Skip to content

Index

  • 1 min read

Is Sarah McLachlan is Video Podcasting?

sarah_wof[1].gif On her site, World On Fire, Sarah McLachlan has an interesting video, which reminded me what Video podcasting or Video blogging can become. Picking up on a theme of mine from a few days ago, one of the important characteristics of the blogging phenomenon is that people who otherwise would have no access to broadcasting are able to get their content (text, pictures, audio and video) delivered to interested people. This perspective says that the barriers to creating the content are low enough now (typing, digital cameras, recorders, video cams etc.) that once the distribution (broadcasting) barriers go away a lot of people who have something to say/show are able to do it on their own. Podcasting represents a major lowering of the distribution barriers. The connection with this video? She made this Video on a total shoestring, like a Podcaster would. it's the kind of video I'd expect to see video podcasted. And another thing: the video and the story about why she made it is pretty cool too!

  • 2 min read

Gmail, Part Deux: Strategy

So what might GMail's strategy be? I listened to a wonderful Podcast with Georges Harik all about GMail and some of the thinking about it. If you are interested in GMail, it's a worthwhile listen. I noticed that Georges kept referring to GMail as providing great emailand communications capabilities. An interesting and fine distinction to be stressing, although the interviewer never referred to it. Another interesting strategic point that was covered was the question of providing free POP and SMTP, which is certainly counterintuitive if you believe that GMail is being made to make money, and the only way they make money is via ads. For example, the way I am using GMail, through Outlook, I never see the ads. Something that was said also made me think about GMail as more than a consumer service. Georges seemed to focus totally on consumers, but at various points left me thinking about what was not said… Here are some speculations about Google's strategic intent with GMail:

  • I doubt that they will decide to start charging for the 1Gig of storage. That would be too close to being 'Evil'

  • What if the longer term plan is to create a for-pay commercial offering. Going to global corporations like General Electric or Shell and offering to take over their email infrastructure? They could offer value added services for security, auditing, document retention, and many others. It would be worth a lot of dough to those companies.

  • Why the focus on 'communications' in the interview ? It seems to imply a distinct focus beyond simple email. Google might be positioning itself to get into other media. How about getting into IM or VOIP? How about aquiring Skype?

  • For the first time Google is building some lock-in. By being the store for all their users email they make it much more difficult for people to take their business elsewhere. Without that there is no loyalty and the next hot search engine could lure us away.

Of course the truth may be more prosaic - It might be that this is a simple advertising revenue play - which might have **astronomical](http://mobile.gigaom.com/2006/08/31/americas-most-unwired- cities/) potential.

  • 1 min read

Free Coffee and Bad Marketing

First the punchline : go to this link, fill out a short questionaire, and receive a $15 Starbucks gift card in the mail, no questions asked. But hurry, because I wouldn't be surprised if that offer evaporates quickly.

Here is one of those cool "internet effects. " There's a site called DealNews where you can immediate reports of interesting offers, coupons, deals, etc. They are posted there by I don't know who - people without a life. They also have an RSS Feed for you BlogBridge users. That's how I found out about the offer.

Anyway, some Oracle Reseller thought that offering a $15 prize to all comers would be a good way to get some market research done. What is wrong with that thought? I wonder what the quality of their information will be.

People are rational actors and will do exactly what is in their best interests, as long as you define "best interests" really broadly. So you need to be very thoughtful about the visible and not so visible incentives you put out there because you will influence the outcome directly, and may have to issue a lot of Starbucks gift cards!

  • 1 min read

Boston Globe on PodCasting

The Boston Globe writes an insightful article about Podcsating (note: the link will turn stale tomorrow, but I will try and update it if I can find the article elsewhere on the web.)

"If Internet-based weblogs turned everyone into a potential newspaper columnist, and digital cameras let them become photojournalists, podcasting is promising to let everyone with a microphone and a computer become a radio commentator."

  • 2 min read

Coding as Writing

If you read this blog at all, you know that I've been working on a piece of software (BlogBridge) which at this point I am pretty excited about, even though I don't know where it will go or end up.

I was recently interviewed about my work by Scott Kirsner (of the Boston Globe) who writes the @Large Column. I don't know whether or when he will write an article, but the questions he asked made me think a bit about what I was doing, and particularlyy the way I have chosen to go about it.

I have purposely decided not to try and raise capital to fund this project, but rather pursue a small-scale, cottage industry, do-it-yourself approach. As a practicall matter, I am pretty sure that the project in its current form wouldn't be venture backable anyway. But still I can rephrase the point by saying that I have purposely decided not to limit myself to projects which are venture backable.

Why?

I sometimes liken my personal approach or motivations towards the BlogBridge project, to why one might decide to try and write a book. One might have a burning desire to tell this story, and is willing to forsake a conventional job to do it.

While I don't know if I will be able to find a publisher or if the book will sell, and I can be fairly sure, statistically, that it's not going to make anyone rich. It's a labor of love, as it were.

Beyond the psychic and creative payoff of doing this work, there are indirect benefits. I am getting experience in important new areas for me, such as blogging, but also working with talented developers in other countries, learning about open source development, and of course hard-core java engineering.) Each of these in one way or antoerh might lead to other business opportunities or somehow help my consulting business.

This is in stark contrast of course to raising $5M, hiring 20 people and racing to a profitable growth business and a liquidity event.

Who knows whether BlogBridge will actually make any money: that's not the only or first reason I am doing this work. Different motivations, different likely outcomes, and each approach applicable to some projects and not others.

In this case, for me and for this project, this is the path that I've chosen.

  • 2 min read

Lightbulb about Podcasting (“Some stuff I just figured out”)

I attended a Podcasting meeting at Berkman a couple of days ago (see "The Berkman Choir" for some silliness) and came back, as often happens, with a new insight. Here it is, and if it seems obvious to you, that would be my failing. (And if you have no idea what I am talking about, well, just move on!) You will see some themes that I've mentioned before, but elaborated in some new ways.

The technology for blogging and Podcasting isn't that complicated or new. It's really stuff that's been around put together in new ways, but really, to an engineer, you'd get a " is that all there is to it?."

But focusing on that misses something important - the accessibility or simplicity to the user (both creator and consumer.) This key characteristic has been crucial to the success of blogging and the eventual success of Podcasting and video blogging, in this sense.

By making 'publishing' (in the most general sense of the word) available to anyone, this technology is exactly what has lowered the barriers and allowed all kinds of people with something to say actually be able to say it and publish it.

Let me elaborate. Publishing in the most general sense includes publishing of written content (newspapers, journals, magazines and books become blogs), but also audio content (radio shows become podcasts) and video content (tv programming become video blogs.)

The technology is key in that development, on three fronts:

  1. ease of use (allowing a anyone to write and article or produce a radio show)

  2. distribution (allowing this stuff to be consumed by anyone, instantly, around the globe)

  3. And ease of discovery (allowing someone who is interested to locate this content.)

With that ease, the theory goes, and the practice shows , an amazing multiitude of people suddenly decide that they have something to say to the other multitude of people who decide they want to follow what is being said. Synergy!

  • 1 min read

Great Movie: Osama

No it's not about Osama Bin Laden (UBL) but about a little girl called Osama, living in Taliban Kabul. I didn't see it in the theatres but got the DVD out. Highly recommended.Review.

  • 2 min read

Heard of GMail?

There are many interesting things about GMail, so this is either going to be a long post or one of a series. First things first: GMail is now my primary email provider. Yes, you heard that right. It's free, does a great job with spam and I can continue to use Outlook. Life is good.

First of all, what is GMail (for those of you who have been living under a rock!) GMail is Google's free, web based, email service. Its major claim to fame, at least initially, was the 1 Gig of free Mail storage they provide. Kind of amazing isn't it? When it first came out, that got all the attention. In fact it seems to have forced Hotmail and Yahoo mail to increase the amount of free storage they provide. I don't believe that they are up to 1 Gig though.

But that's not what attracted me. My issue was spam. I was running on a private mail server which didn't have a spam filter. Instead, I ran Matador's Mail Front, which is a very effective client solution. But what you really want is a server side solution. In my case, the reason was that I also download email to my Treo phone, directly from the server, and hence, no spam filter: phone is flooded with junk mail.

So as an experiment, I redirected all my email to my GMail account, and then used GMail's new free POP service, to pull that email into Outlook as well as into the phone. Sweet!

GMail, with no training, was catching spam with what feels like 99% accuracy. Other than that, my Outlook experience is unchanged, and my Treo phone based email is much much better (no spam.)I recommend it.

Interesting questions to ponder: How can they afford to give me all this service for free? What might their long term stragegy be? Whats the story with the GMail invites and how do you get one?

  • 1 min read

My social theory of blogging

We all love reading blogs (right?), and some of us even use their valuable time writing blogs. In my evangelism of blogging, a common question is " Why?." Why would you spend your time writing, for a small (for most of us) mostly anonymous audience, for free?

Well I have a (lower-case "t") theory that many bloggers (like me) work alone, at home, or as a consultant, or perhaps wor in a company but not among like minded people.

In this scenario, the blog becomes an outlet for casual little thoughts, insights and discoveries (like this one), which usually would be shared around the office coffee machine, by popping into someone else's office, or when running into them at lunch or on the elevator. When none of these outlets are available, a solo worker becomes a blogger and shares those nuggets with "the world."

I don't know if this rings true to other bloggers, but it does to me.