Start your own social network

As a followup to a comment that I just wrote I want to say something about my view on creating a social network (or a site in general).

Since it's pretty easy to create a social network or user generated content site nowadays, I find lots of new sites in these areas. Many are pretty good, and some are less impressive. Since I am a very generous person I will share my views on creating a website.

1. Business or pleasure
Are your site meant to be for business usage or for pleasure? Focus on one of these fields - When I'm working, it's not likely that I (or my employer) want me to be distracted by to much fun, and when I'm not working I might want to be able to relax a bit and even show pictures of myself at a party - That I wouldn't do if business contacts where using the site.

2. Choose your target audience
You must have a legible target audience when you plan your site. Will your site appeal to the taste of everyone? Should it be a general site or are you targeting people with a special hobby or profession?

When you choose your target audience, try and choose one that includes you. If you're into comics, do something with comics. If you want your site to be successful you'll have to marry it for a few years, so try to select an area that you like or are interested in yourself.

3. Check the competition
I guess that you must have some ideas that is value adding to your audience. Unless you have a huge marketing budget or are very good at guerrilla marketing, it will be hard for you to reach your audience if you aren't doing something new and fresh.

4. Get something out there quick, and get feedback
Since you went to step four your site have a clear target audience, and it has enough new and interesting functionality to appeal to the audience.
Now communicate with your visitors and let them co-drive the development of the site.

Or ignore the steps and follow your intuition from start to end! Either you will have a good intuition, and then the site have a chance of becoming a success, or your intuition sucks and the "soccer and knitting site" isn't a big hit. If it's a hit, write me an email and thank me, if it's not, the site is a great showcase for future employers!

Any steps or thoughts you think I missed? ;-)

Widsets - back on my phone, I've missed it!

A while ago I installed Widsets on my cellphone, and I was a frequent user for a couple of months. Then I succeeded in hanging it by closing it at the wrong time. After that it hang my cellphone every time I tried to start it.

Well, even though I was a frequent user of widsets I started to use the Mobile Opera instead, which is the best mobile browser around, so I didn't reinstall the Widset app.

Now however, I reinstalled it for some reason, and man it is a great java app! Much better way to follow blogs and news feeds than through the Opera alternative.

So if you haven't already, give it a try, it fit my needs perfect and it's highly addictive!

When will a cool voip company team up with SocialUrl?

SocialUrl is a nice site for storing and handling your online identity. You fill in information about your existing social networks, so that your friends and visitors can see your full Internet identity (what's my name on Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, do I have a blog).
It's also a social network which is pretty fun. Reminds me of old "Who watches the Watchmen" comic. Will there be a social network where you can include you SocialUrl identity?
Also, apparently SocialUrl is a site driven by a couple of very nice college students. At least that's my impression from some conversation with their founders.

Anyway, except for the fact that it was fun that Linus "the social marketer" at Rebtel turned up on their first page when I created the screenshot above, it's an obvious and great idea behind SocialUrl. Looking at myself, I'm registered at many different networks and have lots of friends from different social contexts. I want a better overview of both my connections and my own profiles, and that, in some ways, is achieved with SocialUrl.

Another thing I would like to achieve is to reach my contacts and friends at the appropriate platform at every given time. If they are very active users on Facebook, and I want to send a postcard "hello, how are you these days", I want to send the message to Facebook. If I want to reach a person fast, it would be nice to know if it's phone, mobile text message, msn or email to use.
I want to use the right message type for each message context.

The coupling to Web2.0 voip services is obvious - Some of the people I know very well, some I don't know and many are abroud. To be able to store all my connections in one place, and make or receive "anonymous" calls from people I don't know, or public calls from people I know, is all possible with service like SocialUrl connected to the voip service. Most of the functionality exist already, as widgets for blogs or social networks, so it wouldn't take a to big effort to reach my Utopian communication ideas. You can even spell it in a three letter word - API.

So the conclusion is, work together with a network as SocialUrl or create an open API! That's right, you heard me. Create that open API now!

The possibilities for great communication are endless - the success factor in most cool startups is to what degree the startup can fulfil peoples need for communication!

Why I like Rebtel, Jajah, EQO and their likes!

I get a few recommendations on different voip operators now that I've written a couple of posts on web2.0 voip services. And I am impressed of both services and the ideas that companies as Rebtel, Jajah and EQO offers! I think like this:

• If it's possible, I want to do all my communication with my cellphone. I love java applications since it adds value to my cellphone usage, and also because the mobile browser is really crappy (well opera is pretty good, but my experience is that custom written java apps for mobiles is far better than a mobile web page).
  
• A unique number for every contact, that I can store in my ordinary contact list is the best way to make me happy!
  
• If mobile phones is not an option, or way more expensive than landlines, I'm willing to use my land line
  
• I think it's great to use web applications to set my preferences - It's easier that way than on a cellphone. Every tool should be used for what it's best at.
  
• I'm willing to use web applications to place calls if the price is much lower than that I get with a service where I don't have to use the web service.
  
• I like widgets where I can make it possible for people to reach me, without giving them my real phone number.
  
• I expect pretty OK sound quality from my calls.
  
• I don't want to download any new applications to my computer. Remember, I'm a web2.0 guy believing in the web application revolution. Actually, a downloadable executable will actually stop me from trying a service.
  
• I don't want to call with my computer. That means I need extra gadgets like headphones and microphones - I already have a phone for that.
  
• Value adding features are a great plus. A nice example of this is the Facebook app from Rebtel.
  
• I don't care about text message services
  
• Open API's would be cool - imagine all 3rd party solutions that would be created for you! But I haven't seen that yet.
  
• Ok, I lied about downloadable executables. I would try an app if it was an Adobe Air app.
  

What do you think? How do you think when it comes to services like these?

It's not a Volvo, but it's a hydrogen fueled car...

It's just an RC car, but it's hydrogen fueled. That's cool enough for me to post it on my blog. Will cars be hydrogen fueled by 2050?

Cool graphics create traffic...

This is yet another proof of the old saying "if you can make something look cool, it'll bring traffic to your site". This is a visualization of live data from a site named Scouta.com. I haven't visited the site, but I think it's a social network in Australia.

Though this has been done many times, people can't help but watching such videos. I for example found it over at most viewed on Viddler.com. So if you want to create traffic and to make your site a bit more well known, a pretty graph or a nice video of some data is a safe bet.

Over 400 Web2.0 API's

I found an amazing list of over 400 Web2.0 API's over at Tech Magazine. Have a look, it's an interesting read if you are into Web2.0.

To-Do list on Facebook

Dabble Do is a Facebook application for creating social to-do lists. It's a nice application, with all the features that you'd expect from a social to-do list.
With Dabble Do you can:

* Assign task to yourself or to a friend
* Check if your or friends tasks are completed
* Mark a task as completed
* Reject a task that someone assign to you
* Reassign a task to another friend

It's clean, simple and easy to use, and your tasks are presented in an intuitive manner so you know what to do. The only feature that I think is lacking is a pop up calendar so that you don't have to write date and time yourself. I hope they'll add that function later.

[Dabble Do Facebook link]

Personal Branding and User Generated Crappy Graphs

I've been a pretty frequent visitor at Brian Shaler's Crappy Graphs lately, it's an amusing site. Now Brian has released a app for you to create your own crappy graph. That's pretty fun, and of course I tried it out and the result is the graph above.

The function is purely for fun, just as the Crappy Graph site.

What is interesting is the purpose of the application and the Crappy Graph site overall. Brian seems to be exploring different ways of marketing himself and his work using social networks as Twitter, Pownce, Facebook and obviously conventional blogging, and I'd say he has proven himself to be quite successfull. For example, a Google search on "Brian Shaler" results in 220,000 hits and he has 7000 followers on twitter. According to Brian he started building his personal brand less than a year ago, so I must say he is a great example of what you can accomplish with some talant and determination.

So what is his underlying purpose for branding himself? His purposed contribution to an interactive festival this year is named "Internet Celebrity: An entrepeneur's Ace in the Hole". "Name recognition can make the difference between reaching your market and sinking into oblivion" he continues. So what web2.0 application will Brian launch?

I find this very interesting.

300 pages IPhone bill...

It turned out that it was the Justine featured below (ijustine.tv) that got the famous 300 pages IPhone bill last week. I also want to add that she seems like a really nice person, and that her videos are pretty good. But the life-airing is still a pretty interesting phenomena.

Internet is... interesting

Surfing around I happened to go to Viddler.com and they suggested I should watch the video above. So I did, and as you can see it's a women doing a mini chicken dance at a coffe shop, and it turned out that she's also broadcasting herself live on the Internet (ijustine.tv). Nothing really new with live web cams, but I've heard a lot about people airing their full life lately. I understand what's driving them to do so, which of course is the hope for fame, money and also some kind of narcissism, like your everyday very personal blog on steroids.

However, whereas a personal blog might be really interesting, watching someone work isn't. Well, obviously it is, but not to me. With a written blog the author can write down the quintessence of his or her thoughts, or even just that day's most interesting events. This obviously isn't happening when you go live 24/7, so who's watching it?

Some would say that just as the live video of someone typing is a bit meaningless and not as interesting as a written blog, the blog would be just as much worse than a magazine article, a novel or a book.
Services as twitter has shown that high frequency and short messages is somewhat favoured by some to in-depth articles when communication. The 24/7 web cam would be the extreme of this trend, since you have an infinite frequency (periodicity of 0) of messages with almost no content at all.

What might be even more interesting is that this as well is another side of the democratic Internet. [Prepare for something already written 1000 times before]
People can now reach the same fame, or product marketing, as only huge companies where able to create before the Internet.

Will "democratic" and not capital dictated fame last or is this just a beautiful and interesting phase of the Internet?

[Parentheses: The "plot" in some of Justine's videos happens to circle around IPhone. Either she was very excited about IPhone, or it's a lighter version of "Lindsay Lohan driving drunk while using her IPhone"-phenomena. Not that I think it's wrong to get an audience to your blog or personal TV-network, even if the methods sometimes are a little bit too obvious ;-)]

SonyEricsson, please let me customize my mobile!

I'm a big fan of Mobile2.0, I love testing new mobile [java] applications and I've even found a few of them really useful (Earth Beta, Gmail, Opera Mini and Widsets),.
I'm convinced that the future of the Internet is mobile.

I've tried a few different phones and for some reason ended up with a SonyEricsson Z610i. It's a phone of nice quality and it has pretty good features.

But what are SonyEricsson up to when it comes to customization?
When I install a new Java applet, I want to be able to make a direct shortcut to it and I want to be able to use any java applet as contact manager. Why isn't this possible?
Now my best choice is to make a shortcut to the program folder, and I end up with 6 clicks before reaching my favorite java application.

When I'm at it, I also want to be able to make my java application settings permanent so I don't get the "Do you give the program permission to communicate with the Internet" every time I start a program.

Anyone know how it works on Nokia or other phones?

I've added Rebtel's Facebook application!

And I think this might have a big impact on Rebtel! It's a great feature and I now I'm waiting for the Rebtel blog application.

I will try it out for a while and come back with a somewhat longer report of my Rebtel / Facebook experience. To find the Facebook application, just grab it on from my Facebook profile.

My first EQO.com experience

Now I've tested my EQO account a couple of times and my experience as a user is so far not very convincing:

* The sound quality is not very good. I've tried a large number of voip solutions earlier, and I'd say that EQO's sound quality place itself somewhere in the middle, not the worst quality, but certainly not the best.
* A few times the sound is breaking up. You probably know what I mean, if you are long time voip users.
* Calls has been disconnected a few times. There's a chance that the call termination has happened when my mobile looses contact with the EQO-site, but I don't really care, disconnected calls are not acceptable to me.
* EQO was really easy to install and it imported all contacts from my phone without any problems.
* It's easy to find and to use the contact list with EQO, they've done a great job there.
* The msn messenger client is really good! Far better than other [java based] clients that I've tried.
* The client looks very good!

So my conclusion so far is that the client is really good, but the quality of calls was disappointing.

Now, this is a first impression, so the overall impression might be different. What is your impression of EQO?

Update: Lego man is art!

Word on the web is that the Lego man is actually an installation by a dutch art group collective called "Du Fois". So the purpose of it might not just to create publicity, but also to do everything else that art is supposed to do.

I think it's the best art installation I've ever seen! Nicely done Du Fois!

Lego and a cool marketing stunt

Today my all time favorite toy was in the media, a giant Lego man was washed ashore to a beach in Netherlands. In press the word is that "no one knows where it came from" and that the Lego man is a great mystery.

On the Lego man's back there is a text "Ego Leonard" which happens to be the name of a website, egoleonard.com. The site is in dutch so I don't really know what it is about, but apparently the giant Lego man has visited dance festivals in the past.

Anyway, this is the perfect PR stunt, and the Lego man is all over the web. I'd love to come up with a similar idea and get my own 15 minutes of Internet fame! But when I do, I certainly will have an English translation of my website ;-)

EQO also had an entertaining blog!

EQO's official blog

It's pretty fun, one conclusion on the blog is that the optimal marketing campaign would be to dress up a drunk Lindsay Lohan as a cat, and have her driving around in a car. I don't know if EQO really want to be associated to drunk drivers, but I guess they want to be associated with Lindsay Lohan Drunk on Google ;-).

Anyway, it's a fun read, have a look at it.

EQO.com - it's crowded out there...

Once again a I was informed about another voip operator with Internet and Mobile applications.
This time it's EQO.com, which has a slightly different packaging and business model for the same technique as Rebtel, Jaxtr and Jajah.

As with the others, EQO gives you the opportunity to call friends abroad via a local number. You call EQO's number, they use voip-based calling for the country-to-country part, and uses a local number in the foreign country. That way they can keep rates lower than traditional operators, since traditional operators are well known to overcharge for international calls (just as they did with long distance calls until competing smaller firms offered low price long distance calls. After a while the traditional operators lowered the rates on long distance calls. Some of the competing smaller firms had by then become large enough to remain a competitor, some was bought by the larger companies, and some went out of business. It's market economy, guys ;-) ).

Anyway, EQO offers that service, and it does so through a java applet that you install on your cellphone. Once installed, the application will download your regular contact list from your phone to EQO, and you then make regular calls to your contacts. If the contact is in your country, the java applet will make a regular call to the contacts regular number. In that case, nothing else will happen than that you send and receive some data to the EQO service. If the contact is abroad, the applet will create a call to a local number that you get from EQO, and you are just charged for the local area phone call by your normal carrier, and for the international call by EQO. As in my case, when my local calls are free of charge, I will only be charged by EQO. That's pretty nice.

If your contact is also a registered EQO user and has the app started, the call will be free of charge! Nice one, EQO.
Some other nice features of EQO is that you can send text messages and go online to online messaging services as MSN, and that your contact list is stored at EQO.

The biggest advantage with EQO is that you don't need to learn any new numbers and that you don't need a computer to use their service.

So what's the downside? I'd say that the main disadvantage is that you need to download and run a special app in order to use the service, and that your friends has to do the same as well as having an EQO compatible phone, if you want to place totally free international calls.

I'd say that EQO is worth a try if you like mobile applications, but Rebtel, Jaxtr and Jajah is just as good choices.

Come back to this blog in a week or so, then I will have tried these different services and then I can say which service I prefer.

EQO.com

Jaxtr - Voip with a twist

After my previous post on Rebtel and Jajah Megan commented telling me to check Jaxtr out. So I did that today.
Jaxtr is pretty cool and they do most of the things that Rebtel and Jajah does.
Jaxtr functionality as far as I've understood:
* People can call you for free or at local call rates from all over the world (or at least from 51 countries)
* Your friends get a local number to call you that they can dial on any ordinary phone.
* Some free minutes each month to be called by anyone (in my case, with a swedish cellphone, 6 minutes)
* Friends on some social networks as Facebook and MySpace can call you from the site directly, and still use their regular phone.
* Visitors on your blog can call you using a similar widget, and you never need to show your phone number to the world.

So far it all sounds great, but the service has some downsides as well:
* You "pay" with Jaxtr credits when you receive calls to a regular phone or mobile phone.
* You get Jaxtr credits from recruiting friends to the service, or by simply buying them. Right now the buying process isn't fullt functional and I couldn't find any rates specified anywhere.

The people over at Jaxtr has done a really good job to make widget integration on your social networks easy, and it is also very easy to invite friends from different sources (as gmail and hotmail). I'm a bit impressed of that functionality, if I ever started a voip company, I would definitely try to make inviting and social network integration as easy.

I also like the thought of being able to be reached by readers or visitors without having to give away my own phonenumber. Right now I couldn't find a timefilter for that service, which might be a problem if you have readers in another country, I don't think I'd be fun to talk to in the middle of the night. On their infopage they wrote about the timefilter, so I guess they'll implement that function soon.

What I don't like about Jaxtr is the payment plan. I don't want to be charged for receiving calls, since I can't really control how much I am called (ok, I can filter people and point my Jaxtr account to a voicemail, but I can't control how high demand it will be for calling me).
I also don't like it that the service only works for a limited amount of time each month, if I don't recruit new members or pay cash. If I put a widget up on my facebook or on my blog, I want to be certain that anyone can call through the whole month.

It's a cool service worth checking out, obviously I have. Rebtel and Jajah fit my needs better than Jaxtr, but Jaxtr's focus on their widgets makes it an interesting service to follow.

Or what about a merger between Rebtel and Jaxtr? That would be really interesting as well.

Jajah vs Rebtel

I just found Jajah and just as Rebtel you can make cheap international phonecalls on using your regular phone, by using their Jajah's and Rebtel's websites.

With Rebtel, you save your contacts on their website, and you get a local number for each contact. Hence you only place local calls by using Rebtel. You can call for local rates, if your contact, after receiving your call, calls back to the local number Rebtel displays to him. I'd say the best thing with Rebtel is that you get a unique phone number for each contact that you can save on your cell for later use, and once you've done that you don't need the Internet in order to make a call, and you don't need any hard to remember long passwords either.
The main disadvantage with Rebtel is that your contact has to call you back, and you have to get them to learn that behaviour to get local rates when calling them.

With Jajah on the other hand, you always place your call via Jajah's website. When you've placed the call, your regular phone will call and when you answer your contact will be called as well. If both phones are landlines (not mobiles) the call will be really cheap, and if your contact is also a Jajah user the call will be for free!
The main advantage with Jajah is that you don't need to teach your contacts anything, their phone will call as usual. If you want the free of charge call you'll need to get them to register, and if your contact is over 40 that might be a pretty hard task.
The biggest disadvantage with Jajah is of course that you must place your call on their website. They have a good mobile version of their site, so that you can use it "on the fly" with your mobile phone, but I still think it's a pretty big disadvantage.

So who's the winner? Both services are good and I think it depends on why you make international calls. In my case, I only need to call a few people, so I will probably be able to make them register with Jajah. I'll then get free international calls, so Jajah will be the winner for me.
However, if I had a larger list of international contacts, I'd say Rebtel was the better one, since Rebtel gives me unique numbers for them.

So what is my conclusion? Rebtel and Jajah should both copy each other and compete with their Rates only. Then they should cooperate with soocial.com and make my life even easier!

(I hope it's not the same company, cause that would be embarrassing)

www.rebtel.com
www.jajah.com

Fun comment on another blog...

I visited Brian Shaler's blog "Crappy Graphs" and found this fun comment
:-)