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Sheldon Steiger › Likes
Gillmor Gang 12.03.09 - http://gillmorgang.techcrunch.com/2009...
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Kathleen Hassinger, Sheldon Steiger, alexandere and Laura Norvig liked this
The Gillmor Gang — Doc Searls, Michael Arrington, Kevin Marks, Robert Scoble, and Dan Farber — rake Comcast and Microsoft over the HTML 5 coals. Recorded live, Thursday, December 3, 2009.
- Steve Gillmor
Just returned from a little potato peeling party for a soup kitchen's presentation of T-day dinner tomorrow. Good to be of service.
Admiral Anika and Sheldon Steiger liked this
good on you for doing it! one of the good guys, you are.
- Karoli
I got tired of trying to take a decent, respectable, trustworthy, don't-look-stupid profile pic for my employment sites. So I took a MySpace-y photo to say hi to FriendFeed instead. Hi!
Jimminy Fuller, phil baumann, Charlie Anzman and 150 other people liked this
OH HAI
- tinypants - Hagitha of FF
Things I note in this picture: the "MySpace angle" makes my eyes look baggy. And it's time for a haircut, though perhaps I'll cheap out and just have someone gimme some bangs.
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
What's wrong with your Friendfeed picture? The seriousness gives a touch of personality.
- Jordi Soler
you have a very sexy and intense look to you. Your eyes are way intense-in a very good way....
- Morgan Haley
I'm not trying to replace my FF profile pic, Jordi. I'm trying to get a decent new pic for my 'official' profiles used in my job search. Right now they have the default goofy face (which is better than most of the shots I took, trust me!).
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
And Morgan, that's my "I DARE YOU to ask me to sell insurance!!!" look. Well, almost: I'm missing the snarl.
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
Hi there, how YOU doin'?
- jcunwired
hi!!
- Eric @ CSTechcast.com
For official profiles try one with glasses on (fake glasses if you don't use 'em). The sexy-dirty-secretary look is a winner!
- Jordi Soler
LOL! Jordi, that was the problem with the pics I took: I had my glasses on and either kept getting reflections in the lenses or inadvertantly crossing that dirty secretary look. Not what I wanted!
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
i wouldn't dare try to sell you insurance....no way....but a rice cooker? Hmmm, maybe I'll try...
- Morgan Haley
Hi, Tina. :)
- Josh Haley
from iPhone
The proper profile pic is important! The pic on my LinkedIn page is NOTHING like any of my other profile pics. I think you did a great job.
- ‘-.-’ Tutivillus Grift
Puuuuurdy!
- MVB (Curmudgeon of FF)
I'm still without the proper profile pic, Tutivillus. This was me giving up and taking a shot for FF since the profile shots all made me look like a doofus. I are not a doofus! Wait...
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
*swoon*
- Derrick
Derrick, you just love me for my kitchen magic. And I am AOK with that!
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
...cool, a Tina sighting! ;-)
- .LAG liked that
holy crap. so so so pretty.
- Bren -- feeling merry
this is way too awesome to be myspace-y.
- Jim in Real Time
Tina, if you can get your hands on a polarized filter for you camera, that'll solve your reflection problem with your glasses.
- Jason Huebel
I'd say that's like 4 on the richter scale of MySpacey photos :)
- anna sauce
I know, Jason, but the polarizing filter I have isn't for the camera I have. If I had a job I'd buy a new one, but then I wouldn't need the filter to take the picture if I had a job. Catch 22s suck...
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
no,no,no...no hair cut! :)
- ovigia
nice
- ffcode
I still don't have a pic on LinkedIn. Tina, I'm no photographer, but I bet if you had a little fill light you could de-emphasize the bags under the eyes. (I notice this with myself, because I am incredibly vain. And have giant bags under my eyes, even if I have enough sleep, etc etc)
- Andrew C
I'd say raise up your chin a tad, sit up straight, and place the camera on a pile of books with a liht source- lamp, etc. eye level and off to the side. It would lessen the bags and make it a little less MySpacey, also think of something funny and don't worry about averting your eyes. This is really done best by someone else- it's *so hard* to take a good self-portrait.
- anna sauce
OT, but how come FB doesn't have a portrait "style" like Myspace does?
- Andrew C
Andrew- it does, it's called "me and my kids" or "just my kids" or "me in foriegn country" or "me with a girl/boy cut out because we broke up" lol
- anna sauce
The picture I use practically everywhere is from my brother's wedding reception. I cropped out the Black and Tan beer I was drinking. That wouldn't be very professional. ;-)
- Jason Huebel
Wow, that's uncanny. You and I share no friends on FB AFAIK and yet you just described most of them.
- Andrew C
Just to clarify: this isn't one of my profile photo attempts. This is a cell pic taken with no light other than what's coming in a dirty window. Sad part is I wound up looking way less douchey in this than in my the actual attempts =P I think the profile photo will be tomorrow morning's challenge: take advantage of the morning light since I won't have to be at a farce of a job interview.
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
H3LL0!
- AJ Batac
This needs to be in my feed every day. Is there a script for that? :)
- Josh Haley
TECHTECHTECHTECHSOCIALMEDIATECH. Sorry, had to make this relevent since it looks like it's gonna wind up in best of day...
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
*stammer*
- Joe Silence
I like this one better than your current profile pic. :)
- Louis Gray
rawr
- Gunny doesn't side-hug™
i like this photo!
- Joe Silence
Louis, that one is pretty tough to beat, but this one definitely makes it a tough choice.
- Josh Haley
That is an excellent picture I think. very "au natural"
- Rasmus Lauridsen
bella gnocca
- khenzo
dopo il tema-Tarantino, mi ritrovo completamente d'accordo con khenzo :-)
- Mobys
@khenzo ...dici che "bella gnocca" lo capisce? :)
- ӊooқ
ma si hook, certe parole fanno parte del linguaggio universale :-)
- Mobys
ma non fate i soliti! :D
- claire
la gnocca è gnocca ovunque
- khenzo
e allora sarà abituata :)
- khenzo
ma non si era detto che le tue amiche sono anche le nostre amiche (specie quelle con questi occhi) ??? :-)))
- Mobys
nessuna è perfetta
- khenzo
le migliori se le prendono tutte e subito ! ma prima o poi arrivano alla scadenza del contratto e si fa valere il diritto di opzione.
- Mobys
Keep!
- Micah Wittman
+1
- Joe Silence
O HAI!
- Steven Perez
*whispers* That looks pretty sexy - OH HAI TINA!!
- Helen Sventitsky
OH HAI HELEN! techtechtechnotnoisetech. See, still keeping it relevent!
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
lovely. i really like the intensity of your gaze.
- T. Brent, technopeasant
*maxiswoon*
- Mo Kargas
srsly. this should be re-posted to the 'beautiful women' group. :)
- T. Brent, technopeasant
So what were you coding at the time you took this pic? In BASIC, you say? How very relevant!
- WorldofHiglet
In fact, I was attempting to hone my photography skills, as a portion of my research on the state of the unemployed in today's economy. Very deep stuff...
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
I look forward to your white paper in due course.
- WorldofHiglet
Love it! Now I'll go back and see what everyone else said.
- MaryB, BrandingBroadOfFF
nice
- Cagdas Seichter
Really like the pic! You look sophisticated, intelligent, and very attractive.
- Bonnie Foster
from iPod
Very Pretty Picture !!
- Burnett Marketing
Those eyes enough to show the qualifications that you've talk. (decent, respectable, trusthworthy xP )
- Mert K.
Friendfeed - beautiful, wonderful, neat looking site,
- Petr Buben
you are hired.
- دکتر فی دل احمدینژاد
love the thought behind it-I know what you mean, Said the woman wiht the hotpink background avatar.
- Kirsten Mitchell
I wonder who the hot pink gal is
- دکتر فی دل احمدینژاد
You so pretty, Tina.
- nakachi
This is a woman NOT to be trifled with. *quickly hides all evidence of trifling...ness*
- MASTER OF THE OBVIOUS
eccola, la strafiga
- khenzo
è la sorella di Boxxyyy?
- gondolanera
Random Passerby in the Cube Farm: WHO'S THAT; Me: That's my friend Tina, now go away; RPITCB (drooling): SHE'S PURRRRTY; Me: GO AWAY
- MASTER OF THE OBVIOUS
We all know you rock Tina .... Can't understand why you haven't be 'scooped up' yet ..... Keep pluggin' !
- Charlie Anzman
la isla bonita
- دکتر فی دل احمدینژاد
or lolita shall i say?
- دکتر فی دل احمدینژاد
Barry, that's freakin' hilarious! Tell them that if they stare too long I'll eat their soul or something equally weird and see what they do!
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
These losers would chance it.
- MASTER OF THE OBVIOUS
indeed!
- Joe Silence
hi Tina ;) good luck on that job application!
- 'Like' robot (frɐnc)
Hello blue-eyed cutie! :) Hope you are doing well today!
- JA Castillo
Hi Tina! Best of luck with your job hunt!
- Louis Simoneau
Great pic!
- Harold Cabezas
very neat, intelligent glamor look site! ... too bad it's married - to Faith Bough. ..why can't ff have profiles just as mySpace, or ..similar big social sites ? has the development stopped again? ,
- Petr Buben
Wow, I just saw this today, sorry I'm late. I think it's a great pic for employment profiles. You've got an utterly beautiful face, Tina, and you certainly don't look like a douche in this pic. Good luck with everything!
- phil baumann
Hi Tina, don't know ya, but this is an ABSOFREAKINLUTELY great pic...those eyes, WOW!
- Samuel Ancira Jr
Way too many hormones in this thread's comments. Really, guys, come on, behave!...
- Zackatoustra
The Private Web - http://www.techcrunchit.com/2009...
Denise Howell, Daniel Rowley, Robert Scoble and 8 other people liked this
In our day we had our Home phone and it was private if you could close the door
- paul mooney
this is our day and there are other alternatives now
- Steve Gillmor
In our day you could have an affair and your GPS coordinates couldn't be traced
- Francine Hardaway
maybe you could
- Steve Gillmor
Steve - Fabulous post! I love the deep level of investigation, research and analysis in this well-thought out and artfully crafted piece. Well done my friend! (Francine LOL)
- Susan Beebe
"The notion of the world as a village is becoming a reality." - James Wolfensohn
Sheldon Steiger liked this
we successfully relaunched Gillmor Gang today. We'll release the YouTube version as soon as we can. thanks to all. it's good to be back.
Richard Carter, FCD, Jason Adams, Wo and 13 other people liked this
It's great to have the Gillmor Gang back. Congrats.
- Warner Crocker
Yes! Fantastic news!
- Phillip Molly Malone
this must the 10th relaunch of GG. Congrats again!
- AlexBarnett
Where's the RSS feed? Great to have you guys back, BTW.
- Scott Greiff
Looking forward to listening! Congrats!
- Steve Mermelstein
great news - well done & thanks - can't wait for the next episode
- pablo
Glad ur back!
- courtney benson
Hell yeah! We want mp3 files and t-shirts to show our loyalty in public...
- Michael Pinto
I hear my 3 yo in the kitchen. I think he is attempting to make me coffee. This can not turn out well.
Luqman Saeed, Morton Fox, Patrick Jordan and 9 other people liked this
GOOD MORNING!
- Parth Awasthi
Good evening, to you Parth. I hope you had a fun and productive day.
- Admiral Anika
It was a holiday today. Been working on my personal shyte all day long. Except I woke up at noon. And went to shop and get lunch. So may day has technically only been 5 hr long so far. :)
- Parth Awasthi
So sweet that he's bringing you coffee!
- Ayşe E.
LOL @Parth the short days are both fun and frustrating. Ayşe, he was only making it. Or trying to. He gave up and got himself some cereal instead.
- Admiral Anika
Good MORNING! =)
- अभिषेक(Abhishek) Das
from fftogo
How did your exams go, Abhid?
- Admiral Anika
Great! I expect full marks from today's paper(maths). Tomorrow, I have OB(organizational behaviour) exam. but torn between usopen and exams. =/
- अभिषेक(Abhishek) Das
from fftogo
Oh, that's great to hear. And guess what? The US Open will be available on YouTube or something. Go study.
- Admiral Anika
i made a new video for time.com :: http://www.time.com/time... :: on the health care debate
Ben Simanek, Leslie Poston, Benjamin Reitzammer and Sheldon Steiger liked this
Just announced that @stevegillmor 's "Gang" will be aired at http://www.building43.com/realtim... Thursdays at 1 pm via http://friendfeed.com/realtim...
Daniel Rowley, Ben, keith feighery and 35 other people liked this
recordings?
- Panayotis Vryonis
meh
- Mattb4rd
It looks like with this announcement, Michael Arrington is now back on FriendFeed: http://friendfeed.com/michael...
- Jesse Stay
During the workday?
- Jeff Harbert
Robert, could you please explain the hard- and software-setup using for the live-stream?
- HansVanRock
Hans: We haven't announced the hardware and software we are using to stream the Gang yet, but for starters it's powered by NewTek Tricaster.
- Steve Gillmor
Looking forward to this, and would like to hear about the tech too
- Kevin Marks
from Android
I'll be asleep on the other side of the world. Let us know when you get the RSS feed up, Steve :)
- Edward Coffey
Plans on a downloadable file? I don't think the boss would appreciate me walking around the store with headphones on. :-)
- Larry Walker
Clicking the embedded viewer works at any hour in any part of the planet.
- Steve Gillmor
Very cool. Thanks Steve.
- Larry Walker
Let us know when the bootleg mp3 download gets posted on Friendfeed
- Christian Burns
from iPhone
RSS please unfollow.
- Christian Burns
from iPhone
Cool, so I just need to write a script to click that link and record the stream so the file is waiting for me when I sync my MP3 player. Modern technology makes it so much easier than when we had to use clunky old VCRs to record things!
- Edward Coffey
you'll be able to download the MP4 as soon as Google fixes a bug they're working on.
- Steve Gillmor
Excellent, thanks Steve. (which bug?)
- Edward Coffey
Bad Hair Day uses RSS. http://badhair.us/rss.xml
- Dave Winer
. @edwardc I am sure the mp3 will be available on the gilmor gang bootleg feed
- Christian Burns
from iPhone
if everyone insists on bootlegging, then won't worry about Google fixing the bug
- Steve Gillmor
no bootlegger me....just need something that will play on my iphone after the fact. :)
- Karoli
No bootlegging here either, just need something to show up in iTunes (automatically) with the rest of the podcasts.
- PXLated
sounds like you will have at least a few options. I'm not planning to release audio only, so you'll need to either get a blindfold or go bottleg
- Steve Gillmor
well, we'll give it a try, see how it rolls.
- Karoli
Will there be official 'Gillmor Gang' blindfolds available in the Building 43 gift shop?
- Cliff Gerrish
No audio only - Booo!
- PXLated
Wait - logo'ed blindfolds at $15/pop is intriguing to m :)
- Rob La Gesse
Building 43 GG blindfolds $30
- Steve Gillmor
oh I see Cliff already got there
- Steve Gillmor
I'll take 2. it's a bargain these days. :)
- Karoli
It's not quite RSS, but it feels the same...
- Cliff Gerrish
Option earplug accessories for just 19.95 (plus separate shipping and handling)
- Rob La Gesse
John Lennon wore our Firesign Theatre Not Insane button.
- Steve Gillmor
Bravos, good to have the show back after your holiday. @stevegillmor are you inviting Leo to play along?
- Dave Martin
Curious Steve - Why no audio only? - Seems simple enough to do.
- PXLated
Close your eyes - even easier :)
- Rob La Gesse
If its video that is released, its video I will take!
- Phillip Molly Malone
Can I get a pair of "driver"-style GG blindfolds, please?
- Robert J Taylor
from iPhone
Attention wise, video is much more expensive than audio. I don't have the money to devote an hour of my eyes and ears to the gill or gang at this time.
- Christian Burns
from iPhone
Christian, I think what they're saying is that you can put the MP4 on your playback device and listen to it and ignore the video component. I know that works on iPods and iPhones.
- Dave Winer
Dave, you are as unproductive as you've ever been. What I've said is that RSS is in the process of being disrupted by micromessaging, and no amount of name calling is going to change that. Your attempts to reinvent RSS will not get traction if you continue to slime the messenger. And having this discussion here underlines how partisan your attacks are.
- Steve Gillmor
The message above is out of context because Dave Winer deleted the message to which I am responding. I thought about saving his message and reprinting it below where only the owner of this thread could remove it, but figured it wasn't worth it. This is also why I never respond to anything in a thread Dave owns unless I don't care if it gets erased or the context removed.
- Steve Gillmor
Where's the Winer Watcher when you need it?
- Matthew Gifford
mmm, popcorn!
- Laura Norvig
The iPhone has a bug that will not allow you to download over the air for consuming later mp3s or mp4s unless they are an enclosure to an RSS feed.
- Christian Burns
from iPhone
once Google fixes their bug (Wednesday) you should be able to download via RSS.
- Steve Gillmor
Steve, the msg you're referring to was here just a few seconds, I realized it'd provoke the kind of response it has, and decided I didn't want to go there. Re being unproductive, I've had a cold this week and have been unable to do dev work, but I'm feeling better and expect to releas some new software this week. Don't expect TC to cover it, as usual. Finally Steve as you know the <cloud> element has been in RSS for eight years, hardly a retrofit.
- Dave Winer
So did google fix their bug yesterday? Any idea what the Gillmor Gang RSS feed is?
- Christian Burns
from iPhone
Sheldon Steiger, Kevin Tunis, Aron Michalski and 6 other people liked this
nice steve... can't wait
- Chris Heath
Loving the NGL there. Loving. it.
- Karoli
Is the mixer new? What kind?
- Amyloo
Mackie. NewTek Tricaster. Mac Minis. Beatles hat.
- Steve Gillmor
Can't wait to see/hear this all come together.
- Jay Cuthrell
Excited to announce The Gillmor Gang will return to the network Thursdays at 1PM Pacific, starting Thursday August 27th. Stay tuned.
Rui Pereira, patrick, Julien and 77 other people liked this
Because someone needs to get it out of the way... "Screw You Arrington. Screw You!"
- Bastard Operator From FF
yay!
- Rasmus Lauridsen
Which Network?
- George MacDonald
Excellent news. I've missed the show. TWiT?
- No Agenda Forums
Good, good.
- Jonathan Brown
Looking forward to it. Always pop new shows to the top of the stack.
- Paul Grous
*shudder*.. I hope not... The show wasn't the same by a wide margin when it was on TWiT...
- Rasmus Lauridsen
That's great news. Love the show.
- Kahlil Lechelt
nice one - can't wait to tune in again
- pablo
Tremendous news. Looking forward to it.
- Mike Doeff
Sweet. - Gillmor Gang was one of my favorite couple hours of the week. Dave and Marshall are doing a nice job over at bad hair day - but I am definitely excited for the return of GG.
- andrew
Will it be available for download again?
- nick
Excellent.
- Jay Cuthrell
Hallelujah!
- Dan Weinstein
Show must go on.
- Mindaugas Dagys
Truly glad to hear it! Also like the NGL sign on your Twitpic. :)
- Karoli
Whooooooooooo----f'king hoooooooooo! It's on my Calendar-in-the-Cloud
- Francine Hardaway
More comebacks than Sinatra, yay :-) Will there be a podcast of it too, pretty please for your *fans* that can't make the time schedule?
- Scottish Lass
Steve: This is great news!
- Jim Connolly
Somebody better update the Wikipedia entry...
- Cliff Gerrish
YES! YES! YES! Thank you Steve - this makes me happy!
- Michael Pinto
For those on the other side of the planet will you be able to grab the show via RSS - oh I forgot RSS is dead, right?
- John Chrisoulakis
Good!
- John Wright
yay! Best news of the week! All I guess this an announcement that the Gillmor Gang is dead as well!
- Phillip Molly Malone
I might be able to come out of hiding now... we'll see.
- Aron Michalski
Excellent news to end the week! Look forward to it.
- Diego Barros
What a one-two punch. Gillmor serves it up on Thurs aft and the Bad Hair Boys knock it out of the park in the early evening! :-)
- Dave Winer
Good news. So who's on the show?
- Michael Metz
Probably too much to ask, but for posterity, please repost the GG archives! There, I said it.
- Scott Mace
There go my afternoons!
- Robert Scoble
from iPhone
Will be interesting to see, will Mr. Arrington be participating...lol
- Johann Diaz
from Nambu
Missed the Gang so much and with the NGL Studio, it will be a tough act to follow for the Bad Hair boys :) #TechThursday FTW
- Alberto Saavedra
why wouldn't Arrington be in it sometimes? It really was Leo who was a "take my ball and go home" crybaby
- Rasmus Lauridsen
Way to go. Looking forward to it.
- Oliver Kohl
YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!
- Susan Beebe
This news has made my month! I can't wait...
- Chris Aldrich
i'm hoping that timeshifting options will be available - i probably won't ever be able to catch it live
- Chris Heath
But, but, but...what about podshow?
- Mark Hunter
Very happy to hear this, but I also wonder about RSS support.
- Robert
w00t!!
- Kevin Nunez
Now that's what I'm talkin' about.
- Raphael, Raphael
Where can I find it?
- Richard South
Steve's back!
- Harald Felgner
RAPatton, Sheldon Steiger and Michelle Martinez liked this
Read the Lefsetz Letter? A total holy shit post from UK promoter Sir Harvey Goldsmith. Will anyone listen? http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/
Sheldon Steiger liked this
from yesterday's Lefsetz Thread on the dying of the Concert Biz, from Harvey Goldsmith... Bob, I have been following the debate on concerts with great amusement. It seems that finally it's all coming out. The perspective is as follows: Fans are voting with their feet and not moving. Most of the big artists are overcharging with absolutely no regard for their audience. We must be the only industry that has scant regard for our audience assuming that because an artist wants to go on the road they will pay regardless of price. We seem to go out of our way to screw our audience both with live,recording and merchandise. To some extent promoters are taking the rap for the artists that are demanding more and more. The problem is that promoters are too stupid to say PASS, so consequently there is always someone who will take the deal and pay more. Then there is the distribution mechanism..... IT SUCKS. We have allowed third parties to take over and become the power in the business. They are...
more...
- Aron Michalski
I've been following this debate closely via The Lefsetz Letter. Fascinating and eye opening.
- Sheldon Steiger
FriendFeed on a Saturday afternoon isn't the same without @stevegillmor's gang.
Olaf Wolff, (jeff)isageek, Sheldon Steiger and 30 other people liked this
Do your own on TinyChat
- Chris Saad
Really?
- Jim Connolly
Scoble Gang
- Mark
You really should go back to doing it audio only, easier and better.
- Mason Lee
Yeah - what about a 'Scoble's gang?' You know everyone worth talking to.
- Jim Connolly
But yeah, I agree-- I miss that podcast, especially when it went somewhat deeper into things like "track" and the future of communications
- Mason Lee
Scoble's Gang reporting sir!
- Özgür D. Cyric
I'll get the Scoble Snacks! (Sorry, someone had to.)
- Darren Landrum
Darren: Loved that! :-)
- Jim Connolly
Heh. Thanks everyone! Gives me something to think about.
- Robert Scoble
from iPhone
I'll help you folks out. Steve: "If we can just get track back, then the gesture economy will finally take hold" Arrington: "Mufflers again, let's talk sports cars." Doc: "Is VRM a muffler or sports car?" Jason: "This show was sponsored by Building 43." Scoble: "Heehee."
- Matt Terenzio
Matt: add some drama and that is pretty close.
- Robert Scoble
from iPhone
Wow. Only a little? Can't wait for Scoble Gang
- Steve Gillmor
Steve: I can't wait either but I already have Scoble Gang. It is called FriendFeed.
- Robert Scoble
from iPhone
I thought we were a mob... now i'm confused
- Chris Heath
HAHAhahahaha yea! =] It's called FF!
- Özgür D. Cyric
C'mon Robert. The yearning mob awaits
- Steve Gillmor
Chris: gang, mob, what's the difference?
- Robert Scoble
from iPhone
but steve, the mob awaits you too!
- Chris Heath
semantics
- Chris Heath
and spelling
- Chris Heath
the mob can [redacted] itself
- Steve Gillmor
that's funny steve, cuz i just [redacted] myself moments ago... and plan to [redact] later tonight as well :-P
- Chris Heath
may cause blindness
- Steve Gillmor
Do not taunt Happy Fun Mob
- Jay Cuthrell
FriendFeed is a gateway drug to Gillmor Gang.
- Robert Scoble
from iPhone
"can't we all just get along?"
- Chris Heath
I've listened to several back episodes of Gillmor Gang over the last few days. They were surprisingly good. Steve comes across as cranky, yes, but underneath he is usually making valid points.
- Laura Norvig
I miss Gilmore Gang :(
- Robert Burgin
I agree Laura, and I also miss the GG
- Chris Heath
How far back did you go Laura?
- Chris Heath
Agree with Laura, I miss the gang, steve tells it like he sees it and doesn't just jump onto the newest thing just because its new .. Bring back the Gang !
- Aaron Dyer
Best part of GG were the inevitable meltdowns every few weeks
- Mark
Give the order Scoble Sir! I'll have their... well... keyboards!! :P
- Özgür D. Cyric
Sometimes meltdowns need to happen to re-focus us all, strong and differing opinions are a GOOD thing
- Aaron Dyer
GG reminded me of an open mic night where everyone ends up playing 12-bar blues.... but sometimes you get a jazz guy in there that mixes things up a bit.
- Jay Cuthrell
Chris, I listened to 3 episodes from March. I'm just going through all the ones that happen to be on my iPod that I never had a chance to listen to.
- Laura Norvig
Scoble -- Do it. The Scoble Mob.
- Dave Winer
"The Scoble Mob(ile)" would make a neat logo and imply the disjointed and anywhere anytime nature of the "mob"
- Jay Cuthrell
The Gillmor Gang was the best show on the internet in my opinion. I miss it tremendously. Scoble Gang wouldn't be the same even though he still could make a good show. You need Steve at the helm to set the tone.
- Wo
so wheres the link to "The Scoble Mob"? Who's going to be on today?
- BryanSchuetz
I'm sure Leo would let you put it on the TWIT Robert
- BryanSchuetz
Yeah I agree GG was great, and I miss it alot. Scoble is great and was great addition to the gang. But not many can do what Steve did so well. Cut into the bone of the conversation with just one "cranky" rant. I'm pretty sure I would subscribe to a scobleshow also though. I wasn't fond of the change over to Twit, it kinda changed the dynamics of the show. Nothing bad about Leo, the show just wasn't the same with him co holding the reins.
- Rasmus Lauridsen
I for one, would love to see Leo [redacted] arrington in the mouth with his mighty "mob", over and over again
- Michael Thomas
Indeed, bring back The Gang...
- Richard Eckel
In a few days I think Arrington is going to announce he worked with twitter and the police to track the hacker down.
- Mark
Steve's a sweet teddybear with strong opinions...just not a great fit on TWiT. I'm sure a new iteration will appear when the time is right.
- Web Pixie
I guess nature does not abhor a vacuum.
- Jim Posner
FriendFeed on a Sunday morning, very early, so early in fact my ass is still in bed and not listening to a podcast isn't the same without @stevegillmor's gang :P
- Johnny Worthington
What does Gillmor do for a day job? I mean, he posts maybe 1 article a week, a couple of tweets. What does he *do* ?
- Mark
He comes up with ideas for the schmuck with the puppets
- Dave Winer
Hahaha
- Mark
lol
- Aaron Thorn
I wonder sometimes how Tech people make their living. I mean, your financial past Dave is known (you made some nice bucks back in the day), Leo Laporte has his network, Scoble has his paying gigs with rackspace, but the likes of Feldman and Gillmor and a bunch of others make me wonder what pays the bills!
- Mark
Heck, Shel Isreal has a new book coming out! baby needs a new pair of shoes
- Mark
Mark: Steve Gillmor's RealTIme Crunchup had 500 people at it. You don't think he figured out how to get paid for that? And why do you need to get paid to talk on the Internet? I did this before I got paid for it. I'm just very fortunate to have found a way to do it all the time.
- Robert Scoble
anybody know how blocking works on friendfeed? Is it bidirectional or does it merely silence the idiots?
- Steve Gillmor
Steve: if you block someone you no longer can see their stuff and they can no longer see your stuff. The rest of us are unaffected.
- Robert Scoble
600, Robert.
- Steve Gillmor
Actually, that's not completely true, because the folks you block can't see you anymore they can't comment on your stuff, so we'll notice that over time your items have fewer and fewer idiots commenting on them. That will increase your personal brand. On the other hand, if you block someone who has a lot of engagement (an idiot like me, for instance) then you'll see the artifacts of their interactions with other people.
- Robert Scoble
... I do miss it as well.
- Johnny Worthington
from iPhone
I'm sure that if you did a Gillmor Gang, you would all say that Chrome OS is in fact Android 2.0 and it's going to kill Microsoft, Intel and Apple.
- Charbax
Charbax: whenever a blogger says something kills something else that just means it's more interesting than something else. Nothing more. So, if that's true, you'd be right.
- Robert Scoble
ok, but isn't new tech supposed to sometimes really cannibalize established tech. If Google OS powers $100 laptops with ARM processors all of a sudden, then who's going to buy Windows/OSX stuff anymore. And how can the old Silicon Valley giants then still make money.
- Charbax
Charbax: it's pretty rare that new stuff actually "kills" old stuff and when it does it takes years to happen. Heck, the Web has been killing AOL now for about a decade and AOL still is around. I don't think Google Chrome will get me to stop buying OSX or Windows but it could change my behavior and that is interesting.
- Robert Scoble
All major laptop OEMs showed 50 sub-$200 ARM netbook designs at Computex last month, I filmed them all http://techvideoblog.com/... (my Computex videos were on Engadget a dozen times in that week). I think Chrome OS is actually just Google optimizing the browser for all these new cheaper embedded Linux laptops.
- Charbax
scoble's definition may work for him, but when I say something's dead, it has a specific meaning -- and it's not that is no longer interesting. RSS has always been and continues to be interesting. But it's still dead.
- Steve Gillmor
Charbax: right. Hi Steve. Someday I'll get the Gillmor translation guide figured all out.
- Robert Scoble
I miss the Gillmor Gang! The industry is very dull without it...
- Michael Pinto
start with Saturday Night Live first 2 seasons
- Steve Gillmor
Keep Arrington away and it'll be fine. He killed The Gillmor Gang. Office is dead. Now The Gillmor Gang is dead. "Well now everything dies baby that's a fact But maybe everything that dies someday comes back" haha I make myself laugh, that's what's really important here.
- Diego Barros
Diego: I figure Gillmor Gang will come back right around the same time we stop talking about it. :-)
- Robert Scoble
I disagree, Arrington's a tool and the perfect foil on Gillmor Gang. Renew it, intact. Saturdays on FF, TC & Twitter are a bore now...
- Thom Kennon
Robert: I'm sure it will, and I think we are all sure it will come back. Just need the dust to settle. Maybe the Gang needs a new home away from TechCrunch (or it may stay there). But yes, it will be back, Steve can't stay away. Oh and BTW, I love Steve's work. That's why I'm here talking about it.
- Diego Barros
They will be back Just will take time
- Aaron Thorn
Thom: You think he's the tool every show needs?
- Diego Barros
That's worth elaborating. Respectively, I hear the same broad sweeping, provocative statements that don't include anything in support of that statement as to why. I understand it's the only way to make a point effectively in a short window of time but I've heard too many people say "RSS is Dead" without much to support that claim/point of view. It's like someone trying to drive fashion.
- Benjamin Taylor
The iphone represents less than 1% of the global mobile phone market, yet Apple amasses $20 Billion treasury, so I guess you are right. it'll probably take them at least a few years to burn up all that money unless they quickly fire most of their 85 thousand employees.
- Charbax
Diego, yep. It keeps things interesting and makes the less toolish look (and act) more brill.
- Thom Kennon
Is there any way to listen to the old shows?
- Robert D'Alesio
RSS is Dead. RSS is live. RSS lives.
- Matt Terenzio
It's alive. Alive!
- Matt Terenzio
Like others have said, definitely miss it. My podcast lineup's not the same with iTunes showing my GG feed broken.
- Micah Wittman
I second the motion to set up the Scoble Mob!
- Adrian Scicluna
I agree
- Robert Burgin
i want GillmorGang back in real-time
- HansVanRock
i can read - http://icanread.tumblr.com/post...
Sheldon Steiger, Aron Michalski, Bec Rowe @d0tski and 4 other people liked this
The New York Times takes a look at Twitter's preferred user list http://www.nytimes.com/2009...
Iván Abrego, Barty, Andrey Smirnov and 62 other people liked this
I think this is the single worst thing that Twitter did against its community. But, Twitter has learned it can beat its users up with a variety of tools and we'll never leave. For two years the service was down all the time (famous fail whale making its rounds) and now search is often down, they treat developers inconsistently or poorly at worst, and they decide who will be superstars...
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- Robert Scoble
Funny, on both friendfeed and Facebook I have more followers than TechCrunch does (well, I did until Arrington deleted his account here on friendfeed). By artificially giving TechCrunch hundreds of thousands of followers they have given TechCrunch a very real financial reward. Same to NYT.
- Robert Scoble
Scoble, good to see that you still feel this way after your meetup with @ev. :-)
- Dave Winer
Dave: I got the consolation prize: a shot of Scotch whisky . ;-)
- Robert Scoble
And you get to keep our respect.
- Dave Winer
Dave: I thought it would only be A listers or media types who care about this issue, since we know that 1,000 people can generate a LOT of money. Look at the Demo Conference, for instance. About 1,500 people are in the audience and they each pay $1,500 to be there (or more). Then there's up to 60 companies on stage and they each pay $18,000 to talk to that audience. It's a great model. Arrington has already been gifted half a million followers by Twitter. That's HUGE economic value. But...
- Robert Scoble
I am blocked from following @TechCrunch :O
- Tom Warren
At the recent Twitter conference you should have heard all the regular Twitter users griping about the recommended follower list. They hate it because they know they'll never get on it and even if they were added to it for some reason (some people do win the lottery) they will never catch up to people who've been on it since February, which makes them distrust the system. People are even calling followers you get the hard way "organic."
- Robert Scoble
It's completely off-brand, unless perhaps we all misunderstood the brand to begin with... and the idea that people who get themselves onto their own A list "organically", says it all --- the term is an apt definition: the opposite of "paid" in this emerging digital media platform. Makes you sorta hope FriendFeed kicks their commercial ass. That'll learn 'em to go all Hollywood on us.
- Thom Kennon
I sympathize with arguments against the SUL as being unfair (although I don't really see how an algorithmic approach would not have its own problems), but I don't agree that the economic value is huge. In fact, I'd like to see some honest reckoning of what the economic value might. The truth is, everybody is seeing incredibly lousy clickthrough rates from twitter users (Winer reported 0.5% I think from his) which means chump change from display ads and probably worse for things like your conference pricing.
- Jacob Harris
Two other things to note about the value of being on the SUL: 1) any value from link traffic/actions probably doesn't scale linearly 2) any value for link traffic should be assessed in terms of relative worth (eg, 600K followers might be a bigger deal to a site with no traffic vs. a site with lots). Ultimately, I find myself agreeing with @jeffjarvis that it's a much more meaningless metric to worry about, and that the impact of being on twitter at all pales compared to what the rest of the world is doing.
- Jacob Harris
At the very least, the SUL is distorting to the essential value of Twitter - and its implied brand identity. However, in fairness to ev@ and @biz, I don't think they understood what they were doing when they created the SUL: they thought they were helping new users who didn't know what to do on Twitter, and who were therefore leaving the service after a short period of experimentation.
- Jason Pontin
Robert Scoble: TechCrunch team is more powerful than yours.Sigh.
- Igor Poltavskiy
cmon now - the list has massive value - just look at erick's post today on tc - he barely mentions that he is on the default list - yet look at the traffic they are seeing - in fact, where is Yuvi - let him calculate what that traffic equates to in terms of cash - i bet it equals robin's salary for the year (or any other tc writer) im betting mashable sees even more traffic from the...
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- Allen Stern
"The Amount And Value Of Twitter Traffic" - http://www.techcrunch.com/2009...
- Ken Sheppardson
"For TechCrunch, Twitter = Traffic (A Statistical Breakdown)" - http://www.techcrunch.com/2009...
- Ken Sheppardson
(just adding a couple of footnotes)
- Ken Sheppardson
Thanks for the links. Based on the last article, it seems like about 7% of traffic to TC comes from the Techcrunch account and some part of that is due to the SUL. But beyond that, we don't know, especially since TC claimed those new users have not been so useful. We also don't have actual numbers beyond the 120K _monthly_ hits from twitter reported in Feb. Let me try though, 120K * ~$23 CPM = $2760 a month (out of $200K total a month). Or am I totally wrong here?
- Jacob Harris
Addl. References: http://www.businessinsider.com/2008...
- Jacob Harris
Ref for the $200K total: http://www.mahalo.com/techcru...
- Jacob Harris
Jason, agreed that their intentions were benign. I am wondering what algorithms would work instead, if you wanted to keep the editorial judgment out of it and still wanted to give a user accounts to follow that aren't just finding their friends. Some pop to mind, but I wonder about spammers gaming them or other runaway effects that might occur. Interesting to contemplate.
- Jacob Harris
Jacob where do you get the $23/cpm? does that add up ALL of the ads on the page? does that include the fact that TC meta-auto-refreshes their page? etc - I think it's way more than that.
- Allen Stern
Jacob - as I've noted before the current list actually HURTS twitter - why not ask the new user for 2-3 interests and location and offer suggestions based on that? it's not perfect but as i said on the cupcake video, offering someone who is interested in food - mashable/tc/oprah/dooce/sai/shaq/justine is of no worth and probably pushes the user away quick.
- Allen Stern
Allen, you wouldn't even have to ask the user anything to quickly and algorithmically find 20 random users for them to follow. Just 20 random users would be fine -- a lot of the people on the SUL hardly ever update. And the clickthrough rate of a SUL member isn't all that different from my click-through rate. I've tested that too.
- Dave Winer
Allen, I assume that when you asked to be put on the list you were told no?
- Dave Winer
i actually looked at the list yesterday
- Allen Stern
Allen, the first link I posted is about the CPM (although negotiated should be lower). You're right there might be multi ads on a page, but I'm trying to get an actual estimate of worth here, so discussion is fine. I think randomized could lead to pointing to a bunch of dormant accounts or a "Twitter PROMOTES PORN!" snafu pretty quickly, which is why many internet sites manually edit frontpages (the "Mullet strategy"), etc.
- Jacob Harris
The Mullet Strategy: http://www.buzzfeed.com/buzz...
- Jacob Harris
Still thinking about TC reported in Feb. getting about 120K monthly hits from twitter. This is where I think any calculation of impact and arguments of favoritism would have to take into account the total traffic "wealth" of the recipient. 120K hits a month might be a lot for TC; it's not for the NYT. And so I don't think we can say the impact is the same for all recipients (something the article noted as well).
- Jacob Harris
My thoughts here are more societal. Why do we care so much about this list? If Twitter gets lists like Friendfeed has then they will be increasingly less relevant as the reecommendations get smarter.
- Steve Rubel
Robert, I've said this to you on more than one occasion: Folks like you don't need the list, you have many people who follow you to different services and echo your thoughts. Guys like me, who get ignored by the tech media even though we use new and innovative tech methods to help people? The Twitter SUL has helped me save lives (and no, it's not hyperbole here). I would NEVER have had...
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- Brandon Mendelson
Brandon, how did the SUL help you save lives? Are you on it?
- Dave Winer
Dave, yes I am (or was, I don't know if I still am at this point). The short version: I promote the early detection of cancer. The list gave me an opportunity to travel across America, sleep on the couch of folks following me on Twitter, and promote the early detection of cancer at colleges and cities across the country. Based on many emails from folks whom I met on my trip, I...
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- Brandon Mendelson
(and I realize it's hard to tell from just text, but my previous comment to Mr. Scoble is said with the utmost respect.)
- Brandon Mendelson
Thanks for letting me know, it's a good story.
- Dave Winer
I don't mind the intent of the Suggested User List. My gripe is the people who are on it--who create lots of noise. When people join Twitter, don't know what to do, and follow SUL accounts, it's no wonder either they 1) give up quickly; or 2) start emulating them in their own tweets. Or worse, people tweet so-called celebrities, hoping for a response, get disenchanted, and give up.
- Ari Herzog
Brandon: the idea that I only report on what my friends in the valley are doing is absolute bullshit. I'm happy you got on the list. But what I saw is that tons of people who compete with me, but had fewer followers, got put on the list. You're probably the only example of something good that was on the list. Even with you, though, I know TONS of people who are raising money and awareness for various causes. Why aren't THEY on the list?
- Robert Scoble
The list, like most lists, is simply a sham.
- Ken Camp
I'll say here the same thing I said on twitter. It's all smoke and mirrors. Twitter chose the so-called popular kids and should simply own it. They did exactly what happens for any movie star. They gave more to a select few, granted them extra followers and status. Who pays the price for that. People like me who work hard and actually truly engage with those in the network. What makes...
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- Sheryl
I think a lot of the Twitter list are people many don't really think are worth that kind of attention.
- Patricia
Robert, as I said in my DM, I should have clarified, that particular comment was not aimed at you (it was at what I felt was biased coverage, mostly from TechCrunch.) As far as other folks who do many good things not being on the list, I do not know, BUT I do make an effort to spotlight them and connect the people following me every opportunity that I can. I do apologize for not being clear on my previous comment.
- Brandon Mendelson
Also worth noting: I know exactly how those folks feel when they do not get the attention they deserve. We were very frustrated we couldn't get the tech media to even look at what we were doing for those battling cancer and helping the homeless.
- Brandon Mendelson
@Brandon, I'd have to say I agree on that. The ego generation or whatever this group/thing is called kind of suck in that sense. I care about causes, not people's money, connections, etc. A few years ago Fox wouldn't cover a charity event because they felt it was more important to cover Paris Hilton and her DUI stuff. Such a pity.
- Patricia
@Patricia it's sad but true, and in defense of the tech media, the mainstream media is far worse at covering causes unless there is a side benefit to them.
- Brandon Mendelson
@Brandon, I would disagree. I think they're both bad. I have worked in media biz almost my entire life - how long have you worked in it? Maybe you see something I don't? In my opinion, both blogs and media do it -- and don't do it. It's like anything else. There are the bad and good.
- Patricia
@Patricia. Eight years. We should take this to another thread though.
- Brandon Mendelson
They had to let new folks start *somewhere*. Is this *somewhere* the best? No. But it's better than nothing.
- drew olanoff
sorry disagree drew
- Allen Stern
@brandon, yes!! i'd love that kind of discussion with someone knowledgable on it as you are!
- Patricia
the list is setup to make sure that the celebs are happy, twitter looks huge and the fluffer blogs get paid. that's what i see as the net.
- Allen Stern
@Allen I suspected you would, and this is why the interwebs is great :) I've personally watched hundreds of new Twitter members try to figure out where to start. They get frustrated. Now does Mom and Pop regular Joe want to follow you and me, or do they want to follow Britney Spears and Shaq? Come on.
- drew olanoff
drew: you have a point there, but I think that when you make technology choices that you've gotta think through the consequences of your choices. Why didn't Twitter make a deal with an outside organization like AllTop? That would have been cleaner than doing it by a human inside their organization. It really messed with the reputation of Twitter as a dispassionate platform service.
- Robert Scoble
Robert: Twitter can't tap an outside source for that type of thing. They have to remain an independent platform that allows people to build on top of them. Imagine if they picked/integrated Alltop for this, wow people like us would freak. Ya know when Digg is down and they have staff suggested links? Why aren't we complaining about why that isn't democratic?
- drew olanoff
I personally like "Staff picks" on iTunes, and could care less who the staff is. That's how I see this Twitter list. Only reason why people are freaking is because....well it works lol.
- drew olanoff
Drew - i have said all along (and will post about it tomorrow if i feel better) is that having a list is a great thing - but having the right list is crucial - and twitter doesn't have that.
- Allen Stern
what's odd about the list is that NOW it's dominated by celebs except for "Allison" she's been on the list since day 1..Who IS she & why is she on the list?
- David J. Garcia
from twhirl
100% agreed with your points Drew. And I'm happy Twitter did it internally, if it was farmed out to another valley company (just as an example) I feel it would again keep the web's spotlight on the same group of folks and not allow for new voices to get through.
- Brandon Mendelson
@David Allison is a musician. Don't know much else about her but I would qualify her as a celebrity as well.
- Brandon Mendelson
Allen: There is no right list. What's right to you will be super wrong to everyone else. Vice versa apparently.
- drew olanoff
Drew - what I would like to see is a list that matches people to interests and location - the example i keep using is that a new user who is interested in food getting the tc feed is worthless. And interestingly - the people on that list are apparently floating over to the default list here because of the twitter import option. that's a different topic tho :)
- Allen Stern
drew: the reason it sucks is because this list makes it very easy to subscribe to the whole list and totally screws with follower numbers. Twitter picks the stars. The rest of us are second class citizens. Far different from how, say, friendfeed's list works.
- Robert Scoble
drew: the way Twitter did this list is yet more evidence that Twitter takes the lazy road through its engineering decisions. There's a reason why we see so many fail whales. They don't design systems the best way, just the lazy way. The fact that you're defending the lazy way makes me wonder. It doesn't take much to do things an algorithmic way that isn't corruptible and that is a meritocracy, not a reward system for doing things the staff members like.
- Robert Scoble
@Robert, It may be easy, but no one is forced to subscribe to anyone, they make the choice. And @Allen, I believe the Twitter folks have said in the news they would be changing the list soon to be more topical to a user
- Brandon Mendelson
brandon - when i did my cupcake series last week and met with a twitter employee, she said nothing of the like when i brought up my ideas - and robert - im not sure i completely agree with the "lazy" way- i think its more about what benefits twitter.
- Allen Stern
Brandon: you are the beneficiary of a HUGE gift. Your judgment on this topic is in question, sorry. Why YOU? Why not the thousands of other organizations and people who are doing great work? Why not all? And why not make it a meritocracy? Why defend a system where some people get picked to be royalty? That system sucks.
- Robert Scoble
Allen: every time I see Twitter employees speak about the list they are very uncomfortable. They know they took the lazy way through this.
- Robert Scoble
robert - aah... i wish that i had a chance to really interview them about it but all i got was 3 minutes - i had no appointment because i had no idea how to contact them since my customer service inquiries went unanswered
- Allen Stern
@Robert, my judgement shouldn't be in question (and as a reverse of what you said to me, if you've been following me long enough, you know I call things as I see it.) I like the list because it is beneficial to new people coming to Twitter. End of story. Is it perfect? Of course not but the Twitter team has said they will be changing it soon, so my attitude is they will fix it.
- Brandon Mendelson
Brandon: actually, most of the people on the list are NOT new people. Most of the people on the list are either large brands or celebrities. There are only a couple of exceptions, you're one of them. If there were more exceptions I might agree.
- Robert Scoble
As far as other organizations, I don't know. What I do know though is that because I was given the gift, I make every effort to help those who did not. I can't say the same to be true for the tech media outlets (not yourself or Louis gray as I enjoy both of your blogs) but the outlets I identified in this thread.
- Brandon Mendelson
@Robert, that is a very fair point.
- Brandon Mendelson
Robert: Re: Lazy engineering, now thats a discussion worth having. Lazy or not, it was definitely the quick and dirty approach...which isn't always the best approach.
- drew olanoff
I actually would argue that making qualititative assessments about which accounts to follow with quantitative algorithms is not necessarily as simple as one might think. Especially if you want to avoid scenarios where power accrues to the earliest adopters instead. Randomization adds an element of risk ("why is twitter promoting a neonazi account?"). So, it's lazy and opaque to us, but it's internally accountable at least for them, so I can understand why they did it this way.
- Jacob Harris
What I don't understand and what has irritated me from the get-go is how hostility to twitter over the SUL has crossed the line at times to attacks on people and orgs on the list, under the assumption that SUL membership is such a massively valued gift it can't but help corrupt the recipient. And that's when this goes from an academic discussion to open warfare. If you have a problem with twitter, I can respect that. But let's keep out of the dark conspiracy theories where everybody is on the take.
- Jacob Harris
Jacob: when people get things they did NOT earn that calls into question the whole system.
- Robert Scoble
@Robert no, it just leads to this cynical trip through the looking glass where the SUL is not a dumb application of a necessary evil but a sinister tool for control wielded by the dark hand of @ev. Something they did NOT earn? Come on. What did people you link to or podcast about do to earn that versus other? Much as we might not like it, it's twitter's call whom they decide to pick, but that is NOT the fault of people on the SUL.
- Jacob Harris
I don't really have a problem with the SUL, I really do think it will improve over time. What I do have a problem with is Twitter lack of ability to teach new users how to use the service. Suggesting people to follow is a great idea and a great place to start, but that's all it is. If Twitter wants new users to hang around they should really invest their time in educating them about the service. Show them how to @reply, DM, search, find new people to follow, etc. They really suck at that.
- Shawn Hickman
Jacob: cynical? Oprah got put on the list after only doing a few Tweets and only being on Twitter a week. How did the Twitter team know she would be a good Twitterer? Is she really better as a Twitterer than, say, you? Or Leo Laporte? Or anyone else who has put a lot more of their lives into Twitter? The problem is that Twitter wants to be a platform player, which requires building a...
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- Robert Scoble
And, Jacob, how do we know that there weren't some "backrubs" to get on the list? iJustine got on the list (for a while, at least). What did she do for Twitter? She brought them cupcakes. She had fewer followers than Leo, Guy, Jason, me. Yet she got on the list. How about Arrington? He didn't pimp friendfeed. He had fewer followers than Leo, Guy, Jason, and me. Yet he got on the list,...
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- Robert Scoble
Robert, simple. The SUL never meant user X was a better twitterer, it merely meant that twitter thinks he might be interesting to new users. And I'm sorry to say but people like you and me ARE less interesting to new users that Oprah. Yes, it's a flawed system and some cynicism towards twitter is probably due (what's this "you guys?"), but I object to corrosive paranoia where everyone on the SUL is considered ethically suspect by association.
- Jacob Harris
I don't resent those who got on the list, but I do have to wonder why I'm the only person in the top 10 _before_ the SUL who has never made the SUL. I can only think that Twitter has something against me and that kind of bias would be a problem, no? 125,000 thought it worth following me but not Twitter?
- Leo Laporte
Jacob: OK, but a cat made the list. Really? You really are defending this list?
- Robert Scoble
Leo: I had the most followers two years ago on Twitter and I've never been on the list as far as I know. There's someone at Twitter who doesn't like me for some reason, it might even have been a technical problem (I was one of the few who used @replies to see everyone who @replied me, which they say caused their systems lots of problems). But I also talk about friendfeed endlessly. I wouldn't put me on such a list either.
- Robert Scoble
I think they decided against you because you were too noisy. I think they decided against me because I was too critical.
- Leo Laporte
Leo: I think it was because of friendfeed. Funny that I'm #1 here on friendfeed and #1 over on facebook too. Too noisy? They put a freaking cat on the list. What's noisier than that? Geesh. I think it was something else. I pissed someone at Twitter off and that was that.
- Robert Scoble
Robert, my attitude is twitter can pick whom they want and it doesn't affect how I feel about myself as a human being. You can decide whom you want to interview or blog about and it doesn't mean they're better or worse than I am. Google can tweak pagerank to boost or decrement sites and it's their perogative. I am not defending the list, but I think the discussion over it has been too tied up with assumptions of self-worth and too quick to condemn those who find themselves linked for some reason.
- Jacob Harris
I far prefer lists where they are meritocracies and where you can earn your way up the lists by doing great content and getting audiences to engage with you.
- Robert Scoble
Well, last I checked anybody can unfollow like that on twitter too. I guess the real question though is how many followers for SUL accounts are active users or abandons.
- Jacob Harris
Jacob: it has nothing to do with how I feel about myself. Getting on these lists affects my livelihood. Anyone on these lists has been gifted real economic value. I used to work at a magazine with 100,000 subscribers and we made millions in revenue every year.
- Robert Scoble
Jacob: TechCrunch just wrote about the traffic they are getting because they were put on the list. http://www.techcrunch.com/2009... Getting on this list is very real economic value. It used to be that we got our audiences organically by earning them. Now we have to give someone at Twitter a backrub to get on the list to earn our audiences.
- Robert Scoble
It could very well be that we both pissed someone off at Twitter. Oh well. Friendfeed is much more interesting anyway. I think we'll both be around a lot longer than either.
- Leo Laporte
Leo: friendfeed is interesting. They don't take engineering shortcuts and I like that about them a lot. Twitter will be around for a long time too, though. In Virginia every radio and TV station was yammering on about Twitter and CNN is giving Twitter lots of free PR even today.
- Robert Scoble
There is a huge difference between 100K active and paying subscribers and 600K possibly checked-out twitter followers (the clickthroughs are horrible). I actually have to go to bed, so you can get the last word on me, but you can scroll up to see my take on the TC numbers. I can see why the SUL might seem a bigger deal to a small startup though, but I think the actual worth is not there. Fair enough though, we should limit it to only celebrities and large media organizations who don't care.
- Jacob Harris
Robert: one last question though. You saw @ev last night. Did you ask him why you're not on the SUL or raise some of your concerns with him?
- Jacob Harris
Jacob: the problem is that Twitter is now a platform and other companies and sites use follower numbers to build lists like this. For instance, on WeFollow if you aren't on the suggested follower list you won't be at the top of most of these lists: http://wefollow.com/ (we follow uses follower numbers to determine order on their lists). I stayed away from talking too much about the SUL....
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- Robert Scoble
Another perspective. Back when Friendfeed had NO profiles, everyone was 'chatting' on a somewhat level playing field. While nobody knows everyone, I found I met some fascinating people because most didn't bother to go over to LinkedIn or Facebook. It was what you wrote that made the difference ... period ... and there were (are) some still-to-be-discovered fascinating, interesting and/or just funny people out there.
- Charlie Anzman
Scoble, the cat has more interesting tweets than you, please get over your jealousy.
- Phillip Stewart
Twitter's "Suggested User List" (SUL) = the quintessential High School popularity contest all over again... augh! Only this time, it's not controlled by the jock and the pretty blonde cheerleader, but some dudes at twitter HQ :-/ Personally, I think the SUL was designed for the primary purpose of getting twitter some notoriety to help make their application go mainstream.
- Susan Beebe
Robert, thanks. Cat allergies aside, it seems the real problem is the relative advantage given to your competitors. So, a principle that would've been good: that anybody who actually is dependent on follower counts for their livelihood should not have been on the SUL. Otherwise, it might tempt them into "backrubs". So, iJustine, individual reporters, small blogs likeTC, etc. should have fought each other fair and square. But Oprah, Sockington, etc. would've been okay. Of course, it's too late now...
- Jacob Harris
HOMEWORK IDEA #1: I'm too busy to do this, but it might be useful to take someone on the SUL (you can pick @aplusk if you want) and programmatically go through the followers. See how many post regularly vs. how many didn't post in the last week vs. how many didn't in the last month. Use that as an approx. of user engagement. Do the same for @scobleizer or @davewiner as a control.
- Jacob Harris
HOMEWORK IDEA #2: Ask Techcrunch the absolute monthly twitter numbers for last month and see if we can get closer to a real worth of being on the SUL for them. Yes, they probably won't share it, but it's good to ask.
- Jacob Harris
@Jacob Perhaps this might be helpful http://www.twitip.com/life-on...
- Brandon Mendelson
Here's a rough study of click-thru -- http://twdsc.us/107...
- Dave Winer
Brandon, you really think if I apply my poor little self I'll catch up to your 631,404 followers someday?
- Dave Winer
jacob -- state your position on the SUL and then let it rest.
- Dave Winer
@Dave, (look at #4) But yeah, I think it's possible. But, I'm always an optimist.
- Brandon Mendelson
Mmmm...I think Twitter shouldn't get complacent. There's always someone nipping at your heels. Look what happened to MySpace.
- debegray
Took a look at the newest list after reading this, and the only one I clicked on was Rania Al Abdullah - since she is doing such great things for women in the region. I feel sorry for the new people coming on Twitter having to choose from that list. I had to dig around for my first following list, but now have alot of interesting creative people from all over the world. Most of them had...
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- Kay Designer
Brendon, you also say we should be satisfied with our little following. Why don't you prove it and delete your account and start over. Be the big man you want the rest of us to be.
- Dave Winer
@Dave, tempting, but it would be disrespectful to those who have decided to follow me (for starters) and more importantly, remember my job is to get the people following me and out to their local shelters this Summer (as mentioned in the article) Since the tech media won't acknowledge anything that I do, it'd be silly to delete my only online channel.
- Brandon Mendelson
That said, I would be a liar if I told you I have not been tempted in the past to do this and I won't rule out doing so after this project has ended.
- Brandon Mendelson
In the meantime your lectures down to us little folk make you look like a (fill in the blank).
- Dave Winer
I don't think that is a far assesment to make. I did that post to be helpful and what I said there is no different than what I said when I had 1,000 folks following me. Also, I don't think I would count yourself or Mr. Scoble as little folk. If Robert, as an example, deleted his Twitter account, he would still be who he is and have many well deserved fans. Me on the other hand? *poof*
- Brandon Mendelson
Then I wouldn't be able to help anyone. And to be honest? That's why I'm on Twitter in the first place.
- Brandon Mendelson
Dave, my position is that while the SUL is stupid, it's twitter's site and they can do what they want with it. I don't feel like they owe me anything or presence on the SUL is a measure of value. My particular bugbear is the hypothesizing that twitter is using the SUL as a form of control over the tech press, especially since we now know there isn't that much intelligence to it. I also am skeptical of attaching arbitrary values to links, especially when used to support the paranoid control theory.
- Jacob Harris
For what it's worth, I think the new Replies behavior and blocking have been far worse to twitter actually, because it makes it much harder for me to see the conversation. But that's a different thread.
- Jacob Harris
Dave, thank you for the clickthrough notes. I was curious how active an audience the SUL followers are, given that they are new to twitter. That's why I thought it would be good to see their tweeting activity as a proxy for that.
- Jacob Harris
You know what? Screw that. I guess I will leave myself open to unfollowing. My comments are better than 98% of my "tweets" and actually say something. My likes are my linkblog. I'd rather be blocked or unfollowed than stifled. Besides, if Twitter actually had a service that filtered and TRACKED, it wouldn't be a fucking problem.
Chris Heath, Sheldon Steiger, Cliff Gerrish and 3 other people liked this
Right on. This is the same impulse as my last big FF food fight, where I found myself not psoting things that I knew drive bys would feast on. Fuck that. Convincing you not to say what you mean and desire to convey is worse than suppressing what you say. It makes you do the dirty work for yourself. Let if fly, let the chips fall where they may which will probably end up being shoulders.
- Dave Slusher
Thanks Dave; I have this circuit that was installed long ago that tends to turtle when someone complains or criticizes. Standing up for myself is an issue; even a friendly request from a friend puts me into a tailspin. I respectfully turn the switches on and what they do is their business.
- Aron Michalski
Why is it so hard to get Bruce Springsteen tickets? | PopWatch Blog | EW.com - http://popwatch.ew.com/popwatc...
Sheldon Steiger liked this
Again, the old models are killing the current experience.
- Aron Michalski
A quick difference between Twitter's architecture and that of FriendFeed pointed out by @biz's post from today...
minitoka, Mohammad Abdurraafay, Michael Parekh and 106 other people liked this
Biz writes, "Every time someone wrote a reply Twitter had to check and see what each of their followers' reply setting was and then manifest that tweet accordingly in their timeline—this was the most expensive work the database was doing and it was causing other features to degrade."
- Louis Gray
But on FriendFeed, every time you see an update, FriendFeed checks if you subscribe to someone, and if you have hidden any service, or even any specific blog from any service.
- Louis Gray
FriendFeed knows when you post an update who can see it and who can't see it, based on who is following, and what services they have opted into or out of. And when you think of how many different ways the database has to be set, the unlimited power is very impressive.
- Louis Gray
FriendFeed checks by list, by service, by name of service, and can even check by if something is liked or not, how many times, has comments, and how many, and who from, if you use the search. There is a ton of data behind the data.
- Louis Gray
Math is hard </barbie>. Sorry, but this seems like a serious cop out to me. If FF can design the DB to function as quickly as it does with as many selection parameters, surely Twitter could do the same (if, that is, they have the proper backend platform to do so, and it doesn't look like they do).
- FFing Enigma (aka Tina)
And yet, FriendFeed continues to add features and have near-flawless uptime without slowness.
- Louis Gray
I agree...it is a major copout. We have been using that technique in online chat systems since the early 1980's. It is not difficult and does not take as much power as @biz seems to be implying.
- Semipro
"near-flawless uptime without slowness"? You can't be serious…
- Mistletoe Glen
I am serious. They had downtime last week, and that was a blip. And what slowness, Glen? (Referring to FriendFeed)
- Louis Gray
Their whole feed was delayed several hours last night!
- Mistletoe Glen
Twitter's was. Not FriendFeed's.
- Louis Gray
my bad — I thought you were talking about Twitter
- Mistletoe Glen
My comments should have run together. Tina helpfully interrupted. :)
- Louis Gray
Yeah, the "And yet, they continue..." sorta started down the road to Ambiguity.
- Ken Sheppardson
Please accept my abject apology and a free libation of your choice at our next (first?) meeting
- Mistletoe Glen
(Edited for clarity) and Glen, look forward to that happening.
- Louis Gray
@ in the middle must be a lot less frequent than @ at the beginning thus saving processing power
- Matsis
But a beginning @ is index 0, there's no seek time compared to an any position @.
- Micah Wittman
also I believe a fair comparison would be twitter removing the @ replies to all (lame) with FF removing FoaF entries from lists other than the home feed. And twitter search is real time - that's probably eating up processing power
- Matsis
Good point re: Friend of a Friend, Matsis. FriendFeed already has to check if you have it enabled or not, and then if you have it enabled for a specific friend or not, and then, execute. I neglected to mention that.
- Louis Gray
Leather: When the "see all @ replies" was an option, Twitter had to decide how to handle @ replies (whether to propagate the tweet to you or to hide it, depending on your setting), which is expensive to the database. So, either they make everybody see all @ replies (which changes the setting of 98% of the users), or they sacrifice the 2%
- Andre P. Siregar
Micah I think twitter's point was that they didn't want to go check the setting (too much work for them) so they removed it. We b*itched and moaned so they gave back something less than what was. Or in other words, if the feature is available, and Oprah has a back and forth with aplusk (say replies 10-15 times), twitter dies. Also what Andre said :)
- Matsis
This is a good lesson for all comp sci students. The @-reply was not a feature Twitter had when they first launched. It's sort of a hack from the community that later got incorporated. But the architecture didn't anticipate this feature. And now it's hard to change the foundation when the house has been built
- Andre P. Siregar
Andre, I also think it's fair to say (many have stated this many times) that the whole of twitter's original architecture wasn't built with the anticipation of its current use.
- Micah Wittman
I think it all has to do with the schema-less design on top of MySQL FriendFeed is using. They're simply making smarter choices ahead of time, rather than reactive choices.
- Jesse Stay
So, by the presumed logic, no one's going to a see any new features that involves a follower dependent setting regarding anything tweet in stream. Well, ok then.
- Micah Wittman
Jesse, I have no doubt Friendfeed made smarter design decisions. When Twitter started the whole micro-blogging thing nobody really knew back then how it was going to grow and be used (now Twitter is much more than just about "I'm having lunch"). So when Friendfeed started, I'm sure they took some lessons learned from Twitter and others
- Andre P. Siregar
Micah, yes regarding Twitter's original architecture. IIRC, Digg went through the same re-architecting exercise a few years back when their users started to skyrocket.
- Andre P. Siregar
It's typical to have to re-architect a system once you realize how much the userbase is skyrocketing. Ideally you've constructed it in such a way so that you can rip out modular pieces and replace them as necessary. It seems to me that the whole of Twitter's backend is a much more serially constructed system, which is why they have to have complete system outages still now at three...
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- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Leather, here is what Bret talked about for their MySQL implementation: http://bret.appspot.com/entry...
- Louis Gray
This thread is fascinating. I'm learning.
- joey
And though I wasn't on Twitter to see it, Robert suggests that they've been seeing these problems since he had about 1500 followers.
- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Rob: that's absolutely true. Twitter was crashing even back in 2006. The architecture they chose was always horrid. It's getting better, actually, but still is having sizeable problems. Friendfeed has been down twice, once for an hour, and once for more than an hour because of a power failure that took down the entire data center. (At least that I remember). Twitter seems like it was down every day in 2008 and even this week has been down more than friendfeed has ever been down.
- Robert Scoble
It's hard to compare the two systems DB functionality because of the lower traffic FriendFeed has compared to Twitter.
- Rick Cogley
Rick, you can compare them based on the time of their lifespan though, and FriendFeed is doing much, much better. See the interview Scoble and I did with them last year when they had a very similar user-base to FriendFeed's.
- Jesse Stay
Rick: absolutely NOT true. Friendfeed today has MUCH higher traffic than Twitter did two years ago.
- Robert Scoble
It is easy to look at the total user base and make excuses for Twitter, but what I'm talking about is the fact that FriendFeed is accomplishing much more complex tasks, and not missing a beat. Even when they are 10 times bigger than they are today, I expect they will scale smoothly, because of their talent and their track record.
- Louis Gray
Leather: I'm assuming the difference is with the amount of WRITE operation in the database (which is much more expensive than parsing)
- Andre P. Siregar
I would love to read how friendfeed has architected itself to avoid the problems twitter is having.
- ian kennedy
Traffic may be one thing, but I would venture to guess the activity in the database is higher in FF than in Twitter for the same number of users
- Andre P. Siregar
ian: on friendfeed there is more metadata to study and filter with. I can say "show me all items that mention Obama" on both services, but only on friendfeed can I also say "and display only those items that have a like or more." That is how friendfeed can remove a major amount of spam (and I use it all the time). Spam doesn't get likes. Another way?
- Robert Scoble
On friendfeed I can delete any comment underneath one of my items. So I can help keep my corner of friendfeed clean. And if I see any underneath, say, your items, I can let you know about it. But what about on Twitter? We can't do shit about spam except report it and hope that @biz or someone gets to it.
- Robert Scoble
Leather: Twitter is more than three years old. Friendfeed is just about 1.5 years old. You aren't factoring that in. Go and compare the two services all along at the same age. I don't compare my 1.5 year old to a three year old, and neither should you. That's a HUGE mistake you are making.
- Robert Scoble
When Twitter was 1.5 years old it had fewer users than friendfeed and was FAR LESS COMPLEX yet it was going down about 100 times more often than friendfeed is today. Twitter's architecture was NEVER thought out very well and we're still seeing the artifacts of that.
- Robert Scoble
Leather: I'm comparing friendfeed today to where Twitter was 1.5 years ago.
- Robert Scoble
Leather: true, but friendfeed is a LOT more complex than Twitter ever was and it also has more users than Twitter did when Twitter was 1.5 years old.
- Robert Scoble
Leather: then what are you arguing with me about? Heheh.
- Robert Scoble
Scoble, yes the filtering on advanced searches is impressive (it even supports simple exclusions). I am impressed that they can keep it all running with every page updating in*real*time. Is each page an open session?
- ian kennedy
ian: I believe it is. Leather: go to compete.com or any traffic site and compare. But adjust the dates.
- Robert Scoble
Leather: keep in mind I've been on Twitter 907 days and I'm not going to do your homework for you. :-)
- Robert Scoble
Louis, you're absolutely correct about FF accomplishing much more complex tasks much more effortlessly. Overall the leaders of this team are more effective. We had a saying back when I was consulting ISP startups "The network IS the business plan" In an online business that depends entirely on its systems for potential revenues, the architecture of the network becomes a model for the...
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- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Leather: believe me, Twitter didn't grow that fast until the last year. The first two years Twitter grew slower than friendfeed did and had a TON more problems (and was even less complex).
- Robert Scoble
Leather: 900 != 700. Heheh. That's a huge number of days in this world. And, anyway, both traffic and complexity are higher on friendfeed and amount of time down is MUCH lower here. So, by either metric friendfeed is winning HUGE.
- Robert Scoble
Robert, here's the screen capture from Compete.com: http://twitpic.com/57bgl Y'all seem to be forgetting about non-Twitter-account web traffic. FF is flat; Twitter skyrockets. And yes, FF is "younger" but is built on top of Twitter so it did not start from the same "zero" point -- nor does it have as many API calls -- nor is it as accessible off-the-laptop (iPhones excepted).
- Kathy E Gill
Kathy: you have NOT shifted the graph to show equivilent times. At 4/2009 Friendfeed is STILL far younger than Twitter was at 4/2008. Shift the graphs and come back. Also, at 1.5 years into its life Twitter didn't have that many apps either and Twitter's API is far more simplistic than friendfeed's is. Twitter didn't take off until after it was two years old. Friendfeed is already growing faster. And who cares what it is built on top of? Twitter was built on top of blogs and we don't hold that against it.
- Robert Scoble
Kathy: Benjamin Golub of FF wrote fftogo.com. FriendFeed on any phone.
- Johnny Worthington
Twitter started March 21, 2006. Friendfeed started October 1, 2007. You must shift the charts to compare apples to apples.
- Robert Scoble
I just don't understand why it's so hard to compare apples to apples. If you want to compare the two companies, you have to compare them at similar stages in their lifecycles. it's really simple.
- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Rob: because our tools make it hard to do the comparison. But I was there and saw how Twitter grew. Twitter was crashing before it even got to the famous SXSW and I only had something like 1000 followers then (and that was in March of 2007).
- Robert Scoble
I use fftogo almost every day. and I use the IM on the other days (twitter isn't really even sophisticated enough to keep their IM service running)
- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Not to mention email
- Johnny Worthington
I don't know about that Robert. We can grok how to compare money from today to money in 1920. We should be able to adjust stats about companies in our brains. We don't compare the revenues of a 3yo company to the revenues of a 30yo company, right (unless the 3yo is performing Outrageously). I haven't heard a single person disagree with what you've said about "the old days" of twitter either. So I can only assume that it must be true. These problems don't sneak up on a company.
- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Rob: Twitter's management will admit they've always had technical problems. Remember, their architect was fired (Blair) and @ev admitted that it was a test project that they never expected to get so big.
- Robert Scoble
Ok, well the first step to getting well is admitting you have a problem, right? Never expecting a thing to get so big is a lack of vision, and not a very good quality for a management team IMO. Since they never expected it, and now that it is, they should be stepping aside as they are certainly no longer qualified to lead it. And THAT is the true sign of success of management teams....
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- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Choose Success, not failure. But, it's interesting to note that "fail whale" and twitter are synonymous. Fail is practically in the name. And that needs to be corrected. It affects team spirit and morale, and causes it to become a vicious cycle.
- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Rob: you have to go back in @ev's history, though. Remember when he started Pyra? They made Blogger. Remember how often it was down? A lot, just like Twitter. How slow it was? Very. How much spam it had? A lot, just like Twitter. Yet it made Ev a lot of money, just like Twitter will. So, since he's been down this path before, why not repeat? It actually doesn't make sense to over...
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- Robert Scoble
And that's where I come back to the lack of vision. If you "aren't sure" then you don't have the vision. You're right that it doesn't make sense to over engineer something if you have doubts, but if you have doubts, why jack with it? But in some sense it does make sense to over engineer things, because in a pinch you can often sell the company for the technology that's running it to someone who has a different vision for it, someone who knows what to do with what you've built.
- guruvan (Rob Nelson)
Robert, I was talking about now, but I see your point about comparing two years ago. However, it's still hard to compare two different systems, different db's, different programming languages, different ways of indexing data, etc, in my opinion. It's pretty apparent that FF has been very stable, comparatively, however.
- Rick Cogley
lots of testosterone on this thread, did we at least all agree that twitter's "organic architecture" sucks now just like it did from inception & friendfeeds "designed architecture" should scale nicely just like it has from inception?
- mike "glemak" dunn
Mike, yes, agreed on that. ;-)
- Rick Cogley
FriendFeed enthusiasts in Scoble's network agree that it's better than Twitter! Film at 11.
- Christian Crumlish
Friendfeed is irresistibly useful now. Recent features add up to a really compelling product. Really hope Twitter never chokes 'em.
David Berrebi, Peter Efland, Tim Moore and 123 other people liked this
Saw this immediately thanks to notifications.
- MG Siegler
Saw your comment immediately.
- Gabe Rivera
BTW, that was my first FF comment since August '08.
- Gabe Rivera
Like a virgin.
- MG Siegler
Welcome back then Gabe!
- Simon Wicks
I'm tellin' ya. FF's back. Just bookmarked their iphone friendly site.
- Mario Sundar
you don't say ;-)
- Dobromir Hadzhiev
The day FF will launch real-time, the earth will stand still.
- Jérôme Flipo
Jerome: wut? I myself will lurve saved searches AKA track AKA Gillmor's Grail
- Gabe Rivera
I meant every smart microblogger will have to move to Friendfeed. Time will only run on Friendfeed!
- Jérôme Flipo
Gillmor may spontaneously combust if track hits FF before it restarts on twitter
- Adrian
I'd love to hear a list why its "irresistibly useful" for you, Gabe. I'm still quasi-resisting, although I do find it useful.
- C. K. Sample III
I will repeat here: it would be great for users if Twitter and FF merged their capabilities. One completes the other.
- William Mougayar
William, what does Twitter do that Friendfeed doesn't?
- Jérôme Flipo
Hey Gabe - great to see you here
- Hutch Carpenter
what recent features excite you
- @baratunde
CK, baratunde: essentially, its capacity to extend Twitter in very useful ways. Creating small friend lists here (to track separately from your main feed) is easier here than with Twitter desktop apps, and the results come in in real time. I also turned on IM notifications for select friends. Remember Twitter had IM? They took the feature away.
- Gabe Rivera
There goes the neighborhood! :-)
- Robert Scoble
The last couple days on Twitter have brought me back to FF as well
- Costa Walcott
Gabe - any plans to add services like FriendFeed/Backtype/Reddit etc to Link Search option in Techmeme. Tried Link Search on top headline i.e. http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL... and got zero results from Google Blog Search/Ask and IceRocket returned 5.
- Atul Arora
Atul: huh, putting a URL in FF search does come up with useful results, so I think I'll add FF to the link search list. If those other services have backlink search currently available, please list sample query urls here and I'll take a look. (BTW, to see what Atul's talking about, click "Preferences" on Techmeme, then click "Show Link Search".)
- Gabe Rivera
Backtype aggregates across Reddit, YCombinator and FriendFeed - See http://www.backtype.com/comment...
- Atul Arora
Gabe bit.ly also does link search and returns FriendFeed, Twitter and Backtype results for all bit.ly version of that URLs e.g. http://bit.ly/info/8XNa4. Since @TechmemeFH and @Techmeme are both using bit.ly the link search is simply adding the + after the URL i.e. http://bit.ly/8XNa4+ for the bit.ly based link search.
- Atul Arora
Gabe, here's a link to our connect feature which shows all the conversation around a link (digg, reddit, twitter, friendfeed, hacker news, and posts that link in): http://www.backtype.com/connect...
- Mike Montano
Mike - so what is bit.ly using to show comments from backtype. It shows zero comments. Is it filtering comments so that it only shows comments from the blog page?
- Atul Arora
Thanks Mike, Atul. I will take a close look at this later and probably add some more link search links.
- Gabe Rivera
Atul, yes they're using a method that only fetches comments from the page being queried, though full connect functionality would be a nice addition imo.
- Mike Montano
Hey look Gabe is back! :)
- Susan Beebe
I agree, except that it should be easier to add an external feed other than through the cumbersome creation of an "Imaginary Friend".
- Derek Mahar
My mustache is more lustrous and thick after switching to FriendFeed. I have a lot more energy. Even my wife has noticed certain improvements in my usefulness around the house. Thanks FriendFeed! [I BLUSH]
- Jay Cuthrell
I'm still going to say that I think links to friendfeed discussions on blog posts belong on Techmeme. ;)
- Thomas Hawk
Wait, is this sarcastic Twitter Gabe or normal Gabe? What persona have you decided to adopt on FF? :)
- Matt Cutts
No idea whether it's of use to TechMeme, Gabe, but FriendFeed's API will give you a list of all the entries that link to a specified URL. http://code.google.com/p... You can see it in action with http://ffcheck.com
- Ken Sheppardson
I agree I like Friendfeed simplicity.
- LaShea Miller
Friendfeed just gets better every day (and is incredibly responsive to user feedback!)
- Charlie Anzman
like the notifications air app ... been trying it out.
- Julian Lukács
FriendFeed FTW!
- (jeff)isageek
@mattcutts: hah, no I'm serious here. FF's current feature set now offers great value to me. I suspect FF still has a major challenge offering a compelling and differentiated product to the Oprah crowd, but that doesn't concern me (and FF may nail that eventually).
- Gabe Rivera
@thomashawk: noted. :-)
- Gabe Rivera
I have already noticed a massive increase in followers on friendfeed recently. Anecdotal evidence indicates friendfeed is growing (I find it has a higher utility as well)
- Jordan Willms
Agree, great improvements!
- Tim Moore
Ev is now crying uncle on the replies issue. Dear Twitter, start being more transparent. You're a utility now.
Peter Efland, Nicholas James, Anthony K. Valley © and 80 other people liked this
OOOOH PWNED
- Mistletoe Glen
Don't go changing the dang thing before I can blog about it! lol
- AJ Kohn
They completely overwrote half of their original blog post on the issue
- Jesse Stay
Reading people's thoughts? Now? Didn't bother to research it before? Hmmmmm...
- Michael McKean
@Jesse: You're right. The whole second section has been rewritten.
- AJ Kohn
@Michael Absolutely, there should always be user research before changes like this
- Mo Kargas
Hence my note to Ev. We are happy to provide feedback in advance.
- Louis Gray
Although "considering alternatives" implies to me that they're not going to just turn the setting back on...
- Costa Walcott
Twitter = design by flames
- Morton Fox
They can discuss this in their lunch-hour downtime tomorrow.
- John Spyers
$5 says they deleted the code
- Jesse Stay
lol @ Jesse
- jojo, adventurer
@Jesse, Reality shows are always in rewrites ;)
- Micah Wittman
@Michael - same thing happened when they turned off free SMS for a bunch of countries - as far as I was aware there was no prior warning, they just flicked the switch. Admittedly, the free SMS was costing them money, but some form of advance warning would have been nice..
- Matt Hooper
evhead is on friendfeed, ya know? http://friendfeed.com/evhead...
- Chris Heath
From the newly written second part of the blog: "We'll be introducing better ways to discover and follow interesting accounts as we release more features in this space." So, perhaps they have some new feature that would trump seeing @replies? Either way, wouldn't you introduce the new feature and then sunset the old - phased approach - or at least do a switchover from one to the other.
- AJ Kohn
In that little screen grab, the favorite star is not marked. ;) ;)
- David Damore
Sorry, David. I recommend downloading the image, opening it in PhotoShop and utilizing the Fill Bucket.
- Louis Gray
It's nice to know they're listening for once. I wonder how many complaints they received.
- Michael Fidler
Ev is pulling a Zuckerberg.
- Violet Mae Lim
Alternative (check or uncheck): "[ X ] Only show replies to those I follow." Eureka! Alternative-ness was already there. Back where we started.
- Micah Wittman
Go ev. It's nice when people can at least consider that they've made a mistake. We all make mistakes. How you handle them is a sign of character.
- Mitchell Tsai
@Micah: +3 @Mitchell: Completely agree.
- AJ Kohn
Got to check out the action on http://monitter.com Add @replies to one row
- Michael Fidler
before our tears hit the floor, @ev responds to #fixreplies
- iTbay
I'm in shock. Twitter has always done right by the community. They screwed the pooch on this one.
- drew olanoff
Thanks for your feedback? Seriously? Am I in the damn twilight zone? The blog post called this "confusing" Yet um its the only way my mom knew who to follow.
- drew olanoff
@drew now that's the best use case example right there! :)
- Matt Hooper
Oh, and re Twitter doing right by the community...ask @jesse about the advance notice provided by Twitter to 3rd party developers before the API is changed, or a usage restriction is imposed. Sometimes there is no warning, and 3rd party apps are broken.
- John E. Bredehoft
from fftogo
Ev is essentially now saying we should have seen it coming, because of this blog post he wrote a year ago. http://bit.ly/vfKY
- Sharon McPherson
I am seriously baffled by their logic. I need to sleep on this since the thoughts behind this is driving me batty. How can they push this option on to people? I really don't understand lol!
- Mona Nomura
Couldn't care less about the feature; this was one of the first things I disabled anyway. But I get really upset for twitter fixing something that wasn't broken, and taking away flexibility from the users. Just stupid.
- gui ambros
gui: it wasn't something you would have disabled... the default was to have this feature turned off - i guess you would say that you never turned it on, since it was never on for you to disable it
- Chris Heath
I'm not sure that @Ev alone is responsible for this decision. I hate this decision but I don't think it was made by one person alone. After all, @Biz wrote the blog entries explaining it all. I bet it was just a terrible group decision.
- Liz
"Group think" is a crusher. Gonna be a busy week at Twitter HQ sorting this mess out/fixing it
- David Damore
I think I missed something.......hmmmmmmm. time to go dig around. =)
- jen
On what point of the learning curve they are?
- 77Agency
Example: "@scobleizer you suck" is a reply, and will only be seen by followers of @scobleizer. "Hey @scobleizer you suck" is a mention, and will be seen by everyone who follows the person sending the message.
Steven E. Streight, Amie Gillingham, Sheldon Steiger and 12 other people liked this
Apologies to Mr. Scoble.
- Mistletoe Glen
you're sneaky. i like that. ;-)
- ♥patricia♥
Adventures in Realtime - http://www.techcrunchit.com/2009...
Alberto Saavedra, Sheldon Steiger, Meryn Stol and 39 other people liked this
It's a wonderfull time, combination of the inevitability of full realtime and everyone joining the conversation via facebook, Twitter and Friendfeed.
- Christian Burns
Coming from CU SeeMe at 160x120 pixel at 10fps over 28.8 kbps dialup to Cisco Telepresence at 1080p at 30fps over 25 Mbps MPLS enabled Metro Ethernet... now when will there be a spigot for the regular home user or real estate to enable this in living rooms, board rooms, and *fear* bathrooms all around the world? Isn't that where it is all heading?
- Jay Cuthrell
Steve, your hashtag comments were remarkably prescient. Of course, me being the one who has to actually do something to learn about why you say it's one way or the other, let's just say I did and I learned, well. Welcome back to the puppet, too.
- Karoli
For me - far and away, the best post by Steve on TechcrunchIT
- Sameer
Track reminds me of Woodstock. The word of mouth so much more interesting than the real thing.
- Jim Posner
Woodstock was much more than word of mouth. Those of us who had track in the Sixties will be proven right in a few weeks.
- Steve Gillmor
Track to me always seemed like a one trick pony, a short-lived novel feature for the gtalk client with track topics polluted by the rest of the stream. twitter search has the latent unpolluted track stream but not available in the gtalk client. The internet was built on the concept of good enough so it is with track, of course in a few weeks...
- Jim Posner
makes no sense, either it's important or it isn't. I say it is, you say potahto
- Steve Gillmor
Being able to track is important, being able to do it in the gtalk client not so much. YMMV
- Jim Posner
if you have drunk from the fountain you yearn to do it again. it was THE way to keep you from having to subscribe to everybody to find what you wanted. great post.
- Sebastian Keil
Sebastian, agree completely. and the net-net has been that now there's some sort of expectation that a reciprocal follow is part of the social contract, which it wouldn't be if we could simply use track.
- Karoli
track in the web client is not track. there is no Twitter track except for TwitterSpy and other similarly rate limited 3rd party unsupported and crippled products. gtalk is only the most useful of the released track clients to date, but as with api access doesn't exist. if you want to find out how important track is, just ask Twitter execs when it will be back. The answer: when it's provided by a strong competitor.
- Steve Gillmor
ron, no way. you'd have to take mine away too. can't. let. it. happen. ;-)
- Karoli
@Steve "The answer: when it's provided by a strong competitor." < Is this your version of the answer or have you heard this stated?
- J Allen
The quixotic quest to bring back track reminds me of the book entitled "In Search of Lost Time" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki...
- Jim Posner
I love that book...
- Cliff Gerrish
Jim: What client you use is not important. I use Adium to talk to twitterspy. Your favorite twitter client vendor could ride on twitterspy's infrastructure and present the matches however they see fit. Seesmic did this a while ago with twhirl and identispy.
- Dustin Sallings
it's coming back. Facebook went realtime today. Quixotic is creating new windmills.
- Steve Gillmor
...and phantasmagorical sightings of track were made in the feature/function flotsam and jetsam which in the end turned out to be low-fi apparitions.
- Jim Posner
Jim just can't seem to let this go. Guess we'll just have to keep this going for another couple of weeks. I'm wondering why you have so much invested in the non-existence of track. Reminds me of the RSS is irrelevant argument of days of yore. Was wrong then and wrong now.
- Steve Gillmor
re: RSS false analogy...stop me if you've heard this one- there was once a strawman who posed as a ironman...
- Jim Posner
Boom! Twitter More Than Doubles Unique U.S. Visitors To 9.3 Million In March - http://www.techcrunch.com/2009...
David Berrebi and Sheldon Steiger liked this
@scottmonty 2010 Ford Transit Connect; Does Ford Do ANY USA consumer research or do they just "hope" this will work? - http://www.mediapost.com/publica...
Sheldon Steiger, Allen Harkleroad and Steve Garfield liked this
Ultimately, says Hurt, the success of the vehicle will depend on whether that "white space" is real or a mirage. (What research is there to make these gambles?) I really don't get it. Ford is "Hoping?" I'm "hoping" that Obama will pay my bills for me, is it that kind of "hope?" Ford is hoping that consumers -- particularly small-business owners -- will climb over each other for one, as there hasn't been anything like it since Chevrolet discontinued the Astro (and GMC Safari) four years ago.
- Jim Peake
from Bookmarklet
OMG that's 100% FUGLY.
- Allen Harkleroad
This pervasive notion that auto companies don't do any consumer research needs to stop. Does anyone honestly believe that multimillion dollar decisions are being made without any input from the target market? Here's a little detail on exactly what has happened so far with the Transit Connect. First of all, this is a *concept vehicle*, meaning that it's not a production model; it's designed to get feedback from consumers.
- Scott Monty
Second, we had a number of people in the field, interacting with families to determine their needs. We met them at children's museums, parking lots, bus stops, daycare centers and more. For people who don't want a minivan for aesthetic or cultural reasons, they still need the functionality & space; plus, many 5+2 vehicles don't have much functional/useable space in the 3rd row. We found that families will trade some size & space for better fuel economy, better ride & handling, and a lower price.
- Scott Monty
http://www.redmonk.com/jgovern... James Governor on Salesforce realtime cloud
Jeroen De Miranda, Sheldon Steiger, Daniel Rowley and 9 other people liked this
Enterprise infrastructure is being functionally deconstructed and reconstructed in components (customer service, financial, marketing, etc) in the cloud. Movement from an environment with poor connectivity to one with rich Network connectivity. Or as someone once said, "Your outside is in, and your inside is out. So come on..." http://www.youtube.com/watch...
- Cliff Gerrish
friendfeed is like going down into the bomb shelter and all the lights and shit work just fine
Edmund Tay, Sheldon Steiger, Thomas Hawk and 43 other people liked this
Love this analogy, it's perfect. Though I like dodging the bombs most days...then run here for cover.
- Karoli
twitter on the other hand is like the last scene in Planet of the Apes
- Steve Gillmor
digging back into my fried brain for that image...
- Karoli
you need a vacation from MSNBC
- Steve Gillmor
I was supposed to be in Maui this week. Stupid economy. Stupid market.
- Karoli
you're not getting good information
- Steve Gillmor
what makes you think i'm looking for information on MSNBC? silly you.
- Karoli
I see references to idiots you're watching on the channel -
- Steve Gillmor
I don't view Rachel Maddow as an idiot. My references to Cramer should not imply that I watch him. I am sometimes subjected to him by He Who Controls The Remote.
- Karoli
Cramer is on CNBC. Maddow is great but you're buying the cable line that Obama is in trouble
- Steve Gillmor
also the lack of ff pointers on twitter makes your commentary disjointed
- Steve Gillmor
I'm not buying that line.WTF are you talking about? He's not in trouble, he's getting shit done. I'm not in Maui because He Who Controls The Checkbook decided we shouldn't spend. I differed. He won.
- Karoli
you're pinned down in the idiot talking points.
- Steve Gillmor
I don't send to twitter from FF. I'm replying to you on FF.
- Karoli
exactly - your Twitter stream is fragmented.
- Steve Gillmor
um...what talking points are those?
- Karoli
that there's a rational discussion about how he's doing
- Steve Gillmor
francine is not in this conversation
- Steve Gillmor
Non sequiturs FTL
- WorldofHiglet
unfollow worldo
- Steve Gillmor
I am not having a conversation with francine
- Steve Gillmor
and I'm not worried about how he's doing.
- Karoli
I think you're kidding yourself
- Steve Gillmor
If I sent my FF posts to twitter, would you think I was kidding myself?
- Karoli
I got some complaints that my ff links showed I was not paying attention to my Twitter community, I feel it's the opposite. ff links give context.
- Christian Burns
Only if twitter peeps are also on FF. When Twitter slowed the RT stream to FF, it fragmented everything to unintelligible levels.
- Karoli
if you sent your ff posts and comments to twitter it would be a good sign of recovery
- Steve Gillmor
because i'm not already noisy enough on Twitter?
- Karoli
cross posting is signal not noise
- Steve Gillmor
it's a circle. when i was crossposting to twitter from FF, half the conversation happened there; half here. I could follow it (more or less), but it created lots of dupes on the RT FF stream.
- Karoli
don't understand the dupes part
- Steve Gillmor
do you feed your twitter feed into FF? or are you exclusively here?
- Karoli
yes I do but there are no dupes. Only posts on twitter come over here
- Steve Gillmor
soooo, if you crosspost to Twitter from FF, don't they loop back?
- Karoli
no they do not. FriendFeed is smart about it
- Steve Gillmor
hmmmm. trying to figure out why I had so many duplicates before then, especially on IM.
- Karoli
Of this conversation, because I follow Steve on twitter, I see only Steve's posts coming over on twitter, I have to come back here to see the other parts of the conversation - I don't recall this ever have happened until THIS conversation, don't know if anyone else following Steve sees all these posts from Steve, but is interesting - there is something wrong on the FF end of things (I have essentially the same name on twitter, clcradio)
- CLC Radio
CLC Radio, that's one of the complaints I heard often too. On Twitter, if you @ someone who isn't mutually followed, you don't see those replies unless you toggle that setting. When they're sent from here, everything lands in the stream, causing some annoyance, though less than when I was sending from identi.ca...
- Karoli
yes indeedy the @reply continues to be broken
- Steve Gillmor
when i can get a reverse bridge to identi.ca (e.g. ff-->twitter-->identi.ca) I'll cross-post. right now, no bridge exists. consider it my form of protest.
- Karoli
Identica should lobby FF; I don't use it at this point. You're kidding yourself.
- Steve Gillmor
Identica users should lobby FF. I do use it because it doesn't blow up my mobile client, particularly when there's an IM flood.
- Karoli
fun discussion. I'm over and out for the night, got some things to do before I get up at the crack o' dawn tomorrow.
- Karoli
speaking of fragmented conversation...just checked in over on FB for a minute and my stream has all of Steve's updates in this conversation and others...but none of the replies. Every comment you made, Steve, shows as a status update on Facebook. Makes it look like you're having a conversation with yourself. :)
- Karoli
hahahaahaa!! LOL
- Susan Beebe
do they contain the link to the FF discussion?
- Steve Gillmor
Yes, each one, as this last one, contain the link everytime - and by the way, when I see the letters FF I think FriendFeed NOT FireFox (just in case someone was using a plugin or something) - if you want, and I remember, I'll go to the FB page and fan myself to see if it is doing that, too.
- CLC Radio
it would be surprising if FB stripped out the link.
- Steve Gillmor
acto ryan boyle on fb, they don't strip it out. So Karoli, it's actually more two-way than Twitter is
- Steve Gillmor
yeah was hoping to check out new FB design but wasn't rolled out yet (for me).
- Ryan
welcome back
- Josh Haley
more of a two-way than Twitter? How so? can you reply to FB comments here on FF? Conversations are being spread like a teaspoonful of jam on an entire loaf of bread. A smidge here, a smattering there, all over the web...makes an ADHD brain boggle more than it already is.
- Karoli
no fb convos are siloed, but each ff post points back to its parent. twitter, no.
- Steve Gillmor
Wait...no...don't! It's a trap!
- Rahsheen ™, Coach Rah
This whole convo is in context and created here at FF, you can NOT do this with twitter by itself (twitter REQUIRES a 3rd party app in order to find the context of a convo). Also, keep in mind that ONLY this convo is having the issue I have described. All other convos that I may have commented on in FF Steve's responses are NOT coming into my tweetdeck - only all of the Steve Gilmor responses are from THIS convo. Also, keep in mind that I am Subscribed to Steve Gilmor at FF, and if I unsubscribed????
- CLC Radio
CLC Radio that's the thing. I follow 2,000 or so on Twitter; far less than that here. I don't talk to all 2K, but still a pretty decent number of them who aren't here. One of my favorite twitter people got really frustrated about having to click into FF every time I posted and sent there. (It truncates posts because I am wordy)
- Karoli
Okay, Steve, I surrender. I am sending to Twitter again. Wish FF had as good a client as Tweetie is for Twitter on the iPhone. It goes from FF to twitter to FB, but not in reverse, which sucks.
- Karoli
excellent you are no longer kidding yourself, except the listening to republicans and msm part
- Steve Gillmor
It goes wherever you want it to go, Karoli. Look here: http://friendfeed.com/e...
- Christopher Harley
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