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If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery...
Gizmoz new offering makes me feel good about some of our Voki features. Yup, I now have another avatar on my sidebar... a photorealistic 3D avatar created from a photo. You can even comment on a Gizmoz. Commenting on an avatar? Really... wow, I wonder where they got that? Still, kudos for adding that feature after the Voki launch. I also like the way they did it without a popup. We'll have to add that ourselves.
Still, I have to ask... what do people think about photorealistic avatars? Frankly, I think they're a little creepy. We've added them as part of the Sitepal service, but I've gone from using my custom drawn one, to a cartoon one, to one that's even more cartoony? I love my little bigheaded cartoon Voki guy and I think that one of the best parts of an avatar is that it's a representation of you... not actually you. We have this debate internally a lot and I've never been a big fan of 3-D photo conversion and am just fine sticking to my flat little 2D avatars.
PS... New commentary on StumbleUpon and Mahalo at Walken's site.
May 31, 2007 in Venture Capital & Technology | Comments (5) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
links for 2007-05-31
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Christopher Walken's Web 2.0 blog on the Last.fm acquistion
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Best. Bio. Ever.
May 31, 2007 | Comments (0) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
I have nothing to say about the last.fm aquisition, but I know someone who does...
Blogging is all about personality, right? Getting yourself out there with your own unique voice in the world...
...but in the Web 2.0 ecosphere, there's a lot of crowd following. Everyone posts about the same thing and says the same stuff.
Until now...
I just discovered a gem of a blog that you absolutely have to take a look at. Who knew that the Continental had a moment to put down the cowbell and talk social media?
That's right, it's Christopher Walken covering Web 2.0. (Please feel free to tag and digg liberally as a favor to the creator... ;) )
May 30, 2007 in Venture Capital & Technology | Comments (1) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
links for 2007-05-30
May 30, 2007 | Comments (0) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
I am a feed.
I am negotiated lunches.
I am softball invites. I am blog reading clickthroughs. I am del.icio.us saves.
I am multiple daily e-mails to Mere. I am last.fm plays.
I am IM.
I am blog posts. I am book purchases. I am Fresh Direct orders. I am tech spec changes tracked. I am live fantasy baseball updates.
I am boathouse photos. I am biking times. I am trailers watched. I am phonecalls to Nana.
I am nextNY join requests. I am EZ Pass withdrawls. I am sunny forecasts.
I am concert tickets by e-mail. I am Regis Business Network listserv responses. I am NYSC ID scans. I am paycheck deposits and mileage card purchases.
I am electric bills. I am bits transferred.
I am a feed.
May 29, 2007 in Venture Capital & Technology | Comments (1) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
links for 2007-05-26
May 26, 2007 | Comments (0) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
Two more thoughts on Facebook: On Accel, Amazon, and Microsoft
1) What Accel did by investing in Facebook was the equivalent of spending $100 on a old painting at a yardsale that later appraised on Antique Roadshow for $5000. That was BEFORE the creation of this developer network. The way they've built this thing is like coming home and discovering that, hidden in the frame of your old painting is one of ten known original copies of the Declaration of Independence.
What I'm saying is that, a few years ago, Accel invested a lot of money in a very hot social networking property. However, there's no way in hell, and no way that anyone could really convince me, that they foresaw Facebook's eventual prominence in the social application ecosphere as the OS. I'm sure they just saw pageviews and signups and all sorts of nice charts with hockey sticks on them and wanted to be a part of that. Now, maybe this is what Mark Zuckerberg had in his head... that's a possibility... I don't know the guy, but I seriously doubt he pitched the social OS concept to them before anyone really even gave any thought to what that meant.
2) If Microsoft wanted to spent that $6 billion of agency M&A money more wisely, they would have bought their way into the web OS by buying Facebook for half that. Google, Adobe... someone who wants to be in that layer should seriously consider throwing $3-5 billion their way.
Actually, to be honest, I think the acquirer that makes the most sense is Amazon. Amazon store+S3+Facebook would mean that you have a place to host your app, spread your app, ways to sell stuff in a whitelabeled way through your app, and a social network to integrate into a "Your friends bought this" concept. Imagine how powerful it would be if when I buy stuff, all my friends get notified.
Jeff Bezos... are you listening? Buy Facebook!
May 25, 2007 in Venture Capital & Technology | Comments (4) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
Facebook is Windows, MySpace is DOS
It would be hard for me to say anything that hasn't been said about Facebook's new developer platform.
So, just a few thoughts:
- If you are any kind of direct to consumer application developer, developing for Facebook needs to become a priority... RIGHT NOW.
- Facebook Widgets, or whatever you want to call them, work because they add in what most web widgets lack... broadcast. All that stuff sitting in my sidebar, it isn't any good to anyone if it doesn't get "in the feed"... Now, what feed, whose feed, where, how, etc... those are great questions, but the idea of getting in the flow of social data is incredibly important.
- I wonder if when Facebook came up with the NewsFeed, they realized how important it would be to their application platform. Just think about it... when I pick up my Twitter app for Facebook, now all my mainstream friends (all the ones who don't know how or where to subscribe to my RSS feed) can see it, grab it, and learn how it works. Facebook basically integrated RSS into their platform in a social way and now they're using it to fuel the spread and functionality of their apps. Incredible.
Let's think about a comparison between MySpace and Facebook and how they approached third party applications in their environment:
- MySpace allowed you to paste a piece of HTML code onto a page. That's it. No hooks into the service. No way to discover new widgets other than random browsing. Then, they tied one hand behind the back of their apps by disabling linking through Flash. On top of that, they made a big stink when others tried to monetize their creations, banned some folks, etc. There's no developer network. No notifications. No nothing.
- Facebook is encouraging development. It is giving apps hooks right into Facebook, enabling the pulling of various parts of my profile, and publishing right back into that profile and publishing notifications and various application output to friends. They even allow publishers of services competitive to Facebook features, like Twitter. There's a developer site, documentation, rules, etc.
Guess which one is the future of web based social application development and which one isn't.
I'll give you a hint, the future of app development rightly turned down a billion dollars for their company.
Brilliant. Anyone know who architected this? I'm so impressed. I want to pick that person's brain.
May 25, 2007 in Venture Capital & Technology | Comments (0) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
Arrow Cat Not Laffing
May 25, 2007 in Random Stuff | Comments (1) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
Sen. Schumer being treated for Lyme... softball in his future?
Noticed this story on how Sen. Chuck Schumer contracted Lyme upstate.... it was sent to me by one of my teammates on my softball team, which is aptly named: Four of Us Had Lyme Disease.
In fact our jersey has a tick in the O...
Just wanted to let Sen. Schumer know that he is absolutely welcome to throw out the first pitch at any of our upcoming games (or play a few innings, if he’d like). The great thing about the acronym is that it scales... allowing for “FIVE of us...”
Here's our schedule, Senator...
5/30 Wed 8:45pm Col. Charles Young #3
6/5 Tues 7:45pm Asphalt Green #2
6/17 Sun 6:30pm CP North Medow #2
6/20 Wed 7:15pm Riverside 107th #6
6/26 Tues 7:45pm Asphalt Green #1
7/11 Wed 6:15pm Col. Charles Young #3
7/18 Wed 6:45pm Riverside Park #8*
7/26 Thurs 5:45pm Roosevelt Island
And yes, I was one of the four.
May 25, 2007 in Baseball and Other Sports | Comments (0) | Remember this post with del.icio.us| E-mail this post to a friend
