Archive for August, 2010

Connectivity equals productivity, here’s a powerful reminder.

Published on August 30, 2010 in business, mobile, technology and video. View Comments

I think this TED Talk by Iqbal Quadir is a poignant and powerful reminder that connectivity equals productivity. For those of us who use the web and smart mobile devices daily, it’s easy to forget just how much these enable greater productivity, even if some of our time is spent on more trivial or entertaining activities.

In this inspiring, embedded video, social entrepreneur Iqbal Quadir tells how his experiences as a kid in Bangladesh, and later as an investment banker in New York, led him to start a mobile phone operator connecting 80 million rural Bangladeshi.

In the process, he became a champion of bottom-up development, rather than giving increasing amounts of aid money to top down development, which seems not to be working very well, if at all. In fact, he maintains that it only empowers authorities to maginalise citizens. Even in countries that have grown rich from oil reserves, autocratic regimes have grown hugely wealthy, while poverty among citizens remains entrenched.

Enter Iqbal Quadir. Not long ago in Bangladesh, only one in 500 people had access to a telephone. Quadir points out that “Vasts amounts of wasted time results. The only way people can depend on each other is to connect to each other, which leads to productivity.”

Watch the video to find out how he overcame the significant hurdles involved in what turned out to be a massive connectivity project and business. How could poor people afford to use mobile phones? Who would invest in such a project in such a poor country? This video is a must see.

via Entrepreneur

New and improved Google Realtime Search.

Published on August 26, 2010 in Google, Uncategorized, social media, technology and video. View Comments

Google has actually had real-time search for a while now, and has been improving it periodically. You may have read my previous post from May comparing 10 different real-time search engines, which included Google’s offering.

To recap, as they say in the embedded “How to” video, Google Realtime allows you to search real-time content from across the web. Sources include news stories, blog posts and social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, Google Buzz and Friendfeed. The real-time stream constantly and automatically refreshes, feeding in live content as it’s posted to the web.

Google Realtime features now include:

  • The ability to look back in time to view updates from the past.
  • The ability to refine your search by location – by town, state or country.
  • The ability to browse a conversation (on Twitter for instance), to see how it developed over time.
  • The ability to set up Google Alerts for real-time updates.

Personally, I really like the addition of being able to refine search by location. As in my previous real-time search engine comparison post, I searched under a favourite topic of mine, cleantech, and then refined the search just to Australia.  It came up with some interesting and useful results for me. I’ve previously said, as it’s not a new feature, that I also like the ability to be able to search historically. This remains true.

What are your thoughts on Google Realtime Search? Have you found yourself using it yet? Is it useful enough for you, or do you use another real-time search engine? Do you use real-time search at all?

Check the embedded video for the full set of new features in more detail and how to use them.

Thanks @warlach via @andrewsayer for the heads up this morning.

21 points tracking the rise and rise of the Facebook business empire.

Published on August 25, 2010 in Facebook, business and social media. View Comments

After coming across a recent infographic regarding the business behind Facebook, I decided to look just a little deeper into the company’s history. Following are some points you perhaps don’t already know, and a few you probably do. Look for the big questions at the end too.

  1. Facebook was launched by Harvard student Mark Zuckerberg and his roommates in February 2004, more than six and half years ago. As you may know, there’s now a (fictional) feature feature film called ‘The Social Network’ based on events surrounding the founding of Facebook.
  2. Within a month of launching, over half of Harvard undergraduate students were using ‘The Facebook’, as it was initially called. Within 4 months, Facebook added 30 more college networks.
  3. As of July 2010, over 500 million people are using Facebook.
  4. Later in 2004, PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel injectd $500,000 into Facebook, becoming its first investor.
  5. Also in 2004, Friendster attempted to acquire Facebook for $10 million. Zuckerberg turned down the offer.
  6. In 2005, Facebook took another $12.7 million from venture capital group Accel Partners, at about a $100 million valuation.
  7. In 2006, Facebook took another $25 million  in funding from VC firms Greylock Parters and Meritech Capital, as well as more from Thiel and Accel Partners. The pre-money valuation at this stage was around $525 million.
  8. In September 2006, Facebook opened up to anyone with an email address.
  9. In 2006, both Viacom and Yahoo attempted to buy Facebook, Yahoo reportedly first offered $1 billion dollars.
  10. In 2007, Microsoft invested over $240 million and become Facebook’s sole provider of banner ads. Facebook has now started dropping Microsoft’s ads in favour of more socially interactive ads, where advertisers are encouraged to use the “Like” button to increase the ad’s influence. Facebook ads can be targeted by location, age and interests.
  11. In total, Facebook has taken a staggering $836 million in funding. Among Facebook’s other investors are, a German internet company called European Founders Fund ($15 million), a Hong Hong billionaire called Li Ka-hing ($60 million), TriplePoint Capital ($100 million), a Russian investment firm called Digital Sky Technologies ($200 million) and a private equity firm called Elevation Partners ($120 million).
  12. In March 2010, for the first time Facebook became the most visited website in the US, surpassing Google.
  13. Facebook’s increasing revenue stems from ads, Facebook applications and Facebook Credits. Facebook Credits are an online currency unique to Facebook. Members purchase ten credits per dollar to buy online goods and play games. Facebook gets a 30% cut of the credit transactions.
  14. Facebook games are popular to say the least. Zynga is the company behind two of the most popular games, Farmville and Mafia Wars. Farmville claimed over 83 million active users in February 2010. Marfia wars has claimed over 25 million users.
  15. In July 2010, Facebook teamed up with Amazon to use Facebook profile data to make product recommendations on Amazon’s US and Canadian site.
  16. Although still a private comapny, industry sources claim Facebook reveunes were up to $700 million in 2009.
  17. It is projected that Facebook will generate revenues between $1 billion and $1.1 billion in 2010.
  18. Current valuations of Facebook are upwards of $20 billion.
  19. Speculation over an IPO has been mounting. Mark Zuckerberg has been reported as saying the initial public offering will happen “when it makes sense”.
  20. 2012: Facebook goes public?
  21. Facebook follows in Google’s footsteps and becomes the next $100 billion web company?

Okay, sure, those last two points haven’t happened, yet. What are your thoughts on these two possible future developments? The IPO is sure to happen. What about the last point? Will Facebook be as big and profitable as Google is now?

Sources: CrunchBase, StartupMeme

Will you have to change your name to escape your digital past one day?

Published on August 19, 2010 in Facebook, Foursquare, Google and social media. View Comments

Google CEO Eric Schmidt was recently reported as saying that because of the increasing amount of information we are sharing online, he predicts that one day people will have to change their names and reinvent themselves if they want to escape their digital pasts, should they want to. Is this an extreme point of view or already an online reality?

Google Search

I’m sure most of us have Googled our names at some point to see what results are thrown up. You’d be silly not to in this day and age. Even if you don’t spend very much time online, it’s increasingly likely that your name will be referenced in relation to something yo’ve been involved with.

The degree to which your name can easily be found online can of course depend on how popular your name is, what name you actually use online, and how much online activity you have engaged in thus far.

Take my name for instance: John Johnston. Believe it or not, that’s not a very unique name in the world. However, partly for this reason, I mostly use my online identifier (okay, personal brand if you like), jjprojects. I don’t attempt to hide my real name, it’s just more beneficial in most cases for me to use jjprojects. However, because I engage in a lot of activity online, and because I do also use my “real” name in relation to jjprojects, my name still appears on the first page of Google results when searched for. I have no problem with what is found there.

I know quite a few people who engage in a lot of social media activity but have several different names, usually to attempt to separate their work life from their personal and political views, when they feel they want or need to do that. Needless to say, I’m not going to ask you to comment and say if you are one of those people :)

Many of these people are probably a little more online savvy than your average web user, so there are many people who use Facebook and Twitter (for instance) who mix personal and professional without a second thought to the consequences. It’s getting increasingly difficult to not mix personal with professional when it comes to the likes of Facebook and Twitter. Do you ignore that friend request from that work colleague on Facebook you’d really rather not let have access to those personal pictures and comments you’ve already posted? Are many people even aware of what their privacy settings are set to on Facebook?

Even if you are aware of who could search for and read your online comments, and see the photos you’ve uploaded, it’s easy to forget. Then there’s the emerging location-based digital culture, in which more people will be leaving searchable traces of where they’ve been and at what time, without a second thought. Foursquare is verging on going mainstream and Facebook Places has just launched.

It has to be said that there is this emerging school of thought saying that we’ll eventually get over caring so much about people’s embarrassing moments and irrational emotional rants online, increasingly played out in real-time on the likes of Twitter and Facebook. The thinking there is that we are all human and we all make mistakes and do things we regret later. Let’s be prepared to forgive people their mistakes, let humans be human, and accept we are going to have more and more of our lives played out online. Let’s get over it and move on. Easier said than done.

It’s often said that common sense should lead when it comes to sharing online, but it may be a little more complicated than that. We are human after all. Humans are fallible. Who hasn’t done something they regret, especially when we were younger? If you are growing up in an culture that spends a lot of time online, those situations are no doubt going to be played out online. We all make makes, and sometimes it’s difficult (or impossible) to delete those mistakes.

What are your thoughts on this? By the way, if jjprojects suddenly stops all communication one day, you’ll know one of two things may have happened ;)

Facebook launches Facebook Places.

Published on August 18, 2010 in Facebook, Foursquare, social media, technology and video. View Comments

In Silicon Valley just a few hours ago, Facebook held a event to announce the launch of the much anticipated Facebook Places. The embedded video is a full launch video replay from the live event, if you’d like to see what was said by Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the Facebook Places team and various partner companies.

For international users, it should be noted from the outset that Facebook Places will only be available in the US at first. Users outside the US will be able to see US Places posts on the web.

Amongst others, partner companies include Gowalla, Yelp and Foursquare. A representative from Gowalla detailed how Gowalla posts will be integrated into Places via the Places API. You can choose to attach an image to a post, as you can in Gowalla now. You’ll also be able to see Gowalla stamps in posts.

The Foursquare representative was less specific about how Foursquare will be integrated, to say the least. In fact you’d have to say he looked a little less than enthusiastic about the whole thing. But hey, how can you refuse to participate in having access to a location-based service that has access to a user–base of more than 500 million users, right?

It was explained at the launch that it is hoped that Facebook users will begin to discover serendipitous moments by checking in to places and finding that other friends are at the same location or nearby.

Facebook Places on iPhone

Facebook Places Tagging Friends

At first, Facebook Places will only be available on the Facebook application for iPhone and can also be accessed by “advanced mobile browers” (meaning those supporting HTML 5 and geolocation) at touch.facebook.com. Mark Zuckerberg said at the launch that there are not Android or Blackberry apps available yet. There are plans for these but no timeline.

In fact, Zuckerberg stated that there are quite a lot of things they aren’t doing with Places yet, including integrating Places with Facebook Events, which seems like a very obvious thing for them to do, especially as they have recently acquired Hot Potato. Zuckerberg said that they want to get things right before launching additional apps and features.

Facebook Places seems to be quite focused on including images and being able to tag friends who are with you when you check–in. You can also post a text update along with your check-in, as you can with most other location–based services.

There’s not a lot that’s new here, but it’s not really about that, is it? What’s significant is that it’s Facebook launching this location-based service. It’s going to be interesting to see just how many of the hundreds of millions of users start using this regularly. Not everyone has an iPhone or a mobile device capable of using the service, so there will be limited numbers to begin with, but still, Five. Hundred. Million. Users, and still growing.

For a full run–down of the features, check out Facebook’s blog post on the subject.

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