Home / readwriteweb.com rss archive / September-10-2007


Technorati Launches New Feature, Taking on Techmeme?
Blog search engine Technorati today announced a new feature: topics. Topics is a river-of-news style aggregator of posts from top blogs in the areas of Entertainment, Technology, Politics, Sports, Business, and Life.According to Technorati, the topics feature was seeded with popular blogs that were chosen by taking into account a combination of "Technorati Authority, frequency of posting, use of relevant tags, links to related subject matter and general topicality."The topics page presents 10 stories in a continuous scroll, though it's unclear if they are the most recent from the pool of blogs or they are decided upon via some other mechanism. Reloading sometimes causes the scroll to back up to the beginning and the time stamp is oddly different on each topic (and as the screenshot below indicates, I'm not sure why today's new blog posts in the sports category were previews of games that happened over 24 hours ago).Unfortunately, Technorati's scroll of news moves so fast it...

Another Facebook Success Story: TravBuddy Hits 1 Million Users
Today TravBuddy, a social network built around travel, announced that it has hit the one million user mark. The network was launched in 2005, but over the past six months has seen its membership grow 100 fold. Why the big increase? One reason is clear: Facebook.In May, TravBuddy launched an a Facebook app called the TravBuddy.com Countries Visited Map, which lets users put a flash map on their profiles displaying which countries they've visited. The app has just under 500,000 users, all of which have signed up for an account on TravBuddy as well.TravBuddy's Facebook app ranks 4th for most active users among applications in the travel section with nearly 10,000 users logging in daily. But does that activity on Facebook translate to activity on the TravBuddy web site? Or does it even matter?It's hard to tell if TravBuddy's Facebook users are making the jump to the site itself, but my money is that most of them aren't. Of the site's 1 million users, just 13,000 travel blogs...

Microsoft Issues 10 Reasons Why Enterprises Shouldn't Use Google Apps
Up till now, Microsoft has been very quiet about the nascent Web Office threat from Google. But today, in response to the news that IT systems consultancy CapGemini has partnered with Google to sell Google Apps Premier Edition (GAPE) to enterprises, Microsoft issued an email listing 10 reasons why enterprises shouldn't use Google Apps. The email was first published by Mary Jo Foley, who says it was an unsolicited email from a Microsoft "corporate spokesperson". The 10 reasons make for fascinating reading - and show just how concerned Microsoft really is about not only Google Apps, but Web Office in general. Here is a copy of the email list: 1. Google touts having enterprise level customers but how many USERS of their applications truly exist within the enterprise? 2. Google has a history of releasing incomplete products, calling them beta software, and issuing updates on a known only to Google schedule this flies in the face of what enterprises...

ajaxWindows Web OS Officially Launches
Ajax13, the makers of a web application suite that includes ajaxWrite, ajaxPresents, ajaxSketch, ajaxXLS, and ajaxTunes, today officially released their web operating system, ajaxWindows.ajaxWindows is a full featured web OS deployed in a browser window using JavaScript. It has a familiar Windows like desktop feel, complete with a task bar, start menu, and desktop icons. It acts as a launcher for many popular web 2.0 sites and applications -- and lets you add menu or desktop icons for each. It also supports a range of desktop widgets and all of Ajax13's applications operate natively.ajaxWindows can probably be looked at as a pretty launcher for its suite of apps, which ties their web office suite together (I say web office, because it includes mostly office-type apps, but they do offer a simple drawing program and a music player app -- both of which technically fall outside the definition of web office).Because the only apps that ajaxWindows supports natively are the ones...

Google Sued for Sponsored Search Ads
Google is being sued in an Australian court for "potentially misleading consumers," reports News.com.au. At issue are the sponsored ad spots Google sells at the top of some search results above the first organic result. The Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) alleges that Google has encouraged deceptive practices among businesses by selling the advertising in that top position on its search results pages, while telling consumers that its results are organic.Specifically, the ACCC names online car dealership Trading Post, which purchased sponsored ads on Google in 2005 for search results relating to searches for the names of other New South Wales car dealerships. The ACCC argues that by using the name of those dealerships in their ads, the Trading Post links appeared to point to the official dealership web sites or implied an affiliation that did not exist. The ACCC alleges that this is a breach of Australia's Trade Practices Law.The judge in the case was...

How To Bootstrap Your Startup
The first in a series of posts about how to run a startup and develop a product, written by guest author Matt Rogers of Aroxo - a person-to-person trading exchange for consumer electronics, computer gear, whitegoods, and more.The aim of many entrepreneurs is to take a business idea and convert it into a professional and functioning business on a low budget. This is typically called “bootstrapping” and it is fraught with potential pitfalls and dangers. But when done well it can really help get a company going fast, professionally and without the founders having to give up much (if any) equity - or bankrupting themselves.Over the next 5-6 posts Ill outline the process which Ive now followed at several corporates and which Ive honed to work with my own startup, Aroxo. Ill discuss what skills youll need, how to write your requirements, how to source developers and designers, how much to budget, how to agree a development contract, how to manage your vendors,...

Google Apps Goes After Enterprise Market - "Team Productivity" The Catchphrase
UK newspaper The Guardian is reporting that Google has partnered with major IT consultancy and outsourcing specialist CapGemini, to sell Google Apps to enterprises. CapGemini, which is also a partner of Microsoft and IBM, will keep the $50 per user fee that Google charges for Google Apps Premier Edition. They will also make money off services. CapGemini currently manages about a million desktops for corporate clients.Interestingly, CapGemini's strategy is to "mix and match" Microsoft and Google office products - so it seems Google Apps will be a complement, moreso than a replacement, for Microsoft Office. Google too seems to be pushing the complement line. Robert Whiteside, Google enterprise manager for UK and Ireland, is quoted as saying: "If you look at the traditional desktop it is very focused on personal productivity. What Google Apps brings is team productivity."Nick Carr has some more info on this news. He spoke to Steve Jones, a Capgemini outsourcing executive, who told...