February 18, 2006
Clickin' on the Real World: Contextual Searching Through Camera Phones
Imagine yourself stuck in traffic on a bustling Tokyo street. You see your destination, the movie theater on the next block. Why not save some time and purchase your tickets while you wait for the light to turn? Now it is as easy as pointing your camera phone at the theater, click to display the theater menu, click again to purchase your tickets.
With Mapion Local Search, users can now walk down the street anywhere in Japan and point at over 700,000 objects such as buildings, shops, restaurants, banks, historical sites and instantly retrieve information on what they are looking at or find what they are looking for just by pointing their phone. Just like one uses a mouse to click on an object on a computer screen and retrieve information, now users can Click on the Real World® using their mobile phone.
Posted by Chuck at 08:56 PM | Comments (1)
December 18, 2005
Web 2.0 Roundup
For my money, the biggest online developments this year were podcasting and vlogs. Anyone can create and distrubute media, globally, for free. Pretty big deal I'd say. iTunes support of podcasting and videoblogging was of course a huge boost to bringing media-casting to the mainstream. Does that qualify as Web 2.0? I don't think iTunes itself qualifies, but rich services such as Odeo and Mefeedia are innovative and user-driven - tasty Web 2.0 qualities.
Meanwhile...
Top Ten Web 2.0 Moments of 2005
Top 10 Innovative Web 2.0 Applications of 2005
The Best Web 2.0 Software of 2005
Five Reasons Why Web 2.0 Matters
Web 2.0? It doesn't exist
Web 2.0 Dead?
Is content king?
Posted by colsen at 04:16 AM | Comments (0)
August 02, 2005
Beyond Book Deals
We all know some of the big names in the blogging world, of those fine folks who have snagged book deals. 2004 was the year of The World According to Mimi Smartypants, and the blogger anthology Never Threaten to Eat Your Coworkers: the Best of Blogs, among others. But now self-publishers are making it happen with movie and teevee deals.
Good things are happening for artist and animator Amy Winfrey, creator of the online cartoon Making Fiends (and a South Park alum). She's made a deal with Nickelodeon. They've launched a new site called TurboNick, where they are streaming her web episodes, releasing two at a time (find them under the Nicklusives category). There are also plans to show the web episodes on TV in the near future, and from there, who knows? But fans can cross their fingers for even more.
And local (Minneapolis) celebrity blogger Diablo Cody has made it into IMDB, with her first Hollywood screenplay. Exciting stuff. Even better, she recently signed a two-picture script deal with Warner Bros. If that weren't enough, she has a book deal to boot. Her comedic memoir, Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper, will be published next year by Gotham.
Posted by Sharyn at 10:02 AM | Comments (0)
July 25, 2005
on global connectedness
Recently I was given a Japanese children's book. The artwork is amazing, but naturally I can't read the text...and I had only a vague idea about its plot. Curiousity got the better of me, so I snapped off some photos and posted them to flickr:
Within 24 hours I had translations, graciously supplied by Kenji (aka Tokyo Knock). People learning from other people can be a grand thing, and in this instance we have technology to thank for it.
Posted by Sharyn at 09:52 AM | Comments (0)
June 06, 2005
Broadband and Theory of the Lesiure Class
Jupiter Research predicts that by 2010, 8 out of 10 online homes will have broadband access. (Not 8 out of 10 homes.) The other notable prediction is that 73% of US households will be online by 2008.
With a conservative prediction of 3.3% growth over the next 3 years (not a statistician, so bear with me), the population is likely to be around 300,000,000. That means roughly 81,000,000 people, depending upon constitution of 'household' (27% of households) will NOT be online in 2008. And we know that this is predominantly a class divide.
I'm going back to my Veblen.
Posted by opperman at 12:07 PM | Comments (0)
May 12, 2005
Hipster PDA
I have a high-tech friend who has recently started going low-tech, a la Moleskins and the Hipster PDA (keeping oneself organized with colored index cards).
He's enamored with this this Moleskine hack -- I just love the idea of "hacking" a notebook.
So is this a backlash against PDAs and Crackberries, or just a passing fad? Time will tell, but I maintain that there is something nice about the tangible nature of pen and paper.
Posted by Meghan at 09:43 AM | Comments (0)
April 08, 2005
Yahoogle!
Even without the recent press comparing Yahoo to Google, I would have liked to think I do a fairly good job of keeping abreast of the latest features of both. I am unashamed about my infatuation with google, and Yahoo was my favorite portal way back in the far gone days of Netscape.
Certainly both companies have been the johnny come lately in one web-based service or another, but you've got to wonder how long Yahoo Research has been working on their new Yahoo 360, which I hate to point out looks a lot more like friendster or myspace than it does like livejournal or any other blogging service.
In comparison, Google Maps launched a feature recently that allows you to switch from street maps to satellite pictures with a single mouse click. My jaw to dropped at the bar this evening when I heard about it from a friend.
Google Labs finds an equivalent in Yahoo's recent Yahoo Next, both portal pages linking to various "beta" features and services from their respective corporations.
One site that takes a very simple visual approach to comparing the two search engines is worth linking in particular. (If you follow one link in this article, do this one... it's particularly fun to egosurf.)
Posted by Martin at 06:10 AM | Comments (0)
March 09, 2005
Web Graffiti
"Grafedia is a boundless, interactive publishing platform..." according to its creator. But it's not some obscure shareware download—you make Grafedia with a good ol' fashioned can of spray paint. Using any ahem, canvas, one deems appropriate, keywords are written in standard blue, underscored lettering. Viewers of the message can enter the link on their cellphone and find whatever content you've placed on the grafedia web site.
Kinda mysterious, kinda subversive...kinda fitting for the street art culture. Shows to go ya how different audiences/communities prefer to interact on the web.
Posted by Andy at 09:22 AM | Comments (1)