Archive for June, 2008
Seven days into my experiment on Friendfeed, I have begun to see some results. Some are good, some are bad. This post is highlighting just one of the negative effects of the experiment. I recently visited rssmeme.com leaderboard, and was shocked to see I am number 4. The experiment has 48 Google Reader shared feeds. Since I am the administrator of the room, it ties all the feeds shared in the room to me. At the time of writing this post, rssmeme shows me as sharing 2172 stories. In actuality I share about 15-20 stories from Google Reader a day. In no way was I intending to “game the system.”
This got me thinking about the other 4 people on the leader-board. It took a combined 48 Google Reader feeds to put me on the board. What about the other 4? There is no way one person alone can share all those stories in a 24 hour period without some sort of assistance. So the question is, how are they doing it?
The rest of the data from the experiment will be detailed and published soon.
Friendfeed is rapidly growing from a life streaming content aggregator, to something much bigger then it set it out to be. If you look at the bigger picture, it’s becoming a free online social encyclopedia, or what I would call the Wikipedia of social networking.
Franklin Pettit recently blogged about Temperature Taking on Friendfeed. This is one of the many examples of how Friendfeed is being used as a powerful research and educational tool. You can post a question, and within minutes you can be assured someone will have a answer. An online social think tank at your disposal, where anyone can chime in and participate in the conversation, no matter there age, gender, race, educational background, social status etc. I have grown to use Friendfeed more and more for research on blog ideas, social media, social applications, etc. The more people you follow, the bigger your encyclopedia becomes. Let’s not forget the handy advanced search function. This is the most powerful tool on Friendfeed. This allows you to tap in to the brains of Friendfeed’s social encyclopedia. Cant find some thing in the search? Try joining one of the many rooms, focus groups.
Think about the 41 social services Friendfeed currently supports & archives. These 41 services databases are the core of the encyclopedia. These archived databases range from, blogs,news, videos, images, music, books and more. These databases are unique because they are built off of user submitted content rather then a robot crawling the web and extrapolating unnecessary and irrelevant data. Friendfeed has some of the brightest minds in the social media arena on board. These social editors are at the core, responsible for building this encyclopedia along with the masses. Almost any subject or topic relating to social networking or social media can be asked or found on Friendfeed thanks to the community and the 41 archived real time databases. Friendfeed is growing rather quickly. As more new users join and add their services, the encyclopedia grows. Friendfeed is run by ex Google engineers, this certainly does not hurt, because they come from the culture of “search technology”. As I have previously commented on Friendfeed, it is truly becoming a powerful research tool, in some aspects more powerful then Google. It’s amazing watching this rapid transformation take place. With that being said, if you are not a member on Friendfeed, join, particpate, and help build this online social encyclopedia.
How do you use Friendfeed?
I’m running a little ongoing experiment using the rooms feature on Friendfeed. Friendfeed recently added the ability to add RSS feeds into rooms. Being a big RSS and Google Reader junkie, I decided to start a room dedicated only to an individual’s Google Reader feed. I posted on Friendfeed asking for people’s Google Shared URL, there was close to 40 replies with feeds for the room. I created this room on Friendfeed and unloaded the 38 various Google Reader shared feeds.
The room has 38 members, or better yet editors. Thirty eight editors handpicking the best content that they deem worthy of sharing. Most of the editors share the same interests as myself, which in turn enhances the value of the feed for the individuals in this test group.
Here is some feedback on this experiment:
This is a pretty cool idea, a whole set of hand picked stories - and you can’t even directly tell who they are coming from, so no biased clicking. - Tim Hoeck
I’m adding this rooms feed to my Google Reader. Nice to meet you.- Erhan Erdogan
With that being said, here are some of my thoughts on this early ongoing experiment:
Positives
- Excellent pool of feeds from some of the brightest minds & bloggers in the social media blogosphere.
- Approx 35 of the feeds are technology/social networking/media oriented.
- Has potential to be a replacement for Google Reader.
- Can be highly customized with feeds from select editors.
- The room has an RSS feed that can be added into any RSS reader.
- No need to subscribe to multiple websites feeds. Let the room editors do it for you.
Negatives
- Duplication of content
- Stories with a note, get imported into the room as a comment. On Friendfeed it shows me as the person who left the comment, not the actual person who noted it in their Google Reader.
This will only work with a large pool of Google Shared feeds. The pool has 38 feeds currently. Want to participate? Post your Google Shared URL on the comments on this blog, or on the Freindfeed thread.
A Majority of company’s have Internet guide lines and policies set in place. At my job there is a trust factor along with the policy. They trust that their employees will follow these policies. While everything from email to instant messages are logged, we have the freedom to do what we want on the Internet, as long as we are responsible about it. That to me is a privilege, not a requirement.
2) Are you concerned about your employer knowing what you do online at work?
As the replies reveal, a majority of us who are behind a computer all day at work, use some form of social networking application.
- 1. Rarely. 2. Almost never. 3. Always. - Louis Gray
- yep to all
- Paula Hawk - On the second question, no. Not at all. But if I did make posts or tweets at work, those are not only an obvious distraction, but I have colleagues (and direct reports) following on Twitter… so they get alerts to their cell phone. That’s not the example I want to set. - Louis Gray
- 1) Not really, but that’s not because I’m at work. 2) No. 3) Totally. Part of my job description is to understand, engage, and distill new technology down and figure out ways our clients can use them, so it’s known I’m using social media. - Mark Trapp
- 1. Rarely. 2. No. 3. FriendFeed, not Facebook, and only during lunch, though I must admin it’s pretty damn hard to not peek into the FriendFeed river of noise during the day. - Brian Daniel Eisenberg
- Yes to often - Tim FitzGerald
- Shhhhhhhhhhhhh! Keep your voice down and YES I do. - Michelle Miller
- must confess to being in the “do that for work” camp. wonder what % we make up, making perceptions totally wacked out - Marshall Kirkpatrick via fftogo
- I try not to when at work but occasionally - Joe
- 1. yes personal use 2. yes professional use 3 & 4 yes for both personal and profession reasons (have apps
Looking to establish a presence on the Internet? Whether a corporate/personal website, e-commerce site or blog, the two basic fundamentals that are needed and never change, are a domain name and a good web host. The former needs no explanation, the latter is a different story. We are a society currently living in the Wal-Mart era, where the lowest price wins. In the world of web hosting this mentality is generally the same. The sheep blindly follow the herd. Great brand marketing has not hurt the industry either i.e Godaddy. This leads me to the topic of budget hosting. Budget hosting is great for small, mom and pop type businesses which want to establish a web presence for very little investment. In other words, “You get what you pay for.”
The average “cheapo” budget hosting plan is $4.29/per month at Godaddy. That’s about the average price of a happy meal Godaddy is like the McDonalds of the internet, an affordable quick fix. There is nothing wrong with that if you are just starting out, but as your online presence grows, you will need to get more serious. As someone who works in the industry, I see and hear of these horrible experiences on a daily basis. Don’t be fooled by the myths and marketing.
Marketing - Marketing is betting on you being uneducated about your choice and glorifying an idea.
If you do nothing else, before you sign up for any unlimited plan, read the Terms of Service (TOS) or Acceptable Use Policy (AUP). Here you will find the limits. Typically there are limits on RAM usage or CPU usage. This is sensible for shared hosting. If you are on a shared host and one of your neighbors sites is getting hammered, you don’t want your site to suffer as a result. Most of the time this becomes a rude awakening right at the moment when you begin to reach success
24/7 Support - For approx four dollars a month, don’t expect 24/7 support. Can you afford for your business to be down for 24 hours+, waiting for an email response?
Disadvantages of budget and in general shared web hosting.
Slow over loaded servers: Given that a physical web server is shared, the amount of customers on one box can be any where from 500-1000+. Websites on a shared server will usually have slower server response times, then compared to a virtual private server or dedicated.
Reliability Issues: In most cases, web hosting providers may take care of the security and performance of the shared server. However, it may happen that some of websites hosted on the shared server run a malicious program or script or over-utilize the resources, can bring down the web server. Your website would suffer downtime and inaccessibility as a result.
Sharing Issues: You just need one “bad” website on your shared web server to get your website banned in a search engine due to shared IP address.
Security: Shared web hosting is more risky and opens up potential security issues and risks, as other web masters having an account on the same web server could possibly lead to your account being breached.
Processes/Ram: Usage are very real limits and you would be wise to investigate what these limits are before signing up.
What would YOU expect for four dollars a month? You would expect a promise or commitment made to be kept. Is it unrealistic to expect the best service at a bargain basement price? If you are told you are getting 24/7 support, and have paid what the host deems fair,then they had better deliver.
Advantages of budget and in general shared web hosting.
Efficiency: Today, shared web hosting service comes with web space and bandwidth that are more than sufficient for small business websites. However, you can always add more resources should you overrun the web space or bandwidth usage.
In closing, do your research when choosing a hosting company. If something sounds too good to be true, odds are it is.
Addiction -The condition of being habitually or compulsively occupied with or involved in something.
The question is simple, are you addicted to online social networking e.g. Friendfeed, MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, and too what extent? Do you obsessively check your multiple social networking sites accounts every hour on the hour or less? Do you constantly check blogs, email, chat rooms, stats, tweets, read comments, post comments, feeds, pictures and videos? Do you spend countless hours of the day looking at and adjusting your profiles on the various networking sites? If you answered yes to any of these, you might be addicted. But the question is, to what extent? Do you find that spending so much time online has disrupted your relationships and productivity both on personal and professional levels? Chances are if you are reading this post, you are probably a techie/cyber geek like myself. We all share the addiction, just on different levels.
Since 1997 when I discovered the internet and subsequently made a career from it, I have been addicted. The extent of my addiction is bordering OCD. Presently, I work for a large internet company. Everything I do is web based. This keeps me in multiple browsers all day long, connected to my social streams and networks. I log close to 70 hours a week on the net between work and home. When it comes to my offline life, I’m a very private person who does not require the need to socialize. Coworkers at work, my wife, daughter, dogs and the occasional family event is all the socializing I need offline. The internet is like the Matrix for me .I’m stuck in it, and I never want to leave. It has consumed me, and the way I do things in my life for the past 11 years. The internet fulfills this never ending, round the clock thirst for knowledge and interaction. You can compare this to a drug addict, whose only thoughts are fixated on getting their next high.
With the advent of Friendfeed, my addiction has been fueled even further. Friendfeed has caused me to abandon all other social networking sites, because it gives me all the “high” that I need. What social networking site feeds your addiction?
A Stanford study conducted in 2006 seeks to define whether internet addiction is a problem.
In the Stanford study— Researchers conducted a nationwide household survey and interviewed 2,513 adults. Because no generally accepted screening instrument exists for problematic Internet use, the researchers developed their questions by extrapolating from other compulsive and addictive conditions.
The researchers found that 68.9 percent were regular Internet users, which is consistent with previous studies, and that:
- 13.7 percent (more than one out of eight respondents) found it hard to stay away from the Internet for several days at a time
- 12.4 percent stayed online longer than intended very often or often
- 12.3 percent had seen a need to cut back on Internet use at some point
- 8.7 percent attempted to conceal non-essential Internet use from family, friends and employers
- 8.2 percent used the Internet as a way to escape problems or relieve negative mood
What type of social media user are you?
The Super User – The Super User is a person who has a lot of pull on any given site. They have a ton of friends and fans and for this reason whatever they bookmark or submit gets lots of views and votes. It is no coincidence you see the same usernames repeating over and over on Digg’s homepage. The Super User takes pride in the fact that they are a Super User. Some have ulterior motives, but to most it’s like a game to them.
The Avid Learner – The AL is knowledge hungry. They love self help articles, how to’s, and cool science. The Avid Learner is also typically an ‘Active User’ at more tech based sites like Digg.
The Active User – This user is really active on any given site - they submit a lot, vote and comment a lot. They may always remain just an active user or eventually evolve into a ‘Super User’.
The Helpful Stranger – The Helpful Stranger is a nice person and loves helping other people. Most of the people they help they never have or will see in real life, but they are experienced with wisdom and like to share it. Helpful Strangers often become ‘Super Users’ because of the reputations they build.
The Smart Webmaster – The smart webmaster gets it. They may be an ‘Average Joe’, ‘Active Member’ or even ‘Super User’ but they understand social media optimization. They understand how to link bait for specific niched sites. They know how to use second tier social bookmarking sites to leverage first tier ones. They know it takes being social and building quality content to strive on social media sites - and they do it often to cash in big time.
So……… Are you an addict like me? Time for an intervention?
I wanted to start off this blog post talking about “noise” on friendfeed. What is noise you ask? The noise level is all relevant to the amount of people you subscribe to. A good example is Robert Scoble. While at first I did not subscribe to him (nothing personal), I do now. Scoble probably has the biggest follower base on Friendfeed. Fear of noise is why i did not subscribe. After following him for 2 weeks on Friendfeed, my opinion is just the opposite. His stream is full of valuable nuggets of information. Most of his followers are smart and intelligent and have value to add to Friendfeed. If this is considered noise, then I embrace it. Hutch Carpenter broke it down even further classifying 2 types of social media consumers, Signalist or Discoverer’s. I would have to classify myself as a little of both, leaning towards the side of discoverer. That’s why I can tolerate noise better. Twitter is the true definition of noise. On Twitter you have the ability to block people or choose not to follow them at all. On Friendfeed you have the option to hide peoples content you deem noisy. You can also unsubscribe from them as well. So the options are there if you choose to use them, but when you constantly complain about noise and do nothing about, you yourself become noise. Now I’m gauging this opinion on the amount of people I follow on Friendfeed, which is close to 100 subscriptions. This is relatively small compared to the heavyweights on Friendfeed who follow several hundred people. I have linked below to some notable posts regarding noise, also embedded a Friendfeed tutorial video on how to use the hide feature.
Notable reads:
A Definition of Noise
Five Ways To Use the Hide Function
The noise reduction system
Hide Tutorial from Ross Miller on Vimeo.
The one thing I’m starting to enjoy more and more on Friendfeed is image streams. It definitely adds color to Friendfeed’s ghostly white background. By using Freindfeed’s public service links, you can tap in to the true power of Flickr. The public Flickr link shows all Flickr streams that are being shared in real time. The beauty of it is, it’s completely random. Refresh the page every few minutes and there is no telling what you will see.
Friendfeed public Flickr url.
http://friendfeed.com/public?service=flickr
You can also use the Flickr rss url and plug that into your feed reader of choice.
http://friendfeed.com/public?service=flickr&format=atom
If random Flickr feeds are not your taste, then check out these highly recommended streams.
- Michael Hocter - http://friendfeed.com/desaturated?service=flickr
- Thomas Hawk - http://friendfeed.com/thomashawk?service=flick
- Brian Auer - http://friendfeed.com/auer1816?service=flickr
- Chris Nixon - http://friendfeed.com/chrisnixon?service=flickr
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Bluechameleon - http://friendfeed.com/bluechameleon?service=flickr
- Jim Goldstein - http://friendfeed.com/jimg?service=flickr
- Cmiper - http://friendfeed.com/cmiper?service=flickr
- AcmePhoto - http://friendfeed.com/acmephoto?service=flickr
- Raoul Pop - http://friendfeed.com/raoul?service=flickr
- JA Castillo - http://friendfeed.com/castillo?service=flickr
Your in Toluu and find a feed you really like. You go to add it not realizing you already have it.
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4 Friendfeed Yahoo Pipes.
This is for all you stats junkies. New Friendfeed Yahoo pipes courtesy of Tim Hoeck. These pipes will show who comments on your items the most, and who likes your items the most. The other 2 pipes will show, who you like the most and who you comment on most.
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- Who You Comment on the Most
- Who You Like the Most
- Most Comments on Your Content
- Most Likes on Your Content
Keep in mind these pipes query the past 300 entries in your feed.
People who Louis Gray likes the most on FF.
