no intention of dying anytime soon, but there's something about open heart surgery that makes me reflective, makes me realize that the simple and everyday things are more sacred than we sometimes realize, and that when something happens that irritates us, we should remember the angry words we say to someone may be the last words you ever share. It's important to show your love. There may not be time later.

On the big picture, I have nothing new or profound to add, just yet. That may come in a few days. But I keep thinking of something I wrote somewhere, probably in a blog post but I can't find it.

My generation came of age in the 60s. We tried to have a revolution back then. It was uglier and angrier than the Conversational Revolution we are now experiencing. We had hoped to achieve world peace. Obviously it has not turned out that way.

But my generation did give you the PC and the internet and social media--and oh yes medical technology that can mend broken hearts. We have made it possible for people in a great many places to talk to people from other lands and cultures.

This is the legacy of my generation. If you are younger than we are, then the baton gets passed to you. We took to the streets to shout our messages in the 60s. Now you can just go online and tweet or blog, or YouTube it.

It's more powerful this way and a whole lot more fun.

[Original posted at altimetergroup.com]

Like many parents, I try to take steps to keep my kids safe online, making sure that they understand not to share personal information online, or even to use their real names. They know how to write appropriate emails, and I constantly monitoring what they do, the emails they send, and most importantly, engaging in a constant dialog with what they are doing online.
But when I logged into my Google Buzz account this evening, I found that my 9 year old daughter had posted the following:

Pretty innocuous, but it was PUBLIC! I saw it because Buzz conveniently made me a follow of hers. I pride myself on staying ahead of my kids, but this time, my kid got ahead of me. She used Buzz without fully understanding that what she thought was a private conversation with her friends was in fact very much public.

Fortunately, this was her only Buzz posting. But what was most disturbing was looking at her friends’ conversations and realizing that some of them were chatting with complete strangers, and in some cases, sharing personal information like emails. Absolutely terrifying as these are 4th graders who have no clue.

I quickly turned off Google Buzz, (but I didn’t totally disable it, more on that below), dashed off an email to the parents of the friends she had been chatting with inside of Buzz (again, all in public, with their real names), and then finally took a long hard look at the situation.

First, I discovered that buried in Google’s terms of service somewhere is that children under the age of 13 are not allowed to have Gmail accounts. But unlike Facebook, which requires that people enter their birthdates when setting up accounts, Google makes no such attempt to educate people signing up for Gmail that such a provision is in place. As a result, while Google is absolved of responsibility because of the TOS, it could and should do a better job of complying with the Child Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). [UPDATE: Google does in fact ask for birthdate when signing up, and sends users who are under 13 to the FTC page about COPPA. Obviously, I violated Google's TOS by putting in MY birthdate and then giving account access to my child.]

Second, I think Google will have a second wave of privacy problems to address in Buzz. The easiest thing to do as a parent is to simply disable Buzz, meaning that the Google profile and all followers are deleted — permanently. But the reality is, my child has actually figured out how to use Buzz and seems to enjoy it – unlike most adult users of Gmail! But managing groups, privacy settings, etc. would be required for her to continue using it and I’m not confident as a parent that she’ll be able to figure all of that out. We’ll give it a try, but unless her friends also keep the conversation private, it will all be for naught.

So while I applaud Google for taking quick steps to manage the privacy backlash on Google Buzz, I think Buzz will bring to the fore the quiet reality that many people have enabled Gmail for their kids (and which Google loves because it ensures a new generation of Google devotees).

Without an overhaul and the addition of true parental controls in Gmail, this will remain a problem for Google, and a potential PR nightmare. Imagine parents (and kids) checking out their Buzz accounts to find that “iorgyinbathrooms” is following them, which is exactly what happened with my child’s account!

Does your child have a Gmail account? If so, have you talked to them about what Google Buzz is and how they should be properly using it? Please take action, which may be as dramatic as completely disabling Buzz on your child’s account. Do this as soon as possible, as I’m concerned that unsavory characters are already exploiting this parental control loophole.

Update Part 1: I received a response from a Google spokesperson, with permission to post it here:

“We designed Buzz to make it easy to have conversations with your friends about the things that interest you. Keeping kids safe online is very important to us. You must have a Google account to use Buzz, and we require all new Google account users to provide birthdates to keep children under 13 from signing up for accounts. Since we launched Buzz, we’ve listened to the feedback from our users and have made many product improvements to address their concerns. It’s still early, and we have a long list of improvements on the way. We look forward to hearing more suggestions and will continue to improve the Buzz experience with user control top of mind. Even as we roll out changes, we think it’s important to remember that there’s no substitute for parental supervision to keep kids safe on the Internet.”

Update Part 2: I had a chance to speak with Scott Rubin, who runs the child safety and public policy program at Google. As a parent of young children himself, Scott understands the need for parents to be able to control what their children see and do online. He pointed out that Google earlier this month enabled Safety Mode on YouTube and that the company continues to develop ways to give people in general better control. Scott acknowledged that things went wrong with Buzz and that some improvements were made quickly, and also that there’s more to come. We also discussed an interesting situation regarding children between 13 and 17 — those are are actually allowed to have Gmail accounts of their own. There are very few controls within the Google universe that give parents control, and Scott expressed an interest in continuing the dialog about what Google can do to ensure child safety.

So if you have suggestions on parental control features you’d like to see Google add, please include them in the comments below.

Update Part 3: As you can see in the comments on the original blog post, I’ve been branded both an irresponsible parent for giving my child access to email and also a responsible one for taking precautions. I’m often asked what I do as a parent so I thought I’d share some details of the madness to my method. First, there is no such thing as perfect, full-proof parental controls for the Internet short of sitting down with them and watching every keystroke. But that’s exactly what my husband and I did, starting early and stressing basic Internet safety such as not downloading files, sharing personal information, learning to exercise judgment online. Over time, we gave our kids more and more freedom to do things on their own, and put in place clear consequences if they broke the rules. Believe me, there have been many mistakes made and a lot of learning along the way! But each time, no major harm was done and they become more aware of all the pitfalls that being online entail.

Email was initially sent from our machines and our accounts with full supervision, then without supervision, and finally they were given their own accounts. But I still get copies of everything that they get, and they are allowed to email only people in their address book that are preapproved. This incident has made me rethink what email service we use for the kids, especially since we’re in violation of the Gmail TOS, and I’ll be looking into other options.

YouTube is accessible only from a public PC in the kitchen, and their PCs are in the family room with screens that I can easily see from the kitchen. We also have K9 monitoring software installed that blocks/allows sites and tracks everything they see and use. But my favorite software is TimesUpKidz, which limits their online time to one highly-anticipated hour a day, and then only during certain times. I love it because it removes my need to constantly tell them to get off the computer!

But more important than any piece of software, the thing that I believe keeps them most safe online is the constant communication and conversation we have together about their online activities. When I talked with my daughter about Buzz this morning, I told her that I saw the post that she wrote, and she readily said that she was looking forward to getting comments on it from her friends. When I told her that the posts were public, she said that she had no idea, and immediately agreed to stop using Buzz. She knows that she isn’t ready for a public presence and the reasons why. Our conversation about Buzz was part of our every day, normal conversation about being safe online, discussed in a relaxed way over breakfast. She and her brother frequently ask about things they hear about from their friends or things that they see online, and my hope is that as they enter the tumultuous teenage years, that we will continue having these conversations (although I think I’m be way to optimistic about that!)

Each family has to decide for themselves what works for their kids, and I understand that some people will disagree with my approach. But it seems to be working for us, and for now, the Google Buzz issue has been resolved. I’m no fool — I know dangerous situations are always lurking around the corner, but I hope that the security controls we’ve put in place plus the ongoing conversations we have will be enough to keep the worst situations from happening.

Global Grind Corrects Their Content Scraping Ways —

A few days ago, we talked briefly about Global Grind’s content scraping practices. As you may know, Global Ground is like Digg for the hip hop community. They cover hip-hop stories as well as celebrity gossip, entertainment, and more. This is a pretty broad selection of content, so many bloggers were shocked to find that Global Grind had basically cut and pasted their hard work and posted it on their own site. They even went so far as to allow these competing pieces to be submitted to Google News. Any blogger would take it pretty hard if their content was scraped by any site, let alone Global Grind which has ties into the exclusive Google News network, a PageRank of 5, and millions in funding. GG wasn’t even providing a simple link back to the original source article.

A major point that Patrick O’Keefe points out is the double standard between Global Grind and Digg. If Digg had never killed the Digg Bar and just started snatching bloggers’ content, there would probably be rioting in the streets or…at least in the blogosphere. As far as GG goes, they are probably getting away with it because the audience is different. They may not be as tech savvy as a whole. In addition, many of the bloggers affected may not have a clue about how to keep track of their own content for the same reason.

It seems that Patrick’s contact with Global Grind has yielded some positive changes that better align with what we should be seeing within the blogging community. They also seem to be committed to making changes in the near future to make sure they cooperate with the community rather than simply dominate it. They have killed the top frame bar that they were using. Digg recently made a similar move as Kevin Rose took the wheel.

Most importantly, full text scraping has been turned off. Content excerpts for submitted stories now has a content limit. You can still submit the full text of a story via the manual form, but this is supposed to become human-edited to avoid further incidents. Content that has already been copied to GG will me reformatted so that the full content is not displayed. Links to the original sources of the articles are more prominent but, more importantly, actually exist as a rule.

It will definitely be interesting to see how this plays out. Most sites would receive a huge backlash for scraping content, even if it was not intentional. I doubt that Global Grind will see any such downturn. On the plus side, this may be the beginning of a closer relationship between Global Grind and the community at large.

Wide-Open History: Twitter is an Archivist's Dream —

I was on vacation when the news came through that Twitter was going to archive all past and future tweets with the Library of Congress. I'm a big fan of Twitter.

I'm quite active chattering from my personal account, and we use it in our business as a Web archiving firm. After the announcement I was asked what it meant to the world of digital archivists. My initial response was positive, and over time has become even more so.

Sponsor

Guest author Pete Grillo is the founder of Iterasi, a Web archiving company serving businesses and government agencies. Pete previously founded WeSync.com which was acquired by Palm in 2001, and co-founded ProTools, acquired by Network General in 1995. He is @petegrillo on Twitter.

First, my hat is off to the folks at Twitter. They deserve credit for coming up with such an innovative and visionary approach. To those who say Twitter is full of insignificant mumblings or that it's great the company can free up its own storage at the expense of the taxpayer, I say this, respectfully: Get a clue. Millions use the medium to curate the news of worldwide elections, pop culture, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, and human interest stories - it should be clear that Twitter is living up to its tagline as "the pulse of the planet."

Bottom line: Archiving is the act of collecting data in raw form so that it can be manipulated in a variety of ways in the future. I believe that archiving Twitter, and certainly other moves to follow, will significantly change the way history is made available to future generations. Two huge wins come to mind:

Wide-open content: Twitter is first but others will follow. I would love to see the photos on Flickr follow this same path. How much of the last 6-plus years of the world's history is in picture form on Flickr?

Wide-open history: People all across the world, starting immediately and continuing on forever, will toil over this rich pool of data. It is safe to expect tools will emerge to mine this data and these tools will be available to more than authors and researchers.

It occurs to me that this level of detail - often the mundane interspersed with the magical, the dredges of the workday intermingled with short snippets encapsulating world events - that this information, when looked back at in some distant future, is a snapshot of the thoughts of millions - and therefore is our worlds' history.

Certainly one can argue that the users of Twitter are not a representative cross section of society, and that there are dangers in only seeing events through the eyes of any subset of culture - let alone the worldwide, tech-savvy intelligentsia. But Twitter is evolving and it will continue to represent a broader audience. If you doubt that, look where it was one year ago.

It is my hope that from this archived data future generations will move from textbook packaging of history in one monolithic form to a model where students can interrogate history as if it were standing there in the classroom taking questions. This is the fundamental tenant that is core to every archivist's heart: the belief that data has valuable and that today we can't imagine all the ways someone will want to analyze this data in the future. All we know, in our heart of hearts, is that once gone, it is gone for good.

And yes, what I am saying is that each tiny 140 character morsel is history in the making, right before our very eyes. And now we are going to hang on to it forever. Bravo!

Discuss

This is one of a regular series of posts on search experience updates. Look for the label This week in search and subscribe to the series. - Ed.

This week we announced a number of new search enhancements:

Brand refinements in search results
Sometimes when searching for product information on Google, you may not know some of the brand names relevant to your particular search. For example, if you're taking on a new river-rafting hobby, it's quite likely you don't have a clue about kayak manufacturers just yet. So, we wanted to make it easier for you to find the brands other people consider useful for popular product searches. So this week we launched a search refinement that calls out brand names related to your query in a single line above the rest of the results. Determined algorithmically, these highlighted brand names may help you find what you're looking for faster, and make your research and shopping experience all the more enjoyable.

Example searches: [wedding dress], [digital camera] and [stroller]

Virtual keyboards in Google search
Typing a search query on a keyboard that is not designed for your language can be a challenging (if not impossible) process. To help overcome any difficulty you might face when using Google search in another language, starting this week you'll see a small keyboard icon next to the search field on both the Google homepage and on the search results page when using Google in one of 35 foreign languages. Check out our announcement, which includes all of the languages currently supported. We hope that this new feature will make your search experience much better!

Example keyboard search in Greek: [flowers]

"Similar" pages on results page
Here's a new feature that makes it easier to discover the variety of choices available on the web. We've offered the "Similar" link on search results for a while now as a way to find new websites similar to ones you already use and like, but it hasn't been too visible. Now, for queries where we think sites similar to the first search result might be helpful, a small block of similar sites will appear at the bottom of the results page. Clicking on the "Pages similar to" link at the start of the block will take you to the full list of similar pages.


More example searches: [american lung association], [tobacco-free kids], [earthquake info center]

New Image Search for iPhone and Android devices
When searching for images on your mobile device, speed and quantity of the images are important parts of a good experience. So we've introduced a redesigned Google Image Search for mobile, based on iPhone 3.0+ and Android 2.1 devices that makes it easier for you to see as many images as possible when searching on your mobile phone. Now, the thumbnails are square to maximize the number of images you see on the screen. In addition, you can swipe to see the next or previous page of results. And for when you want to see a larger version of an image, we've introduced a special image viewing page with black background that both emphasizes the image and includes fading buttons. We hope you enjoy!

On your iPhone or Android device, visit google.com/images and search for these examples: [mount rushmore] or [lady gaga]

Mobile Place Pages
We launched Place Pages last fall to help provide relevant and informative information about places on Google Maps. We've now optimized that same experience for Android-powered devices and iPhones in the U.S., so when you're on the go, you'll be able to quickly view location information, customer ratings, hours of operation and summarized restaurant reviews. You can also get full-screen, dynamic maps to quickly help you see where the restaurant is within the neighborhood you're in.

Stay tuned for next week's post on the latest releases, enhancements and news about search.

Posted by Jen Fitzpatrick, VP, Engineering

How can you tell that location-based social networking service Foursquare is entering the mainstream? Well, movie stars who became governors of California using the service is a very good clue in that direction.

Yes, you can now find out Arnold Schwarzenegger’s whereabouts on Foursquare. He already has over 1000 followers, which is no wonder considering his Foursquare account is advertised on his official page.

It’s a good sign for Foursquare. When Twitter started showing signs of greatness, the debate whether it will ever become a mainstream service raged on for months. Now, Foursquare seems to be entering this stage of development. What do you think: will Foursquare ever be a truly mainstream service? Please, share your opinions in the comments.

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For more mobile coverage, follow Mashable Mobile on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook

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Reviews: Facebook, Foursquare, Twitter

Tags: foursquare, governor, Schwarzenegger

Yesterday, the tech press was all over Facebook's f8 conference.

At this stage, there are probably 10 or 20,000 articles out there on the sweeping changes that were announced, along with videos, and more.

It was, in fact, the day that the 'talent grab' that Facebook got from buying Friendfeed took center stage.

It was also a day where Facebook essentially announced that not only did they want you to access all of your information through them, but they wanted you to bring back whatever you find on the web.  Hmmm.

Facebook challenged Google (and Twitter) with some of the announcements, which I'm not going to repeat here but will link below to a few good rundowns.

The obvious conclusion is that Facebook is trying to do what Microsoft and Google have done before them.  One way or another, despite the reports that the privately held company is now profitable, they want to get their hands into the wallets of every single person on the planet (or almost).

That's the bottom line.  Period.

I'm not saying it's wrong.  It's business and there are very few other companies that have done it.  Once you do, you're 'home' ... for a long, long time.

So this morning I chatted with a few friends that regularly use Facebook.  I even spent more than 15 minutes there myself :).

No surprise.  The 'average' Facebook user had NO CLUE that there was even a conference much less wholesale changes to the service, even though an occasional banner could be seen last night and this morning at the top of various pages.

Nobody clicked.

I've said it before.  There's a blind trust in the Internet (that sometimes is just amazing!) and 'major brands'.

Most people don't have the time, or could care less, about reading 'Terms of Service'.

As a techie as heart, I usually get the bulk of my information from people (online, on the phone, by e-mail, or in my Google Reader feeds).  Most people don't.

It's THOSE people that tech companies want.  Factually, their lives could be changed by some of this stuff.

Google has come under 'privacy' fire as of late.  That's totally expected for a company that has over 70% of the search market and that is consistently delivering earnings. Google isn't the 'privacy issue'. The entire Internet is, and MUCH more likely a disgruntled IT worker who has your credit card ..... and probably your Social Security number too.

The reality is that almost any website you visit is collecting some kind of information on you, anonymous or not, and for the most part, it's always been that way.

The 'delete' button is dead. You're being archived somewhere.


I was gratified this morning to see easily understandable posts hitting the mainstream media, like this one by Sarah Perez writing for ReadRightWeb in the NY Times.  If you care about privacy, start reading some of these.  There are simply some things that everyone should do.

Rackspace evangelist Robert Scoble delivered on of his best blog posts in a long time (with links to a lot of other articles and videos from the conference .... as well as an interesting debate beginning in the comments ... here.

Fun, yet disturbing, was how Mark Zuckerberg out right refused (or seemed confused?) by questions posed by veteran tech journalist Kara Swisher at Dow Jones' AllThingsD .... one of the very few tech websites that not only includes (more than you want to know) disclosures .... but even mentions of tracking cookies.  What??  Shhhh!!!

Kara quizzed Zuckerberg on Facebook's new integration of Microsoft's Docs.com and Google Buzz, and the effect the Facebook changes 'might' have on Google.  He passed.  (According to Swisher, Zuckerberg thinks she writes 'mean' posts).

The reality is that Facebook made changes that those outside the tech world may never realize.  Some were good.  Some kinda 'scary'.

Regardless, they're going to make a lot of money.  It's a given with their existing base.

And, like it or not, the so-called talent grabs of Sheryl Sandberg (Great piece in Vogue) and/or Bret Taylor (and the entire ex-Google startup team at Friendfeed), are coming to fruition.

Contrary to some of what you may read .... they won't own the Internet and Google will be just fine.  Twitter needs to take a huge step out of the box ... as does FourSquare.

The most interesting two years in Internet history continues.  Make no mistake about it.  It effects everyone.

Online or not.

The Perfect Fit: How Startups Can Avoid Hiring The Wrong Execs —

Earlier in the week we mentioned a preview of a presentation Steve Blank is giving this Friday at the Startup Lessons Learned conference in which he describes how startups and larger companies are unique and have differing needs. One the ways they distinguish themselves from one another is that the roles of executives play out in very different ways, and sometimes startups make the mistake of hiring execs that would fit in better with a larger company. Ben Horowitz of Andreessen Horowitz wrote recently on this very topic and provided some hints to startups looking to hire execs.

Sponsor

Startups are, by their very nature, young and small in the majority of cases, after all, once you get older and larger, you're not really a startup anymore. With that, they require a different style of leadership than larger companies. Startups need executives who are constantly active and who are hands on, and having passion for the company is a serious plus. The more the executives reflect the attitudes of the founding entrepreneurs, the better.

This differs greatly from the atmosphere created for executives at large companies. As Horowitz recalls, when he worked for Hewlett Packard, his job was driven by the swarm of outside activity which came to him and created his daily work-flow. Less of this, he says, goes on with startups, and at times a new exec not suited for startup culture can find himself feeling a bit like a fish out of water without any clue as to what to actually do. He calls this a "rhythm mismatch."

"Your executive has been conditioned to wait for the emails to come in, wait for the phone to ring, and wait for the meetings to get scheduled. In your company, he will be waiting a long time," writes Horowitz. "If your new exec waits (as per his training), your other employees will become suspicious."

Horowitz also notes that the skill-sets learned and used by executives at larger companies don't usually apply in the same way with startups. Startups are all about building a company, building processes and growing a product and its customer base from the ground up. Large companies passed these steps a long time ago, and their main focus is on repeating and streamlining battle tested processes and business models.

Execs at large companies are good at fine tuning these existing systems, while startups need people who can help mold and create the business' framework for its future as a large company. Steve Blank says that the reason there are disparages and possible conflicts between traditional executives and startup execs is that education is too focused on traditional business practices, and not enough on entrepreneurship.

So how does a startup founder select the right execs to help nurse their fledgling company into a prosperous large business? According to Horowitz, there are two steps needed to assure the right people are hired: and extensive and highly scrutinized hiring process, and dedicated and focused integration of the executive upon hiring.

"Require them to bring a comprehensive set of questions about every thing they heard that day, but did not completely understand. Answer those questions in depth; start with first principles. Bring them up to speed fast. If they don't have any questions, consider firing them. If in 30 days, you don't feel that they are coming up to speed, definitely fire them," says Horowtiz.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that startups and large businesses are very different and have differing needs, but as Horowitz points out, an impressive resume from a big shot executive can cloud the judgement of some founders when seeking the right executive. While I'm sure there certainly have been acceptions to this theory, success in a large business does not always translate to the startup world, so make sure you know who you're hiring before you waste your time.

Photo by Flickr user wilhei55.

Discuss

Bit.ly Pro Takes the Mystery Out of Shortened URLs —

URL shortener bit.ly has announced some simple user interface changes for its standard users and a whole series of new features for paid users, including custom domain names and statistics.

While the standard user interface changes are neat, it's the "end-to-end branding" that we're actually looking forward to, as it should take a bit of that mystery meat feel out of our day to day online lives.

Sponsor

The biggest changes standard bit.ly users will see is the searchable history, which allows users to search through URLS they have added. Bit.ly has also tried to make it easier to manage the links you've added by adding a specific "Manage" section, which will show all the links with basic statistics on each, such as Twitter conversations and clicks. And all of a user's shared links will be available in RSS format.

As for the bit.ly's pro users, the service will begin offering a traffic dashboard, short domain redirection, unlimited API calls and, most importantly, a full "end-to-end branding". End-to-end branding means that if someone goes to shorten a New York Times URL, for example, they will end up with a link containing the nyti.ms short link instead of a standard bit.ly link. This will happen for all users, whether they shorten the link through the bit.ly website or through third-party Twitter clients such as TweetDeck, Twitterfeed and ÜberTwitter.

While this type of service is not only great for the website, its useful for the users too, because you don't have to blindly click on a shortened link. It keeps everything short and sweet for our Twitter character limit while giving us, the user, some clue of where we're going.

Discuss

iPhone OS 4.0 Beta Video —

iPhone OS 4.0 Beta Video is a post from Chris Pirillo

As TUAW themselves have stated, there’s no telling how long this video may stay on YouTube. It’s in Polish, but the captioning should help you understand which features they are discussing.

If you don’t speak Polish, you likely won’t have a clue what’s being said. However, it’s still pretty cool to actually see the operating system in action!

• What’s Your Favorite Feature of iPhone OS 4.0?
• Soundrop is Addictive for the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch
• iPhone 4.0 Operating System: Multitasking
• iPhone OS 4.0 Thoughts
• Why You Don’t Want an iPad
• iPad Fingerprints
• Turn Photos Into Art with the iPad
• The Future of Apple
• Still Think the iPad Sucks?
• Why Do Apple’s iPad, iPhone and iPod not Use Adobe Flash?

Orange Music puts PC into guitar amp -- ours is not to reason why — Now this is an interesting one. Classic British amp maker Orange Music had a bit of a surprise behind its booth at the 2010 Musikmesse show. The O PC is, well, a guitar amp and a PC rolled into one convenient package. We didn't catch the processor, but there will be an option to use either the NVIDIA GeForce 9300 or ramp up to the 512MB ATI Radeon 5670. Standard fare is there, USB ports and WiFi, but no clue as to processor / memory. On the aural side of things, there's a stereo option for plugging in an extension speaker, a 1/4-inch guitar jack, basic EQ knobs, and yet-to-be-finalized modeling software -- nothing trial, everything full version, assures the Orange rep. Once that's sorted, the estimated ship time is two to four months, with price unmentioned. Video presentation after the break.

[Thanks, Hessel]

Continue reading Orange Music puts PC into guitar amp -- ours is not to reason why

Filed under: Desktops

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My iPad is here — Unboxing it now.

The first thing you have to do after turning it on is connect it to iTunes. Here we go with the synching, the part of iPhones that I totally hate. It's why I use a Sony Walkman and a Droid. Ugh.

Hmm. I thought I downloaded iTunes 9.1 last night. Quitting and relaunching. No good. Going to itunes.com.

Meantime I'm wondering what'll happen when I connect up the iPad to my desktop Mac in Berkeley (where I'm going on Monday). I'll do what I do with my iPhone, I won't change anything till I get back to NY.

First glitch, it says an iPad has already been synched to this copy of iTunes in May 2009. Hmm. Good trick!

Okay so the iPad has a problem that lots of software has, when you finish the basic setup -- now what? There are no movies, newspapers or books on the device, and no clue as to how to get them on there. Those are the first things I want to do, see how it plays stuff. Maybe I'm wrong about that. I should disconnect and see what I get.

Okay, so the first thing I did was bring up the maps. Yes, this is the way the maps app should work. Lots of room, more room than I have on my laptop. And lots more room than I have on my phone. Now you gotta wonder -- when you're looking for something as you're walking around, which will you pull out -- the phone or the pad? What do you think?

First conclusion: I love the way the Maps app works. Love is not too strong a word. You know I'm very circumspect, and I think Apple is just too precious. But this is how maps should work.

I just checked out the web browser, and set up email. I don't remember how to synch contacts with Google, I have to do that.

Next I want to upload some pictures to the device, and Fargo (although I'm not sure which version, probably the big one). Maybe instead this time I'll go for The Big Lebowski (just for a small change of pace, always go with a Coen Brothers movie, cause you can watch them a million times without getting bored).

I also have to get Netflix. And the NY Times. What else?

The Seven Needs of Real-Time Curators —

I keep hearing people throw around the word “curation” at various conferences, most recently at SXSW. The thing is most of the time when I dig into what they are saying they usually have no clue about what curation really is or how it could be applied to the real-time world.

So, over the past few months I’ve been talking to tons of entrepreneurs about the tools that curators actually need and I’ve identified seven things. First, who does curation? Bloggers, of course, but blogging is curation for Web 1.0. Look at this post here, I can link to Tweets, and point out good ones, right? That’s curation. Or I can order my links in a particular order. That’s curation. Or I can add my thoughts to those links, just like Techcrunch or VentureBeat do. That’s curation. Or I can do a video like Leo Laporte does and talk about those links. That’s curation. Or I can forward those links to you via email. That’s curation. The editor who sits in a big building at New York Times or your local newspaper that chooses what content you’ll see in your newspaper is a curator. So is the page designer who decides what story is at the top of the page.

But NONE of the real time tools/systems like Google Buzz, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Flickr, give curators the tools that they need to do their work efficiently. That’s why I’m writing this post, to try to get the industry to see that there’s an unmet need that — if they were met — would mean all sorts of things from better scrapbooks for family photos and events to better news systems like what CNN or Huffington Post are trying to build on the Web. More on that after I get through the seven things.

As you read these things they were ordered (curated) in this order for a reason. If you give me #7 without giving me #1 first your tool will suck and you won’t be used by curators. If you give me #1 without #7, you’ll be way ahead of some tool that gives me #7 only.

This is a guide for how we can build “info molecules” that have a lot more value than the atomic world we live in now. First, what are info atoms? A tweet is an atom. A photo on Flickr is an atom. A conversation item on Google Buzz is an atom. A Facebook status message is an atom. A YouTube video is an atom.

Thousands of these atoms flow across our screens in tools like Seesmic, Google Reader, Tweetdeck, Tweetie, Simply Tweet, Twitroid, etc.

A curator is an information chemist. He or she mixes atoms together in a way to build an info-molecule. Then adds value to that molecule.

So, what are the seven needs of real time curators?

1. Real-time curators need to bundle. We need to be able to bundle certain tweets together. What do I mean by that? Well, let’s say a news event, like an earthquake, happens right now while I’m writing this post. Which are the best 10 tweets that describe that event? Can we bundle those together easily? Bloggers can bundle, but making Tweets look like Tweets is actually pretty difficult for normal people and even for geeks like me. Gotta take a screen shot of the tweet, upload that, then build an image tag in Wordpress, then link that image up to the original tweet’s permalink. Whew. What a lot of work for something that should be simple. This could look like tagging, but calling it tagging is pretty limiting because tags won’t get you to full curation. One question: why can we bundle Flickr photos together by applying a tag to them, but we can’t bundle Tweets together by tagging Tweets? For instance, here’s two photos I shot at Techcrunch’s offices showing their new TV team. How did I bundle those together? Simply by tagging them with “Techcrunch TV” tag. Now, what if I could bundle in Tweets about Techcrunch TV? How about a YouTube video? How about other people’s Flickr photos? How about photos on other services like Smugmug or Picasa? How about Google Buzz items? Now you’re starting to understand why we need bundling cross-platform so we can start pulling valuable atoms out of the real-time streams.

2. Real-time curators need to reorder things. Look at just those two photos. One is more important than the other. Now, imagine a bundle with dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of items. Why can’t curators put the most important ones at the top of the bundle, just like the New York Times front page editor puts the most important news at the top of the page? Or, even better, why can’t we organize them into sub bundles? During an earthquake, like the one in Haiti, some things happened on first day, other things happened on second day, etc. Why are they all in one flat stream? Or, look at Apple’s iPad launch. Some things are about the specs. Some things are about the people involved. Some things are about apps. Some things are about accessories. Why can’t we organize them all into sub bundles? All curated in order of importance?

3. Real-time curators need to distribute bundles. Let’s say I put together a report for my bosses at Rackspace about what is happening at YCombinator (they just had a launch this week of a new crop of companies). Let’s say I built a bundle of not just the Techcrunch article I just linked to, but the Tweets from the event as well as the reports from other tech journalists like those who work at GigaOm, who also had a report on that event. Now we need to distribute that bundle. Of course we’ll Tweet it. But that means a headline of less than 140 characters that must include a link to the permalink of the bundle. But what about Facebook? That can include a thumbnail. Google Buzz? That lets you upload items with longer headlines and multiple pictures. What about emailing this bundle around the way Chris Brogan emails his blog posts. Why can’t a curation tool be smart about distributing bundles and let you see and manipulate previews of how that bundle will distribute itself to the various places you need your bundles to go to get the right audience.

4. Real-time curators need to editorialize. So, now we have a bundle of Tweets, YouTube videos, Flickr photos, Google Buzz items, Facebook status messages, et al. We’ve seen a new pattern in the world and now we want to explain our view of that pattern. For instance, I was at the YCombinator event this week. What if I wanted to add my two cents into the patterns other people saw? I might want to blog like here. Or add a video of my own. Or a Cinchcast (audio recordings done on my iPhone). Or add a bunch of photos I shot, like this one of Paul Graham mentoring his startups at that event with what they did wrong and right. But why did I just need to click “img” and copy and paste a URL to do that? A curation tool would let me drag and drop on my new iPad that I’ll have next weekend.

5. Real-time curators need to update their bundles. When the Haiti earthquake happened, the news story changed over time. We had more information and many many more Tweets to bundle in, not to mention that the mainstream press started flowing stories into RSS and Twitter. If you can’t update a bundle then it will greatly limit the ability for us to communicate. Blogs are pretty bad at this. If I come back in two hours and update this post you probably won’t see the update. In fact, not only can I update this post, but everyone who leaves a comment underneath is really updating it too. Yet early readers won’t see the later comments. They are missing part of the story. Of course, once you update you need to redistribute. IE, let your Twitter and Facebook and Google Reader friends know that the story has changed and there is important new information on the bundle that you need to see.

6. Real-time curators need to add participation widgets. On some bundles you might want to ask your audience to take a poll. Some might want to add comments. Not everyone will. Seth Godin doesn’t have comments on his blog. Other bloggers might want to leave comments open for a few hours or a few days. Even here I’ve made it so you can only comment for 30 days on my blog posts. Why? Because of spammers and other bad actors. I can see a TON of widgets that would be available to get participation on widgets. These would be a great way for these systems to monetize, too. Would you pay $1 to add a poll to your bundle? I would.

7. Real-time curators need to track their audience. Look at this blog post. It has a TweetMeme button on it. That shows you how often this item has been retweeted. I would add such a button to every bundle I do. I’d also add Google Analytics and a few other things that would track where you’re coming from, what kind of engagement my items are getting, and even, how relevant you are based on your own participation in the system. Don’t think that’s already happening? Look at the curation system Spigit built for large enterprises. I met with them yesterday and their system does just that and is getting used by many of the world’s biggest companies like Wallmart and Starbucks.

Does such a curation system exist today? Yes, blogs, but blogs are HORRID for tracking this real time world. Just this post took me 30 minutes to bang out and that was after I had it in my head and I wrote it very quickly. Imagine I was talking about a real time event. The news is already 30 minutes old. We need a new system for real-time curation of what’s happening on my Twitter stream.

It’s interesting that no one has gotten close to even giving us the most basic curation tools. Why is that?

Why are companies ignoring our needs? In talking with CEOs at companies in the real-time space I’ve identified a few reasons:

1. Building-cross-platform tools is difficult. Each real-time feed has different APIs and isn’t set up to interoperate with other real-time systems. Twitter has no API to share its feeds with Flickr. Flickr’s tags don’t have any idea what YouTube’s tags are. Wordpress is blind to all of it. Etc Etc.
2. Fear of platform vendors. No one builds these kinds of features because they are scared that Facebook or Google will build these kinds of APIs and kill their businesses. Not unfounded, either. Tweetdeck built lists into its product and then Twitter came along and added lists in a way that was far more useful than the ones Tweetdeck built. So, companies like Tweetdeck and Seesmic choose to work on things that Twitter will be unlikely to do.
3. Assumption that these features are only going to be used by “weirdos or professionals or both.” I hear this all the time “oh, Scoble, you need these features, but what about normal people.”

The first two I can’t do much about. I agree that these are features that would be best built in at a platform level and have told many of the players to do that. But the third is provably false if entrepreneurs would do some customer research (shocking, but many San Francisco area social networking companies do very little real customer research, which explains why they so often screw up around privacy and fail to find new features that dramatically improve our lives).

Let’s consider the mother who has a 1-year-old son. She invites 30 of her friends to a birthday party for her son. They take videos, do Foursquare checkins, one or two might blog about the party for their mommy blogs. Many take photos, but some of those photos end up on Facebook. Some on Flickr. Some on SmugMug. Some on Picasa. Lots of them Tweet about the event, or Facebook status messages, or put some Google Buzz items up, not to mention FriendFeed, Whrrl, Pip.io, or other systems where you can capture your life’s most interesting events.

Now, how does that mother build an online scrapbook of all the items that were poured into the system? Sure you can use a tool like Scrapblog but how do you get Tweets into that? It’s not a curation tool for the real-time web.

Let’s also take on what would happen once we move into such a molecular world:

1. Search would INSTANTLY improve. (I need a whole blog post on why this is so).
2. Trends would INSTANTLY improve. (You’d have real meta data about important events, look at just the ordering data that would be available to study).
3. Brands would be able to advertise on bundles. (CocaCola would love to advertise on bundles of movie feedback, for instance, especially on bundles curated by the best movie curators — they will never advertise on raw tweets because the risk is too high that their brand would be next to something nasty).
4. A new monetization strategy would INSTANTLY become available for platform vendors like Twitter and Google Buzz.
5. Location services like Gowalla and Foursquare would be able to add real value onto bundles (showing location trends would be a key part of bundles, where they have no real play in augmenting “atoms” like Tweets or Flickr photos).
6. A new form of relevancy, credibility, and authority data would be available for systems to automatically present the best news. Look at how Techmeme appeared after blogging did. Imagine all sorts of new displays of best bundles that would now be possible. Even Techmeme would be able to recommend the best curators on topics, which would greatly improve the real-time news available there.

Anyone feel the need for this kind of new curation tool? Join in, please curate this post and push it around your networks. Let’s see if we can find some companies who are working on providing this new kind of real-time curation system. I’d love to work with startups who are working on just this. +1-425-205-1921 or scobleizer@gmail.com or leave a comment here and let’s work together in public.

This morning, visitors to Google’s corporate site received a bit of a surprise. Instead of viewing the site in English, visitors were redirected to the Chinese version of the site, according to The Guardian.

The news follows Google’s recent, and very public, spat with China — which on Monday saw the search giant finally killing its censored Chinese site, Google.cn. Visitors to the site are now redirected to the uncensored Hong Kong version of the site at Google.com.hk.

The Guardian reports that the redirection occurred on the “Corporate Information – Google Management” page, which lists the company’s current executives, as well as the main corporate site and several other pages under it. The problem recurred even after deleting browser cookies, and viewing the site in a private browsing mode — which makes it clear that the issue wasn’t on the Guardian’s side.

The paper informed Google about the problem, who said that it was aware of the issue. As of the time of this post, the redirection hack is no longer in effect.

Earlier this year, it was revealed that a “highly sophisticated and targeted attack” against Google’s infrastructure — which also compromised Gmail accounts belonging to two Chinese political activists — was likely launched by Chinese authorities.

We have no clue who is at fault with this most recent hacking attempt, but its timing is certainly telling. I can’t imagine Chinese authorities would be so brazen as to command another hack so soon after Google stopped censoring its searches, particularly since the country’s government is still in trouble with the most recent hacks. But then again, I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if that were the case either.

Tags: china, hacks

Companies: Google

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Twitter as a force for good? — If Twitter wants to be a force for good they should stick to small things they have high leverage over, not fancy "big picture" things that any other rich person could do.

Bill Gates made this mistake. Instead of cutting off the air supply of his competitors and landing his company in antitrust hell, he could have been a Force For Good by welcoming competition as a way to keep his company tough and on their toes and responsive to customers. It would have been good for business and made him a force for good.

Instead, he's giving money for education and health care, obvious good things, but places where his money is no better than anyone else's. Had he chosen perhaps to make a little less money 20 years ago the world would have been a better place today, not some day in the future.

For Twitter, doing good would mean decentralizing, not making every tweet flow through their servers. This makes the network weak, slow and fragile. To add bells and whistles to an already-flawed architecture is irresponsible and definintely not something a Force For Good would do.

People wonder if they'd still be a force if they decentralize. Of course they would. They'd be even bigger than before. On the web, people return to places that send them away. We could trust them because we'd have a choice. People don't trust entities that force themselves on you. Look at how hated Microsoft became and how Google is going the same way. Twitter's future is in their hands. They could either trust us to come back or force the issue. If they use force, eventually Twitter will break.

I use twitter.com when I could use any of dozens of clients. In the same way, in a decentralized loosely-coupled space, most people would use Twitter, as long as it remains reliable. And they would have an incentive to be the most reliable. Today we have no choice.

If they're worried about Google eating their lunch, or Microsoft, forget it. Look at the Buzz rollout for a clue. Google is too messed up by strategy taxes to be an effective competitor. Facebook might be a problem, but Twitter decentralizing would apply pressure for Facebook to decentralize. Look at all the upside there. Not just for Twitter shareholders, but for the web.

Try really being good, not just saying you're going to be good.

Finally one comment on the little popup cards. They break Twitter, as far as I'm concerned. Because of the 140-character limit, I have to be able to easily see the last few tweets for anyone I'm reading. And they need to read my tweet stream too. Try to get there (using Firefox/Mac at least). It requires a bunch of clicks to get the attention of the software. To replicate this paradigm on other sites makes me wonder if they're doing any real user testing at Twitter, Inc.

PS: Please get rid of URL-shorteners. They make the web more fragile.