Disqus - Latest Comments for adamposey

Re: Incrementalism

adamposey — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 16:54:16 -0000

I think it's part of the evolution of the web. With a greater amount of information, and a static amount of time, not considering that the things we do with the net are increasing (how many of us REALLY watch TV anymore?) we're having to find ways to make the things we want to do fit into the time constraints we have.

This is why RSS readers exist, why start pages exist, why we've flocked to devices like iPhones to keep us connected as much as possible. We're taking as much information as we can, and putting it in one place, and adapting the technology to properly filter that information. It's why we use sites like socialthing, friendfeed, etc. to take information from all over the place and bring it into one place.

The supply of information is increasing, so this has become our way to condense and filter it.

As for early adopters using 'single feature' sites, I think the real question isn't if mass-audience will use them, but how to deliver them. I suspect that, originally, we'll see sites go with a facebook style 'repository' model where the core service maintains a list of these applications. The thing is that all of these sites are going to be very long tail, they're not going to appeal to everyone and we need to create filters for them. People are going to need assistance making something out of the mess. :)

Re: Incrementalism

Fraser — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 15:48:21 -0000

Do the single feature sites only provide that one thing, but do it very well because that's what we want? Or, rather (1) is a single feature the only way to get noticed by impatient early-adopters; and, (2) to compete against the other X single feature companies who do exactly the same thing you have to "do it very well"

My question is: is the world of lego that you describe something that we want? Or the answer to what we've become?

Re: Incrementalism

adamposey — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 15:29:06 -0000

I think, much like legos, you'll get some pre-defined sets for less enthusiastic people who just want to have a good experience. but ultimately, what we're seeing is single feature sites and tools because the enthusiasts have become accustomed to mashing up everything.

So, when we get a new mapping application, we just want it to do that and do it very well so we can use that functionality on another site, and so on and so forth. We're gonna be building our own experiences, or getting sets built for us.

The enthusiastic among us will flock to places that give us more freedom and control to construct exactly experience we want in a way that mirrors our idea of what the web should behave like. I suspect the mass-market will be about pre-assembled packs of applications delivered to you in a well packaged fashion.

Re: Incrementalism

Fraser — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 14:47:34 -0000

Here's what I can't reconcile in my mind: if the only way to attract early-adopters is via simplistic, single-feature products AND the noise from single-feature, me-too, iterative innovations is deafening...

How does a company transition away from the single-feature and move towards something 'big', rising above the noise?

As for your analogy with toys, I think it holds up but do you think the LEGO web will be about the consumer reassembling the blocks to create something? Or will it be about companies constructing something with the blocks to create new services? My guess is the later.

Re: Incrementalism

adamposey — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 14:32:35 -0000

I hate to draw an analogy of web applications being 'toys' but I think this fits. We're gonna see the same kind of 'innovation' we see in the action figure dept. at wal-mart. Endless cookie-cutter molds of pre-defined experiences and ideas.

The end result: less creativity, more copying, more 'add one feature to an existing product and release it'. There are very few remarkable innovations happening in action figures right now, and it turns out that people are having a lot more fun with 'build it yourself' experiences like Lego which is still going strong.

So, if I'm gonna predict the web in a few years, I'm thinking of it like lego blocks. Every page, every song, every graphic, every person, will be a block. And we can pull those blocks together to build our own experience. I doubt that the killer web2.0 application is actually going to be a website, I suspect it will be a browser application that's smart enough to put these experiences together and simply change the way we interact with the internet and the data on it.

There will be numerous pre-defined molds out there helping us to pull the experience together if we're not enthusiasts, but ultimately, I think the LEGO-web is coming. We're gonna need smarter tools, and smarter services, to help us pick which bricks we want to use in our experience.

The early adopters and the technologically adept will prefer to get a more advanced experience that is highly customizable, and the mass audience is going to prefer to use pre-defined tools and experiences.

That's my take on the situation, at least.

Re: What We Can Learn From Beckett Baseball Card Monthly

steffanantonas — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 17:34:37 -0000

@Adam - I completely agree that showing momentum in a way that provokes interaction with the smartlink would point people towards quality. I would use it that way too. Ultimately people want to be able to decide for themselves anyway, so maybe velocity is the most important.

Re: What We Can Learn From Beckett Baseball Card Monthly

steffanantonas — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 17:30:39 -0000

@Alex + Adam - I agree with Adam, but only in the case that the item or object in question is new or novel. A high upward velocity of a new item that is not yet popular can signal us towards a new trend, one that might "tip" and become massively popular. However, if we're talking about vetting the quality of an item, then Alex is right, overall popularity is the best metric. What do you guys think? I believe that these are subtle, but important distinctions.

Re: What We Can Learn From Beckett Baseball Card Monthly

Fraser — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 17:03:14 -0000

We're in agreement. I just think that for the "fastest risers" chart the obscure artists that are starting to become popular would be at the top.

Moving from obscurity to less-than-obscure results in >> momentum.

Re: What We Can Learn From Beckett Baseball Card Monthly

adamposey — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 16:20:06 -0000

I don't think so Fraser. Mostly because music, etc. is becoming so fragmented into countless niches that you'd probably have greater success being seen as 'obscure', 'on the edge', etc. People would feel like they've discovered something special before anyone else, and would probably become fervent fans for it (the kind that do things like spend $350 on tickets to your shows).

Re: What We Can Learn From Beckett Baseball Card Monthly

adamposey — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 16:16:07 -0000

I have to disagree, Alex. Actually, when it comes to smartlinks I don't think either is valuable enough. The absolute standing shows popularity, but as any good hard look at the iTunes top 10 list will tell you, popularity and quality do not necessarily go hand in hand.

However, I think that showing 'momentum' in a way that provokes interaction with the smartlink would let me find the quality in it.

Re: What We Can Learn From Beckett Baseball Card Monthly

Fraser — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 15:33:47 -0000

In the case of top 10 "fastest risers" (sounds very Casey Casem-ish!) wouldn't they still want to start at the top of the list? You'd assume the fastest risers would be the relatively obscure items that are gaining incredible moment. On an absolute sense MGMT never became "top" but at the start of this year they would have been near the top of the momentum list.

Good question about relating this back to our product. If you could only see one piece of information - absolute or momentum - what would be most valuable?

Re: What We Can Learn From Beckett Baseball Card Monthly

adamposey — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 14:35:26 -0000

As an interesting experiment, I'd like to see what happens if we strip away the absolutes and leave only the trends. Hiding the hard data but saying "This is clearly becoming more (or less) popular than it's competitors".

How would the mechanics of marketing music change if top 10 lists were to be replaced with the "Top 10 movers" or "fastest risers". Would this change how people view the data? I'd like to say that I think it would change how people look for the data. I think they would start at the bottom of the list and work their way up. Rather than starting at the top hits and working their way down. People could feel like they helped 'discover' music by pushing it to the top.

To directly relate it to your product. What would happen if I hovered over a smartlink and instead of seeing an emphasized hard number about it's popularity I simply saw that the link was becoming increasingly popular. What If instead of seeing that no one had clicked the link, I was made to feel that I could be a trend-setter by getting in on that valuable information early (because it was on it's way up).

There's certainly a lot to think about, here.

Re: Sharing the disqussion

adamposey — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 20:20:46 -0000

Plaxo, its great that you're using Disqus for this. Now, all you need is a way to let developers add support for their site to Plaxo automatically. Perhaps a Stream-format is necessary now, with all these aggregators etc. around?

Re: Introducing AB Meta - Simple Annotation for Pages About Things

adamposey — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 22:05:48 -0000

It was metaphorically speaking. :)

Re: Introducing AB Meta - Simple Annotation for Pages About Things

alexiskold — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:16:29 -0000

Hey Adam,

Lets not force things down people's throats - we are civilized here. Lets evolve the set of standards that works.

Re: Introducing AB Meta - Simple Annotation for Pages About Things

adamposey — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 21:04:08 -0000

I support this. The web NEEDS more standards. IF only I had friends who could implement this, I'd force it down their throats.

Re: AdaptiveBlue’s Open House

adamposey — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 07:54:38 -0000

I'm in Elkins, WV. The drive to LP will take about 3 hours from where I am. Unfortunately, NY is an 8 hour drive or more (factoring traffic, and that I don't know the area, etc.) Like I said man, I would absolutely love to but Linkin Park kind of blew my 'let's go do something spur of the moment' cash fund. So I'm left with the basics for now.

Disappointing.

(Edit: Visual Aid: http://snurl.com/24lq0 )

Re: Browser Plugin Functionality, Widgets, & Distribution

adamposey — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 01:32:37 -0000

I think you've really got to look at who you're trying to talk to though. If you're talking to the person who spiders pages, looking for the 'web behind the web' then the functionality provided by the Firefox extension you provide is wonderful (although we've talked about the speed issues).

If I could make any changes to the way it works I would straight up remove 'my things' or make it so that it takes advantage of Firefox's native bookmarking strengths. I certainly wouldn't be opposed to MyThings integrating with the native bookmarking of my browser, even if it means providing a new front-end for bookmarking.

Re: AdaptiveBlue’s Open House

Fraser — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 19:28:33 -0000

Adam, where are you located again? How many opportunities will you have to debate face-to-face with a group like this? I saw how much you spent on Lincoln Park... consider this an investment!

Re: AdaptiveBlue’s Open House

adamposey — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 17:53:34 -0000

Ok, I love you for putting disqus on your site. Next thing.. I'd LOVE to come see you guys, but that's quite a drive/expense for me. :( I'll have to take to debating with you on Skype/Jabber. :(

Re: How to handily tell tech bloggers to STFU

adamposey — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 10:23:58 -0000

Actually, I don't think Web2.0 is going to spread much farther. I believe the core audience has certainly been obtained already, growth will slow down, and eventually the fat will be stripped away leaving us with useful sets of tools and ideas to implement in USEFUL ways.

Re: How to handily tell tech bloggers to STFU

Karoli — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 02:39:15 -0000

You're right about that. I don't believe in telling people what to do with their cash either.

On the other hand, for social media/networking/web2.0 whateveryouwanttocallit to spread and gain traction within communities that are not nearly as entrenched as the tech community is, it seems reasonable to reach out and be a part of the larger world community.

That was really my point. If folks have $1500 to spread around on the purchase of a Twitter identity that will be worthless if it really changes hands, then perhaps it might be used for a greater good elsewhere, and by extension, the goodwill of the inventors, movers and shakers of this community might become known outside of tech itself.

Re: How to handily tell tech bloggers to STFU

ericrice — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 01:44:34 -0000

To be fair tho, the auction hasn't ended, Andrew has no money from it at this time.

Re: How to handily tell tech bloggers to STFU

adamposey — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 01:42:27 -0000

Personally, I think that every person involved in the buying/selling of that twitter account is short a substantial amount of braincells.

I'm sure it's been covered, but people follow that guy on twitter because of who he is. If another person is behind the wheel, they'll simply go elsewhere. This entire auction is along the lines of those people who bid on jars full of air, etc. It's doing it just to say you did it, and there's no logic in that.

Re: How to handily tell tech bloggers to STFU

ericrice — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 01:37:37 -0000

Well, who knows, maybe the buyer has a little extra incentive to think. Or Andrew. Or something.