Microsoft gives up on Live Spaces: blogs to be shifted to Wordpress.com | Technology. Microsoft is closing its Windows Live Spaces blogging platform and moving all its users over to Wordpress.com. It's a dramatic move which means that it's giving up a potentially huge slice of advertising business - perhaps because it simply can't make it pay. Or as Microsoft puts it, "partnering together" - redundant word alert - "and providing an upgrade for 30 million Windows Live Spaces customers".
Make no mistake, this is dramatic: it means that Microsoft is giving up potentially valuable turf where it could have sold ads, in the manner of Google and the Blogger platform (which generates revenues for Google), and retreating from at least one part of the online space. As Tim Anderson puts it, "According to Microsoft it has 7 million users and 30 million visitors; and if you accept that business on the web is all about traffic and monetizing traffic, then it strikes me as odd that Microsoft has no better idea of what to do with that traffic than to give it to someone else.... Join diaspora - blog. Google Cleans Up Its Act -- and Erases My Identity - Advertising Age - DigitalNext.
Has the Future of the Internet come about? This week there’s an online symposium at Concurring Opinions about the I’ll be blogging there; in the meantime here’s my opening entry. I wrote the Future of the Internet — And How to Stop It , and its precursor law review article the Generative Internet , between 2004 and 2007. I wanted to capture a sense of just how bizarre the Internet — and the PC environment — were.
How much the values and assumptions of, metaphorically, dot-org and dot-edu, rather than just dot-com, were built into the protocols of the Internet and the architecture of the PC. The amateur, hobbyist, backwater origins of the Internet and the PC were crucial to their success against more traditional counterparts, but also set the stage for a new host of problems as they became more popular. The designers and makers of the Internet and PC platforms did not expect to come up with the applications for each — they figured unknown others would do that.
I understand and sympathize with that migration. RSS Described in Plain English - Common Craft - Our Product is Explanation. Updated: We've created a video that explains this concept much more effectively. View it here. RSS is often discussed in very technical terms- so my hope with this post is to describe RSS in plain language using general terms. First, the "RSS" acronym itself isn't that important- in fact, there is disagreement on what it actually stands for. The front runners are: Rich Site Summary and Really Simple Syndication. But again, don't clutter your brain with that. ----------------------------------Here's what you need to know about RSS: It allows you be notified when a web site has been updated How does RSS help me know when a web site has been updated? A growing number of web sites are adding an RSS "feed" to their site. When you see the button or link- you've found the feed for that site. How do I use RSS?
When you find an RSS feed for a site you like, you will subscribe to the feed in order to be notified. How do I subscribe to an RSS feed? First- you need an aggregator as described above. Proper Procedure For Shutting Down A Blog. Create your free blog. How-manage-negative-blog-comments from socialmediatoday.com. So you’ve spent all night writing a blog post that can only be described as the pièce de résistance to your dedicated followers. Clearly, you’re proud of what you’ve produced and you’ve poured some serious effort into developing an outstanding representation of what great content truly is. But what do you do once you’ve posted that bright, shiny new blog entry and it’s dashed to bits in the comment section? First off, don’t be offended by the feedback about your masterpiece. Instead consider following some of these suggestions to help you work through any negative comments.
It’s Not Personal Harsh comments can be tough pills to swallow, but remember that it’s not about you. It’s just about perspective. Keep Calm Take a deep breath and a step back before your respond to any negative blog comments. Embrace The Feedback Hate to say it, but comments on a blog post, both good and bad, demonstrate that you’re developing and sharing insightful topics that readers are connecting with. Give Thanks. Blog with Integrity, Inc. Blog with Integrity. Polymath1 and open collaborative mathematics « Gowers's Weblog. In this post I want to discuss some general issues that arise naturally in the light of how the polymath experiment has gone so far.
First, let me say that for me personally this has been one of the most exciting six weeks of my mathematical life. That is partly because it is always exciting to solve a problem, but a much more important reason is the way this problem was solved, with people chipping in with their thoughts, provoking other people to have other thoughts (sometimes almost accidentally, and sometimes more logically), and ideas gradually emerging as a result. Incidentally, many of these ideas are still to be properly explored: at some point the main collaboration will probably be declared to be over (though I suppose in theory it could just go on and on, since its seems almost impossible to clear up every interesting question that emerges) and then I hope that the comments will be a useful resource for anybody who wants to find some interesting open problems.
Like this: Problem solved (probably) « Gowers's Weblog. Without anyone being particularly aware of it, a race has been taking place. Which would happen first: the comment count reaching 1000, or the discovery of a new proof of the density Hales-Jewett theorem for lines of length 3? Very satisfyingly, it appears that DHJ(3) has won. If this were a conventional way of producing mathematics, then it would be premature to make such an announcement — one would wait until the proof was completely written up with every single i dotted and every t crossed — but this is blog maths and we’re free to make up conventions as we go along. So I hereby state that I am basically sure that the problem is solved (though not in the way originally envisaged). Why do I feel so confident that what we have now is right, especially given that another attempt that seemed quite convincing ended up collapsing? Better still, it looks very much as though the argument here will generalize straightforwardly to give the full density Hales-Jewett theorem.
Like this: Tim O'Reilly on How the Web is a Sustainability Platform | Business. Next month's GreenBiz Innovation Forum focuses on the intersection of sustainability and innovation, including how innovation happens inside large companies. Tim O'Reilly, one of the "innovisionaries" to be featured at the event, has been thinking about such things for a long time. He is largely credited with driving both the open source and web 2.0 technology movements into mainstream concepts. Tim's long-term vision for his company is to change the world by spreading the knowledge of innovators.
In addition to O'Reilly Media, Tim is a founder of Safari Books Online, a pioneering subscription service for accessing books online, and O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, an early-stage venture firm. Recently, Greener World Media president Eric Faurot chatted with O'Reilly about the web as an innovation platform. Eric Faurot: You have been at the forefront of both the open source and Web 2.0 paradigm shifts. Do you see any parallels to the current sustainability movement? TO: Absolutely. Academic reference management software for researchers. Upcoming Trends of Web Design in 2010. In 2010 we are seeing the continued mainstreaming of everyday goods and services onto the internet.
As everything becomes virtual, the internet becomes the first port of call when a person needs a new good or requires a new service. More and more people, from all walks of life, are becoming familiar with the internet. Particularly in the last year, as smart-phones introduce the concept of web-services to people who would not normally have exposure to an internet connected computer.
This changes typical user expectations and influences how clients want to market on the web. Websites need to be even clearer, better structured and more eye-catching. We are seeing JavaScript pushing out its boundaries, new design philosophies like grid systems becoming commonplace, bigger bolder headings and banners and more and more iconification of websites.
JavaScript – Light boxes, carousel, tabs and more! Design style can be practical. Presenting many options to a user can make a design cluttered. This Week in Review: Apple’s subscription plan, the exodus from objectivity, and startup guides galore. [Every Friday, Mark Coddington sums up the week's top stories about the future of news and the debates that grew up around them. —Josh] Is Apple giving publishers a raw deal? : The San Jose Mercury News’ report that Apple is moving toward a newspaper and magazine subscription plan via its App Store didn’t immediately generate much talk when it was published last week, but the story picked up quite a bit of steam this week. Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal both confirmed the story over the weekend, reporting that Apple may introduce the service early next year along with a new iPad.
The service, they said, will be similar to Apple’s iBook store, and Bloomberg reported that it will be separate from the App Store. Those reports were met with near-universal skepticism — not of their accuracy, but of Apple’s motivations and trustworthiness within such a venture. Reading roundup: As always, there’s plenty of good stuff to get to. Social Media News and Web Tips – Mashable – The Social Media Guide.
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