TechFold - Bold tech & web commentary

Link Roundup for Wednesday, June 27, 2007

1. SpringWise on Craigslist Meets YouTube at RealPeopleRealStuff - will video classifieds take off for anything other than houses? Speaking of which, why aren’t their video classifieds for houses?
2. Janet Johnson discusses Michael O’Connor-Clark discussing lack of portability of social network profiles. Interesting stuff - perhaps an extension of APML is in order…
3. Janet Johnson double header - turning information into insight. Great discussion on capitalizing on the mounds of data that enterprise-class organizations furiously work to accumulate.
4. Markus Weichselbaum (The Broth) writes on Web 3.0 and posits that it will be a blurring of lines between what we already know from the 2.0 world.
5. Pownce - which I didn’t have time to write on - is covered in depth by DeepJiveInterests (underwhelmed), Frantic Industries (its IM with better multi-person chatting), ValleyWag (underwhelmed), CenterNetworks (actually tried it, loved it), and ParisLemon (acquisition bait?).

Note: the only person that actually tried Pownce was the only one that liked it.

techfold

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Return of the Friday Listening Post: Girl Talk

EDIT: Girl Talk is playing in Winnipeg, June 28th at the Pyramid.

The Friday Listening Post is back after a several week hiatus due to business and busy-ness.

Anyway straight to it: Girl Talk. Mashup artist. Awesome, pop-ish, hip-hop that blends in a tonne of Adam Freedland breakbeat style jamming - generally fantastic, energetic, listenable, danceable, fun - and full of no-doubt non-compliant, un-licensed, fairuse, screw-the-RIAA samples. Big hat tip to Gitta B. for pointing me to GT - thanks, dude!

There’s two MP3’s floating for free: Bounce That and Hold Up. Download and enjoy! Each is full of awesome moments - like when Hold Up breaks into Weezer at 2:30 — killer. This makes me want to clubbing, which I haven’t done for like 5 years.

Girl Talk has three albums: Night Ripper, Unstoppable, and Secret Diary. Each is available for purchase through the deliciously seditious sounding IllegalArt Web Store.

fair use, fairuse, fridaylistening, girl talk, girltalk, mashup, mashups, nightripper, RIAA techfold

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Another Suggestion for Google Analytics - “Link Event” Alerts

Yes, sharing Analytics would be great, but that’s not my only suggestion.

As a new blogger, I’m particularly attuned to “Link Events” - those anomalies where traffic spikes like crazy due to a mention on another site, getting Dugg, or whatever. Often I don’t find out about these till the next day when Google Analytics has updated; that’s a big missed opportunity as I try to capitalize on link events by putting out a custom message targeted to visitors from a specific page.

So - here’s what Google could do for me: based on Analytic’s knowledge of my average daily traffic, send me an SMS and an Email when there’s a link event and traffic is surging. Tell me:

1. The time it started.
2. The referrering domain and page.
3. How much traffic I’m getting per minute.

Do this in real time. I don’t care if the main analytics readout doesn’t update for a few hours, but use your datastores to make time-sensitive info available when its needed.

Theoretically other services could provide this as well - whos.amung.us, for instance, or MyBlogLog, or the WordPress Stats plugin. Maybe this service is being offered already somewhere? If so, please let me know.

analytics, google, linkevent, mybloglog, suggestion., techfold wordpress

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Review Queue

Just a quick FYI - I’ve got a good number of sites in my “review queue” that I’ll be getting to over the next few days, including ILetYou.com (”Rent from anyone, Rent to anyone”), Yuuguu (lightweight desktop collaboration), IndabaMusic (”Find People. Make Music. Easier.”), AmieStreet.com (”Independent Music Lives Here.”), and TexTango (”Redeem your music”).

Edit - also add ThemBid to the list. Thanks Elmer!

Edit 2 - also add TransClick, which does exactly what I was looking for here - thanks Pat!

Thank-you all for your contacting me, and sit tight!

amiestreet, iletyou, indabamusic, reviews, techfold, textango, thembid, transclick yuuguu

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KnowledgeTree - Open Source Document Management for the Enterprise

This post is for anyone that works at an “enterprise” and has to deal with the horror of big, scattered teams and network drives.

I work with documents on network drives all day, and can attest to the problems that arise: multiple scattered versions, weak search through Windows XP, and folder-based categorization often make workflow awkward, confusing, and frustrating. One company offering a solution is KnowledgeTree - South African developers of an open source, enterprise strength document repository product (here are the KT SourceForge pages).

A “document repository” creates a “super-network drive,” for lack of a better explanation. From a high level, KnowledgeTree can be summarized as the following:

1. Its a hosted storage system running on one or more servers in your organization - a file server.
2. You can save documents to it, and open documents from it with hooks built using WebDAV. (KT includes a Windows Shell browser, MS Office integration, and a Web shell)
3. It has superior searching capabilities, indexing file contents and a whole mess of metadata.
4. It allows you to add metadata to files (tags, custom metadata fields, etc).
5. KT offers a CVS style “check-in / check-out” system and versioning features.
6. If you open the KnowledgeTree server to the Internet, it allows for external collaboration.
7. It allows for logging and reporting on all document activities.
8. It includes user and group based permissions and security features (also does LDAP and Active Directory integration).

KT goes a step beyond file server and search functionality however, building in smart collaboration features. Threaded discussions for files, for instance, or folder RSS feeds. Controlled emailing of files is another one that jumped out at me: emailing a KT URL solves the problems of large attachments and multiple versions sitting in inboxes.

Unfortunately, I’m not going to take the time to try out a free, at-home KT installation (fill out the form to download). I will, however, be recommending that my organization take a look at KnowledgeTree and the document repository space in general - I’m getting tired of mapping network drives, chasing down versions, getting permissions changes, and generally dealing with files the same way I have since 1993.

KT jumped out at me because of its 2.0 features - tagging, RSS feeds, and the like. More important than featureset, however, is the notion that business users can benefit from what has traditionally been an IS-centric tool: with the lines between IS and business blurring as everyone becomes a knowledge worker of one type or another, the notions of workflow management, version management, and searchability need prominence for managers on the business side. KT does this by being a full-featured solution that integrates in business workflow out of the box, and couches the concepts of CVS management in a familiar MS interface. CVS for the business - I love it.

A final note: KT offers a free, unsupported version for download, or paid, fully supported “Enterprise & SMB” versions, starting at $2,200 USD per year for 20 licenses, and switching up to $5,500 per cpu per year for larger businesses. How about hooking a local, KT front end to Amazon S3 for truly scaleable storage? I suppose network latency vagaries would make it untenable for mission-critical settings.

Screenshots below are from KT’s own screenshot & video page. I’ve picked out some of the juicier ones…

cms, cvs, document, foss, knowledgetree, management, opensource techfold

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Still Light Posting - Truemors and more in the pipeline

Hey hey. Still posting light. My grandfather passed away late last night - sad, but a welcome release for him - and a chance to celebrate a long life well-lived.

Looking forward to getting back to regular posts; after TechCrunch started posting Truemors screenshots, I was sorely tempted to blow the embargo myself, but managed to restrain myself. I’ll have a full report on May 16th for those interested in Guy Kawasaki’s latest venture. I’ve been in the site and played around with it, and while I don’t think the 2.0 web elite will be drawn to it, that’s not the site’s primary audience anyway.

To TechCrunch: I still think this is lame:

We’ve now gotten into the private beta via some “borrowed” credentials and have had a look around for ourselves. The site, which is built on the Wordpress platform, is a category-based rumor site where anyone can phone, text or email in a rumor.

…and this is not an excuse:

# Michael Arrington
May 8th, 2007 at 11:18 pm
I just want to be clear on a point: I was not part of the private beta. if I was I certainly would have complied with any request not to post before a certain time. I also want to point out that I did not post the credentials that I received for the site. I also took other steps to protect the company that I won’t discuss here.

I suppose I’m annoyed at being scooped (per se), but as a q-lister I’m used to that anyway. I suppose it bugs me because its a disrespectful disregard for someone’s respectful request. Oh well - TC has star power, so post away.

Rock & roll,
-R

arrington, kawasaki, techcrunch, techfold truemores

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Friday Listening Post: The Tragically Hip - Family Band

This week’s Friday Listening Post points you to some Rock & Roll Canadiana (back to iTunes links, I’m afraid - not I am not an affiliate). The Tragically Hip are the quintessential Canadian rock and roll band: wildly creative, ranging in style from Queen-epic to George Thorogood blues, they have a sound that’s uniquely their own, and are generally unknown outside of Canada.

Inside our borders, however, the Hip fill 30,000 seat arenas and sell out festival shows. At least in my demographic, pretty much everyone has the words to “Nautical Disaster,” “Blow at High Dough,” and “New Orleans is Sinking” memorized - these were the anthems for our houseparties and the soundtracks to our summer. Best of all, the Hip continue to grow and evolve - cranking out new albums, new sounds, and new anthems - like “Fireworks,” “Family Band“, “Bobcaygeon“, and “The Darkest One.”

FYI: Check out the rest of the Friday Listening Posts for more great tunes - and share your own with the “fridaylistening” tag!

fridaylistening, hip, techfold, thc, thehip, thetragicallyhip tragicallyhip

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Update on the Internet File System - Winer on WebFS

Dave Winer points us to WebFS - an OmniDrive-hosted group building a commercial and FOSS interface to allow for the flow of info and data between web apps; I’m excited, as this is more or less what I described in my post on “Time for an Internet File System?” and brings life in the cloud slightly closer.

davewiner, ifs, omnidrive, scriptingnews, techfold, web20, webapps webfs

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Friday Listening Post: Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards

Hey - this is the first celebratory “friday listening” post. Every friday I’m going to post a link to music that pumps me up, inspires me, or just works for a Friday, along with a blurb about the artist and how that particular song resonates with the 2.0 tech scene and the modern world we live in. Enjoy! Comments and suggestions always appreciated.

If you have your own Friday Listening to share, tag it “fridaylistening” and I’ll look forward to picking it up in Technorati!

—–

Billy Bragg is a legend among protest punk and alt-folk-rockers, having written and performed politically charged, soulful, resonant tunes since the seventies (solo since ~1983). More accessible than “punk,” Bragg’s fusion adds melody and harmony to make simple compositions into anthems for everyone - not just punk fans.

One of my favorites is “Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards” [iTunes Link] - a song from “Workers Playtime” (1984) that maintains relevance 23 years later.

Edit: It starts of mellow and introspective, and by the end is a shout out loud, footstomping, rabble-rousing, rock&roll anthem. If there’s anywhere legal that I can use to post a link to the full song, by all means let me know….

If no one seems to understand
Start your own revolution and cut out the middleman

So join the struggle while you may
The Revolution is just a T-shirt away
Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards

“Cutting out the middleman” and starting your own revolution is something that the web2.0 crowd strives towards every day, and with armies of Che-sporting ironic tee-shirts coloring the urban landscape, his last verse is near-prophetic.

So anyway - if you’re looking for great way to psych yourself up for the weekend, inspire your next bout of revolutionary functionality building, or just chill out the last part of the workday, fire up some Billy Bragg.

billy bragg, bragg, fridaylistening techfold

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Exodus from DodgeBall - Google’s Growth Working Against Innovation?

Om covers the departure of DodgeBall’s founder and first employee from the Googleplex. Of particular note is the comment in the departing team member’s announcement:

It’s no real secret that Google wasn’t supporting dodgeball the way we expected. The whole experience was incredibly frustrating for us - especially as we couldn’t convince them that dodgeball was worth engineering resources, leaving us to watch as other startups got to innovate in the mobile + social space.

Sheesh - fighting for engineering resources. Sounds like something more likely to happen at IBM, Microsoft, EDS, or some other lumbering 1.0 titan - not everyone’s favorite wizard of innovation. This is where I question Google’s scattershot approach to prioritization - why does Google pump resources into something like Google Base, Google Bus Routes, or Froogle, while viable acquisitions die on the vine?

If you’re losing presumably valuable people (you paid for them) and flatlining acquisitions (that were previously media superstars), its time to re-visit your internal prioritizion system.

EDIT: Scoble makes a parallel point - that Google has gotten “big company disease” and is no longer able to understand/leverage/utilize things below a certain scale threshold. This is similar to what I mentioned above - Google’s prioritization is skewing away from small/nimble/innovative towards large/slow/monolithic.

dodgeball, google, jaiku, sms, techfold twitter

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