Web 2.0 Winners and Losers
By Michael Calore
| 
Also by this reporter
02:00 AM Sep, 20, 2006
A few weeks ago, I implored readers of the Monkey Bites blog to sumbit their votes for the best and worst Web 2.0 sites out there.
I asked them to build a list of their own can't-live-without-it and oh-please-make-it-stop destinations. After tallying up the votes from our readers, I posted the people's choice list on Monkey Bites blog. With their picks in mind, I set out to build my own roster.
There are plenty of good ideas in the Web 2.0 world, and an even greater number of bad ones. In the interest of brevity, I've chosen five sites from each category. The web services industry certainly has more than five winners and five losers, so we've only highlighted the exemplars.
I visited the very top of the iceberg and descended all the way down into the depths of suckitude to compile this list. Enjoy the results.
First, the Winners.
Flickr
A picture is worth 1,000 tags. I've known for a long time that if you want to demonstrate what tagging is all about to somebody who's new to Web 2.0, just send them to Flickr. The photo-sharing site has the best application of semantic categorization on the web. This is because they ask a question that invites creativity: What words would you use to describe a photo? The setup also makes searching the site a breeze.
Other things Flickr gets right: enhancing the community through pools, clusters and groups; options to preserve rights through Creative Commons; free and pro accounts; the open API.
Odeo
Listen up. When podcasting arrived, everyone wanted in on the game. All you needed to get started was a microphone, some audio editing software, a web server, knowledge of peak limiting, compression, EQ techniques ... Ouch. Then Odeo breezed in and de-mystified the podcast.
Odeo allows users to record and share audio using simple, browser-based tools. A browser with Flash installed, an internet connection and a microphone are all you need to start podcasting. The site has tools for sharing and managing audio feeds, an extensive podcast directory and a contact manager that facilitates sharing audio between friends. The company even offers a component that gives mobile users the ability to record a podcast from their mobile phone.
Writely
Who needs MS Word? The big, groundbreaking idea behind Web 2.0 is that the web should and will take over application hosting duties from the desktop. In other words, all of your documents, contacts, lists, e-mails and -- most importantly -- your office productivity tools live on the internet. They're all available no matter where you are or whose computer you're using.
Writely is a word processor that runs in the browser. It offers everything you'd expect from a word processor, including spell check, extensive formatting capability and support for dropping in images. Writely also makes it easy to collaborate with others. Your colleagues can log in and edit a document you started. Users can also collaborate over e-mail, and then publish the results to a blog when they're done. And, yep, it's free.
del.icio.us
Where'd I put that link? Without del.icio.us, I'd be drowning in a morass of bookmark clutter. Seriously, drowning. Every article I've saved for later, every YouTube video I've earmarked for repeat viewing, every cache of free MP3s, every (ahem) NSFW page I come across. It all gets posted to del.icio.us. It's truly a lifesaver.
Del.icio.us takes a while to catch on with some people (what is "social bookmark sharing" anyway?) but once they get the hang of it, they're hooked. One-click posting from the browser bookmark bar, the ability to peek at what your friends are reading and the crazy stuff you find by running tag searches all add up to a truly useful web app. Not to mention the API that gives you RSS feeds, blog posting functionality and import/export capability between del.icio.us and your browser. I'll never lose a webpage again.
NetVibes
Start here. Remember start pages? Those portal-riffic pages that displayed local weather, news, daily horoscopes and sports scores were last seen in vast numbers circa 1999. But with the explosion of RSS and Ajax, a smarter breed of start page has emerged -- and the king of the hill is NetVibes. The Parisian company has created an aggregation tool that lets each user create a personalized page that pulls news feeds and data from web services into modular boxes. The boxes update automatically, and their display options are totally customizable.
NetVibes is built for nine languages. Users can pull in any RSS feed on the web, as well as Flickr photos, Alexa charts, to-do lists, Writely documents and shared calendars. There are even interfaces for webmail services like Gmail and Yahoo Mail. And, unless you want to access your personalized start page from another computer, no user registration is required. Trs bon.
And now, the Losers.
MySpace
No thanks for the ad. They say 100 million users can't be wrong. Well, can't they? Regardless of how popular MySpace is or how many bands, web celebs or stalkers it continues to empower and enable, the social networking site is about as pleasant to look at as last week's cat vomit. The user interface is clunky and counterintuitive. Advertising is ubiquitous and invasive. The garish backgrounds and animated images seem sucked from some terrible time portal that leads straight to the nascent web of 1995. Oh, and auto-launching audio widgets and video players? Don't get me started.
Unfortunately, MySpace is going to be around for a while, so we'd better all get used to it -- or build something better and get everyone to switch.
Squidoo
Advice 5 cents. If you're an expert on some obscure topic, you should be able to use that knowledge to gain fame and notoriety -- and maybe make a little bit of dough in the process. That's the idea behind Squidoo. It's a community site that encourages experts create a "lens," or a page that concentrates on a single topic.
The Lensmasters, as they are known, point curious users to resources on the web about their topic of expertise, giving topical search a more human touch. The Lensmasters earn royalties in the process through Squidoo's revenue sharing program. Sounds pretty revolutionary, except that the Lensmasters don't point you to anything that you can't find on Google. Some of the Lensmasters do a good job, but a number of the lenses are just glorified ads and many are bogged down by opinionated writing.
The bulk of the lenses on Squidoo are made up a few sentences written by the Lensmaster, followed by a dozen or so ads for books and CDs from Amazon. And, as TechCrunch points out, the best Lensmasters are only receiving about $30 per month for their work, much less than they could be making if they started their own blog and pulled in AdSense ads.
Browzar
Huckzter. Upon its release in late August 2006, this new web browser promised the most secure browsing experience possible. Browzar purportedly kept your browsing secret by covering all of your tracks. The application wouldn't keep a history or cache, it deleted cookies and didn't record form or search data, according to Freeserve founder Ajaz Ahmed, Browzar's creator.
The blogosphere gave Browzar a glowing review, even though it was a little clunky and only worked in Windows. Then, a few days later, reports started showing up about Browzar's inability to completely delete page caches or browsing history. It was a lemon. And just in case that wasn't enough, it pushed users to its own branded search page full of contextual ads. No cookie for you, Browzar.
Fo.rtuito.us
Gimme.a.break Fo.rtuito.us turns the social networking model on its head. Instead of relying on the traditional social software experience where you connect with people you already know or bond with strangers over common interests, Fo.rtuito.us delivers a total stranger, chosen at random, to your virtual doorstep.
You interact with that person for four days, discussing interests, sharing ideas and generally getting to know them. Then, you decide whether you have enough in common to actually be their friend and offer them the prize of adding them to your network.
It's an interesting idea, but it never took off. Even if you ignore the silly del.icio.us rip-off URL, you can't ignore the fact that traffic to the site has almost totally flatlined. What good is a social network that nobody uses?
Friendster
Tipped scalability. Friendster was the original social networking golden child. When it first arrived, it was the coolest thing in the universe -- everyone just had to run to the site and set up a page. In fact, everyone did, and Friendster wasn't ready for its newfound popularity.
As the site's traffic grew and grew, page loads ground to a halt. People stopped going to Friendster, but they had already tasted the joys of online social networks. So, when the new kid on the block (MySpace) showed up and offered them a site with the same functionality that didn't timeout during the login process, the masses bailed. And the rest is history.
By Michael Calore | Also by this reporter
02:00 AM Sep, 20, 2006
A few weeks ago, I implored readers of the Monkey Bites blog to sumbit their votes for the best and worst Web 2.0 sites out there.
I asked them to build a list of their own can't-live-without-it and oh-please-make-it-stop destinations. After tallying up the votes from our readers, I posted the people's choice list on Monkey Bites blog. With their picks in mind, I set out to build my own roster.
There are plenty of good ideas in the Web 2.0 world, and an even greater number of bad ones. In the interest of brevity, I've chosen five sites from each category. The web services industry certainly has more than five winners and five losers, so we've only highlighted the exemplars.
I visited the very top of the iceberg and descended all the way down into the depths of suckitude to compile this list. Enjoy the results.
First, the Winners.
A picture is worth 1,000 tags.
I've known for a long time that if you want to demonstrate what tagging is all about to somebody who's new to Web 2.0, just send them to Flickr. The photo-sharing site has the best application of semantic categorization on the web. This is because they ask a question that invites creativity: What words would you use to describe a photo? The setup also makes searching the site a breeze.
Other things Flickr gets right: enhancing the community through pools, clusters and groups; options to preserve rights through Creative Commons; free and pro accounts; the open API.
Listen up.
When podcasting arrived, everyone wanted in on the game. All you needed to get started was a microphone, some audio editing software, a web server, knowledge of peak limiting, compression, EQ techniques ... Ouch. Then Odeo breezed in and de-mystified the podcast.
Odeo allows users to record and share audio using simple, browser-based tools. A browser with Flash installed, an internet connection and a microphone are all you need to start podcasting. The site has tools for sharing and managing audio feeds, an extensive podcast directory and a contact manager that facilitates sharing audio between friends. The company even offers a component that gives mobile users the ability to record a podcast from their mobile phone.
Who needs MS Word?
The big, groundbreaking idea behind Web 2.0 is that the web should and will take over application hosting duties from the desktop. In other words, all of your documents, contacts, lists, e-mails and -- most importantly -- your office productivity tools live on the internet. They're all available no matter where you are or whose computer you're using.
Writely is a word processor that runs in the browser. It offers everything you'd expect from a word processor, including spell check, extensive formatting capability and support for dropping in images. Writely also makes it easy to collaborate with others. Your colleagues can log in and edit a document you started. Users can also collaborate over e-mail, and then publish the results to a blog when they're done. And, yep, it's free.
Where'd I put that link?
Without del.icio.us, I'd be drowning in a morass of bookmark clutter. Seriously, drowning. Every article I've saved for later, every YouTube video I've earmarked for repeat viewing, every cache of free MP3s, every (ahem) NSFW page I come across. It all gets posted to del.icio.us. It's truly a lifesaver.
Del.icio.us takes a while to catch on with some people (what is "social bookmark sharing" anyway?) but once they get the hang of it, they're hooked. One-click posting from the browser bookmark bar, the ability to peek at what your friends are reading and the crazy stuff you find by running tag searches all add up to a truly useful web app. Not to mention the API that gives you RSS feeds, blog posting functionality and import/export capability between del.icio.us and your browser. I'll never lose a webpage again.
Start here.
Remember start pages? Those portal-riffic pages that displayed local weather, news, daily horoscopes and sports scores were last seen in vast numbers circa 1999. But with the explosion of RSS and Ajax, a smarter breed of start page has emerged -- and the king of the hill is NetVibes. The Parisian company has created an aggregation tool that lets each user create a personalized page that pulls news feeds and data from web services into modular boxes. The boxes update automatically, and their display options are totally customizable.
NetVibes is built for nine languages. Users can pull in any RSS feed on the web, as well as Flickr photos, Alexa charts, to-do lists, Writely documents and shared calendars. There are even interfaces for webmail services like Gmail and Yahoo Mail. And, unless you want to access your personalized start page from another computer, no user registration is required. Trs bon.
And now, the Losers.
No thanks for the ad.
They say 100 million users can't be wrong. Well, can't they? Regardless of how popular MySpace is or how many bands, web celebs or stalkers it continues to empower and enable, the social networking site is about as pleasant to look at as last week's cat vomit. The user interface is clunky and counterintuitive. Advertising is ubiquitous and invasive. The garish backgrounds and animated images seem sucked from some terrible time portal that leads straight to the nascent web of 1995. Oh, and auto-launching audio widgets and video players? Don't get me started.
Unfortunately, MySpace is going to be around for a while, so we'd better all get used to it -- or build something better and get everyone to switch.
Advice 5 cents.
If you're an expert on some obscure topic, you should be able to use that knowledge to gain fame and notoriety -- and maybe make a little bit of dough in the process. That's the idea behind Squidoo. It's a community site that encourages experts create a "lens," or a page that concentrates on a single topic.
The Lensmasters, as they are known, point curious users to resources on the web about their topic of expertise, giving topical search a more human touch. The Lensmasters earn royalties in the process through Squidoo's revenue sharing program. Sounds pretty revolutionary, except that the Lensmasters don't point you to anything that you can't find on Google. Some of the Lensmasters do a good job, but a number of the lenses are just glorified ads and many are bogged down by opinionated writing.
The bulk of the lenses on Squidoo are made up a few sentences written by the Lensmaster, followed by a dozen or so ads for books and CDs from Amazon. And, as TechCrunch points out, the best Lensmasters are only receiving about $30 per month for their work, much less than they could be making if they started their own blog and pulled in AdSense ads.
Huckzter.
Upon its release in late August 2006, this new web browser promised the most secure browsing experience possible. Browzar purportedly kept your browsing secret by covering all of your tracks. The application wouldn't keep a history or cache, it deleted cookies and didn't record form or search data, according to Freeserve founder Ajaz Ahmed, Browzar's creator.
The blogosphere gave Browzar a glowing review, even though it was a little clunky and only worked in Windows. Then, a few days later, reports started showing up about Browzar's inability to completely delete page caches or browsing history. It was a lemon. And just in case that wasn't enough, it pushed users to its own branded search page full of contextual ads. No cookie for you, Browzar.
Gimme.a.break
Fo.rtuito.us turns the social networking model on its head. Instead of relying on the traditional social software experience where you connect with people you already know or bond with strangers over common interests, Fo.rtuito.us delivers a total stranger, chosen at random, to your virtual doorstep.
You interact with that person for four days, discussing interests, sharing ideas and generally getting to know them. Then, you decide whether you have enough in common to actually be their friend and offer them the prize of adding them to your network.
It's an interesting idea, but it never took off. Even if you ignore the silly del.icio.us rip-off URL, you can't ignore the fact that traffic to the site has almost totally flatlined. What good is a social network that nobody uses?
Tipped scalability.
Friendster was the original social networking golden child. When it first arrived, it was the coolest thing in the universe -- everyone just had to run to the site and set up a page. In fact, everyone did, and Friendster wasn't ready for its newfound popularity.
As the site's traffic grew and grew, page loads ground to a halt. People stopped going to Friendster, but they had already tasted the joys of online social networks. So, when the new kid on the block (MySpace) showed up and offered them a site with the same functionality that didn't timeout during the login process, the masses bailed. And the rest is history.
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