This week we saw a number of interesting web 2.0 developments. Far outstripping everything else, however, was the terrorist attack on London on July 7. Blogs and the Internet played a big role in getting information out to people, as television lagged way behind and the cell networks were jammed.
Weekly Summary:
1. Terrorist Attack in London
I was flying to Europe for a conference, enjoying my first-ever wifi experience on a plane, when the IMs from friends in London started coming in. “There was an exposion in the tube, they think it was a power converter” one friend said. Then, a few minutes later, “Oh my God, there are reports of explosions everywhere – it may be bus bombs.” Soon I had flight attendants and other flyers coming up to me for updates. The pilot sent a flight attendant back to hear what was happening because she couldn’t get news via radio. I was the only news source on the flight, it seemed.
BBC’s website went down from the traffic, and people turned to blogs for the news. Wikipedia was cited as the most up to date source of information. Others blogged about their experiences.
From a big media v. blog angle, Fred Wilson summed it up perfectly when he said “This is what its all about and why CNN with its 24×7 news channel is hopelessly out of date.” (linking to Jeff Jarvis).
Our heart continues to go out to everyone affected. I was in Manhattan on 9/11. It takes a few days for reality to set in.
2. BlogHerald: Blogs credited for role in promoting record Internet growth
Blogherald cited the Netcraft report , which showed the largest-ever month-over-month growth in June 2005 domain names. One of the reasons included “The explosive growth of weblogs, a growing number of which are purchasing domains for branding purposes.”
3. Om Malik on the Power of RSS and the emergence of RSS spam
“RSS is to the written word, what TiVo is to television. RSS, has been a ruthlessly efficient and rather simple way to keep in touch with the breaking developments in areas that interest.”
However, “Will RSS spam become as much a part of life as say email spam or spyware?”.
Also See BusinessWeek for an interesting article on the growth of trackback spam.
4. Ian Davis – “Web 2.0 is an attitude not a Technology”
Ian writes a wonderful essay, furthering the definition of web 2.0: “Here’s my take on it: Web 2.0 is an attitude not a technology. It’s about enabling and encouraging participation through open applications and services. By open I mean technically open with appropriate APIs but also, more importantly, socially open, with rights granted to use the content in new and exciting contexts. Of course the web has always been about participation, and would be nothing without it. It’s single greatest achievement, the networked hyperlink, encouraged participation from the start. Somehow, through the late nineties, the web lost contact with its roots and selfish interests took hold. This is why I think the Web 2.0 label is cunning: semantically it links us back to that original web and the ideals it championed, but at the same time it implies regeneration with a new version. Technology has moved on and it’s important that the social face of the web keeps pace.”
5. Read/Write Web – Technorati is gaining traction, massively
“Technorati is growing at a rapid rate. It’s recently overtaken Bloglines and is blitzing Feedster. “
6. Brian Livingston – RSS Readers, Narrowing Down Your Choices
Overview of top 20 RSS readers:
“Although only a small minority of Internet users have ever subscribed to an RSS feed, the number of blogs out there now is reportedly more than 10 million worldwide.
RSS adoption is growing rapidly as a result. Because RSS is, well, really simple, everybody and his brother seems to have written an RSS reader (also called an aggregator) and is vying for your attention.”
Click the link to see the results. Hint – Bloglines isn’t no. 1.
7. You’re It! – The pros and cons of tagging
A brief but thoughtful overview of what’s good and not so good about tagging. Check out pinds.com on improving tags as well.
8. Joi Ito: Thoughts on Microcontent, metadata and trends
“Attention is moving from commercially produced content to dynamic or contextual content”
9. Steve Rubel – Yahoo testing blog search engine
Steve is the first to notice a quiet blog search engine launched by Yahoo, which was later pulled off the net.
See also Blogspotting, Jeremy Zawodny, and Niall Kennedy, PhotoMatt.
10. Forbes – Apple may be launching a phone service
“It might sound far-fetched, but the pieces are in place for it to happen later this summer. Apple…is already developing a hybrid iPod/cell phone with handset maker Motorola… And companies ranging from the Virgin Group to The Walt Disney Co… are proving that a new network model can allow all kinds of businesses to easily enter the mobile market.”
Also see GMSV on this.
Tags: RSS, techcrunch, web2.0, tagging, tags, yahoo, search, apple, itunes, London, spam
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