Shonzilla, a pattern-seeking animal

Thu Sep 17

It’s now obvious that social networking and social media are becoming an integral part of everyday life of more and more people and that the some basic rules of business are changing, namely how relevance and reputation and won and maintained.

The video above tackles the question whether “social media is a fad?”. It was created by Erik Qualman as a part of the campaign for his Socialnomics book on the business of social media.

I might add one correction to the video though. Facebook must be the 3rd most populated country on planet by now. :-) It had 300 million users 2 days ago and USA is estimated to have 307 million.

[video via Jackson Bond]

Sat Apr 25

OpenSocial interoperability with web 2.0 applications

A discussion recently started by Harry Hübner and commented by Christopher Blum in OpenSocial Interest Group I’m moderating over at XING, led me to a conclusion:
Supporting various applications (either web 2.0 or headless server functionality) inside an OpenSocial container can create more traffic (and revenue if they’re commercial) for application’s developers.

(Caveat: the conclusion is currently based on theory alone but sounds perfectly plausible once you read my explanation.)

Here’s my attempt to stand on Christopher’s shoulders and go into more detail. His proposition of “OpenSocial interoperability” by bringing various popular [web 2.0, headless] applications into OpenSocial containers is one of the ways to get more traction and traffic by using OpenSocial, which in turn could improve perceived interoperability.

This kind of interoperability can be best achieved using OpenSocial REST API which enables application’s home server to access selected OpenSocial container functionality. In this case, best-of-breed and widely adopted technologies are used: HTTP protocol for invoking container’s entry points and JSON for encoding data (read or written).

BTW, headless application can be any functionality on some server that runs or can run without a UI. For some examples of headless applications consider a Jabber or IRC server. You can let your imagination run free once you realize that this headless application can also be (almost) any application running in Amazon EC3, Google App Engine and other clouds. I’m wrote “almost” in parenthesis to include only those apps that understand REST, i.e. speak HTTP and understand JSON.

In more detail and related to OpenSocial, the scenario I’m supporting is the following:

using OpenSocial REST API to enable application’s home server read from and write into OpenSocial container to improve integration of application’s core functionality (running on server) by accessing OpenSocial data items like Person objects (e.g. users of XING, Orkut, MySpace, etc.) and AppData objects (which encapsulate all the specific object types relevant to the application’s core functionality). Using Person and AppData objects on home application’s server improves “social-awareness” of that application. Another part of this scenario is:
using OpenSocial Gadget XML and Gadget API to display socially-aware application’s data (accessed inside an OpenSocial gadget

Note that either part of this scenario or both 1. and 2. can be used to improve application’s interoperability.

In using part 1 of this interoperability scenario, the initiative for improving social-awareness of a popular application by using REST API to connect to OpenSocial container is in the hands of the original application’s developers. In the case of open-source application projects, there are less impediments and objective reasons not to connect open-source applications to OpenSocial container and, through it, all the users using the app. This way, data is not only more socially-aware but also more pervasive when part 2 is used.

When using part 2, application data is embedded into a “personalized web panel” running inside OpenSocial container thanks to Gadget XML, Gadget API and different features-specific APIs that are optionally supported by the respective OpenSocial container. The most interesting feature (i.e. OpenSocial JavaScript API namespace) is RPC feature (which stands for remote procedure call) that an OpenSocial container may implement (since it’s an optional API) to provide gadget-to-container, container-to-gadget, and gadget-to-gadget communication.

The final result of this interoperability scenario is better data availability and more convenience to users which can lead to an increased [web 2.0, headless] application’s usage.

The most prominent example of increased usage thanks to implementing OpenSocial (albeit implementing the entire OpenSocial container is more work than previous scenario) is Plaxo Pulse which got an order of magnitude

Sat Oct 25

mynetworkvalue.com

Measure the value of your network - business contacts and friends.

Sun Oct 12

Personal genomics

Welcome to the new field of personal genomics where you can learn about your genetic heritage and, as many (venture investors and insurance companies alike) might ~~hope~~ know, about health risks written in your genes.

Thanks to the exponential advancement of computing power (a phenomenon called Moore’s law) contributed to the birth of fields of bioinformatics and computational biology, that computer-aided data processing. In human genome (everyone reading this has it) there 3 billion DNA base pairs and only a small fraction makes us differ one from another - only as little as 0.02%. Also, it is the genes that bear information inside our organisms about our susceptibility for any of the hereditary diseases from a long list of genetic disorders. A variation in a DNA gene that makes a difference (functional like cancer or physical like height) is single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP, pronounced snip) and it occurs on a single nucleotide, as it name implies.

In an attempt to map the human genome from the physical and functional standpoint the Human Genome Project was initiated in 1990. It was a exceptionally successful attempt, exceeding all expectations and time estimations (probably due to longevity of Moore’s law) with the complete human genome being mapped (or genotyped) in 2003. In the process genes in human DNA were identified with the total count ending up in 20.000-25.000 range, since not all of us need to have all the distinguishing genes or snips present.

Bringing this process to masses became increasingly important. Over the years a lot of research in IT, bioinformatics and computational biology has been carried out and the genotyping process became available to everyone. This field is now appropriately called personal genomics. The main output is a list of mapped snips.

There are several companies offering genotyping services:
1. 23andme (CEO is Sergey Brin’s wife, so it’s logical why Google backed this company) - $400 for 600.000 snips, delivering report on 23 clinical conditions (incl. the obvious eye color and less obvious muscle performance) and 68 research reports
2. deCODEme (from Island) - $985 for 1.000.000 snips, while estimating risk of 29 diseases
3. Navigenics (several software engineers fled from Google and Apple to this company) - $2500 for $900.000, while estimating risk of over 20 diseases with the list increasing
4. other much more expensive options

The business plan for 23andme is to offer a social networking features around genes allowing its users to find to ~~other users~~ strangers with similar genetic variations. 23andme users can have their DNA scanned anonymously. They seem to have user’s privacy as a top priority, and we’re supposed to be impressed with HTTPS used exclusively to access their site and results, upon genotyping is complete.

Navigenics claims to be more medically oriented service, updating its users with new medical research information as they become available.

deCODEme follows the similar approach as 23andme, allowing you to connect to your genetic friends.

One interesting aspect and positive side-effect of doing genotyping your DNA might be getting your genome file and cross-referencing it agains the encyclopedia of snips called SNPedia. There’s a tool called Promethease you can use on your genome file and have it compared to the latest genome research.using

Sounds interesting, doesn’t it?

But would you do it?
Would you be concerned about privacy?
Insurance companies learning about your health risks?

Sun Feb 3

Sign of the space-time

(I am updating this entry with a map and open invitation)

Guys over at Dopplr have published on their blog a map showing where their members (I might call Web2.0 early adopters) have travelled in 2007.

In the spirit of time (Zeitgeist in German they call this Raumzeitgeist, the spirit of the space-time and results can be seen here:

Dopplr Raumzeitgeist 2007: Where we went last year

Hopefully everyone out there will have at least one dot away from home this year.

Dopplr requires registration, but it’s invite-only. If you need one, let me know.

[via Dopplr Blog]