Web 2.0 Presentations

This semester, we had a number of presenters come to class and enlighten us with the work they do with respect to web 2.0 technologies. The subject varied from security to legal issues to even the future of marketing. It was really interesting to get an “inside” perspective on how companies in today markets are implementing web 2.0 technologies. In my opinion, one presentation stood out from the rest though. Eric Bosco, from Platform-A, gave us a good overview of advertising web 2.0 styles. He provided a nice history of media evolution and how we ended up with today’s extensive global internet. Eric introduced concept which were new to me. First, he informed us that his company was a media broker. What is that? I had no idea what this was. Eric informed us that advertisers don’t have the time or energy to select every website they may want to put ads on, thus a media broker collects sites for the advertiser. To do this, there is a lot involved but basically a number of factors will result in the optimal place for an ad to be placed. Another term he introduced me to is rich media. Rich media is basically interactive advertising. One way to think of it is banner ads made 10 times better. Rich media has proven more affective versus traditional ads. Being a media broker, there are a few different ways to charge your customers. One way to do so is based on CPM (Cost per thousand). This concept basically estimates the dollar value associated with displaying the ad to 1,000 views. For example, $40 CPM means that it costs $40 to show the banner on 1000 page views. The other two ways to charge are CPC where you get paid on the basis of cost per click and the last one is cost per action where you dont get paid unless the person performs some type of action such as buying or registering. This presentation was very interesting. I provided me with a good understanding of advertising and all of the various intricacies that I was unaware of before. Advertising is a simple concept but involves very complex algorithms for the determinations of where ads should be places, what colors to use, image size, how often to change an ad, etc. Additionally, advertising is a new market place for even individuals looking to make some money on the side. Any given person can start a blog, if it gains momentum, using applications such as adsense..there is always money to be made!!

Ashton versus CNN

Recently, Ashton Kutcher challenged CNN on twitter to reach over 1 million followers on Twitter. Kutcher won!! This event was the first of its kind. Kutcher did not even spend a single cent and was able to reach an amazing number of people, increase awareness for a good cause, and show that a single voice can have power. The cause was malaria awareness. Since he won, Kutcher will be donating 10,000 bet nets for the cause. Since its inception, Twitter can be considered “the ultimate ego drive” as some would call it. This could be the case if someone is simply providing self-motivating updates such as “I am still great!” But Kutcher wanted to really point out that even with an ego driven sites, egos can be channeled into good causes such as raising malaria awareness. More importantly, Kutcher wanted to show that a single voice has the power to beat a multi-media network such as CNN. It’s only been in recent times that such things are possible! Apparently, other celebs want to use the site to really reach their fans. For example, Sean Combs (P Diddy), utilizes twitter so fans can get a sense of who he really is. He claims his image is always related to the flashy lifestyle and he wants to get away from that. Thus using tweets, he can reach his fans in a new way and show his real personality. Oprah Winfrey is also a twitter user these days although I am not sure what he angle is. With all of the celeb hype, some twitter fans are fearful of what it means for twitter.First and foremost, with increased usage, can twitter handle the traffic? This remains to be seen. Also, loyal users are afraid that it will become a fad which will quickly become yesterday’s news. Loyal users want twitter to remain about the masses and not become all about following the celebs. I understand this point of view but doubt it will become simply a means to follow your favorite celeb. Honestly, shame on celebs whose intent is to monopolize twitter for their own means. But if you are doing things that promote a good cause…well…I would say tweet away! What do you think? Should celebs like Kutcher tweet? Why or why not?

Can you ROI this?

Being a part-time MBA student, one of the things drilled into our heads is the importance of ROI and its basic use when making tough business decisions. When we start a new project or start to even consider taking on a new initiative, as business people, we often times look at the return on investment (ROI) associated with taking on the new project. The ROI gives the company and business managers an idea on what to expect as far as returns are concerned for the business. ROIs are meticulously evaluated and analyzed. The basic formula for ROI is as follows:

ROI = (Gain from Investment – Cost of Investment)/Cost of Investment.

Risk factors play an important role in determining whether or not to start a project. For example, if the risk is high if project, and ROI is relatively low, a company will most likely not take on the project due to the large possibility the project will fail.

As new web 2.0 technologies are being introduced, companies have to once again engage in trying to assign an ROI to web 2.0 technologies. I initially thought that ROI could be applied to a web 2.0 technology such as a blog, but I have learned this is far from the truth. Its hard to measure the true value a blog has on a companies marketing effort. Any VP or CEO can implement a blog and post discussions but does anyone care? On one hand you may have an engaging blog while another is barely even noticed. The one that commands a following is truly instrumental in connecting with the masses. Given that web 2.0 technologies are highly dealing with user generating content and experiences, its hard to say that a given web 2.0 technology will hold “X” amount of value. So question is, how does a company place value on a web 2.0 technology? This question is hard to answer since web 2.0 technologies affect many “soft” areas such as loyalty and customer engagement. In my opinion, here are some factors you may want to look at:

Estimating the number of customer interactions (such as blog posts, downloads, surveys, product sales coming from the web 2.0 site, etc. )
Time required to set-up the web 2.0 technology
Time to learn the technology.
Maintenance of the site
Affect on other company processes (i.e. is your blog answers certain product related questions, this may in turn reduce customer service calls.)
Customer satisfaction

Can you think of any others?

Lets share...

Being a consultant often times means being on the road to various client sites. We stay in hotels throughout the week and try out best to stay connected. Staying connected to our teams is extremely important but its hard to accomplish, especially if your team is a lot of people. For example, lets say you are a team of 5 and you are all spit up to do simultaneous installs at five different locations. But at the same time, you are all trying to work on another project that needs collaboration amongst the group. Usually, a share drive would do that trick but now…you are away from your companies network and getting access may complicate things. Well…now there is an easier solution. In a previous class, we had discussed cloud computing. The following is a specific example. A new website called box.net is solving problems such as the one described above. This solution provides a shared workspace for teams where they can have one copy of each document that is secure and accessible by all members. This allows for version control, making the configuration managers job a little easier. This site can even be used for discussions for traveling teams. Some other cool features are that when a document is downloaded, you are able to see when this was done and by whom, making auditing easier as well. This site allows users to view files using any browser-enabled mobile device and use Box’s apps on the iPhone and Blackberry. Pretty cool. Additionally, when someone makes an update to a group document, you can get an update. It is similar to a news feed for your groups shared workspace. So if you are in a meeting and are wondering when your boss will review a given document so you can deliver it, you will get an update once its complete, making it available for whatever purpose you choose. Access control is well thought-out in the site as you have control over data access and use. It is customizable. And for those of you security minded people, you can set levels of view and edit permissions, times for auto-deleting a file or removing a link, and of course password protect files. The cost of this app is relatively small and training is virtually zero when compared to other methods. Since everything is in the cloud, there is no software and hardware cost and start up time is in minutes!!!

what time is it? ...5pm

In today's workplace, team work is pretty unavoidable. Very rarely do we see places where you can work by yourself and get things accomplished. For example, one area people may say that solitude is good is that of research. I agree that while doing focused research is probably better done by a subject matter expert, at some point, this topic has to be published and then adopted to be turned into something useful. Even technology transfers require teams. Teams today are dynamic and require a lot of planning and coordination. As teams grow and budgets shrink due to the lovely economy, group dynamics has to be well-coordinated as increasingly complicated tasks now have to be accomplished quicker and more efficiently than ever before. On web app that assists teams in setting and then successfully meeting deadlines is 5pm. This website is awesome!

5pm offers a variety of tools to help manage both short and long term tasks. Being centrally accessible allows all members of the team access to useful data concerning with project planning. 5pm offers a customizeable interface that displays a gantt chart outlining project sub tasks and deadlines. There is a section called “My stuff” that provides each member of the team their own space where they can keep tabs on items that are related to themselves. The site offers RSS support so when a project manager moves a deadline out another week, each affected member is now informed and can relax knowing they have more time to complete their specific task. Project leads can even export reports to CSV. This app is able to link into various calendar applications such as Apple iCal, Google calendar, and any other that supports iCalendar format. The auto-archive options is also a useful features as tasks which were at some point taken off the table are suddenly required again.

The cost of adopting 5pm in your work place depends a number of factors such as the number of people in the group, number of projects the site will manage, and your file storage requirements. The cheapest plan starts at $18/month for 5 users, 10 projects, and 300Mb of storage space. The most expensive plan is $175/month for unlimited users, projects and data storage requirements. As with another app I reviewed, 5pm also requires no infrastructure. All maintenance is taken off your hands and handled by 5pm….now can you find a better deal!!

Aviary

Today was a beautiful day…so we decided to head out to DC. While visiting the National Cherry Blossoms this afternoon, I noticed how many people have digital cameras, including myself. A lot of people will probably go home and leave the images on their cameras until the memory if full at which point they will download the images and burn it onto a DVD for storage purposes. Some images may be uploaded so they can be purchased but a majority will be stored away in some shelf. Well, now we have another option. Web 2.0 technology sites like Aviary now offer people like us some useful photo editing tools. Websites like these offer a lot of options not just for photo editing. This website promotes creativities in many different ways through its various tools. Below each is described but I recommend visiting the site itself…some are just so cool you have to try them yourself (at least check out the images some users have created).

One tool available to users is one that would be expected at a site like this, photo editing capability called Phoenix. This includes things such as touching up an image to more complex options. The next tool is called “Raven” and provides the ability for the user to create scalable vector art appropriate for things like logos and tee shirts. The next tool is called Toucan and allows users to use various color palettes so they can enhance the color quality of their images. The next one, Peacock has so many features that a wiki has been dedicated to it to help users understand all of the features and capabilities of this toolbox. It is describes as a “ hub (node) based effect/pattern generating application.” The images some have created are pretty nice…see below.

There are other products offered as well and various blogs and wikis associated with the site to promote collaboration and community knowledge dissemination. This site seems to be attracting a lot of foot traffic as seen through the various comments and topics written about. If you become found of the site, you can receive RSS feeds on things like Product updates and twitter updates.

CrossLoop

When was the last time your computer acted up and you needed help? Have you ever reached out to geek squad for help. If you are like a lot of people, you probably have. Or maybe have had to stop by your parents place on your way home so you could fix a bug for them? Well…there is a new way to get help. CrossLoop is here to save your day! CrossLoop is an internet company that offers people help with their computer problems. You can reach out to trusted and qualified service providers who are able to provide support quickly and effectively. CrossLoop is not like any other company. Instead of taking your computer to some big store and wait in a long line, you can get help while just sitting on your coach. Additionally, you don’t have to let someone into your house but rather you log onto the internet and connect with a service provider over the internet. Then the service provider is able to view you desktop and fix your problem or provide support/advice on how to fix the problem at hand.

The unique thing about CrossLoop is that people of any technical level of expertise can now provide support to those of us who are a little less knowledgeable. This introduces a new level of collaboration on the internet. There is a tremendous amount of information known by people who log onto the internet everyday. Being able to tap into this wealth of knowledge could help solve many computer related problems more easily and quickly. What will help result in more collaboration is that CrossLoop is available in 21 languages and is used by people/companies in over 150 countries. Areas for which CrossLoop provides support include technical support, training, and collaboration. Some popular categories in which CrossLoop has provided support include: antivirus, home networks, spyware, outlook, digital photos, iTunes/iPod and iPhones.

The last two here make me wonder though…why would you not go to apple for support with their products? It would be interesting to see why people prefer coming to CrossLoop for assistance. I am guessing it’s the ease of getting help from your own laptop versus taking you device to the apple store. I have stood in those lines before….not fun!!!

Kids on the Internet

Recently, we were asked in class if we would let our kids online, specifically social networks. This was an interesting question. I think the answer really depends on a number of things. First and foremost, this is a personal decision and what one parent does with their kid does not mean that it would be the answer for another kid. Each parent probably has to look at a number of factors before deciding how to proceed. Some things to consider would be: age of the child, how long the child spends online, what kind of site the child want to visit, do his/her other friends have access, etc? Needless to say, it’s a complicated decision and probably needs monitoring regardless.

I found a few good things to consider when providing your child with access to the internet (Parental controls that keep tabs on young Web surfers). First, carefully choose your ISP (if you have not already done so). Most ISPs these days have built in parental controls and web site blockers which can come in handy. Next, choose a good router. Routers can be used to stop suspicious content from reaching your child’s computer. Next, configure your operating system to block the child from harmful internet content. For example, Windows Vista comes with parental controls. Additionally, web filters can block games/certain programs. Web 2.0 is also helping keep kids safe via efforts such as “Google Safe Content” which filters out Web sites based upon Open Directory keywords and listings. Today, there is more and more software to help keep things age appropriate. For example, AOL at School also filters searches for kids. Today, tools for social networking and messaging are not only useful but necessary. Services are able to monitor email message and IM in attempts to regulate who the child can talk to and how. For example, if a child’s uses suspicious terms during a conversation (IM), a parent is notified about the session. This enables parents to then reach out to each other and may be even identify possible predators who are reaching out to their children. One example of this is IMSafer. Some social networks have implemented controls of their own. For example, MySpace has MySpace Watch which will create a report which summarizes your chills MySpace profile and any content involving sexuality drugs, curse words, and racism.

It is somewhat comforting knowing that options such as these are available to parents when they introduce a young child to the internet. But regardless, nothing can take the place of good parenting and simply talking to your child about what using the internet means.

Where do you get your news?

Newspaper has had a long history. Going back to the original origins, newspaper was first seen some five centuries ago in Europe. Things were initially handwritten and passed between people to inform others of important events. The first published newspaper was seen in Germany back in the 1400’s. In American, the first paper was published in Boston in the year of 1690, it was entitled Publick Occurences. Today, just within the US, there are many varieties of newspapers such as national papers, city papers, and even county papers.

Recently, there has been much talk around the possible closing of big name Newspaper companies. For example, recently, the SanFranciso was named as a company that is in danger of closing or being sold, if it does not stop the huge losses. There are many more examples like this company who are either closing their doors or choosing to go mostly on-line. The internet has been the main culprit causing such recent events. Even more, the rise of web 2.0 technology can even be seen as an additional reason. For example, people going to a website such as cnn.com or the washingtonpost.com is one thing. But when you couple this with people now getting RSS feeds, twittering, getting live updates, etc. this compounds the issue. People no longer have to go somewhere to get the news, the news is essentially delivered to them via their emails, iPhones, PDA, etc. Even more, people can decide what news they want. A traditional news paper, would deliver all news for the day, even when the reader may only really want the sports section. But with web 2.0 technology, a user is able to specify what exactly he/she would like delivered to them. This is an prime example of user customization.

With such possible closings, it makes me ask some questions. One in particular is what type of people are still getting traditional news? Who is still buying these hard copy versions? Why have they not gone online to get their news? What will they do once newspaper production is limited? How else can web 2.0 technology help with the customization and dissemination of the news? Who will be a prime providers of online news? Will there be a prime provider? (I am guessing not.) What happens to people that don’t have access to the internet on a daily basis?

Jinni

Have you been to the movie rental place recently? I was just there a few days ago and like usual, had no idea what to get. I like suspense and drama..but I was not sure of the titles that were there. I tried reading the summaries but how much can you really get out of those? There is never really a guarantee that you are actually going to like the movie you pick…even after your best friends recommends it. Enter the new web 2.0 technologies. Jinni is a new social search-and-recommendation engine that uses their “Movie Genome” to make movie recommendations. Jinni is an effort to combine a complicated tagging methodology and user suggestions/input to provide the best and most logical movie recommendations for users. The movie genome is an intense effort being done by Jinni. When a movie starts, Jinni experiences staff starts tagging the movie, trying to best capture data such as: genre, plot, storyline, mood, etc. After some time, the genome application learns the method of identifying tags and takes over this process from the Jinni staff. This mix of human and machine identification and tagging is supposed to provide the most expertise movie recommendations. Jinni is even working on a wiki. This purpose of this wiki would be to define all of the different genes that describe numerous aspects of video. The wiki is supposed to be editable by users so as to really get the users involved. This concept is really good and reaches out to the target market and tries to get them involves. If customers are allowed to modify what defines certain genes, Jinni is in essence allowing the customers to be involved in the recommendation process. This makes the customer feel like they have something to add and thus draws in users more. I believe that Jinni has a very strong future. The days when a family sat down and just watched channel 4 are gone. Users are more likely to search for a show based on some characteristic. For example, users may search for comedy and scroll through some list brought back by the service provider. Jinni is a solution to problem that us just really evolving now. With the demand for video on demand increasingly enormously, Jinni offers a unique offering by being able to provide a discovery solution for premium video content.

GumGum

So once again, I was on the search for web 2.0 related articles, and while I was on the hunt, I stumbled upon an article entitled "GumGum Wants To Turn Celebrity Pics Into Shopping Sprees With ShopThisLook". The title seemed interesting and so I continue to read on. The article talks about a recent upgrade offered by the company where they take high quality images of celebrities/famous individuals and on the side...using shop this look, provides information on where one can purchase clothing times similar to what the celebrity has on. The example they gave was of Lindsey Lohan, wearing jeans, a shirt, jacket, and a purse. On the side of the picture, they have the listing of the individual items and price. Pretty sweet! Now, we girls no longer have to do our own research, its pretty much done for us. Since the company had an interesting concept, I looked them up and discovered that Gum Gum is "an analytics and monetization platform for content online". What exactly does that mean? Well...basically, they make content available to publishers, large or small for a fee of course or in exchange of advertising. They have two distinct pricing schemes. One where the publisher pays per use. For example, if Gum Gum provides an image, they will be able to monitor how many people viewed or clicked on the image. (Gum Gum does provide useful info like # of views, percentage of female viewers, age range, visits, etc. )This then will equate to the dollar amount the publisher has to pay for the image. The other method of payment is to go with ad supported images that subsidize the cost of images. Seems like a lot of companies probably use the second route since it FREE. How does this work? Developers simply download Gum Gum code into their own company code. Not that complicated really. An interesting comment made by a reader was how is this really going to work when only a fraction of shoppers can afford the same clothing/fashion wear that celebs have? This is a very valid point...but I would think that a company like Gum Gum would have thought this piece out and probably tried to offer low-cost alternatives maybe for people who want the same look but can afford the same prices. Whatever the deal, this seems like a pretty good concept…will be interesting to see where this goes in the future. This is something worth looking into....

Are you happy?

Happiness. This words means so much to us and is a necessity in our lives regardless what age, gender, or ethnicity a person may be. It is something we are constantly in search for and when found, its wonderful. Happiness can be linked to many different things. For some, its family or a week long vacation in the Greek Islands and for others its meeting that special someone. The answer really differs depending on who you ask. But research has shown that happiness is tightly liked to a sense of belonging and community. People who are involved in a community and are active with others are proven to be more happier than others.

Interestingly, (as a recent article points out) web 2.o technology has recently played a great part in today’s user happiness. Social networks like Facebook, twitter, MySpace have been shown to contribute to a persons happiness and well-being. It does not matter if its just touching base just once in a while or keeping in touch on a daily basis, social network have made it easier for people to connect and feel a sense of belonging. But with this increase, there has also been an increase in Internet addition. People just cant seem to get enough. People are hooked onto their blackberries and constantly checking email. You know what I am talking about. I have seen it and experienced it. When having a conversation with someone and every few minutes they get a Facebook update. So ANNOYING. I digress. Web 2.0 technologies have created communities for people and aided in making users attain happiness but at the same time, they have take time away from the “real” word. Addition to the Internet is a real phenomenon. Worker productivity has gone down. Valuable time parents could be spending with their kids is now spent catching up on email on their PDAs. Or even worse, parents may be using the Internet to baby-sit their kids?!?!?!

There are key things to look for that can signal that you have some level of Internet addiction. Below are a few.
1. Some signs that you are online too much:
2. Personal Relationships are deteriorating
3. Increase in Conflict with Family
4. Decrease in time spent with Family
5. Job Production Loss, Leading to Threat of Job Loss.

We all should be aware of signs that you are online too much. Its good to have a balance and go outside sometimes to get fresh air:)

CNN recently published an article, Twitter Business Model Found!, about Twitters business model a.k.a. money making scheme. Twitter as like many of the other well-known web 2.0 technologies offers useful capabilities people can use to follow each other. But in order to stay in business, these companies need to also make money to survive. Facebook is another example of a company that is struggling to make a profit regardless of being the number one web 2.0 technology today.

As one profit earning tactic, twitter has a list of the most “Suggested Follows”. You can imagine, that being on this list offers one very high visibility and reach within the community. Jason Calacanis recently offered Twitter $250,000 to be on of the 20 users in this list. You may ask who is Jason Calacanis? I did not know myself..so I looked him up. Jason Calacanis owned on of the first dot-com companies in New York City. He is also know to be one of the fist to capitalize on the growth of blogs before selling to AOL. He is a well known Internet entrepreneur and is someone who people would probably actually like to follow. This, having him be a part of the People to follow lists makes sense.

So the question I ask is, what do you think about being able to buy yourself a spot on the “Suggested Follows” list or any other list for that matter, that makes them highly visible? For example, if twitter was surrounded around audio devices for the home, is it fair that the companies with the most money can just buy themselves onto the list? Would it be fair if customers actually rated potentials companies to follow? I guess what I am getting at is that some other factor used in conjunction with money may be beneficial when trying to make a list like this. This way the originating company makes money but the users also have input to these lists which only validates the offer as well.

I understand that these new web 2.0 companies need to make a profit to survive, its not just all about the user. But these companies need to pay attention to their customer base and their best interest as well. I guess this is why Facebook is having such a challenge as well. Mere advertising does not cut it these days but I am sure that with a little more thought, profit is inevitable. Just a thought.

The Gov Goes 2.0

Federal Computing Week recently came out with an article titled, “Twitter, blogs and other Web 2.0 tools revolutionize government business”. This article discusses the recent adoption of web 2.0 technologies by the government and the effect this change in culture has brought on. The article offers several cases where government employees are not only using but really embracing this technology in their day to day tasks. For example, in one case, instead of simply providing hard copies of a report to the intended audiences, the report can now be posted to a portal which is updated as needed. The portal is only accessible to a wider audience but now is always update to date with real information. Another example discussed the salmonella-tainted peanut butter and how the CDC would just normally post information to their websites. But in order to reach more people, they used software widget that automatically pulled the most recent recall information from an FDA database to various websites. This spiral effect is why so many more people received this information quickly. Cases like this are repeated throughout the article and offer profound insight into how useful web 2.0 technologies truly are.

In my opinion, one critical issue the government is dealing with is the breaking down of barriers not only between organizations but within organizations. The old way of doing things will simply not work anymore. The need is to be efficient and responsive to every threat/issue that arises. In trying to eliminate this problem, the government has done a great job in embracing web 2.0 technologies to break down stovepipes and increase communication and effectiveness between its people. Blogs are being used more often to offer people personal space to voice opinions and share ideas. Shared spaces are on the rise to help break down barriers to information flow. With the use of shared spaces and groups, the right people are getting the right information at the right time. Web 2.0 technologies are offering employees with a feel of community and team participation. Its easier now to be a part of a team where everyone may not be down the hall form each other but has access to the same information and can make well-thought out decisions. I think we will continue to see this adoption across all government agencies as our missions become more critical and our resourced continue to decrease. It will be interesting to see what the face of government will be in the next 5 – 10 years as new technologies enter the field.

LM Presentations

Recently in class, we had two individuals come in from Legg Mason (Ray and Gretchen). Each talked to us about their jobs and personal experiences with Web 2.0 technologies. It was nice to hear real stories from the industry. Stories like theirs offer valuable insight which I can take back with me and apply to both my own personal life and professional career. Ray discussed WEB 2.0 security, while Gretchen focused on legal issues. Being a security person myself, needless to say that both were very interesting and applicable to my job. The first presenter gave us an overview of WEB 2.0 security issues and how he and his team goes about testing their companies websites. The whole thing was fascinating. What makes this issues interesting is that is not like we solved the WEB 1.0 security issues..and to make things worse, we have built upon it to expose ourselves to even more threats. For example, did you know that you can have malicious code sent to your computer via a RSS Feed!!! Or things like mashups, that sound cool and with the times actually can take a vulnerability and blend it with a "good" application to generate something that looks all innocent but its not really. The topic of web 2.0 security is very relevant in my current job. We analyze new systems and applications all of the time. Now that I understand todays threats and vulnerabilities a little more, I can be smarter at my job and provide clients with better service.

Gretchen was from the legal department of the company and discussed how web 2.0 technologies have made her work life a bit more interesting. She is constantly building a "picket fence" to protect her company and its customers from fraudulent activity. She even tracks down the "criminals" and sometimes threatens to take legal action if they don’t stop pretending to be a company representative. She discussed cases where people put up fake websites and actually lured customers and were able to take money from their accounts. Cases like these seem to be on the rise and probably will continue to rise as we go through a recession and more and more people become desperate for money. Although this topic does not directly apply to my day to day professional career, it is always good to know that things like this happen so I can protect myself as a consumer.

(http://www.walpolewoodworkers.com/images/categories/Picket.Fence.A.jpg)

(http://www.privcom.gc.ca/information/ar/images/cartoon6.jpg)

The Recession

During the current recession, social media seems to be playing an important part in connecting the unemployed with support groups, tips on how to survive, and even odd jobs that maybe you would not have done before but now are open to. A recent article on cnn discusses different ways that new technologies allows people to connect and get support that we are need during such tough times.

The ability of web 2.0 technologies to create communities around various topics still amazes me. This is another classic example. One interesting website is "recessionwire.com". This site is termed a pop-up site that is meant only to be temporary and will go away with the given situation, the current situation being the recession. Its meant to aid the urban professions who are now laid off. The community is welcomed to tell their story and offer tips on how to survive. For example, a recent article discusses things to do in the first hours, week, even months after being laid off.

"pinkslipsarethenewblack.com" is another site where the unemployed can go and blog about whats on their mind and offer support. One blog talked about the top 10 places to go to get free bar food...the list seemed pretty good. I am pretty sure that if I lived in New York and was out of a job, I may check it out. Another article successfully makes us middle class people feel a little better when it reports that hi-end pawn shops are saying that many of the rich are falling hard and as a result pawning off many of their valuables. This just really makes you feel like you are not in it all alone.

For those who may even need a little more support and cant afford to see a phychologist, you can visit "feelingupindowntimes" where Marlin Potash, a New York City psychologist of 30 years, offers support and serious advice on how to get buy and deal with the emotional stress of losing your job.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/02/24/recession.web.sites/index.html

http://www.pophangover.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/recession.jpg

Lets Tweet

For my post this week, I decided to look into twitter and what its all about. Twitter is defined to be “a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates (known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter) So basically you can think of it as the status updates on Facebook but delivered to your phone. Or even just a test message that is sent to multiple users. Twitter has approximately 4-5 million users. Its apparently the 3rd most popular social networking site behind Facebook and MySpace. At first, I was not sure why one would want to have such an account. Yes, I agree that status updates are interesting at times but having it sent to my phone would be much. But with some more reading, I learned that this technology can be quite useful.

This technology is used in many different scenarios. For example, during the infamous California wildfires, firefighters would use twitter to send users updates about the fire. Twitter was even more effective in spreading information and updates to students during the Virginia Tech shootings than traditional media. In this scenario specifically, I can see how useful and effective this technology is. I remember watching the updates on TV on that horrific day. I cant even imagine how frustrated family and friends were not knowing how their loved ones were and what we going on. Another area that twitter could offer its support are updates for students at colleges and universities. For example, when there are closings dues to in-climate weather, colleges could just tweet students. I know some college are adopting this, I think more should.

There are other similar services out there such as Jaiku that is offered in other countries and offer additional services such as lifestreaming. Lifestreaming is defined as an online record of a person's daily activities, either via direct video feed or via aggregating the person's online content such as blog posts, social network updates, and online photos. Twitter seems to be losing ground nationally. For instance, in China, the Chinese version has outdone twitter with many enhancements. Twitter seems to be doing well within the US but needs to move quicker and make more enhance to attract international users.

Hi-tech Hits Health Care

Coming from a family inherent to certain health conditions, I know it can be hard to offer support at times. I have seen loved ones suffer with symptoms and realize that at times, they just need to talk about what they are going through. Web 2.0 technologies are now becoming more and more engaged in the Health Care Industry. With such new technologies, patients now have more options in trying to deal with conditions. Sites like PatientsLikeMe.com offer options for patients to log on and connect with people who also may be going through or have gone through their certain medical condition. I think this is brilliant. I truly believe that mental support is irreplaceable when people encounter certain conditions like cancer, sepsis, etc. These conditions are life altering and the limited interaction with doctors sometimes is not enough. The site has various communities set-up around certain medical conditions. A patient can join a community just for social interaction, ask questions such as medical side effects, get opinions on health care facilities, or compare treatment options.

Sites like these are getting a lot of pushback from doctors. Doctors don’t believe patients should be sharing medical information. Some doctors even say its illegal...which I find ridiculous. Doctors are great and all but sometimes what they can offer may not be the entire picture. Additionally, it’s not like the doctor will sit and talk with you while you go through the serious side effects of receiving chemo. Sometimes it’s hard enough to get them on the phone to ask a question. Being able to log on and ask another cancer patient what treatment they are on and what they did to ease certain symptoms can be not only good know but comforting as the patient feels like they are not the only one going through this.

Another web 2.0 enabled site available to patients is HealthVault. This site allows users to store their health records online. So no you can get rid of those dusty files and go hi-tech. People can even sync their personal accounts to medical devices so data is entered automatically. For example, if you have one of those pedometers (devices that measure the distance you walk/run), you can log on and just plug in your device and the information is uploaded to your account. So this data along with meal information is used to help you stay healthy or lose a few pounds if need be. This site makes it easier for users to manage their personal info and make better decisions.

What is all of the hype about? If any....

I recently joined second life...man was that a mistake but its required so oh well. I have logged on a few times now and each time I am pushing myself to stay on. Here are some reasons why.

Downloading this took forever. This time intensive process was just annoying. Sorry…I don’t have much patience if you can tell. I am the person when doing searches, keeps hitting the refresh button thinking it will speed things up when I know it won’t.

The application is memory intensive...so it takes forever for buildings/objects to load. I could be walking to what looks like open ground and then boom, a building appears. I am sure I look like an idiot to other people on second life. My system has crashed three times so far and I am sure its not the end of it. Also, my avatar randomly starts slapping her upper back...I am not even touching the keyboard...I swear!!

No matter how hard I try, I keep ending up at adult sites. I have even been chased by hookers. Not sure why?? The last one was the only one that was someone normal. But even then, people were just standing around..not really chatting. I have tried to talk to some people and the responses ranges from silence to some actual normal conversations. Quite honestly though, I have no interest in talking to random strangers. I have enough going on in my real life and making small talk with some random avatar falls real far down my list. I have noticed though that if you are "away" from you computer, you avatars goes into away mode...but he/she basically looks like they are sleeping with their heads facing towards the ground. Looks kind of funny...see if you can find one.

I had heard that second life had some good places to go to try new view products. Not sure how that would work. Are there clothes you try on your avatar? Even if my avatar looks good with it, I doubt I would buy it. I also did a search on places to go such as art museums, school, and other “PG” related sites but there was not much going on. Kind of boring.

So my question is, who are these people that are logging on and spending hours everyday? And why? Just trying to figure out all of the hype around second life.

The education of tomorrow...

With the advance of today’s technologies, our students of tomorrow need to be on the ball with these innovative technologies and work them from early childhood.I personally think the educational curriculum needs to be changed to more intensively include new technologies and their applications. I know, some may not agree that steering young children to technology will develop a bias toward those types of jobs but the truth is that this is where the future is going. Additionally, as you will see below, a number of web 2.0 tools can be used to further a child’s interest in things like art and literature. As Prof. Bliss proved to us in our first session, our nation’s kids are falling way behind children of the world. This coupled with other factors such as our nations current economic status further magnifies the problem of being misguided for so long. Introducing our children to things like web 2.0 early on can better prepare them for tomorrow’s workforce. Education is the place to start.

I recently read a blog that rates a number of web 2.0 applications for educational purposes. Below are some apps I found interesting. (http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2008/09/11/the-best-web-20-applications-for-education-2008/)

Criteria set upon each tool were the following:
-Accessible to English Language Learners and non-tech savvy users. - Not like second life where I keep hitting myself over the head.
- Free-of-charge.- Appropriate for classroom use. - Not like 2nd life that has a lot, a lot of adult content.
- Completely browser-based with no download required. - Not like second life..which is so very very very taxing on your computer.

Work on your presentation skills on: Number twenty-eight is Selfcast. It lets anyone with a webcam immediately broadcast over the web for free, and anyone (without registering) can watch and also participate via live text chat.

Build artistic skills: Number twenty-seven is The Broth. It lets you create password-protected private “rooms” where people can cooperate on creating a piece of art.

Conducting Polls: Number twenty-four is Fo.reca.st. It’s a free online polling application that lets you easily add sound, images, or video to your polls/surveys; has a variety of ways to see your results; and many different formats to show your survey.

Comic skills: Number twenty-one is an online comic-creation site called Pixton. Allows users to put self-made comic strips in a virtual book. Only appropriate content is allowed on site…so its kid friendly.

Online Scavanger Hunt: Number eighteen is Zunal. An easy and fun way to do scavenger hunts on the web.

Instructional Stuffff - Number fifteen is Graspr a site where users can upload (and watch) “how-to” or “instructional” videos. Online test: Number six is My Studiyo. An innovative way to create online tests and quizzes.

Web 2.0....is it the same as electricity?

Electricity is something people rarely think about. They just plug in their devices and off they go. Very rarely do you see anyone trying to figure out the power grid and all of its intricacies. Recently, some discussion has surfaced as to whether the evolution of web 2.0 technologies has caused less of a need of network engineering. At first, I thought this was ridiculous but at second glance....I don’t know... I am on the fence. Network engineering deals with things such as Network Latency, Bandwidth issues, Routing protocols, network layouts, etc. From what I can remember from my networking class in college, we were taught that network architectures play an important role in delivery of service on a given network. There are many network topologies to consider, hardware pieces to buy, etc. A well planned and detailed architecture would be the foundation of a low-latency, low error network. At the same time, applications (and services) existed within internal networks and the idea of leveraging a service from various outside networks was not really on the rise. Thus the thought of a lessened need of Network engineers first seems preposterous to me. But now...given that may web 2.0 app reside on distributed networks and not within company walls, some of the things that were issues before may no longer be much of a concern. Additionally, computing power of servers and such has grown exponentially and some would even say its hard to reach high levels of utility. So now that servers can do so much more with less and more and more applications may be housed outside of a companies boundaries....it leads me to believe that maybe..just maybe that job of a network engineering may be a little easier..even if its just by a small amount.

Another aspect to consider though is the amount of data these Web 2.0 companies are processing. The data rates I am assuming are high and most likely will continue to rise exponentially as more and more people joins the web 2.0 revolution. I guess, if I had to choose a side, I would say that overall, the job of a network engineers is getting more and more complex. Years ago, network engineers dealt with a limited number of servers that made up a confined network. Now, things are very different and there is more to understand and comprehend.

Below is an article that discusses just this issue. (http://gigaom.com/2007/04/10/web-20-death-of-the-network-engineer)

Privacy and Web 2.0

To start off a discussion on privacy, I first decided to define what it actually is. Below is what I found compliments of (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privacy) "Privacy is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves and thereby reveal themselves selectively."Personal information includes but is not limited to: Name, Sex, Address, Political Beliefs, Religious Beliefs, Medical History, Income, ID numbers, etc.

Now with this understanding, privacy is a big concern for some while not so much for others when it comes to Web 2.0 technologies. Differences can be due to things like generational gaps, personality traits, past experiences, etc. It’s been my observation that younger generations are much more liberal with there personal information while older generations tend to tightly hold their information and are hesitant in providing it. Additionally, there are individuals who are in the middle, myself, for instance. I post personal pictures; post employment related items, and sometimes even will comment on religious issues but providing things like my home address makes me nervous. ID theft in today’s world is a very big concern and I feel like the more you provide about yourself, the more information someone has to put together a faulty ID and boom....you are left with a mess you have to clean up.

Recently I heard of cases in the real estate industry where people were providing virtual house tours online. The next thing you see are an increase in burglaries in these homes where the thieves seemed to know all of the ins and out of the home. Now that’s scary. Even on Facebook recently, someone’s account was hijacked and the imposter changed his status message to say: "BRYAN IS IN URGENT NEED OF HELP!!!" This victims’ friends ended up getting scammed and lost a good deal of money. (http://redtape.msnbc.com/2009/01/post-1.html#%20posts) The ability of web 2.0 technologies to collect personal information is a huge concern. Users usually don’t know what is being collected, what it is being used for, can access their own information, and don’t know how their information is being protected if at all.

The following article discusses what is termed the ""Four principles of the Privacy Manifesto" and I think it is worth a mention. (http://gigaom.com/2008/01/08/a-privacy-manifesto-for-the-web-20-era/)
1. Every customer has the right to know what private information is being collected.
2. Every customer has the right to know the purpose for which the data is being collected, in advance.
3. Each customer owns his or her personal information.
4. Customers have a right to expect that those collecting their personal information will store it securely.

I think this is a pretty good start where users can actually start protecting themselves.

Cupcakes and Organized Chaos...

In an attempt to get ideas about a first birthday party decor, I hopped on Flickr to see what I could find. My search returned some amazing pictures such as these cupcakes and farm cake. Just browsing through images of childrens parties gave me ideas such as making my own sesame street cupcakes and setting up an ice cream bar. Flickr came in good use when trying to see what options I had. But I also noticed the tags already associated with each picture. Some made sense but others not so much. For example, one tag was "mmf" for a cupcake. Now what is "mmf"? Maybe people should put a little more thought into tags? Just a thought. Digg is another Web 2.0 place to go to cehck out what hot and whats not. People can "digg" a site and when more people digg the site, it rises to the top of the page. So basically you can see what people are into that day. For people who enjoy baking cupcakes, cutlery, and other party ideas, I found an awesome blog. Its "http://cupcakesandcutlery.blogspot.com/" Check it out. Some of the images are amazing!

On another note, not know what RSS feeds really were, I did some searching and found the following. RSS can stand for Really Simple Syndication, Rich Site Summary, or RDF Site Summary based on who you ask. I like the first one. It’s basically a standard format for sharing content. The content can be news articles, podcasts, blogs, video links, etc. As you may be able to tell, I don’t subscribe to an RSS feeds (that I know of). But when thinking about RSS feeds, the question arises of how much information is too much. Not being a subscriber, I would guess that 5-8 feeds would be plenty but apparently people end up subscribing to as many as 50!!! What are people doing with that many feeds? I would not have time to actually read all of these. In general terms though, we definitely are at a time when mass amounts of information is loaded upon us everyday…there has to be a better way of managing it and taking in what we really need. I found some additional info about RSS but wont go into detail…I think someone in class is going to talk about RSS and I don’t want to step on his/her feet:)

Some cool sites

Some interesting web 2.0 sites I found:

http://www.scrapblog.com/: An online scrapbook site that allows users to post online, share with friends or even print them. Apparently, well-know designers of the scrapbooking world have provided templates that are available for purchase. (I did not know that scrapbooking world had well-known designers!!!) I do some scrapbooking but cant find the time recently...this may be a good option.

http://www.imbee.com/: A social networking site for kids and tweens. Its basically Facebook for kids but has a lot more privacy/security features so not anyone can see a kids information. This sounds a like a good place to start kids off on social networks since its highly restricted and not open to the public. My first thought was to suggest keeping kids off sites such as these but realizing that is not really possible, other than in my head, this seems like a good alterative.

http://letterpop.com/: Ok..this looks pretty cool. Its a site where you can create newsletters, photo collages, invitations, party invites, etc. To start, you can join with no fee but you get limited features like you can only upload about 25 pictures the first year. Which is not a lot at all..but if the templates come out nice...it may be something worth looking into. If you are a small business owner, this look like an easy way to do newsletters, ads, different marketing letters, etc. I think I may try this one out myself.

http://www.wayfaring.com/: Kind of a personalized google maps where you can create maps of your own with your own specifics and then share them with friends. So for example, if a friend is coming into town, you can mark the best places to stay, eat, and see a movie on the map so they can see where everything is. Kind of interesting.

http://www.webkinz.com/us_en/: Second life for kids? This is how it works: purchase a Ganz Webkinz or Lil'Kinz plush toy at your local retailer, or online; and then, use the code number that comes with the toy to enter the online world and play with your virtual pet. It looks kind of cute:)

http://www.clubpenguin.com/: This I thought deserves a mention just because its soooo cute!!! But the idea is the same, as second life but for kids. Downer here is that it costs money to join…nothing seems to be free.

Concepts About Web 2.0

To learn some more about Web 2.0, I visited http://oreilly.com/ to see what else I can find. There is a wealth of info on this site, so I started with one article. While reading an articale about web 2.0, the following was stated, "In fact, the value of the software is proportional to the scale and dynamism of the data it helps to manage." This statement speaks to the current shift towards data management and less of application management. The emphasis is even stronger these days on data and effective use and application of data is what more often determines a company’s success in today’s market. (http://www.oreilly.de/artikel/web20.html)The notion of reaching out to the tail and edge is discussed rather than focusing on the head. This addresses a point that with Web 1.0, the accepted notion was that a few websites would be the center of the internet and individuals would have to visit these sites. But now, the notion of every one person being a "server" ios becoming more of the norm. Where first a central database housed all the necesary data and thus individuals needed to access the database, now people can access eachother to attain whatever they are looking for. Thus the term a social network. Collective Intelligence is used to describe the success Web 2.0 is currently experiencing. One company that has used this concept and thrived on it is Flickr. More about this on a later date. This article additionally goes into programming concepts that are key to successful web 2.0 technologies. They are as follows: 1. Support lightweight programming models that allow for loosely coupled systems. - I am guessing this is due tot eh nature of no longer dealing with one centralized DB anymore. 2. Think syndication, not coordination. - The distribution of info is key, not the management of it at the end user. 3. Design for "hackability" and remixability. - OpenSource is the path to be on.One of the key concepts to understand was that Web 2.0 does not have a boundary but rather is more of a set of principles/characteristics which define it.

More on Facebook

So I did some research and found out some interesting things about Facebook. Facebook is defined as a social utility and was founded by former-Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg. Joining Facebook is free and connects people via internet email accounts. Facebook started as a project within the Harvard confines. It was originally only for Harvard students but its popularity gained momentum and its adoption spread quickly to high school/college students and beyond. These days I feel like everyone has an account. Facebook has evolved in recent years with the addition of new features to profiles so more information can be shared with users. A profile includes: Information, Status, Friends, Friends in Other networks, Photos, Notes, Groups, Chat, and The Wall.

The following are some surveys/study findings[1]:

In 2005, survey showed that approximately 80% of students in supported colleges had a Facebook account, with 60% logging in daily.
It was voted the most “in” thing after the iPod and tying with Beer.
90% of all undergraduates in the US use their accounts regularly
76.2% never click on ads

In my last class, we learned about the technology hype cycle. As defined by Gartner, a hype cycle is “a graphic representation of the maturity, adoption and business application of specific technologies.[2] “ There are various stages a given technology goes through such as technology trigger, peak of inflated expectations, and plateau of productivity. So my question is where on the hype cycle do you think Facebook is? I would imagine that it is currently climbing the curve to the peek of inflated expectations. The popularity of Facebook is still on the rise and as it continues to roll out enhanced and new features, it will continue to up the bar. Its visibility is turning the head of many companies who are trying to implement it within their business solutions. Thoughts?
[1] http://mashable.com/2006/08/25/facebook-profile/
[2] http://www.gartner.com/pages/story.php.id.8795.s.8.jsp

My new class...

I recently started a web 2.0 class in my MBA. This class looks to be very promising. To introduce everyone, the professor “googled” everyone and displayed their info on the projector. It was interesting to see how open we as a society are versus a decade ago. It was pointed out that as the new generation is adopting these new technologies, its very evident of their behavior and patters of interaction. I am unfamiliar with what exactly defines web 2.0 and hope this class expands my knowledge on the topic. Effective use of the technology will also aid in further business development options especially in our current economic situation where consumers are less enticed to spend the next dollar.

Just with the first class I have learned a lot. The cool thing is that I already know some of the Web 2.0 tools such as Facebook and Myspace. Myspace from my understanding used to be popular but is now being crushed by Facebook. I know a lot of people who have decided to move away from MySpace and migrate to Facebook. I joined Facebook last year sometime and actually like the tool (I am usually a little skeptical about such tools.) Privacy is always a big concern and this class will discuss this topic as well. Facebook allows you to create a network of friends, post pictures, join groups, “email” eachother, invite people to events, etc. Facebook does have security options where you can make your profile as public as you like or as private as you would like. This is good for us older people who like a little bit of privacy. Facebook is actually a good way to keep in touch when you are busy with work, school, family life etc. It can server as a central location instead of first sending email, then sending pics, and then creating event invites.