Ben Ackles

A few thoughts on the New Digg

Sun, 18 Jul 2010 20:33:00 -0700

A few days ago I received my invitation for the new Digg. The changes are great overall for the Digg community.

A few of my favorites…

No Digg Bar
Added Follow Feature
Avoid Duplicate Links with Submission by Content Creator via RSS Feed

A few things I would like to see added…

Topic Customization
Profile Customization - how do I change my avatar?
Facebook Connect Integration - where did it go?

The new Digg gives me a second chance at filtering the noise of Twitter while taking advantage of the new methods of content discovery.

In sum, I dig the new Digg!

Android Knows You by Name

Mon, 05 Jul 2010 21:27:49 -0700

My brother recently purchased the Droid by Motorola. He went to add his first contact (me) to his contact list and saw my photo before even adding the number. All he typed was my full name and instantly Google accessed my Google Profile. He’s not a techie guy so this feature made him a little uncomfortable. Here’s an instance of technology outpacing the average users comfort-zone.

Search powered by People's Likes

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:25:00 -0700

Today, Mathew Ingram of GigaOM reported that Google is trying to build a “Facebook killer”. The rumor started when Kevin Rose tweeted (UPDATE: deleted) that he had a credible source telling him Google had plans to release a service called Google Me. The service is reported to have combined the features of many of (or all) the Google properties to build a formidable competitor to Facebook.

A little voice inside me, call it intuition tells me that Google will fail. I am not alone since the article, along with the rest of the blog echo-chamber say the same thing. I’ll explain why I think most people are missing the point of why Facebook succeeded and others will fail with these Google Me-too services.

Attract Real People

Facebook started out building in a closed ecosystem called academia. They built a robust community around an existing network of people who were assigned a 1-to-1 relationship with a .edu email address. Even though many people rejected the idea of closing off the service to people who were outside of college. They resisted growth at the risk of social value dilution.

People vs Organizations

Organizations are a different entity than people. Yet they exhibit many common characteristics and are always created and operated by people. Facebook made this a key component in the nature of the beast. For most of Facebook’s history they only allowed people to create profiles. As people (students) joined the workforce or became interested in representing brands or organizations, Facebook needed to make it possible for people to create pages. Pages were a representation of organizations, products, or public personalities. People had their own set of controls and pages had to be administered by people. Enter permission based marketing and a new way to interact with brands while giving the power to the people.

Constraints to Structure

MySpace allowed users for customized profiles, allowing users to butcher the brand and provide a faddish look only a 15 year old school girl would love. As you navigate throughout MySpace you are lost in a maze of glitter and garbage (mostly ads). MySpace was a place for people to express themselves through visual and audio noise; not content. Facebook on the other hand constrained people in a way that content became king and structure avoided the perils of fads. People found utility in Facebook and a faddish chaos over at MySpace. Game over MySpace!

Avoid Things You’re Not Good At

Facebook will not be a Zynga, Foursquare, or any other gaming killers; the product’s are too specific. Facebook wants to be a hub of shares and likes to create a social graph of the behavior patterns of people. Search has proven to be the greatest engine for profitable advertising. Facebook’s clearly positioned to capitalize on likes over links. Are we seeing the genesis of PageRank for likes?

Google on Social Search

I love Google. I think they are a transformative company. They have redefined what the modern multi-national corporation should look like. By most accounts they remain a very innovative company and exercise the strength of intrapreneurship. However, Google needs a long-term strategy, acknowledging that Facebook’s killer can’t be built overnight. Furthermore, they are probably not going to build the product in-house. The product will probably grow outside the walls of the Google Plex. I think their only concern should be on whether their core competency (search) will maintain the ability to index likes; not just links.

In a related post, I’ll argue what I think Facebook Connect is all about and why LinkedIn is missing the opportunity.

How to Take your Start-Up to the Next Level

Sat, 12 Jun 2010 14:00:35 -0700

How to Take your Start-Up to the Next Level

when Photographers camp

Fri, 11 Jun 2010 12:34:00 -0700

when Photographers camp

Mike McDerment - Marketing Metrics and the Systems you need to...

Tue, 01 Jun 2010 18:44:45 -0700

Mike McDerment - Marketing Metrics and the Systems you need to Measure Them

“Korea Internet Galapagos” at TEDxTalks by Chang-won...

Tue, 01 Jun 2010 07:56:00 -0700

“Korea Internet Galapagos” at TEDxTalks by Chang-won Kim

bradybd: The surprising truth about what motivates us.

Sun, 30 May 2010 17:42:23 -0700

bradybd:

The surprising truth about what motivates us.

Mag+ live with Popular Science+

Tue, 25 May 2010 09:30:29 -0700

Mag+ live with Popular Science+

Tim Ferriss keynote The Next Web Conference 2010 - Love the...

Thu, 20 May 2010 10:16:54 -0700

Tim Ferriss keynote The Next Web Conference 2010 - Love the Haters

The Transformative Power of Personal Projects by Ji Lee at The...

Mon, 17 May 2010 07:09:47 -0700

The Transformative Power of Personal Projects by Ji Lee at The 99% Conference

Diaspora's curse by Jason Fried

Mon, 17 May 2010 02:07:07 -0700

Diaspora's curse by Jason Fried:

They have too much money
The spotlight is on too early
Expectations are too high

A Bewildering Tangle of Options - Graphic - NYTimes.com To...

Wed, 12 May 2010 19:56:23 -0700

A Bewildering Tangle of Options - Graphic - NYTimes.com

To manage your privacy on Facebook, you will need to navigate through 50 settings with more than 170 options. Facebook says it wants to offer precise controls for sharing on the Internet.

Web 3.0

Tue, 11 May 2010 15:32:21 -0700

Web 3.0

Kathy Sierra Business of Software 2009

Mon, 10 May 2010 20:52:58 -0700

Kathy Sierra Business of Software 2009

API Documentation on Huffduffer

Mon, 10 May 2010 06:49:39 -0700

API Documentation on Huffduffer:

If you don’t append a file format to the end of a URL, pages are returned as HTML5. These pages are marked up using compound microformats so you can parse the HTML directly.

The Search Platform: Friend Or Vampire?

Fri, 07 May 2010 02:24:04 -0700

The Search Platform: Friend Or Vampire?

"Fortunately, a recent road trip uncovered a long list of investors who believed in our mission, so..."

Wed, 05 May 2010 08:11:34 -0700

“Fortunately, a recent road trip uncovered a long list of investors who believed in our mission, so we were able to raise enough money to make Stack Exchange absolutely free. (The details of that investment are not quite ready to be announced, but we’ll let you know as soon as they are). So now we’ve got the audience, and we don’t need the money, so all we need is ideas.”

- Stack Exchange 2.0 - StackExchangeBlog

Hanok are traditional Korean houses which are positioned in...

Sun, 02 May 2010 06:43:34 -0700

Hanok are traditional Korean houses which are positioned in relation to their surroundings; giving consideration for land and seasonal variations. Instead of destroying the environment they are built to enjoy a harmonious relationship with nature.

(via axian)

Sat, 01 May 2010 06:35:43 -0700

(via axian)