Monthly Archive for March, 2008

Facebook users: more and more in just four months

Published on March 16, 2008 in social computing, with 0 Comments. Tags: , , , .

I am currently doing some research for an analyst report at work, and I thought I might update my November findings of how many Facebook users there are.

The total is within the ballpark figures of total users (Mix08 panel indicates around 65million from memory) so listing seems fairly complete, with maybe less than million missing for small countries not listed.

I found some of the results impressive, especially given the user growth in less than four months- even in countries like the US and Australia which I'd thought would be peaking. Sweden appears to have a bit of Facebook fatigue with canceled accounts, and looks like fundamentalist Saudia Arabia has a bigger userbase then tech-savvy Russians showing.

facebook users march08 update

How to piss your customers off – a lesson courtesy from eBay

Published on March 16, 2008 in Business, with 0 Comments. Tags: , , , , .

I get e-mails from companies. Sometimes I request it; but on the whole I always tick the option "please do NOT send me promotional material". So when I receive e-mails from companies, I give them the benefit of the doubt that it was my error, although this is being extremely generous because I know I never allow them to send communications above what I need. The fact I am getting an e-mail from them already has me tense.

So if a company is going to send me promotional e-mails, I expect courtesy because they are taking up my time. Note to companies about how not to do it:

ebay

"...to change your communication preferences, log into eBay..." and click through the barrage of poor usability options to find that hidden box that allows you to stop being spammed. After all, a one click unsubscribe option or even a link of where you need to go makes it more likely that you would unsubscribe so we adopt of model of trying to discourage you, because we know most people haven't got the effort to action and would rather delete it than remove the sending from the source. Hey, marking us as 'spam' or deleting each incoming e-mail is a better option because the more numbers we have on our mailing list as 'receiving' the more it makes the marketing director feel all warm and fuzzy that we have distribution outlets for campaigns, even though we know you don't read them.

"Please note it may take us up to 10 business days to process your request" because it takes 10 microseconds to technologically do so but we are a bunch of losers who are going to hope you forgot you tried un-subscribing and will send follow up e-mails in that time hoping to win you back, because we refuse to accept we screwed up and have ruined our relationship with you".

Here’s a secret: the semantic web is the boring bit

Published on March 12, 2008 in semantic web, with 0 Comments. Tags: , , , , , .

Marshall Kirkpatrick caused a wave today, when he gave a brutally honest assessment of one of the most talked up semantic web applications, Twine. It was as per usual, an excellent analysis by Marshall and I don't think he needs to hide behind his words as they are fair. However, what I think is crucial is now that the semantic web is gaining traction into the mainstream from a academic thesis to real world web applications, is we do a little bit of stakeholder management.

Ready? The semantic web is as boring as bat shit.

Essentially, the semantic web is about structuring content in a way so that computers can interpret the information. It's a bit like linking every word on the web, to a dictionary entry so that computers understand the language that humans use.

But seriously, how is that exciting? People don't get the semantic web, because it's the fundamentals - and thats boring! Take for example RDF, the semantic web building block, and which is about structuring data into subject, predicate and object. This is straight from primary school grammar lessons, where we learn about the fundamentals of the English language (no coincidence I just linked to an grammar guide, not the RDF guide). And if you have heard of subject, predicate and object before in the context of the semantic web, you probably didn't even realise it's how the entire English language is based. It's because you probably did learn it, and forgot - it's boring as bat shit. But damn, without them, we wouldn't be communicating right now to each other.

The point I want to make, is that the building blocks are not where the excitement: the excitement, is what you can do once we have those building blocks. In English, we have poetry, literature, and just language in general where we communicate as human beings. Once we get the basics down of information, we are laying the foundation of a whole new world of computational possibilities. Marshall is spot on in saying "...semantics may be best suited to the back end..." because the excitement is what they enable, not the actual semantics itself which is going to take a long time to build up.

Imagine, the sum of human knowledge accessible by a computer to query? Semantic web applications are boring and you won't ever get them - but what they enable, is a whole new world of potential which once we can flick the switch, will mean a world we will barely recognise from today's standpoint.