Web Technology & Entrepreneurship

Google started out as a search engine, and have since expanded, through product development and acquisitions, to include services in every link of the information chain. I call this collection of services the Google Information Ecosystem, and I wanted to present this visually; an explanation of the category abbreviations is below. Without further ado, I present to you:

Google’s Information Services

As you can see above, I’ve grouped everything into the following categories:

Internal Information Creation: These are the services through which Google hosts or enables the creation of content. Content under Google’s control can be analyzed much … [Read the rest »]

Without the Internet, there would be no Google. And without the physical world, there would be no Internet. These overwhelmingly obvious statements are the basis of a very simple principle: that everything is built on top of something else. To build something, whether it’s a school, a website, or a virtual house, there must be a platform for it to be built on.

For most of human history, we’ve only had one platform to build on, the ground we walk on. The past few decades have given us a digital platform, the Internet, on which we’ve built things that wouldn’t … [Read the rest »]

While everyone else is talking about Yang taking over(good idea) and the possibility of acquiring MySpace for 25% of Yahoo!(bad idea), I thought I’d point out five other things Yahoo! is up to, some big, some small, that have been flying under the radar. Without further ado…

1. Yahoo! is integrating with Facebook. Unlike various fan-made Flickr applications, Yahoo! has announced an official Facebook app for its Upcoming.org events service. It’s competing with both Attendio and Going.com’s services/Facebook Apps. If traffic numbers for the services themselves are a determining factor, Upcoming.org will be the eventual winner. Though the appeal … [Read the rest »]

In March I wrote a proposal for a “partnership between YouTube and Adobe”:http://jayneely.com/2007/03/28/a-profitable-partnership-how-youtube-can-re-revolutionize-personal-publishing, suggesting that by providing video editing tools to YouTube users, YouTube could help generate more of a community around content creation. I was catching up on my tech news from the weekend today when I saw this TechCrunch story: “YouTube Remixer: Edit Videos Online at YouTube”:http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/06/16/youtube-remixer-edit-videos-online-at-youtube/. Powered by… you guessed it, Adobe Premiere Express. Even though the implementation isn’t exactly what I had imagined, I still feel like flashing lights and throwing confetti in a Colbert-style “I was right!” moment.

Adding captions and transitions obviously isn’t going … [Read the rest »]

What’s the best way to kill your incredibly popular service? Is it:
a) Fight with your users?
b) Eliminate most of your content producers?
c) Increase your legal liability?[I am not a lawyer, none of this is legal advice.] d) All of the above?

It seems that I can’t stop hearing about Audible Magic. First they were trying to filter P2P networks, in what may or may not be a violation of wiretap laws, and now every video sharing site that’s ever heard the word “copyright” is hoping this software will keep the “big”:http://www.viacom.com/ “bad”:http://www.universalstudios.com/ “wolves”:http://mpaa.org/ off their back. But … [Read the rest »]

In an increasing number of countries across the world, social lending is being hailed as an alternative to ‘traditional’ bank small business and personal loans. These services connect individual lenders with individual borrowers, creating a peer-to-peer loan service that is streamlined, efficient, legally formatted, profitable, and most importantly, helpful. Social lending sites provide an opportunity for financial assistance or gain to those who would otherwise not have the opportunity.

An Overview of Services

Zopa was the first social lending site to launch, serving the United Kingdom since 2005 and now planning on extending its services to the U.S. Zopa’s basic … [Read the rest »]

What’s the difference between a social network and blogs or a blogging service? One is for your *friends*, the other is for your *audience*. The key difference is that one group already knows you(it’s easy to replace “friends” with “coworkers”, “family”, “neighbors”, etc). Pure social networking services like “hi5″:http://www.hi5.com/ and “Reunion.com”:http://www.reunion.com/ are made for connecting with your friends, family, and miscellaneous contacts. Pure blogging services like “TypePad”:http://www.typepad.com/ and “WordPress.com”:http://wordpress.com are for publishing content that’s available to anyone. But either service can be connected to anything on the Internet, because the true “killer-app” of the web, the hyperlink, lets me send … [Read the rest »]

Google has already made a security company acquisition, and many still don’t understand how Facebook is changing the way Social Networks do business. I’ll move on to new topics soon, but first I want to follow up on two of my previous posts with more links, more commentary, and more discussion. If you want, you can skip straight to the “Facebook Platform Update”:#Facebook%20Platform%20Update.

Google Security Already Acquiring

When I first wrote “Google Enters the Security Market”:http://jayneely.com/2007/05/22/google-enters-the-security-market, I predicted they would “buy the expertise they need both to complement their knowledge of search, and possibly to enter the desktop security market”. … [Read the rest »]