FriendFeed Debuts Real-Time Search Spanning 50+ Social Sites
More than a simple aggregation tool and social network, FriendFeed has grown to be one of the deepest social databases on the Web, taking in information from more than 50 different social sites, including blogs, status updates, photos, presentations and video, and making it searchable. The service moved its core product to real-time a few months ago, and has now taken a big leap forward in also making its search results real-time, letting you see how people from around the Web are engaging and talking about topics, covering much more than "just Twitter", which so far has been the go-to destination for real-time response.Best of all, the service isn't asking you to change the way you do searches, and all saved searches on FriendFeed work, but they now execute in real-time and continue live updating as new entries are added to the service.
For example, I could now embed a vanity search in my blog and see it in real time, thanks to FriendFeed.
As you can no doubt guess, popular discussions that have dominated Trending Topics on Twitter would also see rapid updates on Friendfeed - as FriendFeed acts as the superset for social activity. See for instance: Obama, TweetDeck or Michael Jackson.
FriendFeed's user base is still smaller than the most popular Web services, including Twitter and Facebook, but they are executing on making a feature-rich alternative. Moves like today's addition will continue to separate the innovative team from others who are still putting their full efforts into maintaining stability.
Labels: Friendfeed, Realtime, Search, Twitter
posted by Louis Gray @ 12:35 PM
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The dust has not yet fully settled on yesterday's news that RSS feed circulation numbers around the Web spiked, 
In April, 
In technology, if you can measure an activity and compare it with that of other users, it's likely somebody is working on a service to crunch the numbers. 
Given all the rumors about 
Though it may end up being a temporary blip, at this moment 
Sometimes, too much of a good thing can simply be too much. For some Webheads, the information firehose that is the new 
Now, thanks to a 
The path from engineering to marketing is usually not a straight line. Often there can be many stops along the way, as a product goes from idea to a spec to prototype release build, through the quality assurance process, and eventually general availability to the marketplace. As the product develops, so does the way it gets named, branded and described - starting with what's typically a straight forward problem/solution issue from engineering, and morphing into a more refined, even if not always as accurate, pitch from marketing. But in the Valley, often we skip those steps, and it's our users who end up paying the price - by being taught to think and talk like machines.
FriendFeed's direct messages share some similarities with those on Twitter, in that you can only send notes to those who are following you, but they differ in that you can send direct messages to more than one user at a time, and can even include photos. But once you've started a thread via direct message, you can't add another person to the thread.
As social networking and social media sites increasingly become as much about companies and brands as they are about people, you are seeing names like 
YAWN. Supposedly, that is what we are looking for in an application. Before you misunderstand me, the idea started with a quote from 
New services for people to connect to peers and share their interests are cropping up around every Web corner. Some, like 
Like with FriendFeed, your stream of likes and comments are found on your profile. You can also see how many different people liked an item, and who they are, and see recommended items based on what you've told the system you like. You can also view how many other users of the service you like, and who likes you.
A Stay N' Alive piece (is there a cooler blog name than that?) by Jesse Stay called 
I spent the last three years managing the production of a number of social networking websites. During 2006-2007, I produced ZonaZoom, an ambitious (and now defunct) attempt to grab market share of social networking Latino teens in the United States. And I spent a grueling, rewarding year producing quarterlife.com in 2007 and early 2008, the home of short-lived NBC show quarterlife (I'm not including the direct link as the site looks far different now than the version I helped to bring to life.)
This made all the sense in the world to me until recently... when methodically, relentlessly every single person that I know, have known, or knew in some former life friend-requested me on Facebook. I exaggerate of course, but it seemed like everyone from the dude I hung out with at woodworking class during a Boy Scout retreat in 1985 to my mother's co-workers added me at some point recently.
When I first joined Twitter in early 2007, I thought one of the coolest things about it was the ability to "conversation lurk" and eavesdrop on conversations between the likes of Robert Scoble, Dave Winer, Jason Calacanis, Mathew Ingram, and so forth. And even cooler was the fact that you could participate with the very real chance that a Twitter celebrity of the day would respond. These days, the best place to experience this kind of interaction, I've found, is on FriendFeed in places like the Best of Day section. 
Which professional conferences are you planning to attend in 2009?
As I've mentioned several times before, I border on pack rat behavior when it comes to my e-mail. I very rarely tend to throw anything away - unless it's clearly spam or advertising from someone I don't know. For whatever reason, I save Twitter direct messages. I save responses to statuses on Facebook. I save receipts from iTunes purchases. And I definitely save e-mail confirmations from services that tell me when somebody has started to follow me online - whether that be on 
I've been 
Who really owned the comments... the original poster or the aggregation site that "stole them away" was one of the biggest small-time blog wars on the Web in 2008. Whether bloggers were complaining about seeing comments and conversation moved from their blog and instead taking place on 
At the end of the year, it's a tradition for many sites and blogs to pick "best of" lists, offer predictions, show their best posts and the like. At louisgray.com, we're no different. In fact, we're probably worse than most when it comes to liking to sort, use statistics, find trends and display highlights. I thought it'd be fun (at least for me) to do a quick run through the year soon to be completed, looking at how things progressed - the good, bad, interesting, and not so much. Below is a quick summary, somewhat, of how each month went, including the top stories and new companies and people we encountered along the way.