The next phase of the Internet will be about creating value from the WOW (Wide Open Web)

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So far the primary theme of the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco seems to be openness and APIs (Application Programming Interfaces), which I defined in our Web 2.0 Framework as “A defined interface to a computer application or database that allows access by other applications.” Web companies new and old are announcing APIs that provide access to the data that resides on their site.

ReadWriteWeb writes about the next frontier after ubiquitous APIs, an interview of Web 2.0 keynoter Max Levchin focuses on the implications of APIs on every application, and Tim O’Reilly in his keynote says that the paradox is that applications built on open, decentralized networks are leading to new concentrations of power.

In the last weeks I’ve been looking across what is available on APIs, and it is quite extraordinary. Driven significantly by the impetus of Google’s leadership, over the last couple of years the industry has taken a massive turn towards openness, making it hard to run online initiatives any other way.

I am finding myself completely staggered by the possibilities. There are so many ways that this vast trove of information can be used in new and innovative applications. ReadWriteWeb’s article provides a list of the ways APIs can be used. Some of the promising areas I see include:

Content aggregation. Despite the existing proliferation of blog and feed aggregators, there are many more opportunities to create highly specialized content aggregators, bringing together the web’s most relevant content in niche domains.

Collaborative filtering. The richness of information about people’s content preferences available from something like FriendFeed (or the individual feeds that go into it) make it possible to correlate taste across media and genres.

Latent social networks: Suggesting friends or connections based not just on profile or musical tastes, but an integrated view of preferences and activities. This could be particularly powerful in dating.

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Is one web ratings black box better than another black box? Why should we believe Alexa is better?

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Alexa, the Amazon.com subsidiarywhich provides website traffic and rankings information, has just announced it has revamped its rankings system. Since I have the Alexa toolbar installed in my browser, which shows the ranking of whichever website you’re currently looking at, I actually noticed this morning that the rankings were changing. Techcrunch reports that the change has downrated many technology blogs. It has actually increased the ranking for this blog by about one third.

However the announcement gives absolutely no information on how the ranking is calculated or the sources used. There are bold, completely unsubstantiated claims:

– MORE SOURCES: Alexa rankings are now based on more sources of data to give a better indicator of website popularity

– BETTER RANKINGS: The rankings are an even better indication of website popularity due to new and improved algorithms

Alexa has been much criticized for the inaccuracy of its rankings system, which until now has relied entirely on picking up the web browsing activities of those who have installed its toolbar. This is a skewed population, and there are various ways to game the system.

While I don’t necessarily expect Alexa to reveal its exact algorithms, I think people would be far more likely to have confidence in its measures if it gave at least some indication of what the new sources are, or what they look like, or what changes to the algorithm were made. In fact we know less now about how the Alexa rankings are compiled than we did before. Alexa think they’re better. I guess I think they’re better, since I’m ranked higher. But why should anyone else believe they’re better? Tell us please, oh Alexa, just something that supports your claims that Alexa is improved…

Techcrunch donates party proceeds to DataPortability and OpenID

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Techcrunch’s Geek goes Chic party in LA last night attracted 2,100 people, which is probably the biggest gathering of well-dressed geeks in history. Techcrunch divided the $13,000 raised in ticket sales ($10 each for the 1,300 who weren’t cool enough to be on the guest list) to DataPortability and OpenID. Michael Arrington has been a big supporter of these initiatives, which has the potential to create a more open web that is far more valuable and useful. The money will be used to create benefit to the community.

In other DataPortability news, the 15 finalist logos from their logo competition I wrote about recently are now up. My favorite is below – anyone can vote so go check them out.

The evolution of blog ranking mechanisms (Trends in the Living Networks ranked #549 by Wikio)

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Wikio represents the new breed of media and blog aggregation, bringing together a range of features to improve access to breaking news. It includes the top-ranked breaking news, top blog stories, latest stories and conversations in 16 categories, and a shopping section featuring the most popular products, with user rating of stories. The founder Pierre Chapaz has described Wikio as “Google News meeting Technorati meeting Digg”.

The company is based in Luxembourg and until recently has had a primarily European audience – it is particularly popular in Italy and France. It officially launched in the US in December, with Mashable at the time calling it the Rolls Royce of MemeTrackers.

Wikio has had a swift development path, regularly adding new features. The latest is a ranking of the top blogs, overall and by category. Certainly the site that Wikio is most comparable with is Technorati, the original and once predominant blog search engine. While it is still the reference blog search engine, it has been losing presence primarily to Google Blogsearch, though other blog search engines include Ask Blogsearch, Icerocket, and Blogdigger. As importantly, attention has been shifting somewhat from blogs to Twitter and other conversations.

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The many layers of collaborative filtering – news and entertainment comes to us

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For the last ten years I have believed that collaborative filtering will be one of the most fundamental platforms for business and society. In a world of massively increasing information overload, the only way we will cope is to collaborate to filter what will be most relevant to us. Early this decade I was finding myself very surprised by how slow progress had been over the last five years, despite some interesting research and initiatives. However the last five years on the Internet could almost be characterized as the rise of collaborative filtering. Our Web 2.0 Framework is in a sense a description of how we collectively filter information. Almost all the significant developments on the web I would interpret as related to this evolution of collaborative filtering.

An article out a few days ago in the New York Times titled Finding Political News Online, The Young Pass It On described how young people share political news they are interested in by email and on social networks. In the same way, many young people primarily read articles that has found them in this way. In short:

“..they rely on friends and online connections for news to come to them. In essence, they are replacing the professional filter — reading The Washington Post, clicking on CNN.com — with a social one.”

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Device convergence in our pockets

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An interesting article in the Sydney Morning Herald titled Is that a computer in your pocket? examines how mobile phones, PDAs, portable computers and more are converging. It quotes me as follows:

According to Ross Dawson, chairman of the Future Networks think tank, other obstacles will also frustrate users looking for a portable mobile computing solution. The first is the limitation of existing small screen technologies to give a satisfying viewing experience. The second is the need for a more efficient means of inputting data on the device or through accessories such as fold-away keyboards.

He adds that the usability of a mobile for computing functions is also dependent on whether you must hold it to your ear or not.

“When you do that you cannot see it. Although more people are using ear buds or Bluetooth, they are still the minority. If you are making appointments when speaking to someone you need to have a separate interface”.

While there are many issues at play here, the interfaces to mobile devices are probably the most important factor in how they will be used in the future. I’ve written before about the role of video glasses and portable displays in making mobile devices more embedded in our lives. Similar issues of interfaces and immersion apply in home entertainment and living online.

I absolutely believe that mobile devices will be central to our lives and even entertainment, however first the interfaces for input and output must become seamless and compelling. The current generation of mobile devices and peripherals is on the verge of that becoming reality.

Trends in the Living Networks has been Slashdotted…

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The recent Slate article on the future of libraries, together with the Extinction Timeline referred to in the piece, have been slashdotted.

For those not familiar with this term, Slashdot was the first of the user filtered websites, and has always proudly sported the moniker “News for Nerds”. When I wrote about it in my 2002 book Living Networks, it was already a focus for the technology community in finding out what was hot news. To be “slashdotted” meant to be linked to from Slashdot, and the massive ensuing traffic often resulted in servers crashing.

Today servers and bandwidth are far more solid, so sites are less likely to fall over. Moreover, attention has shifted to the new generation of user filtered websites and services such as Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, and many more. However Slashdot still has a devoted following in the tech community, it remains a great source for what is important, interesting, and quirky, and it still gives a massive boost to traffic.

Startups carnival 2008 – judging the next generation of startups

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The energetic Vishal Sharma of VS Consulting Group is running a Startups Carnival over the next two weeks, bringing together a promising field of Australian technology startups. I am a judge for the carnival, together with Justin Davies, and Duncan Riley of Techcrunch fame – bios for the three of us are here.

Detailed applications from 23 Australian startups giving insights into their strategy and situation have been received – the full list is here. I’ll keep you posted on some of the insights and results.

Logo competition for DataPortability.org: how to get the best

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I love this kind of thinking. DataPortability.org, the extremely important web initiative I have written about before, needs a logo. Redhat claims that its existing logo is too similar to theirs.

Chris Saad, the chair of DataPortability.org, has launched an open competition to design the new logo, with the winner determined by open voting on the web from a short list selected by the steering group. This being a highly prominent initiative that is potentially enormously valuable to the whole ‘net community should attract some talented people. However Chris has also got a whole host of prominent people and companies who support the initiative to kick in prizes, to in fact make this a very attractive proposition to the winner. Prizes currently offered (with more continuing to come in) include:

dplogos.jpg

Initial submisssions

Current prize list:

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New Australian broadband chip could change media distribution and home entertainment

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The Sydney Morning Herald reports that NICTA – Australia’s peak national technology research and commercialization body – has developed a new chip which could have a significant impact on the technology and media field.

The key features of the chip are:

* Very fast: 5Gbps (an HD movie in seconds)

* Short range: Up to 10 meters

* Small: 5mm by 5mm chip

* Inexpensive: Less than $9 in mass production

* Low power: Uses less than 2 watts

* Uses 60Ghz spectrum: faster and less crowded

* Out soon: available in one year

* Cute name: GiFi

A few of the potential applications:

* Download an HD movie (or any other content) to a mobile phone or PDA at a kiosk on your way home, then transfer it to your home entertainment system

* Link all your home devices, including PC and home entertainment so every device has access to the Internet and content can be transferred between devices and across rooms.

* Modular PCs, with CPU, screen, keyboards, drives, mouse all separate devices.

Just two days ago GigaOM wrote about the potential of using 60GHz spectrum and some of the obstacles. It seems that the Australian team has nailed them. GigaOM now says: “I’m impressed,” and also points to similar efforts from Vubiq and SiBeam.

I’m looking forward to this technology being available. Let’s forget Megabits per second and start talking Gigabits per second.