Incredible Web Efforts Made to Shield Victims of Santa Clara Shooting

Note: I recognize this is an extremely sensitive issue, and one that continues to develop, so the words I use here are measured. Condolences to all affected by this horrible incident.

On Friday, as you most likely know, an employee of Santa Clara-based SiPort, who had lost his job that morning, returned to the office and took the lives of three of his former colleagues, the CEO, VP of Operations and head of human resources. In such a difficult economic climate as we are facing now, many saw the horrible incident as one emblematic of the tough times. Michael Arrington of TechCrunch called it "a Sad Day in Silicon Valley." Knowing the startup culture well, and living in Sunnyvale, neighboring Santa Clara, I've been watching the story, and was somewhat relieved to learn tonight that the alleged perpetrator had been brought into custody, having been captured in Mountain View.

The human tragedy here, when taken out of the macroeconomic view, is devastating. The three lives were not statistics or meant to be examples. These were people with families, with jobs and goals, people who were taken from the Earth way too soon, and in a horrific way.

But as information consumers, looking to learn as much as we could about this incident as news developed, to be both informed, and alert, as the suspect was not apprehended until this evening, it has been interesting to see how much effort has been taken to reduce the information available to the public in terms of learning about the company or the victims themselves. Almost immediately, on Friday night, SiPort shut down all pages of its Web site, with the exception of the main page, including hiding the management page. And today, the entire site itself is empty (unless you view the Google cache).

With today's Web world leaning toward one of transparency and posting copious amounts of information, it's no surprise that the victims of the shooting had created online profiles, including on the career-oriented site of LinkedIn. VP of Operations Brian Pugh and human resources lead Marilyn Lewis, who lost their lives Friday, had posted online resumes. (Pugh, Lewis)


The Mercury News' Early Version Cited LinkedIn as the Source
In fact, it was via LinkedIn that reporters garnered much of their data on the victims themselves. An early version of a story in the San Jose Mercury News stated, "Lewis, who lived in a San Jose, worked at NeoScale Systems before joining SiPort in November. 2006. In a LinkedIn profile, she wrote," but in a subsequent filing of the story, this piece was amended instead to say, "In an online profile, she wrote."


Subsequent Updates Did Not Mention LinkedIn
Just past Midnight on Sunday morning, LinkedIn's Web site is down, so it's not clear if the online career site has been asked to either take down or modify their profiles, but the effort by the Mercury News to remove the reference to LinkedIn in their article seems to have been done to discourage curious Web viewers from further invading the deceased's data. The way in which these victims lost their lives is well outside of the focus of Mike Fruchter's Mashable article from last month, What Happens to Our Social Profiles After We Die?, but the data we do post on the Web about our home, work and hobbies is something that cannot be hidden, or erased, even after we might be gone.

(Update: LinkedIn is back up, and both profiles still are there, without changes)

The incident is horrible, and very close to home, geographically, as well as in terms of understanding the issues of stress, strife with colleagues and the demands one's career can place on the rest of your life. I also understand the desire for families to want privacy and for news media and others to be extremely sensitive to the victims, but to pull the data, or make it more difficult to learn about the human side of this tragedy may make it more difficult to relate to, not less. It is also very interesting to see how efforts are made to pull data and have it disappear from a Web that is built to not lose it.

My 9 a.m. Morning News Trumps Your Evening News

I am an information glutton. I want to know all the news, and get it as it happens, preferably before everyone else. By the time it's discussed in the afternoon, I want to already have seen it, dissected it and reacted to it. It's this demand for a real-time news firehose that has me turning to Twitter for real-time events instead of Google News, and what has had me looking to Google Reader and FriendFeed before mainstream news sites or Web portals for just about everything else.


Google Reader Tells Me 9 a.m. is the Primetime News Hour
As Google Reader's Trends statistics show, I read every single item that flows through my RSS reader, even if it's just for a second. But the time you're most likely to catch me, unblinking, in front of my RSS reader is around 9 each morning. The statistics show I'm parked on Google Reader most often at 9 a.m. with other spikes around 3 p.m. and 5 p.m., and on those days when I start earlier, 8 a.m.

Assuming a typical workday, I have probably taken in between 800 and 1,000 new items from RSS before the evening news comes on. By the time the news networks have selected what they'll focus on for 30 minutes, with each story getting maybe a minute's worth of attention, interrupted by commercials, I've likely seen the news break and get spun by multiple people whose opinions I trust. By 11 p.m., when the late night news comes on, I've more than moved on. And you can forget about waiting around for the next morning's paper.

By the time your papers are hitting the driveways of people across the country, much of the news is 24 hours old. That's why you've seen a rise of 24-hour news networks, headline news, and new ways to get the news shoveled ever quicker. I may not be a morning person, and the twins certainly aren't helping there... but I know to get the news early. Google Reader and other tools enable you to pick who your information filters are, and when you want to get your news. Don't wait for the networks or the paper to choose when you should get it. Just go get it already.

Top Resources to Help Stay Informed In a Crazy World

By Mona Nomura of Pixel Bits (FriendFeed/Twitter)

I completely suck at numbers. I could give a crap about the stock market. I tune out politics since I'm sick and tired of the same old rhetoric. And if you're like me, you most likely skip over all the panicked headlines about how the $700 billion bailout got kicked from Congress.

I mean really - why would all this junk be relevant to regular people like us? The headlines are too damn depressing and most importantly - we don't have power, money or stature for any of this to really matter anyway - right? Wrong.

Listen to me, you guys: Now is not the time to tune things out.

Why is this important for people like us? Because well... I kinda sorta wanna know if I should close all my bank accounts and hide the cash under my mattress - don't you? It's also ... uhhh... election year, too. And as much as I want to turn the other way, this time, I can't. All the signs are pointing to: our country is in deep s--t.

I'm not sure if you've noticed, but the rest of America doesn't seem like they know what's going on either. Just ask someone to explain the stipulations of the 110-page bailout and how/what we (Americans) need to do to protect ourselves moving forward. Or the presidential candidates' action plans to rectify this economical disaster. I guarantee not everyone can - regardless of who they are or what their pedigrees are.

So you see, now is the time - moreso than ever, that we the regular people, need to come together. And if enough of us get together, our voices WILL matter. How do we do that? It's all about information.

Yes, I know reading the headlines is depressing, but educating ourselves so we're aware of the current happenings is a must; so we can get involved to make differences. How do we get involved? Well that's up to you - the reader to decide.

But what I CAN do for you, is provide resources to keep and stay informed. Hubs, if you will, so you don't have to dig through and search to stay involved. Please remember, to take account all sides, know your options, and if and when action is called - don't hesitate and go for it. Whether it be by voting, informing people around you, or just informing yourself, knowing and keeping up with the current situation means you have power to decide what to do with the knowledge.

So without further ado, I present to you:
"Mona's Top 5 Resources to Stay "Smart" - the Lazy Way"

1. NPR's Planet Money:
   NPR tags all articles pertaining to the financial crisis. It's just one click, and it pulls up all recent articles. The layout is easy on the eyes and there's no hunting or pecking through a mountain of pages to stay up to date.
   
   
2. Google News: Top Stories:
   I prefer Google News over Yahoo News because it's
   • Customizable
   • I can personalize it
   • Easy on the eyes
   All the top headline news from various sources are aggregated there. Pretty neat.
   
   
3. Harvard Business Online's Guide to the Downturn:
   A bunch of articles from really super smart people that are free. Plus the layout is nice, easy on the eyes, and surprisingly, the information is relevant to normal people, too. Don't be fooled, go check it out. Even if you think it's irrelevant, you can namedrop like I do. "OH YEAH? Bet you don't know what HARVARD professors are saying!" - or something close to that. ha!
   
   
4. Google Power Readers:
   Explore news sites read by McCain, Obama and political journalists, and see articles the campaigns and political pundits are sharing with Google Reader. What's better than knowing what they're reading and sharing!
   
   
5. Aggregation Sites like FriendFeed
   Since signing up for FriendFeed, I've been exposed to a lot of new blogs, different views, from so many different sources. The best part is, you can see what others are sharing, and choose if you want to read it or not. If you see the same headline shared by numerous people, it's a sign telling you: "READ IT, STAT!"

That about wraps it up. I hope this can help you, as much as it's helped me.

And remember, this is an election year. Our economical and country's future is dependent on us - We the people.

Update: Head on over to Scripting News. Dave Winer has a great write-up: "The US Economy After Katrina".

Read more by Mona Nomura at Pixel Bits.

Will Future Information Consumption Be In Nested GUIs?

As Web technologies evolve, new, innovative ways to absorb information via the Web browser are being created. Some, like Google Reader, and blogs on SportsBlogs Nation are utilizing keyboard navigation, letting you type letters to jump from one new item to the next, while others let you move between screens by using the arrow keys, instead of clicking the mouse. An enterprising developer, Michael Buchanan, is hoping that nested GUIs, which he calls "Microspaces", will be a new way to approach navigation - letting you view a page within a page, within a page, all without opening a new browser window.

While he's just getting started with Microspaces, an initial trial site, called StoryLinez, has been posted, that brings top news sources for business, entertainment, health, news, sports and tech in one place. While that in itself is not new, the way the site operates is.


StoryLinez.com Wants to be a Hub for News On All Topics
Instead of clicking on an item, and getting a pulldown menu with multiple options, the nested GUI technology is triggered via mouse-over. For example, having your mouse over the "Business" section opens up a smaller window within a window, with sites ranging from CNN to Fox News, Yahoo!, Forbes and BusinessWeek, surfacing.


The Nested GUIs Technology Shows a Site Within a Site
Rather than send links off to a new browser window, as most sites do, putting your mouse over these news sources, and their resulting headlines instead shows the story in a section within your same window. And when you're done reading, move your mouse back to the listed options and get more stories. The goal? As Michael wrote me, "One of the things I wanted to accomplish was the ability to navigate everything without clicking." (See the blog for more)


You Can Click Through to Articles but Not Leave the Site
We've gotten used to flooding our Web browsers with new windows and new tabs. New Web 2.0 technologies are helping us to see the Web as a foundation for applications, which will need new ways to approach data. Could nested GUIs be one of the future ways we'll consume media? The StoryLinez site is fairly raw, but it's an interesting experiment. Could you get your news this way in the future? Michael hopes you will.

(Also See: TechCrunch: Microspaces: Playing With Nested GUIs from August 19th)

The LDS/Facebook Rumor Didn't Pass the Common Sense Test

In the absence of news, there's nothing the blogosphere loves more than an unfounded, nonsensical rumor, especially if two visible, but often misunderstood, parties are involved. I was amusingly dumbfounded this afternoon to find that today's rumor du jour settled on the idea that the LDS (or Mormon) Church had made an offer to acquire the hot social networking site, Facebook. While some, knowing only a mote of data about the church, suggested Facebook's strong database of familial interconnects would fall in line with the Mormon's well-known efforts in family history, the rumor was laughable on its face, which had me going from blog to blog saying it was complete bunk - which it of course, turned out to be.

See the nonsense here:

The Industry Standard:
LDS church rumored to have offered for Facebook
Venture Beat:
Rumor from the news doldrums of August: Mormon church trying to buy Facebook
WinExtra: The Mormon Church Looking To Buy Facebook?

As a life-long Mormon, I've grown used to people coming to conclusions about what the church does, stands for, or how its members behave. And despite the church being more open and active on the Web than almost any other faith out there, that I can think of, there are still pieces that remain mysterious, leading people to speculate well beyond reality. And today's rumor was just too juicy for people to pass up - and was more reminiscent of the Twitter-fed rumor that Subway's Jared had died than anything smacking of real journalism.

Whether it's a religious group, a person's country of origin, their race, their age or their gender, people have a tendency to make generalizations based on what they've seen through interacting with others, through what they've learned through the media and books, or been told about from friends or family.

When I tell people I'm Mormon, I'm often assumed to have a short haircut, wear a white shirt and tie, avoid cigarettes, coffee, tea, alcohol, drugs, and caffeine. Taking it a step further, people guess I probably spent good time in Utah, that I probably have 8 to 12 brothers and sisters, that I served a two year mission, that I likely graduated from BYU, married early and would have more than one wife if the laws were just a little more flexible.

At other times, I'll get the "You're Mormon? Really? But you're so normal!", which both gives me a sense of relief, but makes me feel somewhat guilty that I wasn't so exemplary a church member that it would have been obvious.

But while I can take the one by one issues with people who are ignorant, or just curious, today's rumor that the church would use a good portion of its estimated $30 billion cash horde to acquire a social networking site best known for poking and sending zombies to bite you was completely off the wall, and anybody who had any real knowledge about the church's mission had to have been giggling, knowing it had no basis whatsoever.

As a tithe-paying member, 10% of my total take-home income is donated to the church. While I don't dictate how the church uses my money, any more than I tell the government how to spend my tax dollars, I know that the funds are used to build new chapels and temples worldwide, to support the church's extensive welfare program that helps families in need, and to provide service in times of disaster. The church was extremely visible in aiding victims of the 2001 terrorist attacks, in responding to the South Pacific tsunami, and was instrumental in responding to Hurricane Katrina. In fact, the church's well-orchestrated service arm is so strong, that other faiths will often work with the LDS church while encouraging their own members to provide donations in times of strife.

And this has nothing to do with buying any social network.

In regards to the intimations by some that this was some scheme to lop a massive database into the church's genealogical archives, that too made no sense. As members, we are encouraged to pursue our family history and look backward to our ancestors, but we can only submit names of those with whom we are relatives. We don't submit friends' or celebrities' data, and we're certainly not out there buying lists to do a mass import.

But, clearly, not everybody knows this, and that can only be due to a lack of trying to understand.

The LDS church, whether you believe their doctrine or not, has done an amazing job at providing materials for visitors to understand their goals, their current events and their curriculum. Not only do they provide every word of their scriptures, including Book of Mormon, the Bible and all cross-references and footnotes online, and make them searchable, but they stream their semi-annual meetings online, they provide all church magazines going back to 1971, in full text, online, and all curriculum materials. This means any Web surfer can know this week's Sunday School lessons or see the church leadership's comments on world events. And all texts available to rank and file church members are visible to any site visitor.

Yet somehow, the church is seen as mysterious. Even though the church is among the fastest growing worldwide, and all these resources are available, the fact there are denominational differences and behavioral differences between the church and its members, makes people wonder if there's more to the story. That's partly why today's rumor took off like it did. Eric Eldon of VentureBeat wrote, "It got legs because it was so ridiculous, yet intriguing."

It was at least ridiculous. The good news is that, as church members, we've seen this kind of annoying misunderstanding before. It's the same kind of herd mentality that associates the church with the HBO series "Big Love", the same ignorance that linked the church with the odd polygamist sect in Texas earlier this year, or those who forced Mitt Romney's hand, making him do a pronouncement on religion earlier this year. It seems that no matter how many questions we answer, or how open we are, people would prefer not to understand and recognize that the church and its members are not secretly plotting to buy out the Web, and we aren't trying to take over the world. While Duncan Riley of the Inquisitr was good enough to have a little fun with it, many of his sources were of course from anti-Mormon sites or incorrect material, which he's not faulted for finding. And others didn't even do the basics of a simple Web search to understand how to contact church authorities and find the truth.

As one fellow member wrote me on e-mail today, "These guys are not drunk, they are smoking something really strong. It may be a slow day, but that does not mean they need to break the word of wisdom. If they are not smoking it they should at least not inhale."

See Also:
Being Mac. Being Mormon. It's Quite Similar.
Mormon. Liberal. Not Conflicted.

Why the Embargo Process Is Broken and Why We Still Need It

In the world of public relations, press management and blogging, an embargo sets a date and time by which a story can be written. Often, the embargo date and time coincides with a press release from the company, a Web site refresh, or the product's availability. Assuming all goes well, an embargo restricts all outlets from publishing a story until all is ready, and assuming multiple parties have been briefed, you can expect a waterfall of stories and press coverage to flow in a short period of time.


But, as you know, any time humans are involved, things can go awry, especially, as you see often in the blogosphere, you have a large number of media outlets that cover similar spaces, and a scarcity of topics. The resulting clamor to be heard amongst the noise, when so many different people are writing very similar stories, makes for an environment where the slightest bit of mistrust can turn into a simmering feud, or outright frustrating and finger-pointing, be it at a competitive blog, or the people behind the service being launched. Add in to the mix a rising number of inexperienced writers, prone to mistakes, with high levels of visibility, and this can happen with some regularity.

To start, why would a company ask for an embargo?

1. To be sure a product would not be pre-announced before it was ready.
2. To prepare and have enough time to brief all interested parties.
3. To ensure no favoritism was shown to any media outlet.

Why would media/press/bloggers agree to an embargo?

1. If they wouldn't agree, the company might not give them the story.
2. Because an embargo often comes with news ahead of time, allowing time for writing.
3. The service might have given them an interesting non-standard angle.

At an enterprise company, a media and analyst tour typically consists of a series of face to face meetings, plus conference calls, with an agreed upon date for a press release that coincides with the product's launch. Reporters often are looking for customer references and analyst references to validate the company's claims or add a wrinkle to the story.

For more bare-bones operations, including startups focused in the Web space, face to face meetings are less necessary. Sometimes, a series of e-mails, with potential for a phone call, is all that's needed. That's why you, on most blogs, rarely see quotes from a company's executives or customers, even if they had an extensive beta. Most bloggers, even if they have tested a product themselves, are echoing a press release or e-mail introduction from the service's founder. Again, a date is usually referenced in the e-mail to "go live".

Sounds good. Right? So why do these nicely laid plans fall apart?

On the company side:

1. Sometimes an embargo is for "everybody except one or two publications", who are allowed to break it.
2. Sometimes the Web site or company blog can go live before the embargo, in effect, scooping themselves.
3. Sometimes a story isn't all that much of a secret, and things leak to the point there's no reason for an embargo.

On the media/blog side:

1. Going first is seen as being "special", even if it's a matter of minutes.
2. Being first can make the originating blog get more attention and linkage, or prominence on sites like Techmeme.
3. Some blog management systems aren't fool-proof, enabling stories to go "before their time".

Clearly, you have some juxtaposed issues. The company launching an announcement would benefit from being covered by the most publications as possible, seen by the highest number of people. This is augmented by a need to be seen by publications with a high level of prestige. (Think Wall Street Journal, News.com, eWeek, TechCrunch, etc.) But there's something of a magnetic pull on press or blogs to go early, whether that's at midnight on the day of launch, or by posting five minutes before an embargo is lifted, and simply moving the timestamp, as has been known to happen. Blogs and press publications get a lot of visibility through gaining exclusives, and even if the same announcement has been sent to a wide audience, to hit the "post" button a little early, getting the word out first makes you appear more "in the know".

Whether intentional or not, blogs are rewarded for breaking embargoes, even if it hurts the launching service. And there's rarely any level of repercussion, as competing blogs in the know of the embargo are not naming names.

Of late, I've seen a healthy dose of complaining by some bloggers that other blogs have willingly or unwillingly violated an agreed-upon embargo. Yet, interestingly, it's a rare person who will name the offending party, even after their activity has clearly irked them.

See for instance:

Svetlana Gladkova of Profy:
"Very-very angry. Is it impossible to run a blog without breaking embargoes these days???"
08:23 PM August 18, 2008

Allen Stern of CenterNetworks:

"wtf is up with the broken embargoes this past week - 3 today, 5 in the last week - im feeling like busting out a video tonight"
06:32 PM August 18, 2008

Marshall Kirkpatrick of ReadWriteWeb:
"PR just called to say that mainstream media guy broke embargo, lol. you can't trust those mainstream media types with embargoes!"
02:18 PM August 15, 2008

Notice how even though they claim frustration and anger, nobody says who the offending parties are...

Embargoes serve a real purpose for the company making the announcement. They are there to build time to polish the product, to enable true beta testing, to set up press activity with multiple targets, and to get one's message distributed. Embargoes serve a purpose for the blogging community, for those who choose to follow them, to help guide an editorial calendar, or to be sure you're also talking about a story on the day of its debut. And while some people might wish they disappear, it's not going to happen, so long as companies look to synchronize their internal and external activity.

As we see a rise in the total number of bloggers writing on the same topics, the issue of some sites trying to get out a step ahead of others isn't going to go away. Those that play by the rules and follow the agreed-upon embargoes, are on occasion, going to get burned. But what doesn't help the situation is that nobody is making a list and checking it twice. Why complain if nobody is going to name names? If there are one, two, three or ten blogs that regularly break an embargo, and it's clear there is a pattern, it should be visible, and these sites should be avoided by companies like the plague.

I believe in and honor embargoes. I also love exclusives, and think that there is more than one way to launch a product. But this practice is tried and true, so long as we have more transparency. What disincentive is there for bloggers who break embargoes if nobody steps up?

NewsCred Launches With Two Critical Supporters

NewsCred, a site aimed to bring "all the world's credible news in one place", went live today, offering news junkies the ability to not only catch up with the day's events, but also to select their sources of information, and rate their credibility. In theory, one could grade a media outlet up or down, and the crowd's input could highlight whether a source for news was trustworthy or not.

The service has already gained substantial coverage, including from TechCrunch, Profy and Mathew Ingram, for starters, but more importantly, the service clearly values not only the community's opinion, but the community at large.

Witness their outreach to two of the world's future newsmakers, Matthew and Sarah Gray:



As Shafqat of NewsCred wrote me earlier today, "WOW. That is possibly the best thing to happen to us all day. Thank you for putting everything in perspective - they are adorable and we're thrilled to be able to share our launch with your kids!"

So it is possible to launch new products and make friends with the community at the same time, by having fun and stay credible too. Now go check out NewsCred or one of these babies will have a tantrum!

Google Has Leveled the Internet Playing Field

By Robert Seidman of TVbytheNumbers (Twitter / FriendFeed)

There are many motivations to write something and publish it on the Internet. Some write in hopes of making money, others like Louis, write because they want to be a part of something they enjoy, others like Hutch Carpenter find their next job. But I believe whether it's Duncan Riley, Louis or Hutch the common denominator is this: they want their voices to be heard.

It's a Very Different Landscape Than 1994…
A very low barrier to entry brings with it some blessings and some curses. The more people who participate, the better things are for everyone in the aggregate. But the more people participating, the harder it is to compete and have your voice rise up above the cacophony of all the other voices.

During my first foray into Internet publishing in the fall of 1994, the landscape was dramatically different. I launched a newsletter essentially summarizing the big events of the week in the online/Internet space. At the time of launch, my only competition was for-fee subscription content. There was no freely-available competition and as a result, I gained access to readers and industry insiders very quickly. Fortunately, Robert Scoble was writing about visual basic or something at the time, so I didn't have to compete with his bullhorn either.

I first met Bill Gorman, who I now run TVbytheNumbers with, within two months of launching my 1990s Internet publication. Bill was an executive at AOL, who helped launch America Online's international division. Around the same time, Bill started reading what I was writing, so did the person who was running AOL – Steve Case. Basically within two months of launching I was reaching high-ranking industry insiders.

…But It's Still Possible to Get Your Voice Out There
Today, if you were to launch a blog on social network services and hoping to get Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook to read it, I believe that task would be about 10,000 times more difficult. The likes of Louis, however, are proving that it's not impossible to write about companies you're interested in and gain 'inside' access. It may not be on the scale of Facebook executives for Louis (yet), but gaining insider access is certainly something he's accomplished to the point where he's now taken an advisory role with ReadBurner.

Louis might seem like an 'overnight success' story to many in the blogging circles, but not to me. What I see is a kid who has been plugging away since January 2006 and really started to get some traction by late 2007, which has accelerated greatly during 2008. Thirty-two months of plugging away to get where he is today isn't an overnight success story. It is a success story, but it is a success story that involved a lot of hard work, persistence and determination.

All Good Things…
The other day I brought up my FriendFeed and saw the link "Robert Seidman Quoted in NY Post On Phelps/Olympics" posted by none other than Louis. It was the first I'd heard of it. Although we have talked to reporters from the NY Post (and other publications) I hadn't talked to them about this. They'd just lifted the quote right out of a blog post and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Although getting quoted is nice, especially when quotes are just lifted off blog posts, the thing I was most proud of for the week was seeing this story comparing the minutes of online streaming to the minutes of viewing via traditional television pop-up in my Google Reader. An analyst working at Fox television crunched some numbers on top of some numbers I'd crunched in a blog post and Fox's PR team circulated it, citing our blog as the original source.

It's not lost on me that mostly happened because the song I was singing, "TV is still king", was a tune the people at the television networks really love to hear. But in a world where we're in some ways competing with Variety, Advertising Age, The Hollywood Reporter, Media Week, TV Week, The New York Times and the USA Today, to wind up having my thoughts on the subject heard was extremely gratifying. In some ways I'm in awe that the playing field is still level enough for that to happen.

Thanks Google!

I know a lot in the tech blogging circles will opine on whether Google is good or evil. For now in my mind, Google is still good. It leveled the playing field for us. We have little in the way of expense overhead (almost $0, really) and sure, it may work out that I've made about eight cents per hour, but that's the subject for another blog post. From my perspective, we are allowed to compete, and compete fairly without spending anything on marketing. It's hard for me to find fault with a system that provides that sort of level playing field.

Organic Google search (including Google News) is our number one traffic source. This leads to a lot of referral traffic from other sites and a good bit of the direct traffic.

A level playing field does not mean it's easy to get your voice heard, in fact, one of the best ways to compete in a very level playing field is with a lot of hard work. This may not equate directly to riches or fame, but if those were your goals the odds were already stacked against you before you started and you knew it.

Ultimately though, having your voice heard can lead to other very cool opportunities. Ask Louis, or Hutch, or even me. The best job I ever had, as a Senior Vice President at Charles Schwab running various portions of its online brokerage (from 1998-2003) came at least indirectly, and mostly directly, in my opinion, as a result of having my voice heard on the Internet. That was a lot easier to achieve in those heady pre-Google days, but even in this vastly more competitive era, Google does a great job leveling the playing field.

P.S. because I didn't think many FriendFeeders are interested in TV Metrics, I stopped feeding our blog into my FriendFeed stream and created a separate one here.

Where You Get Your Tech News Shapes Your Tech Views

By Rob Diana of Regular Geek (Twitter/FriendFeed)

FriendFeed seems to be the source of most of my interesting conversations these days. Sometimes the benefit of FriendFeed is not even the conversation itself, but finding a link to a blog post that I normally would not read. This happened this week when Jesse Stay shared a post to a story on newspapergrl.com. I read a lot of what Jesse shares, but this site is one I had never read. I found the post interesting because it was about tech news and how slow things are:

I just got off the phone with my friend Chris and we talked about how we hardly blog anymore. Also about how nothing seems that exciting in tech lately. It's mostly about Google and the iPhone over and over. Are we just cynical or have things quieted down considerably?

I had no idea that this is what people thought. This was not written during the iPhone hype, this was written a few days ago. So, I decided to look and see what news was posted on Thursday, July 31st.

First, let us look at what TechCrunch had to offer.


Click to Enlarge Image
Out of 16 stories in our selection, 4 were tech financial news, 3 streaming video stories and the remainder (9) were about various sites and their features. For a technology news site, that seems very reasonable.

ReadWriteWeb tends to have more opinion and review posts than TechCrunch and their stories reflect that.


Click to Enlarge Image

You can not tell from all of the headlines, but of the 16 posts, 6 were opinions and reviews. 4 of the posts were about video, image or mobile devices. The remainder were about various sites and their features. Again this is a reasonable breadth of information.

The last "heavy" technical news site I want to look at is Mashable. They tend to be not as news-heavy as TechCrunch, and have more of a social application focus. So, what did they post?


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Out of Mashable's 16 posts, 5 were about video, audio or images and 10 were opinions or reviews of various sites. Lastly, there was 1 self-promotion post. Given the specific content focus, this is also reasonable. So, we have looked at the 3 popular tech sites that many early adopters read. In order to contrast what a mainstream user might read, I took a look at what stories Yahoo Tech News listed for the day.


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For Yahoo, we again sampled 16 stories. Of these stories, 5 were financially related, 2 were about cell phones, specifically controlling kids use and cancer risks. 3 of the stories were about server products (VMware, Microsoft "Midori", and SharePoint). 3 more stories were about video games, 2 of which were about WordScraper/Scrabulous. The last 3 stories were the Chinese internet censorship, a Blu-ray player for Netflix, and 6 Ways to Save on Groceries. A simple breakdown does not really show the difference, except for the groceries story. The 3 stories on server products were mostly business related. VMWare giving something away, another product trying to replace SharePoint, and what "Midori" could do for Microsoft.

Most of the stories on Yahoo contain little or no technical detail. You do not see anything about social networks or other social applications. There was no announcement for the SocialMedian release or the redesign of Delicious. So, why is this important? It is important because most people are not reading about the same things that an early adopter is reading. Obviously, there will always be some overlap, but the mainstream users care about very different things. Given the various discussions about passionate users, early adopters and mainstream users, maybe we need to take a step back and think about how we bridge that gap. If you do not agree, then find your most non-technical friend and explain why they need to use Twitter and FriendFeed. Do not be surprised if they ask whether they could find more than 6 ways to save on their groceries.

Smart People, Stupid Tweets. Fake News Spreads Fast on Twitter.

The combination of a rush to publish and a low barrier to entry for microblogging makes posting quick notes to Twitter extremely tempting for people who are trying to break news. In seconds, a rumor can be launched, whether true or not, and hit thousands. If those thousands then, in turn, repost your note, you've got a rapidly snowballing mess to deal with.

Today, that happened, in real time, when a few popular Twitter users, including Kevin Rose of Digg and Adam Ostrow of Mashable posted a link to a parody site, claiming the famous Jared Fogle from Subway's line of commercials had passed away. The "news", which had long been debunked as an urban legend by Snopes, spread like wildfire, catching otherwise well-respected folks like Dave Winer thinking it was true.


Kevin Rose's Tweet Kicked the Rumor In High Gear

Many, Many Others Followed Suit
(See also: FriendFeed: "I'm so gullible I believed it. Oy. - Dave Winer")

Many have claimed Twitter can break news faster than traditional news media. People were buzzing on Tim Russert's passing away on Twitter before it hit NBC, and Twitter has already proven itself a news source for natural disasters, like earthquakes. But the mainstream media largely likes to prove rumors true and get multiple sources before reporting, to this day. When Twitterers run amok and post any old yarn they've heard, there's no stopping it.

When Kevin Rose posted his Tweet, it had the potential to reach his more than 46,000 followers. The trickle-down effect hit Ostrow's 1,300 or so followers, and Summize showed the gullible Twitter crowd re-reporting the bad news multiple times a minute, reaching who knows how many people?


See: Summize: Search for Jared

See: Summize: Search for Subway

Whether you're writing a blog post or entering something on Twitter, it absolutely makes sense to take a cue from traditional media and check your facts. While the Subway Jared parody is more amusing than critical, it highlights a need for people to take a deep breath before repeating everything they hear. Twitter can be a tool for good, but for mischief as well. I would expect people like Kevin, Adam and others, proven to be intelligent in other areas, could act smart here as well.

Fav.or.it Opens Up, Reminds Us of Google News for Blogs

When I first learned of Fav.or.it, I thought the site was going to try and take on the powerhouse Google Reader, as a next-generation RSS reader with social features and integrated commenting back to the site. Not meeting those expectations, I didn't give my beta experience a very favorable review.

Now that Fav.or.it is finally here, the service has tried to make it more clear that it's about trying to reach "the masses" and not the odd early adopter (like me). The result, so far, is a portal-like service that looks a lot like Google News in terms of prioritization of stories and categorization, but utilizing blog content instead of mainstream media.


The top story on Fav.or.it on Wednesday morning
The change in strategy, or at least the change in my understanding the strategy, makes me both less interested in picking them apart, and less interested in making part of my daily consumption, so far. But I'm not exactly the target audience. For what it's worth, I don't read Google News either.

Fav.or.it's front page says it's "Bringing blogging to the masses." Note no mention of RSS or feeds. It has a top story, although it's unclear how that's determined, it features a section of recent posts, called "Brand Spanking New", and highlights many other facets of news and blog categorization you're used to, including "Tags", "Most Commented", and topics, such as Technology, News, Business, and Culture. Clicking through any of those topics leads you to the full copies of stories generated elsewhere, but integrated into Fav.or.it's look and feel.

Duncan Riley of the Inquisitr calls Fav.or.it's new approach "splogging", essentially repurposing other people's content and aiming to make a profit, potentially in violation of copyright. Nick Halstead, the site's creator, responds in the comments there that by blog authors implementing Creative Commons, having the option to feed comments back to the original source, and being able to opt in or opt out of the site, this should reduce any concerns.

I don't share Duncan's concerns in this case. I've always erred on the side of letting RSS readers and sites innovate in new ways to present my feed content, and I expect that as RSS enables full feeds to be displayed, there will be some new and interesting ways they are shown from one site to another. For every reader who sees my full content elsewhere and chooses not to visit my site, there's another who does come in and becomes a regular, so those sites can serve as free advertising.

What Fav.or.it does do well is deliver a clean-looking site, with a strong amount of underlying data, easily findable. There's clearly a robust underlying database of stories and metadata around tags and comments powering the site, but it does a much better job than other sites, like Technorati, who have tried to make blog posts a valid replacement for mainstream media. If, in fact, the common layperson chose to get their news from Fav.or.it instead of say, Google News, it would clearly expose them to a wealth of new sources for stories. It might also get them comfortable with the concepts of comments and tags, things we've long taken for granted.

In fact, Fav.or.it's efforts in the comment portability process should be lauded. At launch, the service claims to support many different commenting engines, meaning comments placed on Fav.or.it flow back to the original blog. They don't support threaded conversations, believing simple threads are preferred, but again, in theory, this might be less complicated for the blogging newbie. (See more in Nick's launch blog post: Bringing Blogging to the Masses)

Talking about Fav.or.it now, as TechCrunch has with their piece, Fav.or.it Finally Opens Beta To Take RSS And Commenting Mainstream, makes me feel wistful, like when you go to the graduation of a son or daughter leaving junior college when they once were offered a full-ride scholarship to an Ivy League school. Sure, you're proud of them, I guess, but it's tempting to wonder what might have been, and what they could have been if they'd just taken your advice or gone a different direction, they have so much talent.

Fav.or.it might have a hit on its hands with people who are nothing like me. There sure are a lot of them out there. But for now, it's a destination site displaying content I've either already seen in my RSS reader, or didn't care to see anyway. As a start page, it could work very well, and as a blogging ambassador it works well, and I'll probably just have to accept that maybe this is what they wanted to be when they grew up.

Giving a Service Wings By Pushing Them from the Nest

For those of us blogging who like to break the news by announcing new services, and using our site as their platform to debut, it can be tempting to pull an "old world" journalism mentality and claim that topic as "our turf", resenting anybody else who tries to step in and steal the thunder by posting the news first, or even feeling betrayed if the entrepreneur takes the news somewhere else. But I've seen that after what I consider an incubation period, the fastest-growing services do best when I can step back and let them take their first steps away from the nest, as they engage with other bloggers, gaining them a new audience and greater exposure.

In this analogy, it can be nerve-wracking to see the little ones as they leave the nest. I worry the new caregivers might not see them in the same way I do. The new influencer might be cruel or may not recognize their talents. But to try and protect them by keeping them in the nest could stunt their growth.

As mentioned in yesterday's popular post, the first stage of being an early adopter can at times be indistinguishable from the service's PR or Marketing firm, as you try to make a product you like extremely visible. You've no doubt seen me do this, as I'll not just help by introducing a product, but keeping you posted on its updates, from Assetbar to ReadBurner, FriendFeedMachine, RSSmeme and Toluu.

But there comes a time when the right thing to do is let go, when the service has gained such momentum that I instead suggest the developer reach out to other sites to get a broader perspective and more exposure, so that their service is less tied in with me, and seen, instead as more of the broader landscape.

Don't get me wrong. I love exclusives, and part of my journalism background makes the little hairs on the back of my neck stand up when I know that someone who might be considered competition is writing about the same topic at the same time with the same deadline. But lately, for services that have gotten some traction, I've opted out of story opportunities and encouraged the developer to get some new voices talking instead.

A prime example of this was with Toluu yesterday. On Wednesday, Caleb Elston reached out to me with some great new service updates, including details on subscriptions within Toluu by feed, and story popularity, in part helped by AideRSS. I told Caleb that instead of waiting for me, to take his outreach to the next level, and it worked, without question. Yesterday ended up being a record-setting day for Toluu, after what Hutch Carpenter called a great example of social media marketing, by participating and reaching out to bloggers and following Toluu references on both FriendFeed and Twitter.

Similarly, RSSmeme announced options to find similar sharers of data to you, and integrated widgets on each page that show top tags and sharers for that blog or topic. See: Using RSSmeme To Find Similar Sharers: Louis Gray’s Example. Having just given RSSmeme a ton of credit last Saturday on being the authority on Google Reader sharing notes, I again waved the white flag, and told Benjamin to spread the word. He did, leveraging a custom room on FriendFeed for RSSmeme, to update followers, also adding RSSmeme as a user of the service, and today, leveraging the FriendFeed API to speed up the site.

You can see how other services have taken steps to leave the nest, as other sites, often much bigger than mine, take up the rallying cry:

ReadBurner:
The Inquisitr: ReadBurner Gets Digg Like Features

Shyftr:
Mashable: Shyftr Beats Google Reader with OPML Imports

LinkRiver:
SheGeeks: LinkRiver is My Personal Techmeme

Part of being a good partner to new services is knowing when to let go, and to see if the service has wings. A few weeks ago, I wrote to one pair of entrepreneurs, "Let me know if there's anything else I can do, but I do believe it's going to come down to you guys being more visible." With everything else that's going on, I can't possibly do it all myself. That's why, even though it can be bittersweet on occasion, the right thing to do is let them take a risk and let go. It gives others, like Corvida, the opportunity to do a social media roundup on service updates, and it's best for the community at large.

You Can Only Pitch Me In Reverse Polish Notation or Pig Latin

As the world of journalism/old media gets increasingly blurred with bloggers/new media, some of the larger news-breaking bloggers are finding themselves inundated with pitches from companies looking for additional exposure. In an effort for some top bloggers to reduce the total noise sent their way, some are spelling out the right way and the wrong way to pitch them. But for any company looking to make a name for themselves, how can they possibly remember who wants to be communicated how?

Take a look at some of the more high-profile bloggers who have, at one point or another, said there is one approved way to get their attention:

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Stowe Boyd of /Message writes Via Twitter, "The Only Approved Way To Pitch Me" is via TwitPitch.


On his blog, he writes, in Twitpitch Is The Future, "Companies will be directed to this page to get the idea, and those that try to stick with the bulging email approach will suffer a three-strikes-and-you're-out rule: After three times of being warned, they go into the spam category."

Upside to him: Less e-mail, more clarity on whether something is being sent his way to write about.

Downside to the company: Their pitch is visible to everyone, making it clear they are shilling, and exclusivity is eliminated.

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Marshall Kirkpatrick of ReadWriteWeb says the site gets "piles and piles of pitches for coverage from companies all day long and they almost always come in by email." His recommendation for would-be article subjects would be not to send an e-mail, not to call, not to use Twitter (even Direct Messages), not to use Facebook or Instant Messenger. Instead, he wants you to use RSS!


His idea there is that PR folks should send RSS feeds for client blogs and news releases, so when updates are made to their blogs, he'll see it, at his leisure.

Upside to him: Less e-mail, and the ability to enjoy/actually use Facebook, IM and Twitter without getting pitched.

Downside to the company: No understanding as to whether ReadWriteWeb actually "saw" your pitch, absolutely zero pre-pitching, and zero exclusivity. This way, RWW wouldn't get the news until it was out. In fact, Marshall says this is only for things that are public with no embargo, even pushing people back to e-mail for those.

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And last year, Robert Scoble famously said Facebook would be "a new kind of press release". In the face of a growing e-mail tsunami, he said Facebook wall messages would be passed to his Nokia phone. He says, "now we have a new way for PR people to let me know about their apps. Write it on the wall please. Facebook: the new press release."

Of course, this only works until every PR person figures it out, and Robert would end up with the same information glut, just moved somewhere else.

Upside to him: Lower e-mail flow and fewer phone calls.

Downside to the company: Not every company uses Facebook or considers it professional. Facebook pitches would get lost amidst others wishing Robert a happy birthday or any other notes, and again, they would lose any chance at exclusivity or an embargo, after pitching in public.

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So what do we have here, just in these three examples? We have three prominent bloggers with three very highly differentiated, inefficient ways of soliciting engagement with public relations and companies. While it's extremely popular these days to dish on old media journalists and claim print is going the way of the dodo, even the biggest reporters at the high-profile media outlets can still be reached by phone or by e-mail. They're not making you jump through hoops to get their attention.

To me, while its likely bloggers are looking to make their own lives easier, and looking to utilize available technology tools to bring clarity to the process, it looks like a sign of weakness. Can't handle the data glut or the outreach coming your way? Somebody else will. Somebody else with the ability to write as quickly as you can, with the right tone and a big enough audience, who can be reached by e-mail or by cell phone, or by Twitter or Facebook or FriendFeed or anything, will write that article and get that news coverage you miss.

Do you really think companies are going to remember to pitch Marshall at ReadWriteWeb via RSS and Stowe Boyd by TwitPitch and Scoble by Facebook? Knowing PR companies, I know they won't. Most of them still believe in the spray and pray method of e-mailing all contacts under the sun. There needs to be change, but making everybody jump through hoops while losing the personal engagement, exclusivity and timing won't work.

UPDATE: Elliott Ng, in the comments, gives us some good links, including Brian Solis' article on PR 2.0: In Blogger and Media Relations, You Earn the Relationships You Deserve and Rafe Needleman of WebWare complaining on Twitter about being pitched via Plaxo.

Does Negativity Deliver Credibility? If So, That's Nuts.

Over the last 18 months or so, I've gained something of a reputation for being an early adopter more likely to heap praise on early versions of software with clear bugs than to drag services through the mud, calling out their every hole and flaw. I've stated that I do champion the little guy, and when I've found a service I like, there's no question you'll know, because I'll be consistent in my comments on it, highlighting new tweaks and trying to help you understand why I like what I do, and, in the converse, why I might not like other options.

But does my tendency to be positive and shun negativity make me less believable? Should I maintain a ratio of cranky posts to positive ones for variety's sake or to prove I'm not a paid shill on the take? As far as I'm concerned, no. In most cases, rather than drag down services, or dance on the graves of failed startups, I see sites' potential, and recognize the very real people behind services who are working hard to make their products as good as they can.

Marshall Kirkpatrick of ReadWriteWeb jokingly commented on FriendFeed today: "You should write a really harsh review of something tho, just to maintain credibility!"

It's clear my quasi-utopian view isn't held in many corners of the blogosphere. Some revel in negative reviews or tearing people down. Others feel they have a calling to be "balanced", evening out an otherwise positive post by highlighting a service's deficiencies, or if the service happens to be amazing, to pick three random competitors for whom this new arrival will certainly mean curtains. But to be honest, even if I have more readers now than I did three, six or twelve months ago, this is still my personal blog, and should reflect how I feel. When I write up a service, I aim to deliver an accurate portrayal of the news, sites or individuals covered, but I would much rather highlight those companies and services I like than waste my time showing you the services that I didn't like. In essence, my silence in itself can be considered a negative review - and if you think about those topics I do write about, maybe there's a good reason I haven't covered every single service out there under the sun...

This isn't to say I haven't had a few negative posts here and there. I've at times been frustrated with TechCrunch (TechCrunch's Celebrating Failure Doesn't Help Anyone), ValleyWag (Valleywag Thinks My Old Posts are Breaking News) and even TechMeme (Blogrunner Likes Me, TechMeme Hates Me). I wasn't exactly overwhelming in my praise for NotchUp (NotchUp Sells You Out, but Nobody's Buying) and you likely remember my first comments on Fav.or.it. (Fav.or.it Beta Effort is Not My Favorite. Not Even Close.)

But these negative posts are are a rarity.

In fact, Mark Hopkins of Mashable said to one FriendFeed user in search for good PR that it's fairly obvious when I've found a favorite: "Talk to Louis Gray. Forget product evangelist. When he likes something, he's a one man crusade."

If you listened to this week's Elite Tech News podcast, you could probably tell that my positive viewpoints on the Web were frequently outnumbered by those who didn't favor companies, services, or individuals, who feared their content would be stolen, and that tech leaders and bloggers were too money-driven or ego-driven to be trusted. But I would rather accurately portray my intrigue and excitement around new services, even if they're not perfect. I don't think it does me a lot of good to sit down with a service I don't like or can't recommend and put 500 words into it.

You could probably also tell this from the interview Mark Evans posted this morning, Who’s Louis Gray?, which helps explain my background, and shows why I've ended up covering what I do. The tech world is moving faster than just about any market out there which I can think of. There are some amazing folks out there working ridiculous hours trying to make the next big thing. Only a few will make it. But if we tear them down too early, they might never actually reach their full potential, and I don't think it's really worth it, simply to engage in a race for page views.

Former Jobster CEO's Social|Median Incubating in Alpha

At the end of 2007, Jason Goldberg, CEO of Jobster, stepped down, leaving the online career site behind and taking on a new job of his own, founding a stealth mode online social news site, called Social|Median. Months after raising less than $1 million in seed money from a number of angel investors, the site has risen from "dog food" mode to alpha, on the backs of an offshore engineering team in India and Jason's own efforts, seeing more than 500 early adopter users join the site, aimed at creating topical news networks and sharing hot news with friends. (See their blog here)

While the site has been in closed alpha stage for several months, I managed to snag 200 invites to Social|Median, with the code of "LouisG". (Sign up here)


Social|Median Has a Feed Showing Updates In Your Networks
Despite its alpha stage and so-far underdeveloped user