“One more suggestion for FriendFeed - tagging. I want to be able to tag individuals, both in my posts, *and* my comments if I'm talking about them or something they might be interested in.”
I'd also like to see Disqus comments to be treated as comments, which by implementing Louis suggestion in point 2, will make more sense i guess. Comments are comments, posts are posts. In case there will be no link to which the comment is added, it could work like posting a link with the Disqus comment under. Btw, @Robert, you don't have Disqus hooked up in FF ;) - Tibor Holoda
Excellent post Louis. You are pretty much spot on with those 10 suggestions. - Mike Fruchter
Tibor: I don't like Disqus pulling in comments here. Often I want different communities to remain separate. I'll manually pull in comments or point out when I've made comments that FriendFeeder's should be aware of. Like I did here. - Robert Scoble
FriendFeed is a lifestream aggregator and I use it to aggregate all my various 'outputs'. Disqus comments are just one category of my 'outputs'. Therefore, Disqus comments are perfectly valid and *do* belong in my FriendFeed stream The fact, that such comments may be out of context to people bending FF into a Social Media Forum is an unfortunate consequence. - Andy C
11. add user definable font size. the new beta makes me squint :) - h1ro
#9! I hide things liberally and it does bug me, when I click on page 2, I'm seeing page 1 all over again. - Yolanda
Great suggestions Louis,
I would also add:
The Ability to Hide Specific RSS Feeds and
Search All Entries by URL - Shey
and go-faster stripes, a background of babes in bikinis, and intermittant embedded hilarious fart noises. - john conroy
I have to so that FF has been growing well with the current feature set. Like all areas of activity contraints can sometimes be helpful. FF needs to innovate itself, rather than copy straight from Twitter (DM's), Facebook (profiles) etc. 2,4,10 are most important. The issue here is not so much what features we want as how can FF grow into a mature platform. - Roberto Bonini
Robert: I see your point, but i still think it would be a good thing to handle Disqus comments as comments, not as posts. User decides, if he wants them appear in his FF stream or not - like in your case. - Tibor Holoda
Great List Louis! #2 is my favorite one. - Peter Hoffmann
Tibor, I agree with you (Robert, when are you going to enable Disqus on your blog?). For the blog owner it's much easier to consolidate into one place if they can tie your comments straight to the FriendFeed post itself instead of an entirely new post. - Jesse Stay via twhirl
One more suggestion - tagging. I want to be able to tag individuals, both in my posts, *and* my comments if I'm talking about them or something they might be interested in. - Jesse Stay via twhirl
Excellent list. My top priority though, isn't on there - (as per Shey) renaming or separating "Blog" posts, so individuals can hide your blog vs. another "blog" .. I'd also like it easier to determine which services I am/am not showing per individual. Just give me some enable/disable checkboxes on the users page. Strands did this right. - Tim Hoeck
Great suggestions Louis. One clarification on #4 -- most people never see this "default" list because they were either invited by another user, or they import friends from email or facebook. The recommendations are then based entirely on who their other friends are, and will make a lot more sense. - Paul Buchheit
Indeed some good suggestions. My guess is that the reason that #2 (duplicates) has not been implemented yet, is that it is very tricky to do right. If they do manage to implement it and get it right, I will be very impressed. I would not be too surprised though, since Friendfeed has some really sharp people working there. - Robert Felty
Excellent List and some good suggestions in comments as well. I really would like to see 2,3,5,6, & 10. The share on FF bookmarklet should be more like Tumblr's. I would also like to be able to filter my feed to prevent duplicates. I would like to cross post my tumblr to my main blog and twitter but in doing so I create more noise for my FF stream. If I could filter out posts from blog or twitter that started with "XYZ" then I could cross post freely without worrying about FF noise. - tsudohnimh
@Paul, thanks for the comment. I did test by signing up to just one individual, as if they had invited me, and by changing the one person I subscribed to, the recommended friends did change. That said, if you check out recommended friends in Facebook, there's the option to "X" out people you don't want and provide more. Plaxo also does this well. - Louis Gray
Re: #1 and #8 I would like to see profile information that I can search, so I can find FF folks who are geographically near me or who are in my profession or who share a common interest with me. Great post - thanks! - Courtney McGough
Pownce should worry about #10. FF will soon have to worry about cannibalizing its data suppliers, and what that means for ongoing openness. #! & #2 are the big ones with me, and I just don't see why FF enabled fake followers. - Logical Extremes
being 1st or 2nd is all that matters in that particular field.... 3rd placings and below would normally whither away - Mark L via twhirl
I am really getting confused. I just commented on the post. Now I see the comments here as posts. Totally agree with Tibor, messing posts together with comments, be it from Disqus or anywhere else, does not increase transparency. - Jan Horna
#7 - want to make sure i understand that concept of "fake follow" - home feed contains all friends by default & you can then add them to a list/grouping to subdivide them for easier readability - to remove them from the home feed you have to actually de-select them when you add them to a list and then never go to that list again - is that what "fake follow" is - if so, way to much work for no return and only lame*ss self absorbed status mongers will be doing it - imho of course :) - mike "glemak" dunn
#5 - My thought would be to make an invitation-only private room. Wouldn't this solve the partial-distribution problem? - Mitchell Tsai
Mitchell, it could, and some do, but that's a room, and not a feed. Unless the room data permeates the feed, it could get missed. - Louis Gray
I like your list. One other feature I'd like to see is to filter by service in whatever view I am in. - Jeff P. Henderson
The absolute killer feature for me would be, if FF will recognize languages of the posts, or at least to differentiate between english vs. non-english and allow filtering. Would that even be possible or did my brain just farted? :) - Tibor Holoda
(sorry for cross posting) Firstly, I'd like to add to Louis' list the capability to search rooms and then to search inside rooms. Secondly, I must confess that support for a basic profile would be useful. But as always I'd encourage the reuse of data (so importing it from whatever source the user decides). DMs might be usefull, but I haven't felt the need for them so far. - Alex Popescu
I usually don't like to speak about things that are not ready, but this post was catchy. I currently have a prototype that deals with de-duping the resource links. I haven't looked into de-duping pure messages, but my gut feeling is that this might be even easier. I hope to find the time to deploy this app sometime soon. - Alex Popescu
About private messaging: at first I thought this was a silly idea for ff, until I realized that the private messages could just show up where ff items normally show up, e.g. private comments. - j1m
I've switched and don't know that I'll be going back. Someone lemme know when beta is live so I can hit the normal site! =) - Stupid Blogger (aka Tina)
Mona, poster names are still links they're just styled differently so they don't look like the other links. - Stupid Blogger (aka Tina)
beta.friendfeed is my new friend !! lots of new stuff to play with.. 8-10hrs lag with list data ..but a very very powerful feature. !! Way to GO TEAM FF !! - Peter Dawson
Love it. If this does not go mainstream, I don't know what will. - Vinay | विनय
This could be very good... but where 's the Rick Roll? - Bill Sodeman
OK: That's a long enough beta period. Let's do it live! - Chris Baskind
I want to start a pool -- (a) first blog to hit techmeme with an article on the re-design, (b) blog with most articles about the re-design (within 2 days starting now) - Wayne Schulz
Michael: if you're viewing your feed from the main address, there is a 'sharing' box up at the top, and the options (comment, photo, link) appear once you begin typing. - Stupid Blogger (aka Tina)
click on your name Jennifer, above right - Tibor Holoda
@Jennifer "My Feed" in the sidebar replaces the "me" tab. And like Tibor said, your name works too. - Dan Hsiao
you launch this right after takeoff from scoble to berlin - coinkydink? :) - Allen Stern
@Stupid Blogger: Thanks, I'd figured that out, was just pointing out what seems like a bug in the current UI. - Michael Nielsen
Looks nice on first glance, and it seems easier now to reach rooms. The friend lists should be a great way to organize my imaginary friends which are basically topic subscriptions. The "Add/ Remove friends" link is confusing at first because when you don't have any friends in the list yet, clicking it will result in nothing (making you wonder if it's broken). The message sharing post form is also confusing because you don't quite know what to enter into it; a link, or a message, or...? The fact that it says "Share a link, message, or photos" doesn't really help. Also wasn't sure how to remove a friend from the home feed after moving them to a special list feed. Took me some seconds to find the Delete List icon, because I was looking near the "Add/ remove friends" link navigation. Wasn't sure if I like you created so many default friend lists for me (personal, favorites, professional), though I guess it may be useful to get the point across. I think I'm liking how names aren't underlined, though not so sure a - Philipp Lenssen
I love the new info bubble. Super better than the old one :) - AJ Batac
Looks like the logo now clicks to the Friends view, as you'd expect. Same as You + Friends. - Chris Baskind
can't seem to access the beta site: Service Unavailable
We encountered an error on your last request. Our service is new, and we are just working out the kinks. We apologize for the inconvenience. - Thomas Hawk
Awesomeness, very useful, and solves the biggest problem of noise reduction! great! - Aditya Kothadiya
awesome! Working now. Anyone know if there is a pagerization greasemonkey script yet for the beta site? - Thomas Hawk
thanks for the iteration.. it's a great step forward - Travis Parsons
like the new functions, but not the new layout, it just doesn't look like friendfeed and a bit feel like google groups (caused by the side bar maybe). miss the old layout... - Baron Mok
We need a "remove from home feed" button under the friends settings. Or there must be an option that we can choose the list which shows on main page. For example, i want to see only "Professional" friends' feeds on the main page. - Selim Yoruk
So many small details and improvements, make SO much difference. - Martin Añazco
At last, I will be able to add to my feed all the people who subscribe to me, and it won't impact on my main source of infobrainment. It looks nice, too. Looks like you guys have pulled another one out of the bag. +1 - Slippy Lane
Hopefully the Greasemonkey scripts I have installed will work with it. - Steven M. Cohen
I'm truly amazed at how good the UI is. The subtle touches like the use of blue links in just the right places or the contextual help like "How does hiding work?". Really great job. I think mioNews just became a little less useful to me, since FF now natively has friend groups. Oh well :P - Patrick Lightbody
It has a great feature in allowing me to separate different people into different lists - that will be worth the whole interface change in itself. I hope that rooms also have embeddable feeds tho! - Justin Long
FF is in a frenzy. This is 16 hrs old and 3rd on my Best of the Week. Congratulations Bret and team. - Russellreno
@Marcos: you can hover your mouse over the comment bubble in front of a comment to get its timestamp. - Dan Hsiao
That is how it should work. Efficient... :-) - Hakan Dahlstrom
One major reason I use FriendFeed is that it is FAST and EFFICIENT. Small companies don't really need conventional PR except to hire employees. - Mitchell Tsai
it only works for hot startups though, otherwise forget it - Loic Le Meur via twhirl
i don't agree loic. i urge all of our companies to do it this way and most do. it works for all companies that are willing to engage in social media. - Fred Wilson
i think only very hot startups get reasonable attention in social media ... - Raza
It also works where there is a lareg community into which it can be plugged - Dennis Howlett via twhirl
Perfect answer Steve - I would wonder if all those blogs drove more than 100 new users. - Allen Stern
Not really, what about the thousands of small companies who has continuously updated blogs and still no one hears about them? - Amit Morson
Fred, it is because you link to all your companies each time they announce something and you get them on TechMeme, if not, you are the one getting on TechMeme for them. It works too but not all startups have a Fred Wilson - Loic Le Meur
It works in the social media space. Not a suitable strategy for most IT and even Web businesses - john conroy
@john conroy, i totally agree. it is about the audience and the audience lives here. - Jonathan Nguyen
It's early adopter marketing, doesn't work in other contexts. - Vincent van Wylick
It works - if it is integrated with other instances of marketing and PR. It is never either or but always both. - Niclas Strandh
Publicity isn't the same thing as PR. This tactic is working in this case as a publicity tool for a hot tech startup. That's a big difference to a PR strategy. What if they face a crisis? Will a blog be sufficient? - Dave Fleet via twhirl
Dave - of course not. Obviously, they would approach a crisis much differently, that goes without saying. These guys at FF are uber smart and I totally respect and admire them for it! - Susan Beebe
If you have a kick ass product bloggers will write about it unprompted. and thats better because readers will sense the bloggers aren't just repurposing a canned PR press release. - Jason Kaneshiro
walk into best buy or circuit city, ask 100 people if they use friendfeed ... think you'll get one? - gregory lent
@gregory lent: that's why one can't depend only on one channel. The long tail of information you know. - Niclas Strandh
there is a PR advantage to a product like friendfeed that has divergent use cases and can't be fully explained in a short, repeated message... existing users are compelled to explain how they use it, what they like about it, what it "means". letting go of some message discipline in PR, finding an authentic voice and letting early adopters evangelize... both honest and effective, two words that don't apply to most PR. - tonx
He's not playing the mean game correctly. You're supposed to do it with push poll phone calls from unnamed "polling" comanies, or leaflets on windshields, or 527 ads you can disavow. "Approved by McC?" -- approved by a loser! - Dave Winer
He should really choose The Count from Seaseme Street for his VP... "5,6,7... 7 houses HAHAHA" - John Worthington
it is fine, divide and conquer, this is how the game is played. we don't have a candidate that knows any other way. change is not enough. - gregory lent
That's got to be a new record in the arena of panic-induced manipulative scumbaggery. So it's nice to see the McCain campaign showing a little initiative and really reaching for superiority in *something*. At the same time, that's precisely the sort of tactic that lights fires under a certain type of voter. I'm morbidly curious to see how that plays out for them. - Derrick Burns
Derrick -- right -- be careful about motivating your opponents too well. - Dave Winer
This is how the game works. It's up to the Obama Nation to find a way to handle this without acknowledging this douche-baggery. - Jonathan (Vacation Boy)
I think a McCain-Clinton ticket would wildly amusing. - Mot Faerin
who would have thought an Obama-McCain general election would be so wholly negative? Not I. What the hell has happened to John McCain? Just ambition, is that all? - Christopher Galtenberg
with reference to LBJ's favorite joke, "Let's start a rumor that John McCain fucks pigs... - Steve Follmer via twhirl
Glass houses, bay-bee. Good luck with that. - Chris Baskind
i hear whit romney is mccheney's running mate and they both fuck pigs - Dave Winer
I hope Obama will spend almost every dime on running TV commercials in the small towns of America where people are not "connected" and read local opinion newspapers to counteract this super-low behavior from McCain. - Andrew Baron
the ad aside, i don't think the underlying question is very controversial. why Biden over Clinton? not a surprising question from people who voted for Clinton, so just answer it and have done, i say. - idnan
Just like Obama, Clinton said the same, she's not in this to be Vice President. She wouldn't have accepted if asked. She wants to be President. - Adam Turetzky
this could so quickly descend into playground fighting! "No you!" - alphaxion
@Adam just so, but to assimilate the Clinton voters that needs a little polish and presentation. then this McC attack becomes moot, and we can have a rest until the next campaign sally. - idnan
This is what I hate about the presidential election. The issues are never the issues. - David Finch
@davidfinch ,,, which is why no one can convince me that politics is important - gregory lent
Ah, yeah, McCain, and the minute I see YOU hugging an asp, you'll get my vote! - MiniMage via NoiseRiver
interesting strategy. they totally photoshop'd his turkey chin at the end - Ryan
Smart advertising... sorry "the truth hurts" - Ron Emrick
Having served in that role for a Governor, I can tell you the cross-agency politics are maddening and incredibly difficult to navigate - even at that level and even with the full support of the Chief Executive. At the federal level, across the entire Executive Branch, I can’t even begin to imagine how compounded that would be compared to my own experience… Having said that, I do think it’s a worthwhile goal to try to integrate the thinking, the policies, and the action with a *strong* CTO - if the person is really given the authority he or she needs to be effective. This person could not be a token mid-level appointment. They need the ear of the President and his backing to go out and kick some butt. - Anthony Citrano
One more thing - I agree with Lessig (at least what he seemed to be saying) - you need someone who is both geek and evangelist. But also, that person needs a huge amount of political / diplomatic deft, the ability to negotiate, and (while bold) they do need a sprinkling of personal humility. Find me *that* among geek evangelists… ;) - Anthony Citrano
Robert, are you looking for a new job? ;-) - Jordan Hofker
the problem is cross agency politics as Anthony mentioned. I do a lot of consulting work in state and local governments and it seems that the department that sets IT policy for the entire state doesn't understand what each agency does, so the individual agencies ignore the "standards" setup by the state CIO. I think this would be even worse on the federal level were no one works togther and everyone is competiting for budgetary dollars instead of trying to their own job good (see FBI and CIA not working together as an example) - Jonathan Jesse
also it seems that greed just becomes a factor as well in what technology they use. sales staff love the lucrative contracts which the federal government provides which is why we have 3 million dollar toliet seats - Jonathan Jesse
@ Anthony Citrano--I like the idea of a strong CTO, but who would that be? Mike Arrington? I think a huge problem here is that a vast and diverse skill set is needed for the job. I agree with you on the qualifications (tech nerd, known and respected in the tech community, a great speaker, and very politically savvy), but I really don't know of any people who can fulfill that role. I wonder who Obama will find for this position if he wins (not when). - Brian Wilson
Actually, when I read the article, my first thought was Arrington, but I think he may be "too abrasive" for that post. Basically the same reason Scoble would not be a good fit. They would tell people how wrong they are, and it seems like you really have to walk on eggshells in those political circles. Paul Graham is an interesting idea, but I do not think he would be interested in a demotion :) - Rob Diana
Someone from Microsoft..they could make Vista mandatory that way - Michael VanDervort via twhirl
I am not trying to be a troll but there are a number of reasons why I think this would be extremely undesirable. I understand the attraction of having someone tasked with understanding and advancing a tech-related agenda but I have to wonder how many innovations would still be little more than a thought in someone's mind if this position had existed already. There are some actions that require government involvement and there are others that thrive without it. Not enough room to get into it but I vote no - Marco
the US CTO s/be like Sam Pitrodo of India !! He is a hecka kewl guy with a lot of tech vision. He created the Indian Telecom and IT infrastructure landscape that exists today ! Go figure -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S... !! BTW C-DOT was a great place in em old days to gain technology stuff in india !! :)- - Peter Dawson
Vinton Cerf - Since most people probably have no idea where the phrase 'surf the internet' even came from ??!! (plus he knows the international landscape) - Charlie Anzman
-quote - "tech nerd, known and respected in the tech community, a great speaker, and very politically savvy" and an academic. The academic piece is very very important. A show stopper IMO. - Kevin
Bill Gates! He is about old enough to start his political debut! Plus it would be really hilarious. - Geoff Schultz
You can't argue that Bill Gates wouldn't be a good choice IF he was completely removed from Microsoft. If he still had an interest in MS it would be very similar to GW and DC having a stake in oil companies winning contracts in Iraq. Vint Cerf would be my other choice, he just seems more diplomatic. - Devlin Dunsmore via twhirl
Not Lessig -- he's a zealot and we already have too many of those in Washington. Meg Whitman maybe -- built a huge business and had the good judgment to get out before it tanked. Ironically, since she's such a close adviser to McCain, Carly Fiorina probably stands a better chance. - Sprague D
Scoble, you announcing your campaign? You know I come out of politics if you need a solid campaign manager :-) - Richard Binhammer
Richard and Jordan: I have no interest in being in politics and I don't have the skills to do this job properly anyway, even if I was interested. Thanks for the ego boost, though! - Robert Scoble
I don't want the Federal government to be tech-savvy. We need some kind of refuge from the government. What they don't know won't hurt us. - Rick Wolff
@Rick Wolff: Why don't you want the federal government to be tech savvy surely that was in jest... The better we can automate through technology some of the business process the more we can cut pork that isn't needed and save us money by eliminating taxes. - Jonathan Jesse
here's a winning strat: pick a politician (CTO) *and* an engineer (Dir of U.S. Tech). this is the pattern used by embassies. The ambassador is the 'front' the one who attends parties, travels, gives, speeches, pushed policies. the 'head of the embassy' is the 'technician' the one w/ the real skills in lang, culture, history of the region, etc. - MikeAmundsen
Jonathan, if the government could figure it out (read: had computing power), they'd find excuses to manage everything about our lives, manage and spend all our money, and control our every action. I like my government hobbled, ignorant and un-streamlined. Don't you? - Rick Wolff
Robert...yes you do have the skills, youd be a perfect candidate :-) - Richard Binhammer
Arrington?? Arrington?? Sorry, but that's hilarious. God, what a circle-jerk this "social media" world can be. Thinking about a guy like Vint Cerf, on the other hand, starts to make sense. - Anthony Citrano
It's possible the people best for politics are the ones that have little interest in it. - ·[•_•]·
Scoble, if you get named USA CTO we're definitely doing a photowalk in the White House. - Thomas Hawk
I bet photo walk + photosynth would be pretty sweet - jeff
robert: funny. just commented on a call for a national CTO yesterday. bottom line; we need a cabinet position with real tech policy authority and it should be the commerce secretary: http://463.blogs.com/the_463/2... -- we really should grab coffee to talk tech policy - Sean Garrett
I am still having a hard time understanding why everyone wants to create a position that grants someone the power and provides them with a huge bully pulpit to advance tech policies that, at some point, will invariably benefit large tech-related businesses at the expense of smaller innovators and users. Again, I understand the desired outcome of the idea but the unintended consequences are massive.... - Marco
...Creating a cabinet-level Tech Czar post will not guarantee adoption of efficient practices by govern bureaucracies any more than having a cabinet-level Labor issues czar effectively ushers in sweeping changes in support of federal workers. - Marco
Marco, true, having a cabinet position does not guarantee anything, but having "bully pulpit" with no authority does guarantee ineffectiveness. - Sean Garrett
Efficiency in government is not necessarily a good thing. A certain level of sand in the gears reduces the amount of interference the civil "servants" can force into our lives. - John Ahrens
I've read Robert's post and I fail to see any connection between those people and a CTO. Indeed, the named ones are great people but most of them have nothing to do with a CTO. - Alex Popescu
Sarah, I didn't know about the Action Streams plugin, but I liked DavidRecordon website so much that I did my own c# script to generate something like that. http://www.alexsauceda.com - Alex Sauceda
Funny. I was searching Digg.com for this art... er post and leave a comment there. I typed in the beginning of the title "The Next Social Networks" and found one post in particular made end of last year (<a href="http://gigaom.com/2007/12/11/t..." target=_blank>click here</a>) titled: "The Next Social Network: WordPress".
Personally, after having played with Del.icio.us, Diigo, Facebook and whatnot, I recently came to the conclusion that sharing with no return/feedback from anybody has little meaning so when comments are better valued than 'clicks', 'diggs', 'votes', 'shares' whatever digg-like website can think of it will really mean the beginning of the construction of a social network. Until now I haven't seen much taking that direction.
Make people talk with each others instead of at each others. - lelapin via FriendFeed MT Plugin
Duncan, you know he really looks like you...Don't tell him I said that though, poor fella.;) Only messin, happy birthday from me & London town. - Zee at WeDoCreative via fftogo
awesome! 6 is such a beautiful age. My son Will is 6. - Thomas Hawk
My eldest is 6 too, she's starting to get really independent now - Glenn Slaven
Nice. My son is going to be 1 soon. I can't believe it, I can see this is going to go very fast. And yes, I think he does look like you Duncan, I can see that. - jjprojects
Mine turned 7 last month ... They grow too fast! *cry* - tj hanton
what a handsome little guy. my girl turned 5 in april and is already talking about all the 'big girl things' she'll do when she turns 6. - faboo mama
It seems a million years ago that mine were young and cute. My "baby" turned 17 last month and I can barley remember that I love her between bouts of wanting to strangle her! - Aura Mae
