May 2012
16 posts
A Closer Look at Jolicloud →
Great to hear Tariq Krim shedding some much needed light on the ambitious Jolicloud vision.
“We have to focus first on developing the product and getting users to value their personal cloud.”
and
“I think though there is a cloud ecosystem that’s being built as we speak in France, but maybe the problem is that we don’t make ourselves heard enough.”
Too true.
2 tags
Do one thing better than anyone else
Memolane is a personal cloud service which stores all your online activity from Twitter and Facebook to blogs and photos. I signed up a couple of years ago and plugged in Twitter and Flickr, the only services which were available, and then forgot about it. As you do.
Then a few months ago I started receiving a daily email containing Twitter updates and Flickr photos from that particular day in a...
The personal cloud is all about context →
Damn right.
“We sincerely hope WebIntents become ubiquitous, supported by all modern...”
– Superfeedr : WebIntents are links 2.0 (via msgboy)
Degrees of difference
I have tried to use Pinterest, on and off, for over year and it just hasn’t found a place within me. Whatever hooks it has have not sunk in. And yet today I came across Gimmebar, effectively yet another personal cloud service, which immediately took hold in the same way Jolicloud got under my skin.
Even if a service has shortcomings and lacks certain features it can still find a place...
Radically Simplified WordPress →
Matt Mullenweg is still one of the brightest sparks in tech and it looks like he’s not letting up on the WordPress innovation.
The cloud in reverse
I just received an invite for Social Folders which on the face of it seems to aggregate all your cloud data for easy access. Although during installation it became clear that it synced all your cloud date back down onto your local computer.
Personally, the whole point of apps like Dropbox and Evernote is to get data off my local device and up into the cloud for access from anywhere, not to sync...
Ranking for signal to noise ratio →
Seth Godin says:
Signal to noise ratio is a measurement of the relationship between the stuff you want to hear and the stuff you don’t. And here’s the thing: Twitter and email and Facebook all have a bad ratio, and it’s getting worse.
The clickthrough rates on tweets is getting closer and closer to zero. Not because there aren’t links worth clicking on, but because...
1 tag
Simple but smart
I’ve just started testing Sepia Labs’ new private group sharing product Glassboard.
As with many of these new private sharing services it’s hard to ignore the tumble weeds as they blow past while you wait for your friends and family to join up too. If they can even be bothered that is.
Glassboard have done something simple but very smart to help alleviate this problem. By...
Bitly readies real-time viral search engine,... →
Realtime search is coming back! I love how Bit.ly keeps moving, keeps innovating.
Time Warner Cable CEO: 'I'm not sure I know what... →
This says everything you need to know about the future of TV.
Why Evernote Really Could Last 100 Years →
Evernote do great marketing. They’ve crafted two superb tagline ideas; one for users and one for investors. Both nonsense but both distinctly memorable and endlessly recyclable.
For users we can play with the idea of Evernote becoming our ‘second brain’ while the business sector can savour the idea of a ‘100-year company’.
When the media picks them up and runs with...
Eat the Document →
What The Fuck Is My Social Media Strategy? by Mike... →
Beautiful. I didn’t know it but I’ve been waiting for the new version of Dack.com’s Web Economy Bullshit Generator.
Drafts, the quick way to capture and share ideas →
Another great iPhone app for taking notes and then spitting them out to myriad different service.
2 tags
750 Words →
The best site I know for writing and/ or journaling.
April 2012
6 posts
Hojoki: A personal cloud integrator that IT should... →
analyst:
Rather than starting with social activity feeds and adding in information services, like enterprise social collaboration platforms do, Hojoki starts by just connecting the cloud apps first to generate an activity stream of pure updates form the productivity services people use. This does generate value immediately, versus the often difficult task of demonstrating rapid value with...
The Verge at work: sync your text everywhere,... →
Pretty much a carbon copy of how I use and sync notes.
3 tags
Interview with Hojoki
App activity stream service Hojoki has been on my radar a while now and I thought it high time I found out a little more.
Describing themselves as ‘making all your cloud apps work as one’ I like to see them as the Twitter for apps. Activity streams are everywhere in our personal lives so why not get the benefit as we work?
How long has Hojoki been going and from where did it...
Micro messaging
An extract from Keith Teare’s post on Techcrunch
As Android, iPhone and other mobile platforms grow we are moving away from the page based Internet. The new Internet is app centric and often message-centric. The number of users engaged in this app-centric and message-centric Internet is both huge and their use is growing. People used Instagram for images, not Flickr or Picasa. They use...
The Post PC Enterprise →
The Mobile Paradox →
March 2012
63 posts
It's not what but how
Some of the best practitioners of so-called social media aren’t even aware they’re doing it. Largely because they don’t think of it as such. They are simply communicating and sharing in an honest and open way. The secret is that’s not all about them. Actually it almost always is but it’s about them indirectly and cumulatively.
Don’t tell people who and what you...
Hootsuite sells $20 Million Stake to OMERS... →
So Hootsuite start making a profit and think they can beat Salesforce to the punch in social enterprise as their plans include adding internal team communications. This will get interesting.
Knight News Challenge: ThinkUp →
newschallenge:
1. What do you propose to do? [20 words]
Build an information network that connects to today’s social networks, but isn’t centralized and dependent on a company or investors.
2. Is anyone doing something like this now and how is your project different? [30 words]
Others from Diaspora to…
1 tag
The audience is fickle →
Timeless storytelling advice that applies to everyone who wants to communicate.
Advice from legendary filmmaker Billy Wilder, a fine addition to our ongoing collection of advice from cultural icons and modern heroes.
From the excellent Conversations with Wilder.
(ᔥLists of Note)
2 tags
I will do a review at some point but am preferring Hojoki to 300.mg right now. The word ‘slick’ keeps springing to mind.
2 tags
The Wait is Over: Evernote is Here! →
Work activity stream service Hojoki adds Evernote support.
Why it’s over – confused of calcutta →
Email Is Crushing Us, Can Activity Streams Free... →
Maybe…
Today
Today is a day for quiet, for listening. For breathing and thinking…
3 tags
Wunderkit revisited
The other day I rather damned Wunderkit with faint praise. Along with Basecamp I said the two project management services were beautiful but that similar functionality could be had from other, separate services. I also made the observation that Basecamp had no comparable mobile apps.
Well, I’ve had cause to revisit Wunderkit and am happy to discover that many of the early teething...
Influence or be influenced: the cause and effect... →
Key Ways to Find Your Community in Social Media... →
3 tags
“You can’t force art, innovation, invention. Trying too hard can be as...”
PubNub: Push Real-time Data to Mobile, Tablet, Web →
Cloud-hosted messaging service for building real-time applications for web and mobile apps
3 tags
“I firmly believe that the drive to create social businesses will become the...”
– JP Rangaswami interviewed by ZDNet
Interview: JP Rangaswami - Chief Scientist at... →
Very smart guy. Big fan.
“They say the best camera is the one you have with you. I am discovering that the...”
Capturing The Value Of Social Media Using Google... →
Google enters the the social analytics fray.
3 tags
Let's be clear
The problem with new and emerging technologies which change the way we do things is that unhelpful and often impenetrable jargon spews forth which attempt to describe but actually conceal the goodies within. As a result the very people who may benefit from the changes are alienated and react against the new but obscured possibilities.
In all the talk about cloud and social isn’t what...
Cloud, App Economy Converge to Create Extremely... →
“Cloud computing is growing up, and it’s time for us in IT management to loosen...”
– Cloud computing is entering its teen years — Tech News and Analysis
“Emerging cloud services will become the glue that connects the web of devices...”
– PC now means Personal Cloud - The Cloud
1 tag
Google+ is a very busy ghost town
There’s a lot of guff flying around at the moment about Google+. One the one hand it’s a massive 90 million-strong network that is flourishing. On the other hand it’s a ghost town. The problem is both sides are right.
Let’s assume the relatively new network does have 90 million users. That’s great. I’m delighted for them. The problem for me is that I...
4 tags
If Google had any sense
With Kevin Rose and the Milk team now part of Google, their considerable talents should be brought to bear on Google’s extraordinarily poor iOS apps. If it’s true that Rose and co. are to be part of Google’s social activity then first on the list must be a complete rewrite of the Google+ iOS app. Oink was a beautiful folly. The Google+ iOS app is simply a folly. Here’s to...
5 tags
App of the day - ListBook
ListBook for iOS is a great general purpose list, task and note manager.
A pleasant sliding pane navigation and built in iCloud backup and sync as well as timed notifications, makes ListBook a solid buy at £1.49.
What are you waiting for? →
minimalmac:
You have everything you need, right now, today, to do the work. So, work with what you have.
I’m a writer. I have everything I need, right now, to write. Take away my computer? I’ll still write. I’ll use pen and paper. Take away my pen and paper, and I’ll use my fingernail to scrawl it into…
3 tags
Beautiful new Basecamp
Despite my raving about using distributed apps strung together by realtime notifications I can’t help but behold the beauty of the new version of Basecamp which launched this week.
37signals’ flagship project management product had always been an accomplished cloud application but with the new (and modestly priced at the low end) version they have surpassed themselves.
My only...
1 tag
“Email doesn’t need to be fixed. It needs to be forgotten.”