Archive for the 'Social Media' Category

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The Web Is Reborn (HTML 5)

Published on November 6, 2010 in High Tech & Media and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , .

The last decade expanded what we could do online, but the Web’s basic programming couldn’t keep up. That threatened to fracture the world’s greatest innovation engine—until a small group of Web rivals (Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group) joined forces to save it.

The central goal of HTML5 is to give websites the chance to expand beyond pages and into programs. For instance, the language will have tags for video and audio, which should dramatically streamline the way the Web handles multimedia: it will be as easy for a Web developer to incorporate a film clip or a song as it is to place text and images.

In some ways, HTML5 is taking the best of how the Web works and making it standard. For instance, today Gmail lets you take a file from a computer desktop and instantly attach it to an e-mail by dragging it into the browser window [Source].

One of the most illustrative applications of HTML5 is “The Wilderness Downtown,” an interactive video that the Canadian band Arcade Fire unveiled in September through a collaboration with Google.

Real-Time Measurement of Public Opinion

Published on October 26, 2010 in Real-Time Web. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Harvard-Developed Tool Measures Real-Time Public Opinion on Social Media.

Crimson Hexagon analyses online conversations about a given subject using its unique “statistical human-assisted approach.” Developed at Harvard’s Institute for Quantitative Social Science, the technology originally began as the “hyper-accurate estimation, classification, and quantification of unstructured data,” says company CEO Scott Centurino, which, in non-science speak, just means the measurement of public opinion from unsolicited data.

The company uses sophisticated algorithms and dynamic dashboards to dig through and track massive amounts of information in real-time [Source].

“There’s a real value in tapping into these millions or billions of conversations online, where people are talking openly and honestly about what’s important to them,” says Centurino. “Our real kick comes from being able to understand the underlying themes from those conversations, so you can actually act on them. If all I know is that negative things are being said, what can I possibly do with that information?”

The New Faces of Social Media

Published on October 25, 2010 in Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

From YouTube celebrities to chief social-media officers, these unexpected players exert outsize impact and power online — offering new channels of communication that businesses can’t afford to ignore.

For businesses, the definition of influence is less important than its impact. And there is a new, emerging generation of web personalities whose activities are having impact, online and off. FastCompany has taken a snapshot of this universe, highlighting six categories, including YouTube celebrities such as iJustine; chief social-media officers at major corporations; and specialist bloggers in key industries. Few of these new influentials are household names — yet. Unless your home happens to be one of those that are absolutely devoted to them.

US$250 Million sFund

Published on October 23, 2010 in Global Strategy and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

Companies developing social-media applications for Facebook have a new place to look to for funding: one of Silicon Valley’s most powerful venture-capital firms: Kleiner Perkins is teaming with social and traditional media companies to back a $250 million fund aimed at fostering social-technology innovation.

The firm, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, announced it was creating an “sFund” devoted to putting money on the table for companies developing social-media applications—particularly those that could be integrated with Facebook and the social network’s 500 million users [Source 1] [Source 2] [Source 3].

“Think of it as a quarter-billion-dollar party,” said John Doerr, a partner at Kleiner Perkins. He called social media the next great wave of disruptive technology to come from Silicon Valley, after the development of personal computing and then the Web browser. Doerr, one of the most important venture capitalists and thinkers on the Silicon Valley scene.

7 Trends to Watch

Published on October 5, 2010 in High Tech & Media and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: .

7 Trends to Watch, In An Age of Info Overload. Information is now the most abundant commodity on earth. These are strange times — not just for us citizens, but for all the corporate citizens that employ us, feed us, and work the engine that makes the world go round. So here are seven home truths to help keep things in perspective [Source].

1. People Crave Certainty
2. “Branded Content” Is a Dangerous Road — Drive Responsibly
3. Bet on Humans over Technology
4. If You Have Nothing to Say, Don’t. No, Really
5. Privacy Is Becoming Pivotal — Take a Stand
6. Information Works for You, Not the Other Way Round
7. Empower Your Intrapreneurs

Untangling the Social Web

Published on September 5, 2010 in Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Software: From retailing to counterterrorism, the ability to analyse social connections is proving increasingly useful.

The market for such software is booming. By one estimate there are more than 100 programs for network analysis, also known as link analysis or predictive analysis. The raw data used may extend far beyond phone records to encompass information available from private and governmental entities, and internet sources such as Facebook. Adoption is being driven by the availability of more sources of information, and by the fact that network-analysis software is becoming easier to use.

Where is network analysis headed? The next step beyond mapping influence between individuals is to map the influences between larger segments of society. A forecasting model developed by Venkatramana Subrahmanian of the University of Maryland does just that. Called SOMA Terror Organization Portal, it analyses a wide range of information about politics, business and society in Lebanon to predict, with surprising accuracy, rocket attacks by the country’s Hizbullah militia on Israel [Source].

Facebook Unveils a Location-Based Service

Published on August 19, 2010 in Real-Time Web and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: .

2010 is the year of location–at least in blogs focused on social networking, which is a Montana-sized “at least”–and Facebook’s entry into the increasingly crowded field has long been expected. Today, the company officially announced its plans, by the name of Facebook Places.

Facebook’s Places borrows heavily from location-based social networks like Foursquare and Gowalla, which allow users to check in at places and broadcast their location to friends. But those companies, as well as others like Yelp, said they saw Facebook’s Places as a complement to their own services and as an opportunity to gain additional distribution.

Google Gets Semantic

Published on July 17, 2010 in Real-Time Web and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: .

Google has acquired Metaweb Technologies, a five-year-old San Francisco startup that maintains a massive open database that details all sorts of real-world stuff in an effort to “build a smarter, more connected Internet.”

“The web isn’t merely words—it’s information about things in the real world, and understanding the relationships between real-world entities can help us deliver relevant information more quickly,” Google said in a blog post.

Google’s emerging rival Facebook recently announced the Open Graph, a way to map all objects on the web like movies and places and peoples’ relationships to them. The metadata required for this would create a rival structure to what Metaweb has built. And because Facebook has the “like” data recording the preferences of its 500 millions users, it would be in the best position to harness the metadata to create a compelling search product.

Facebook is Pushing a Platform Strategy

Published on July 14, 2010 in Global Strategy and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Facebook is going to go beyond rolling out standalone applications for iPhones, Google Android devices or feature phones and start considering itself a platform for developers to distribute mobile apps with.

“Where we’re going from here is a platform strategy. We’re going away from a one-off app strategy,” said Erick Tseng in his first public appearance since joining Facebook as head of mobile products. Speaking at VentureBeat’s MobileBeat conference today, he said the company will start building out this effort over the next several months [Source].

The Most Influential Women in Technology

Published on April 26, 2010 in High Tech & Media and Social Media. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Last year, Fast Company raised plenty of eyebrows by publishing a ranking on “Most Influential Women in Technology”. To compose an updated 2010 ranking it received an overwhelming number of nominees and fresh names proved that. Nonetheless, women in tech remain at a distinct disadvantage by almost any metric (average salary, top-management representation, etc). However, there is also plenty to celebrate and be inspired by. Fast Company categorised those woman into seven categories respectively:

  • The Executives
  • The Activists
  • The Media
  • The Entrepreneurs
  • The Evangelists
  • The Gamers
  • The Brainiacs

Also check out the list of “Most Influential Women in Web 2.0” published in 2008 by Fast Company.