WediaBuzz

Something worth thinking about. I spent a couple of minutes talking to Stephen Rouse from Igloo Inc. at Web 2.0.  Igloo is a company that offers corporate social networking. I’d describe it as Facebook meets Sharepoint meets intranet. It seems very intuitive and visual.

I think that the Gazette Company could really benefit from something like this. To me, it almost seems obvious. If we’re trying to innovate and create a corporate culture with the future in mind, we should be working in this kind of social network — getting our hands dirty. It’s harder to innovate if you’re not using the new media products. And this might be a “zero entry pool” approach to get the Gazette Company’s collective feet wet (for those who aren’t already there).

We can hold meetings through this, upload files, tag and share files, blog, manage company events, message eachother, create expert groups, create websites, it’s secure, we can post photo galleries, create sub-communities, maintain personal profiles, manage announcements, make knowledge libraries and forums and I’m sure a lot of other things. 

I’m not necessarily pitching this company, but the idea seems great.

At the Web 2.0 Expo, I attended a workshop by Scott Berkun who wrote the books “The Myths of Innovation” and “Making Things Happen”. You can find both on his website.

Selfishly, I go into more detail on his philosophy on innovation on my personal blog, but one statement Berkun said is right for this audience to weigh in on.

So here it is - and the context behind the statement is that Berkun was describing four incubation methods of where it’s safe to play with ideas at work.

Here’s what he said: What percentage of ideas from your employees actually makes it out to product? That is the best way to judge the creative culture.

What do you think?

This part of Web 2.0 caught my attention. I wish I would have studied more psychology in college, but that was my loss.

Gavin Bell gave a rather technical talk at the Web 2.0 Expo recently, but his points are worth sharing.

He says developers and designers should design web sites for people not companies. He also says that we are all systems of human behavior and make decisions based on the world around us. We need to design products to fit into how people think about the world, he says.

Creating web sites is a process of understanding people. Site owners have something to offer and they want to help people to use the site to help themselves. Cognitive psychology has a lot to say about how we should be approaching web development from pace of change to exploration and interaction. Read more.

Here are some bullet points from Bell’s talk:

• Web sites need to be simple, adaptable and respect the audience you have acquired.
• People don’t want features. They want experiences that you have designed just for them.
• Don’t focus on the experts or new users, rather focus on the everyday person using your site.
• If you do things right users will respect the context in which you provide an experience.
• And, what I felt was most important, find a way to figure out what your users are doing right before they come to your site. It will help you better understand the experience they are having with your product.

Dan Lyons, aka Fake Steve Jobs, is a senior editor at Forbes. He was at the conference to discuss his popular blog, The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, where he writes about the tech sector from the “perspective” of Apple’s Steve Jobs.  His talk was entertaining, gave a satirical peak at this web 2.0 industry and is particularly interesting for us, as he’s an old school media (Forbes) guy who’s made the jump into the web world.

WATCH HERE

Video from all of the keynotes is available on blip.tv here: http://web2expo.blip.tv/#864747

I was searching for a way to describe some of the atmosphere at the Web 2.0 Expo last week I found another post that really summed it up in a way I think everyone at Gazette Communications can relate to.

J.D. Lasica of MediaShift’s Idea Lab caught onto it. A perfect example, as he writes, occurred on the third floor of the Moscone Center as the traditional media lounge sat right next to the blogger lounge, which was aptly named Blogtropolus.

Here’s how he described the press lounge:

Enter the press lounge and it’s akin to stepping into a public library: about 18 tech reporters are hunkered down at their laptops, sitting around small tables with nary a whisper. Stacks of brochureware and press releases line the room. A coffee stand is set to one side.

Here’s how he described the bloggers lounge:

Immediately next door, Blogtropulus brims with energy and buzz. About five dozen bloggers mill about, chatting up friends and new acquaintances. In the back, a line forms at the two chairs where you can lie down for a massage. At the far left, three bloggers in their 20s are taking turns playing virtual bowling on a Wii; one simulates a bowler’s stance, and moments later a bowling ball sails down the lane toward a perfect strike on the projection screen.

Where would you want to spend more time? Who do you think did a better job of covering the Expo? What culture would you rather play in?

So Becky.com decided to take a leap today and put out early this morning that she wanted a discussion on traditional media in the Web 2.0 world.

The cool part of this expo is that you can propose any topic to discuss in a certain location - in this case she reserved a table at lunch - and then let people’s feet do the talking. If people show up, which they often do, a good discussion likely ensues.

In this instance we met a few people, but in particular Robert Wescott, vice president of audience development, and Scott Horton, multimedia creative director, for Opubco Communications Group, the company that does such sites as NewsOK.com, The Oklahoman newspaper and so on.

Oh, and a really cool new events site called wimgo.

There will be more that comes out of the discussion we had, but give props to Becky.com for coming up with the idea and following through.

By the way, we need to take a site visit to see how this media company functions. I think it would be beneficial. - Jason

From Becky.com

Here’s another video from day three here in San Francisco which includes these ad-hoc sessions called Birds of a Feather.

Throughout this week, I’ve heard a few themes repeated.
1 - How can I sync my contact lists on Facebook, MySpace, Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Friendster, Outlook, and my cell phone so that I don’t have to maintain them all? A single online database? A script that can sync them all?
2 - Consumers want a free, secure, and portable solution for storing all of their online usernames and passwords OR a single sign-on to every site they join on the internet.
3 - How can I centralize my online photos, music, videos, bookmarks & favorites, contacts & address books, so that everytime I buy a new computer or mobile device I don’t have to start from scratch?

more to come… Todd

Sat through a Disney presentation today - man are they awesome.  They are doing some cool stuff. 

For the teens they are building in functionality that allows them to customize desk top (click and drag approach) and allows teens to do a million things at once (kids can task like this) like watch video, listen to music, play games… Also building a protective social network. 

For 6-10 year olds they are building a social network with the profile being a fairie - check it out http://disney.go.com/fairies/

They don’t forget the parents http://family.go.com/.  Here they target moms mainly with topics from recipes, travel and family tips to coupons.  I know there are PAC projects targeting these areas - thought this might be helpful. 

TB