Friday, September 03, 2010

A Fragmenting Web?

www,domain,internet,web,netImage via Wikipedia

The web is not dying, (Dead Web?) and it is not fragmenting in an alarming way. What is happening can be compared to biological evolution over long periods of time. The end result is a richer ecosystem. The same is happening to the web. (Is The Mobile Web In A Category Of Its Own?)

The iPhone apps do not take away from the web. They might be these little, walled gardens but those little, walled gardens - most of them - do interact with the web in limited ways if not fully.

The birth of the web was like the Big Bang. There is no going back. I am not worried.
The Economist: The Future Of The Internet: A Virtual Counter-Revolution: The internet was a wide-open space, a new frontier. For the first time, anyone could communicate electronically with anyone else—globally and essentially free of charge. Anyone was able to create a website or an online shop, which could be reached from anywhere in the world using a simple piece of software called a browser, without asking anyone else for permission. The control of information, opinion and commerce by governments—or big companies, for that matter—indeed appeared to be a thing of the past. ........ the “cloud” is code for all kinds of digital services generated in warehouses packed with computers, called data centres, and distributed over the internet. ...... Only Apple’s latest iSomethings seem to inspire religious fervour ...... it appears to be balkanising, torn apart by three separate, but related forces. ..... governments are increasingly reasserting their sovereignty ...... big IT companies are building their own digital territories, where they set the rules and control or limit connections to other parts of the internet ...... network owners would like to treat different types of traffic differently, in effect creating faster and slower lanes on the internet. ...... Before the internet and the world wide web came along, this balkanised model was also the norm online. For a long time, for instance, AOL and CompuServe would not even exchange e-mails. ..... had telecoms firms, for instance, suspected how big it would become, they might have tried earlier to change its rules ...... Individuals have access to more information than ever, communicate more freely and form groups of like-minded people more easily. ...... In a more closed and controlled environment, an Amazon, a Facebook or a Google would probably never have blossomed as it did. ...... China’s “great firewall”. The Chinese authorities are using the same technology that companies use to stop employees accessing particular websites and online services. ........ allowed domain names entirely in other scripts. This makes things easier for people in, say, China, Japan or Russia, but marks another step towards the renationalisation of the internet. ...... Try viewing a television show on Hulu, a popular American video service, from Europe and it will tell you: “We’re sorry, currently our video library can only be streamed within the United States.” ..... “net neutrality”..... one of the internet’s founding principles: that every packet of data, regardless of its contents, should be treated the same way, and the best effort should always be made to forward it...... “the Tony Soprano vision of networking”... If operators were allowed to charge for better service, they could extort protection money from every website. ..... large internet firms like Amazon and Google have long redirected traffic onto private fast lanes that bypass the public internet to speed up access to their websites. ....... net neutrality has become far more politically controversial in America than it has elsewhere. This is a reflection of the relative lack of competition in America’s broadband market. .....“A technology is invented, it spreads, a thousand flowers bloom, and then someone finds a way to own it, locking out others.” ...... Android, Google’s smart-phone platform, which is less closed than Apple’s, is growing rapidly and gained more subscribers in America than the iPhone in the first half of this year. Intel and Nokia, the world’s biggest chipmaker and the biggest manufacturer of telephone handsets, are pushing an even more open platform called MeeGo. And as mobile devices and networks improve, a standards-based browser could become the dominant access software on the wireless internet as well.... There is just too much value in universal connectivity .... just as world trade can collapse if there is too much protectionism.
This article just tells me why Android is so important and why net neutrality is worth fighting for.

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Is The Mobile Web In A Category Of Its Own?

Image representing John Battelle as depicted i...Image via CrunchBase
To me the answer is obvious. Of course the mobile web is a category of its own. Where have you been these past few years?

Twitter, FourSquare: Mobile Web Thingies

Fred Wilson responded to my blog post this morning. He declared we are in resonance.

Fred Wilson: Mobile First Web Second

John Battelle responded disagreeing with Fred.

John Battelle: It's All The Web

Of course it is all one web. But we are also all one humanity. Why do we talk of different cultures and heritages? Why do we talk of white and black and brown and yellow people? To acknowledge and respect and celebrate those various heritages is not to deny the wholeness of humanity.

I am in disbelief that John Battelle said what he said. Where has he been these past few years? The mobile web has so taken off. It is not possible he missed out on that.

The meme that the web is dead that has really taken off recently in some circles does not go well with me. I don't think iPhone apps are anywhere close to competing with the larger web. The iPhone apps enrichen the ecosystem, but they are a small subcategory.

Dead Web?

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Information Overload And Twitter

Image representing Evan Williams as depicted i...Image by The Economist via CrunchBase

Twitter, FourSquare: Mobile Web Thingies
San Francisco Chronicle: Twitter Creator's Quest: Bring Order To The Chaos

There are people who argue Twitter should not try to be their email substitute. I come from another angle. I think Twitter ought to try and become our information overload engine. It should be our email, our news reader, our search engine, our social graph. It should attempt to be everything. Because I got only so much time in my day but I don't want to be missing out.

That is not to say Twitter should be the only engine. There is plenty of space for many engines. But there is something very sweet about 140 characters. But the Twitter of today is not delivering. It spent long months scaling poorly. And during those long months it totally skipped out on the adding new features part.

Sometimes I wonder if Twitter has not had the wrong CEO from the very beginning. Evan Williams should have been the Chairperson, Jack Dorsey should have been the CEO, and who is Biz Stone? The person inside the company in whom the DNA of the company exists, that person is Dorsey.
GigaOm: Ev Williams: Twitter Will Actually Help Information Overload: Williams, an unusually theoretical CEO ..... compared Twitter to email, where information overload can be incapacitating ..... “The problem with email is that it’s sender-driven, and sender-driven media doesn’t scale” ..... recipient-based media can scale better “in a world of infinite information” ..... “Google is very good at ‘I need to solve a problem, I need to buy something, I need an answer,” he said. “Twitter is more ‘I’m interested in many things, I don’t know what I need to know.’” Where Google is more likely to be gamed by a company like Demand Media ....... scaling that system so you don’t have to pay attention to everything, but you don’t miss the stuff you care about
Reclaiming My Twitter Account
Towards Threaded Conversations On Twitter
Twitter: The Obvious Missing Features
Chris Dixon On Twitter: Not Impressive
Twitter Has To Scale The Signals
Twitter Does The Deed: Ads
Twitter Acquires Tweetie: The Drama
Twitter Need Get Work Done
Twitter Needs To Eat Into Its Ecosystem
Measuring Your Twitter Influence

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YouTube And Online Movies

YouTubeImage via Wikipedia
New York Times: YouTube Ads Turn Videos Into Revenue: In the past, Lions Gate, which owns the rights to the “Mad Men” clip, might have requested that TomR35’s version be taken down. But it has decided to leave clips like this up, and in return, YouTube runs ads with the video and splits the revenue with Lions Gate..... more than one-third of the two billion views of YouTube videos with ads each week are like TomR35’s “Mad Men” clip — uploaded without the copyright owner’s permission but left up by the owner’s choice .... “YouTube is a big component of our display revenue, and display is our next big business” ..... YouTube will bring in around $450 million in revenue this year .... Revenue at YouTube has more than doubled each year for the last three years ...... YouTube shares advertising revenue with content partners, who may be big entertainment companies like Lions Gate or amateur videographers who have developed a following. Hundreds of these partners make more than $100,000 a year. Some, like Sal Khan, a former hedge fund manager who now makes math and science education videos, have quit their day jobs..... YouTube is testing a pay-per-view film rental service and broadcasting live events like concerts, and it just signed a deal to show on-demand Major League Baseball games in Japan...... YouTube now has 160 million mobile views a day, almost triple last year’s number. When Google introduces Google TV later this year, people will be able to watch YouTube videos on Internet-connected televisions.

My point is if it can work for movie clips, it can work for full length movies. Pay per view online is also good,but it is not great. The business model has not caught up yet with technology. Viewers should have both options. You can pay per view, no ads, or you can watch for free, ads served. Choice, it's about choice.

The Web Not Yet Ready For The Video Format
Saavn's Great Business Model For Movies

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HTML 5 Browser Wars

Image representing Google Chrome as depicted i...Image via CrunchBase
TechCrunch: In The Coming HTML5 Browser Wars, The Markup Should Remain The Same: On Monday, Google made a big splash with a customized Arcade Fire video page that showed off all the cool things HTML5 can do, from video, animations and 3D rendering to gorgeous fonts and choreographed windows. .... But until then, expect to see grandstanding about which browser does HTML5 better.
Google does call Chrome a "modern browser."

Innovative disruptions have to take place before standards talk can take place. We are in the early stages.

HTML 5 is when finally the browser will have left the desktop far behind. No wonder Google is so excited about Chrome and HTML 5 and all the rest.

The Chrome browser, HTML 5 and the Chrome OS notebook: that is a package deal. Windows is so yesterday.

Arcade Fire
  1. HTML5 Canvas 3D engine renders a flocking bird simulation that reacts to the music and mouse.
  2. HTML5 audio plays music and keeps track of timecode.
  3. Sequence system controls and synchronises effects and windows to the timecode.
  4. HTML5 video plays film clips in custom sizes.
  5. Choreographed windows are triggered by the music and placed relative to screen size.
  6. Map tiles are rendered, zoomed, and rotated in a scripted 3D environment.
  7. Animated sprites are composited directly over maps and Street View.
  8. 3D sky dome is used to render Street View with scripted camera control.
  9. Procedural drawing tool allows the user to create velocity influenced tree branches.
  10. Generative typeface triggered by keypress, uses an SVG path reader and individual canvas compositing for each letter.
  11. Google Maps API for fetching dynamic routes to destination and checking Street View content at points along the route.
  12. Street detection for animated trees composited dynamically in place over Street View.
  13. Color correction by combining canvas blending modes to enhance contrast and tint.

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Netizen Has Arrived: A Link From AVC

Montage of New Yor City imagesImage via Wikipedia

There is a Google Alert in my inbox that says AVC.com has linked to a post from this blog Netizen. I feel like Netizen has now arrived as a blog. This is the ultimate compliment.

Curiously I have not been the daily visitor to AVC these past few weeks like I used to be for months before that. I have been too caught up with Reshma For Congress. But I intend to visit when I can.

AVC is a great blog. Fred is a great guy. There is this amazing sense of community at AVC. It is also a NYC thing for me, a hometown thing.

A New Floor Of 1,000 Page Hits
Happy July 4 Fred Wilson, Brad Feld
Fred Wilson: An Unassuming Kind Of Guy
Meeting Fred Wilson In Person

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Thursday, September 02, 2010

Twitter, FourSquare: Mobile Web Thingies

Image representing Evan Williams as depicted i...Image by The Economist via CrunchBase
Twitter Blog: Evan Williams: The Evolving Ecosystem: "Twitter is too hard" ..... we were doing users a disservice by not having a great client on each of the major mobile platforms ..... Total mobile users has jumped 62 percent since mid-April, and, remarkably, 16 percent of all new users to Twitter start on mobile now ..... 46 percent of active users make mobile a regular part of their Twitter experience.....while smart phone clients are important, there are even more people who use the mobile Twitter web site and/or SMS. We've been seeing strong growth in both of these areas..... users of programs like TweetDeck are some of the most active and frequent users ..... The number of registered OAuth applications is now at almost 300,000—this number has nearly tripled since Chirp.....we currently have more than 145 million registered users and the performance of our Promoted Products has exceeded our expectations.

FourSquare more so than Twitter, but Twitter too. FourSquare was never really meant to be a big screen web thing. Twitter can work on the web, but not FourSquare. But even Twitter, it can be argued, is primarily a mobile web thing. It is meant to be a mobile web thing.

I keep thinking in terms of the Twitter of things. (The Internet Of Things) I think most tweets sent in the far future will emanate not from people but things. Or perhaps there will be a next generation company that will focus on primarily being the Twitter of things. And the "tweets" will not be words at all.

I have been late coming to the mobile web phenomenon. That is rather curious for a Third World guy.

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