In announcing supporting partnerships with more traditional banking institutions, Reich emphasized that the company carefully selected partners that shared its opposition to surprise fees and that support “modern real-time systems that enable deep connectivity with the BankSimple platform.” That’s key to understanding the true nature of BankSimple’s aims.

Sponsor

Joshua Reich lead several data-intensive high tech startups before co-founding BankSimple in 2009. The company was founded on a desire to combine real-time data, strong user experience, design and customer service and an app-platform type approach. The company made a big splash when it hired Alex Payne, the original leader of the Twitter developer platform. Last Summer, BankSimple opened up a public discussion about its app platform and what could be done with it.

Ideas discussed included things like using the company’s mobile app to annotate transactions while still inside stores (for categorization and analysis), the creation of subaccounts, of course off-site 3rd party personal finance apps tied to a user’s bank account and more.

Reich says that many of his competitors are thinking about remaking banking only as deep as a thin layer of visual interface. “They don’t do anything that fixes the foundation of the bank,” he says.

“These banks are built on decades-old batch processing systems. They may improve the appearance, but it’s not improving the fidelity of the data. Customers have a lot of questions about their data and banks make it hard to answer those questions because of things like a lack of real time data and annotation.

“When you swipe a card at the store today, the merchant sends a message through the Visa or Mastercard network and it arrives at your bank within a second with up to 120 fields of information included. They know your location, which terminal of a store you’re in, whether you’re in the pharmacy section of a Walmart or the register section. They know what category of transaction it is. They have a hugely rich corpus of information about every transaction and they just throw it out. All the bank cares about from a balance perspective is whether the transaction can be paid for.

“This was all designed when storage was expensive and real time processing wasn’t the norm. We [BankSimple] keep all that information; storage is cheap and we do it all in real time. We correlate things with Simplegeo so we know what kind of store it is. We have really powerful search, all fast because it’s done browser side. You can say coffee last week in New York and see all the maps and all the details like how much you spent on coffee vs lunch that week. All this information makes people feel less anxious about their money.”

Right: BankSimple CEO Josh Reich. Prior to co-founding BankSimple, Reich ran a think tank focused on “basic research that develops fundamental models for understanding the environment in which a firm operates and how to question the unknown.”

Reich says that while some big banks are talking about far-out ideas like 3D bank statements, his company is focusing on the basics of User Experience design, typography and making it easy to leverage feedback loops with your purchasing data.

“People turn to tools like Quicken, Mint or Wasabi because they have questions about their money – but there are huge barriers to getting those working right,” he says. “So you’ll only ask really important questions at times like like tax season. But on some random Thursday, you might be curious about something. If you know how difficult it is to ask that question – you won’t. As a result, people have all these unanswered questions and that just makes them more anxious about their money.”

Demand for Change

Market conditions for such innovation appear favorable. A small majority of bank customers feel good about their banks – but they don’t like their websites or off-line branches. The 8th annual World Retail Banking Report from Capgemini this year, for example, found that 59% of surveyed banking customers in 25 countries are satisfied with the banks they use. United States banking customers were the most satisfied in the world.

Globally, only 35% of banking customers reported positive or very positive customer experiences, in braches and online for example. In the US that number was 53%.

Analyst firm Gartner said last year that traditional online banking faces a serious challenge from a new class of service providers focused on more advanced financial operations than mere transactions. “Most bank offerings have limited forecasting and analytical tools and don’t cleanly support multiple bank relationships,” says Gartner’s Douglas McKibben. Traditional banks need “a wake-up call,” McKibben wrote, “regarding the need for responsive, personalized customer applications.” “In the longer term, the concept of a proprietary online commercial banking platform will be obsolete,” McKibben wrote in a related report with Stessa Cohen, “and banks will only orchestrate and not control access to services and information.”

It seems that there is a lot of opportunity, then, to use the web to deliver a more satisfactory customer experience. BankSimple aims to take real-time technology, an emphasis on user experience and a customer-centric refusal of fee madness into the fight.

The company’s hand got a lot stronger with today’s news.

Discuss

Go to Source

The Mixpanel team originally built the API server with Erlang and the framework MochiWeb because of the performance demands of running a real-time data service. However, the team lacked an Erlang expert and the code became difficult to manage over time.

Sponsor

The team settled on using Eventlet, a concurrent networking library for Python:

Since the API server handles and responds with some interesting headers, I decided to use eventlet’s raw WSGI library. Eventlet is actually built to emulate techniques pioneered by Erlang. Its “green threads” are pretty similar to Erlang’s “actors.” The main difference is that eventlet can’t influence the Python runtime, but actors are built into Erlang at a language level, so the Erlang VM can do some cool stuff like mapping actors to kernel threads (one per core) and preemption. We get around this problem by launching one API server per core and load balancing with nginx.

If you’re thinking about using Python for concurrency, the post is worth a look.

On a related note, here’s a benchmark comparing Scale Stack, Node.js, Twisted and Eventlet.

Discuss

Go to Source

The Mixpanel team originally built the API server with Erlang and the framework MochiWeb because of the performance demands of running a real-time data service. However, the team lacked an Erlang expert and the code became difficult to manage over time.

Sponsor

The team settled on using Eventlet, a concurrent networking library for Python:

Since the API server handles and responds with some interesting headers, I decided to use eventlet’s raw WSGI library. Eventlet is actually built to emulate techniques pioneered by Erlang. Its “green threads” are pretty similar to Erlang’s “actors.” The main difference is that eventlet can’t influence the Python runtime, but actors are built into Erlang at a language level, so the Erlang VM can do some cool stuff like mapping actors to kernel threads (one per core) and preemption. We get around this problem by launching one API server per core and load balancing with nginx.

If you’re thinking about using Python for concurrency, the post is worth a look.

On a related note, here’s a benchmark comparing Scale Stack, Node.js, Twisted and Eventlet.

Discuss

Go to Source

The Mixpanel team originally built the API server with Erlang and the framework MochiWeb because of the performance demands of running a real-time data service. However, the team lacked an Erlang expert and the code became difficult to manage over time.

Sponsor

The team settled on using Eventlet, a concurrent networking library for Python:

Since the API server handles and responds with some interesting headers, I decided to use eventlet’s raw WSGI library. Eventlet is actually built to emulate techniques pioneered by Erlang. Its “green threads” are pretty similar to Erlang’s “actors.” The main difference is that eventlet can’t influence the Python runtime, but actors are built into Erlang at a language level, so the Erlang VM can do some cool stuff like mapping actors to kernel threads (one per core) and preemption. We get around this problem by launching one API server per core and load balancing with nginx.

If you’re thinking about using Python for concurrency, the post is worth a look.

On a related note, here’s a benchmark comparing Scale Stack, Node.js, Twisted and Eventlet.

Discuss

Go to Source

The Global Innovation Series is supported by BMW i, a new concept dedicated to providing mobility solutions for the urban environment. It delivers more than purpose-built electric vehicles — it delivers smart mobility services. Visit bmw-i.com or follow @BMWi on Twitter.

In order to tackle urban transportation challenges in cities around the world, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the National Research Foundation of Singapore launched a five-year cooperative project in 2009 — Future Urban Mobility (FM) — to look at new models and technology tools aimed at sustainability. The FM team is one of four interdisciplinary research groups that are part of the Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology Centre, or SMART Centre. FM is developing SimMobility, a simulation platform where researchers explore transportation, environmental impacts, energy and land use and the activities of individual travelers in the mix.

Some of the projects of FM include autonomous driving — as in, cars that drive themselves — and simultaneous research is being done in the areas of vehicle-to-vehicle communication and vehicle-to-infrastructure communication. Vehicle-to-vehicle communication looks at applications for both safety and information retrieval.

Applications are being developed so your car will get information about the location and intentions of vehicles in your vicinity, contributing to the process of autonomous driving. Vehicle-to-infrastructure projects are less safety-related and more focused on traffic operations, including the possibility of your car receiving information from traffic signals regarding data like when an upcoming stoplight will turn green. With this data, you can adjust your speed and slow down without having to stop at the signal, thus reducing stop-and-go traffic movement.

Mobility On Demand

Another area of the FM project is mobility on demand. A bike-sharing services is an example of mobility on demand: You get the mobility you need, when you need it, at the place you need it, and you can take it to your destination and drop it off without having to return it to the pickup location. At this time, car-sharing services like Zipcar are not considered mobility on demand because you have to return the car at the same location you obtained it. One solution investigated in 2007 to address the issue of space for car-sharing stations was CityCar, led by the late MIT professor William J. Mitchell. The mobility on demand project is exploring additional solutions.

“Today’s phones have more computing power — in number of transistors — than supercomputers of 50 years ago. Yet, we don’t use it much beyond individual computing,” explains Li-Shiuan Peh, associate professor of electrical engineering at MIT. “Phones have to access all web services through the Internet as they are computed on servers. My group is exploring ways to better harness the immense computer power of phones, networking a collection of phones together to run and drive novel services.”

A recent application Peh’s team developed and prototyped consists of phones mounted on car windshields with no Internet and no servers — just phones talking to each other. SignalGuru is an iPhone app service that lets users know when traffic lights will turn red or green so they can avoid stop-and-go driving and save on gasoline. They deployed the service at MIT and in Singapore and saw a one- to two-second accuracy in predictions and a 30% savings in gas.

LIVE Singapore

The LIVE Singapore! project is “a convergence of art, digital media and information technology” that gives citizens access to visualizations of data from multiple digital streams from the city. The public exhibition of this project opened at the Singapore Art Museum (SAM) and consisted of five large-scale projections of multi-dimensional maps of the city showing the movements of people, vehicles including planes and automobiles, electricity consumption and other elements.

“Employing real-time data recorded and captured by a vast system of communication devices, microcontrollers and sensors commonly found in our urban environment and mapping this information onto multi-dimensional maps of Singapore, we have been able to merge cartography, statistical analysis and data platform technology,” says Carlo Ratti, director of the MIT SENSEable City Lab. “This suggests new ways to view, understand and ultimately navigate our city like never before.”

DynaMIT

The DynaMIT project is a computer system that predicts the future of traffic and transportation conditions and provides the information in real-time to travelers and traffic managers. DynaMIT, led by Moshe Ben-Akiva, professor of civil and environmental engineering at MIT, stands for “Dynamic Network Assignment for Managing Information to Traveler.” Ben-Akiva and his research group at the MIT Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) recently received the The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) ITS Outstanding Applications Award in 2011.

So what does it do? DynaMIT provides short-term predictions of congestion in a specific traffic network and then attempts to anticipate congestion before it occurs. DynaMIT uses a mash-up of real-time and historical traffic data for a given area and operates on a continuous basis to not only analyze real-time information, such as from traffic sensors, but add a behavioral model to show the potential impacts of human reaction to the data received (i.e. gaper’s block). The output offers a prediction for a “short horizon” and essentially simulates a network of transportation for an hour into the future every five minutes, completing each simulation in about a minute. The simulations are run faster than real-time using both parallel and distributed computing. The system utilizes “network decomposition” — a traffic network is divided into sub-networks that are then simulated on multiple processors. This kind of work couldn’t be done without modern computer methods.

“DynaMIT allows us to look into the future and see what the travel times, speeds and bottlenecks will be in the next hour,” explains Ben-Akiva. “If we develop and broadcast information about future traffic conditions, it will affect the behavior and as a result, will affect what will happen in the future and invalidate the prediction unless we take that in account.”

Right now, Ben-Akiva’s team is working on DynaMIT 2.0 to re-engineer the system for new data that might become available to incorporate into their system, including navigation systems and travelers equipped with smartphones.

DynaMIT has been tested in a variety of locations including Los Angeles (but not in relation to the recent “Carmageddon”) and Irvine, California, Beijing and Singapore. How well does DynaMIT predict?

Says Ben-Akiva, “We’re testing it right now in Lisbon, Portugal, and it predicts very well. It has a unique advantage over other prediction methods in that it can be used to predict how a network will behave under situations where there is an event affecting demand or supply of transportation, whether it’s a planned event or unplanned event.”

Ben-Akiva explains that a “planned event” might be roadwork, in which case capacity is taken away because a lane is closed or road blocked. An “unplanned event” might be an accident or flooding or another occurrence that causes a reduction in capacity. There could also be events that increase demand, such as a sporting event. In all of these situations, historical data is hindered because there is an unusual or unexpected change in either demand or supply, and that is exactly where DynaMIT excels.

“We did a test of unusual situations or unplanned events in Portugal and demonstrated that the system of DynaMIT has a significant advantage over data-mining, artificial intelligence or statistical methods that essentially combine historical with real time data to extrapolate it into the future,” says Ben-Akiva.

Where do we go from here? In the future, car manufacturers will be installing more and more electronics in our vehicles. Soon, there will be equipment that allows vehicles to communicate with some sort of traffic information hub to provide information in real-time about the locations and the speed of travel and much more, as well as receive information that can be applied by the vehicle and the traveler. And when will we have cars that “drive themselves?” Soon, say the experts — soon.

The Global Innovation Series is supported by BMW i, a new concept dedicated to providing mobility solutions for the urban environment. It delivers more than purpose-built electric vehicles; it delivers smart mobility services within and beyond the car. Visit bmw-i.com or follow @BMWi on Twitter.

Are you an innovative entrepreneur? Submit your pitch to BMW i Ventures, a mobility and tech venture capital company.

Image courtesy of LIVE Singapore!, MIT

More About: car, Global Innovation Series, mit, simmobility, traffic, transportation

For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech & Gadgets on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech & Gadgets channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

Yes, we all know the Internet is huge and it’s getting bigger all the time.

But more important than its size is its impact. The UN considers the web so vital to communication, self-education and global participation that it’s called Internet access a human right, in fact.

The web can be a barometer for how we feel about issues and events. For a long time, it’s been a huge part of where and how we spend money, as well. It’s also a battleground of the modern economy and is quickly becoming our de facto news source, too.

Here’s a mammoth, interactive infographic that shows many touchpoints in the overall landscape of the web. It’s even got a bit of real-time data thrown in, too. Click the image below to launch the infographic itself.

Source Online Schools

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, ahlobystov

More About: infographics, internet

For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech & Gadgets on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech & Gadgets channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

I visited the Artefact office in Seattle last month and was shown the prototype at work on an iPad. The app, as yet unnamed, is designed to help doctors, administrators and patients manage patient care in a hospital. The colorful and eminently usable design is – I can only hope – a pointer to the hospital and doctor apps of the near future.

Sponsor

What most impressed me about the app was that it didn’t resemble the clunky, boxy, database-looking apps I’d seen in the past at hospitals and doctor clinics. This prototype was intuitive and had a clean, functional design. What’s more, it appeared to revolve more around the patient than the hospital system.

A picture can tell a thousand words. The image directly below is of the prototype hospital app from Artefact. Below that is a traditional hospital app.

A healthy, attractive app!

An unhealthy hospital app that should be euthanized.

The Artefact app has a dashboard for each patient, showing who the care group is and a chart of that patient’s vital signs. Interactive infographics help caregivers understand the patient’s health data.

The app employs modern Web design features. For example, there is a rating for each patient, fed by real-time data. Colored up and down arrows display whether the patient’s health is trending up or down. It’s a relatively simple feature, similar to ratings used in hundreds of ‘Web 2.0′ sites over the past five to six years. But simplicity is exactly what’s needed in hospital apps, which have traditionally been bloated and overly complex. With this prototype app, a doctor or nurse can check the overall status of a patient in one glance. He or she can of course also drill down to the actual data points and check the patient’s history.

Taking a cue from the world of social gaming, there is an end goal for the app. The target for each patient is discharge – that is, going home. To help the doctor track the patient’s well being, the app has an "estimated discharge" task based system.

The Artefact app is designed to be a decision making tool, while also allowing the sharing of information among hospital staff (such as reports).

The above screenshots show an iPad app, but like any good modern Web app it will cross different devices. According to Artefact, while doctors will probably use tablets at the patient’s bedside, unit coordinators may use their desktop PCs to see the status of patients and make plans for them.

Anything that simplifies hospital care and removes the need for complex medical apps is a great advance forward in health technology. Let’s hope this is indeed the future of hospital apps.

Discuss

Go to Source

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.

Name: SceneTap

Quick Pitch: SceneTap tells you how crowded a bar is and what its gender ratio is in real time.

Genius Idea: Relying on cameras instead of a checkin service to collect anonymous real-time data about a bar.

Whether you’re looking for a bar where conversation is possible or the loudest, most crowded bar in the city, it’s hard to tell where to find it. SceneTap wants to simplify this process by incorporating a live count of how many people are in a bar, the range of their ages, and their gender ratio into an iPhone app.

Instead of relying on a checkin service that might give clues as to how crowded a bar is, what SceneTap CEO Cole Harper has in mind is an accurate tally of patrons — whether or not they use a particular service. He says about 50 bars have already agreed to install cameras at their doors that can identify the gender and approximate age of patrons as they enter.

When the cameras go live sometime next month, SceneTap users will be able to get a glimpse of what the current scene at those bars is like based on that data. They’ll also be able to chat with the bar and other SceneTap users (i.e. “Are there any tables available?”), see specials and purchase Groupon-like deals using the apps.

Harper hopes bars will pay to participate in exchange for detailed analytic information about their customer bases and a social, location-based marketing tool.

But there are two obvious and somewhat opposing risks in opting in: that the technology will creep people out and that it won’t be accurate enough to attract consumers.

“It’s less intrusive than scanning IDs,” Harper says about the former concern. “No personal data is obtained and nothing is recorded.”

The technology only notes a person’s gender and approximate age, he says. Some display advertising already uses a similar technology to record impressions, and you could argue that more data is collected about you during a Google search.

In order to understand what kind of person is entering a bar, SceneTap’s technology matches a person’s image with a database of faces to determine relative age. If the person matches a photo of someone in the database who is 27, for instance, that’s the age the camera will assign him or her.

To what degree of accuracy this method can label people — is a 23-year-old’s face shape much different than a 37-year-old’s face shape? — is something we’ll be able to test when the service actually goes live. For now, it’s just an interesting idea to consider as you start planning your Friday night.

Would you find a service like this useful for making plans? Are you bothered by the idea of a camera tallying your anonymous entrance to a bar? Let us know in the comments below.

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

More About: bar scene, bizspark, mobile apps, scenetap

For more Startups coverage:

• Follow Mashable Startups on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Startups channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.

Name: SceneTap

Quick Pitch: SceneTap tells you how crowded a bar is and what its gender ratio is in real time.

Genius Idea: Relying on cameras instead of a checkin service to collect anonymous real-time data about a bar.

Whether you’re looking for a bar where conversation is possible or the loudest, most crowded bar in the city, it’s hard to tell where to find it. SceneTap wants to simplify this process by incorporating a live count of how many people are in a bar, the range of their ages, and their gender ratio into an iPhone app.

Instead of relying on a checkin service that might give clues as to how crowded a bar is, what SceneTap CEO Cole Harper has in mind is an accurate tally of patrons — whether or not they use a particular service. He says about 50 bars have already agreed to install cameras at their doors that can identify the gender and approximate age of patrons as they enter.

When the cameras go live sometime next month, SceneTap users will be able to get a glimpse of what the current scene at those bars is like based on that data. They’ll also be able to chat with the bar and other SceneTap users (i.e. “Are there any tables available?”), see specials and purchase Groupon-like deals using the apps.

Harper hopes bars will pay to participate in exchange for detailed analytic information about their customer bases and a social, location-based marketing tool.

But there are two obvious and somewhat opposing risks in opting in: that the technology will creep people out and that it won’t be accurate enough to attract consumers.

“It’s less intrusive than scanning IDs,” Harper says about the former concern. “No personal data is obtained and nothing is recorded.”

The technology only notes a person’s gender and approximate age, he says. Some display advertising already uses a similar technology to record impressions, and you could argue that more data is collected about you during a Google search.

In order to understand what kind of person is entering a bar, SceneTap’s technology matches a person’s image with a database of faces to determine relative age. If the person matches a photo of someone in the database who is 27, for instance, that’s the age the camera will assign him or her.

To what degree of accuracy this method can label people — is a 23-year-old’s face shape much different than a 37-year-old’s face shape? — is something we’ll be able to test when the service actually goes live. For now, it’s just an interesting idea to consider as you start planning your Friday night.

Would you find a service like this useful for making plans? Are you bothered by the idea of a camera tallying your anonymous entrance to a bar? Let us know in the comments below.

The Spark of Genius Series highlights a unique feature of startups and is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark, a startup program that gives you three-year access to the latest Microsoft development tools, as well as connecting you to a nationwide network of investors and incubators. There are no upfront costs, so if your business is privately owned, less than three years old, and generates less than U.S.$1 million in annual revenue, you can sign up today.

More About: bar scene, bizspark, mobile apps, scenetap

For more Startups coverage:

• Follow Mashable Startups on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Startups channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

It’s time for our best news of this week. We have a lot of graphic and web design, a bit of architecture, ads, tech news, awesome reads and other crazy stuff! So take a look at the links we’ve selected for your inspiration and to keep you updated about what’s going on out there!

<!–break–>

We want to give a big thanks to our sponsors:
Wix, Taste of Ink Studios, Shutterstock, W3-Markup, VectorStock™, inkd, Site24x7, Pingg and SiteGrinder. A special mention to Media Temple for the excellent service and support with Abduzeedo!

You can keep sending me your suggestions via Twitter twitter.com/FabianoMe or twitter.com/abduzeedo, and include #abdz_best in the message.

This post is brought to you by WeGraphics.

Featured set of the week from WeGraphics:

Hand Drawn Knots

Also, all Abduzeedo users can get a 10% off on all WeGraphics premium account using the coupon code WG_ABDZ, check this out!

Friday 04/29

iOS vs. Android: Round 3 — I can change my mind, right?

Cole Valley Hillside Residence

Stunning Photography by Christophe Gilbert

Use Impact to Build iOS Games with Just JavaScript

Buzz Off, Google Buzz

Chicago Disaster Porn

Kerchum Residence / Frits de Vries Architect

classy digital art

The Art of the Automobile: Ralph Lauren in Paris

House in Ubatuba by spbr

Create a Surreal Landscape Using Photo Manipulation

Apple reportedly buys iCloud.com for $4.5 million

Marvia.ads is like Adsense but for newspapers and magazines

Study: 77% Don’t Want to Share Location on Smartphones

Android 2.3.4 heading to Nexus S over the air, bringing video and voice chat to Gtalk

Thursday 04/28

Urban Illustrations – the Cities Seeing by the Creative Eyes

Amazing Photos of Long Exposure Photography

Real-Time Data And A More Personalized Web

Sculptures by Mark Newman Part 2

Helpful Articles to Improve the Typography in Logo Designs

Nick Meek

Best sites for Web Resources

Google launches Chrome 11, flat icon is here to stay

TweetDeck 2.0 for iOS: Here’s why you’ll want it

Is Your Company an Irresistible Buy?

Why Color May Be The Next Twitter

Facebook, It’s Time For An iPad App

Wednesday 04/27

Yahoo Sells Delicious To YouTube Founders

Volvo – Superb Luxury

The Art of Drew Struzan

Showcase of Beautiful Bridge Photography

Conheça o destemido Gerador de Nomes de Agências

“We don’t charge fees for stuff that should be free” Southwest Airlines

YouTube ready to start renting video on-demand movies from major studios?

TweetDeck v2.0: A Complete “Re-imagining” Of The iPhone App

Facebook Deals on Launch Day: Looks Strong, With Some Surprising Limitations

Gates Center for Computer Science and Hillman Center for Future Generation Technologies / Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects

EEA + Tax Office / UNStudio

Tuesday 04/26

House at Punta Chilen by dRN Architects

Celebrity Photography by Jason Bell

20 Inspirational Surreal Illustrations

Proximity in Design: Why I Can’t Use My Car’s A/C

15 Examples of the Pop Web Design Scene

The Most Beautiful Origami Art

Another Y Combinator Win: WuFoo Exits For $35 Million, After Raising Only $118,000

Facebook Launches ‘Send’ Button For More Selective Sharing, Announces 50 Million ‘Groups’

Runens Social Running App Will Let You Train With Friends, Strangers

Steve Jobs breaks silence on iOS location issue, says “we don’t track anyone”

Google introduces Background Send to Gmail

TweetDeck releases a brand new iOS app

Showcase of Amazing Paper Made Artworks and Sculptures

Monday 04/25

Living in Ikea

When It’s Time To Go – Leaving Your Current Workplace

Nintendo confirms next-generation Wii launching in 2012

Disabling location services won’t stop your iPhone from tracking your location

One-Line Tips to Stay Creative [Creativity]

30 Portfolios to Inspire You

Coca Cola – The Bottle

Unusual Home Addition: Bau Sallinger Office in Austria

Go to Source

  

As Web designers, we face a daily struggle to keep pace with advances in technology, new standards and new user expectations. We spend a large part of our working life dipping in and out of recent developments in an attempt to stay both relevant and competitive, and while this is what makes our industry so exciting to be a part of, it often becomes all too easy to get caught up in the finer details. Responsive Web design, improved semantics and rich Web typography have all seen their fair share of the limelight over the last year, but two developments in particular mark true milestones in the maturation of the Web: “real-time data” and a more “personalized Web.”

Since the arrival of the new Web, we’ve been enraptured by social media. We share links, we “follow,” we “poke,” we’ve become accustomed to it all. Through no fault of our own, we’ve become lazy users. The likes of Google, Twitter and Netflix cater to our every desire, serving up instant personalized searches, offering recommendations based on behavioral data and tapping into the preferences of our peers and others with similar tastes. Businesses are beginning to realize that loyal visitors can become volunteer sales forces, and these “anti-defection” measures show a real shift in power toward the user.

Web gurus and industry analysts are simultaneously arriving at the same conclusion: we are entering a new chapter in the evolution of the Web. Many would argue that the future of the Web will be influenced by the growth of the mobile market and location services, and their beliefs would be correct. Both of these, however, are pieces of the bigger picture: personalization, instant data and real-time communication. In this article, I’ll explore how the best in the industry are already adapting to these changes and how Web designers can design for an ever-shortening attention span.

Welcome to the new era.

Real-Time Data

Serving up real-time data is an effective way to keep users interested and to persuade them to become return visitors. In large corporations, it shows transparency and accountability and can be a great way to facilitate trust and confidence in your brand.

The rise in browser support for the HTML5 canvas element provides the opportunity to display real-time data visualizations without the need for plug-ins—a technique admirably employed by Ben Sekulowicz-Barclay on his portfolio website (screenshot below). However, support for the element, and various other HTML5 features for that matter, is relatively limited, as full browser support is not yet here. While canvas can easily display relatively simple data visualizations and animations, it was never intended to replace the likes of Flash and Silverlight, which have more tutorials and learning resources and offer greater interactivity to the user.

When considering the implementation of a real-time data visualization, think of your users. For example, what browsers and devices do they use to view your website? What level of support for JavaScript and Flash are built into those browsers (see Google Analytics). Also, factor in the complexity of your visualization and the user’s need for interactivity before making your decision.

Tip:
When trying to locate the canvas element on the page, you will need to “Inspect element” instead of viewing the page source. When you choose “Inspect element,” you will see that the document tree after the JavaScript has manipulated the DOM and the tree after the browser has applied its corrections.

2010 saw the knives really come out for Flash, and while browser support for canvas is improving, Flash is still a significant force in real-time data delivery. Yes I Am Precious documented a charity bike ride across the US, during which the rider’s tweets, location, speed, temperature, humidity, grade and even cadence were all pulled together to form a great front-end experience. The implementation of an interactive history bar across the top of the website, which showed the status of the bike and the rider at various stages of the journey, let the user “roll back” and “replay” events. Consider this important feature when designing for real-time data; it gives context to the content. The emphasis, though, should always be on real time.

It is worth noting that using canvas or Flash for highly complex visualization or a lot of visualization can be taxing on the CPU and will be slower in browsers without hardware acceleration (which are still the majority).

Stefan Sagmeister’s newly redesigned website offers an interesting alternative: it uses JavaScript to show a real-time feed of his office, with floor-mounted vinyl stickers as the main navigational indicators.

Question: What do Google Analytics and printed newspapers have in common?

Answer: They’re both yesterday’s news.

Real-time data is making waves in Web analytics. This new breed of analytics presents owners with instant actionable data and enables them to capitalize on opportunities and mitigate threats.

Chartbeat is one of the best examples of real-time analytics around. Its “bells and whistles” interface is backed up by an alert system that, via SMS, email or its very own iPhone app, informs the publisher of traffic spikes and downtime. The interface presents actionable data to the user, highlighted through the “F”-style layout. Color shades are consistent, headers are clear, and changes in data are designed to be easily recognizable. These are all excellent features to include when designing for real-time data.

Observing the way users interact with your website in real time is one thing, but acting on your findings is another. One option is to implement a Twitter widget like Monitter, which doesn’t require a page refresh to update the feed. Monitter uses jQuery to deliver an asynchronous Twitter feed that you can easily implement on your website. It isn’t “real” real-time, but it’s pretty close, and with the surge in popularity of similar services, it won’t be long before truly real-time APIs and widgets are available. This use of a real-time Twitter widget allows publishers to communicate rapidly with their users and show what people are saying about their product or service.

For the last two years, Collecta has provided a real-time search engine, offering free embeddable APIs and publisher widgets. However, Collecta has recently stated that it is shuttering its main product and is now looking in a new direction in the real-time data market. When asked about their reasons for switching direction, CEO Gerry Campbell spoke about what he learned from their two years in business:

“First, there is a huge need for real-time information, Second, a destination site is not the correct vehicle for reaching people. Third, new behaviors, specifically with Facebook and mobile, are growing.”

— Gerry Campbell, Collecta

Interestingly, Collecta’s main competitor, OneRiot, has also recently changed directions, shelving its search engine and moving into online advertisements.

This highlights an important point for the API consumer: always have a back-up plan in case your API provider pulls the plug (as Collecta and OneRiot have done).

Another proclaimed casualty of last year was the RSS feed, partly due to Twitter’s new-found purpose as a news distribution service. However, many believe that RSS is evolving to meet rising user expectations in the new Web climate. PubSubHubbub, in addition to being quite a mouthful, is an instant publishing and subscription protocol that adds real-time capabilities to your RSS feed. PushPress is a particularly useful plug-in that adds PubSubHubbub support to your WordPress RSS feed and allows your push subscribers to receive updates instantly.

One of the main advantages of PubSubHubbub is that it “pushes” new content to your users without the need for crawlers to “poll” (i.e. regularly visit to check for new content) your feed, thus saving CPU and bandwidth. While services such as Ping-O-Matic provide a similar service, subscribers still need visit the URL, which is where PubSubHubbub shines because it requires your server to do less work.

It is important to recognize that the successful delivery of real-time data relies heavily on the integrity of the data. While vetting and backing up data are sound practices for any publisher (real time or not), serving up data in real time increases the importance of their adoption. The need to curate and filter data is also important when considering your website’s performance. When delivering real-time data, you want to keep client-side processing to a minimum and do whatever processing you can on your server. This way, you are only sending the user data that is useful to them, and you are optimizing the speed of your website.

On smaller shared servers, you will need to keep the volume of data small to adhere to bandwidth limits and ensure that your server isn’t spending too much time processing data in order to save CPU. If this limits your options, you could always upgrade your hosting package or use a third-party service such as Kwwika, which will keep processing off your server.

A More Personalized Web

Every two days, we create as much information as we did up to 2003.

– Eric Schmidt, then-CEO of Google

Although there are many positives to the rapid growth of user-generated content over the last few years, there are of course some corollary effects of the “content tiger.” Users are quickly becoming overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information being presented to them, with the increase in real-time data further weakening the “signal-to-noise” ratio. In an attempt to alleviate these problems and better organize the mass of information and data available, developers and content providers of the future will thrive by making relevant information find the user, as opposed to the user having to find the information relevant to them (bringing the mountain to Mohammad).

While catering to unique visitor segments and personalizing user experience is nothing new, its relevance has never been more important, and the technologies available to us have never been better. As the user becomes even more accustomed to these personalized touches, the bar of user expectation will once again rise, leaving behind sluggish publishers and retailers that are slow to adapt their online strategy.

Not only is this further shift towards a more personalized user experience becoming a necessity for our bombarded user, it also demonstrates, more interestingly, a measurable shift in consumer behavior. I presume that most of you will get your hair cut a few times this year. How many of you go to a particular salon or barber shop? How many of you even have a preferred hairdresser at that location? I know I do, and I return to this particular hairdresser month after month not for the complimentary light literature and cup of coffee, nor even for the quality of the haircut. I return because the service is personalized—a concept lost on some businesses.

Instead of looking after existing clientele, these businesses choose to put all their resources into pursuing new business. The method of targeting individual users based on their profile histories and the profiles of others has been fervently exploited by the e-commerce market. Savvy companies realize that traditional marketing and advertising methods no longer exclusively drive consumer behavior, and they are instead turning their attention to personalizing their services and investing in word of mouth. These companies are giving users both the inspiration and tools to talk about their products and share them across various social networks. Seth Godin coined a term for this process: flipping the funnel.

Netflix was one of the first to implement a recommendations engine on its website. In addition to recommendations, there’s a “Friends” tab where the user can see what their friends are watching in order to compare interests. Recommendation engines use specific types of information filtering to present items (movies, products, etc.) that are likely to interest the user. When implementing such a mechanism, you must first understand the data, content and user’s intent. Recommended results should be visually defined and supplemented with a clear marketing message, and you should always be aware of data-shift issues. Although this type of technology may seem out of reach to small businesses and their developers, it is still possible on a smaller budget.

Programming Collective Intelligence is probably a good staring point for anyone looking to implement such functionality.

In June of last year, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg commented at London’s Barbican Centre on the potential of “products built around people” and spoke of the company’s “aggressive expansion” into the “personal Web.” Facebook’s “Connect” APIs allow websites to connect with a Facebook user’s identity, profile information and even information about the user’s friends. These APIs provide an alternative to the sign-up process, social context, personalized content and other means of customer service communication.

Allowing users to share content across a variety of social platforms is an effective way to reach a large targeted audience. Social “sign-ins,” commenting, content sharing, widgets and APIs are all effective methods of optimization. Social optimization is beginning to rival search engine optimization in importance in the world of online marketing. A recent survey by Pew found that 75% of news consumed online was via links on social networking websites or in email.

The new BBC website is one of my favorite examples of a personalized user experience. The user can drag and drop various news widgets around the home page, remove them completely or customize the content that each widget serves. The website is optimized for social networks, but I feel that the sharing utilities could be slightly more user-friendly. Another step some companies have taken is to re-arrange content and navigation based on user profiles. While this can be convenient for the user, it can also put them off and have a negative effect on usability. For this type of personalization to work effectively, publishers should ensure that they build comprehensive customer profiles before creating rules to target user preferences.

Reviews and comments are another way to engage and empower visitors. If your business delivers a good product or service, then they allow users to share their reviews over numerous social platforms. It’s the perfect breeding ground for customer evangelism.

In addition to optimizing your website for mobile use or creating an app, personalize your service by targeting users according to their location. Recently, Google’s Marissa Mayer told Media Bistro that Google’s focus at the local level is to use location to help searchers find what they’re looking for. Google’s interest in the local market led to an attempted acquisition of Groupon, a discount provider that has been particularly successful in targeting users by location and socially optimizing its services.

Summary

While this cataclysmic shift in the evolution of the Web and the role of the user is welcomed by most, others argue that focusing on providing a personalized Web experience creates an echo chamber of information, opinions and ideas. Is the outsider’s perspective getting lost? Are user expectations of “real time” becoming unrealistic? And could pandering to these expectations contribute to our own downfall? Regardless of the continuing importance of a static Web presence and the infancy of these new technologies, serving up the same stale content to everyone is, without question, no longer enough.

Other Resources

Real-Time Data:

• “Real-Time Data Visualization Using Flex”
• “Real-Time Heat Map Example With JavaScript and HTML Canvas”
• jQuery-accessible charts
• Chartbeat’s design process
• “Weekend Project: Add PubSubHubbub Syndication to Your Website or Blog”
• Phil Leggetter, real-time data evangelist

A Personalized Web:

• “HTML5 Apps: Positioning With Geolocation”
• Word of Mouth Marketing Association blog
• “Social + Algorithms = Personalized Web”
• “How to: Integrating Facebook in Your Website”
• “5 Predictions for APIs in 2011”
• “Facebook eCommerce Success”

Related Articles

You might want to read the following related articles as well:

• Designing For The Future Web
• Holistic Web Browsing: Trends Of The Future

(al)

© Sam Quayle for Smashing Magazine, 2011. | Permalink | Post a comment | Smashing Shop | Smashing Network | About Us
Post tags: personalized web, real-time data

Go to Source

Ford Motor Company Executive Chairman Bill Ford Jr. is confident that the auto industry is on its way to eliminating CO2 emissions. He’s less confident, however, that the world is prepared to adequately deal with an even larger problem: the global gridlock created by a population set to grow to 9 billion people by 2044.

The growth, said Ford in a talk at the TED conference in Long Beach, CA on Wednesday, will see the number of vehicles on the road go from 800 million today to 2-3 billion by 2050. The global gridlock crisis, as Ford describes it, will “stifle economic growth and our ability to deliver food and healthcare … [and] our quality of life will be significantly compromised.”

Citing the fact that the average American spends one week per year in traffic, and that the average resident in Beijing spends 5 hours per day commuting, Ford thinks the answer to the crisis is not to build more roads, but to build a smarter transportation system that makes use of real-time data and connected cars.

Ford envisions a future where all cars are connected and as he puts it, “talk to each other,” such that you already have a parking spot at your destination when you leave your house, be automatically re-routed to avoid traffic based on data being sent in real-time by the cars in front of you, and find a cab via your smartphone. In theory, this data would also let you live a more efficient life, enabling you to leave your home such that you’ll get to your destination precisely on time.

Ford thinks such a future “will be ready for prime time really soon,” noting that tests of such systems are already under way around the world. Of course, Ford’s company has been an early mover in the connected car space, with Ford SYNC technology now on board 3 million vehicles.

Ultimately though, he sees solving the global gridlock crisis as a huge opportunity for entrepreneurs of all sizes, that can both be profitable and as he puts it, “preserve the freedom to move effortlessly around the world” that has been responsible for so much economic growth in the century since his great grandfather created the Ford Motor Company.

Photo Credit: James Duncan Davidson / TED

More About: bill ford jr. ted, cars, connected cars, ford, ted2011, trending

For more Tech & Gadgets coverage:

• Follow Mashable Tech & Gadgets on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Tech & Gadgets channel
• Download our free apps for Android, Mac, iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

"Sales professionals are at the heart of almost every successful business," said Ballmer. "Microsoft Dynamics CRM redefines productivity by offering an industry-leading product that is fully embracing the cloud. The things that make Microsoft Dynamics CRM an industry leader include giving sales professionals a familiar user experience, enabling greater collaboration, streamlining of processes and access to real-time data so they can improve their customers’ experiences and effectively compete in the market."

"The service is available today as a cloud offering," he said. "This is the first time we’ve made a release in the cloud before we have done so in the server version, and I think that really reflects the push by Microsoft into the cloud."

"I think our customers are really going to embrace this new release," he added. "It brings with it the ease of use that sales, marketing and service professionals expect; the ease of deployment for departmental managers; low cost and agility for IT; and most importantly, the kind of functionality, capability and value that’s really going to drive revenue and drive customer satisfaction."

Go to Source

Web forms play a big part in every day web use. If you build and/or run websites, chances are, you have a web form in it, whether it’s a simple contact form or a rich and robust web app. There are several ways to make sure your web forms are optimized for your users. Here are some tips for making sure that your form submission process is user-friendly.

1. Clearly Highlight Required Fields

It’s annoying as a user to submit a web form only to later find out that you’ve missed required input fields.

A common convention for highlighting required fields is to have an asterisk (*) beside their label. Explicitly stating that an input field is required or that the field is optional is a safe way to go.

The Zappos.com registration web form highlights required fields with an asterisk (*). Optional fields are explicitly stated.

2. Provide User-Friendly and Descriptive Error Messages

I’m sure you hate it when you make a mistake in a web form and all the error says is "You must fill out all of the required fields below," when they should really provide a more specific error message like "You forgot to enter your e-mail address."

Performing real-time data validation as the user is filling out the web form is a good solution to ambiguous error messages. For example, immediately after filling out the email address input field, the web form should check whether it’s in the correct format, and if it isn’t, the user is immediately notified.

Yahoo!’s sign up form provides meaningful real-time error messages even before the form is submitted.

Read about best practices for hints and error-validation in web forms.

3. Use Client-Side (JavaScript) Data Format Validation

Using JavaScript data validation saves the user time, as well as reduces the amount of work your web server has to perform to process incoming web form submissions. Client-side error validation allows you to let users know they’ve made a mistake right away, instead of after they’ve submitted the form. This is good for any input fields that don’t need to check your database; things such as making sure the provided email address is in the correct format or that a phone number only contains numbers.

SurveyGizmo’s sign up form lets you know that the format of the email address you entered is invalid.

4. Visually Style Focused Form Fields to Let Users Know Where They Are

Make sure that you visually style input fields so that it is very apparent which field the user is on. You can do this by using the CSS :focus pseudo-class selector.

Wufoo’s web form visually styles the active input field by giving it a distinctive background.

Make the input field have a different border color at the minimum — by default, web browsers will do this for you, but make sure that the default color is distinctive against your website’s design.

Google Chrome’s default style for a focused input field is to provide it with a yellow border. In Firefox, it’s a faint blue border.

5. Show Progress Clearly

If your web form is big and it spans across multiple pages (or has several steps), make sure that you provide the user with constant feedback on their progress to let them know how much more time they will require to finish the web form submission process. This is common in cases such as an online survey form with many questions or an e-store’s checkout process.

All it takes is displaying "Step 4 out of 5," or something of that nature. If they keep clicking "Next" buttons with no clear vision of when they’ll be done, they’ll most likely stop sooner than you’d like.

Amazon.com’s checkout process has 4 pages. The form shows you where you are and how much more there is to fill out.

Of course, the better alternative would be to shorten your web form — but barring that option, at least give the web form user an indication of where they are in the completion process.

6. Save/Cache Form Data Periodically

Forms that go through multiple pages or steps are prone to user errors. To avoid data loss, you definitely want to implement a way to save your users’ inputs in either a session or cookie variable. This makes the web form more fault-tolerant, and improves your chances that the form will be completed even after accidents such as the user navigating away from the web page. Having to re-fill out the web form may discourage users from completing it.

7. Ditch the Default "Submit" Text

Instead of having your web form’s submit button say "Submit," have it remind the user what it is they’re doing, like "Sign up now," or even better, let the user know of the advantages of filling out this form.

Basecamp’s signup form replaces the default "Submit" text with something more useful.

8. Your "Cancel" Button is a Major Distraction

If you were at a store buying a new shirt and the salesperson asked you, "Are you sure you really want to get this shirt?" would you continue to buy the shirt? Probably not. Maybe you’d be hesitant; is the salesperson telling you the shirt doesn’t look good on you?

Same goes with your web forms; having a "cancel" button may make your users think twice about what they’re filling out.

9. Show Users the Proper Input Format

If you’re asking your users for a specific input format — such as a phone number or credit card number — let them know what you’re expecting. If a password has to have a certain number of characters, or if it must contain certain combinations of characters, clearly describe these requirements. This reduces ambiguity and makes filling up the form quicker.

The Geico registration form provides unambiguous instructions on what format they’re expecting.

10. Single Column Vertical Forms Are Better

According to an eye tracking study by cxpartners, a user experience design agency, scanning down the form is preferable to scanning from left to right. It reduces the number of eye movements you need to make in order to fill out the form.

Single Column Example

Backpack’s signup form is oriented vertically in one column.

Multicolumn Example

A counter-example, eBay’s multi-column signup web form requires users to fill out the form up and down as well as left to right.

Showcase of Excellent Web Forms

For inspiration, here are a few excellent web forms.

Alexandru Cohaniuc

Alexandru Cohaniuc’s web form looks absolutely stunning as far as design and functionality goes. It clearly lets you know whether he’s available for freelance work, it has easy-to-read labels and has input fields with clear and legible type.

Grip’d Custom Facebook Tab Creator

Grip’d’s custom Facebook tab creator lets you know exactly what step you’re in, along with big buttons that attract a user’s attention to keep going through the process of generating a custom Facebook tab.

Groupon

Groupon’s web form clearly lets you know where you are in the process of signing up. They do an amazing job at effectively using a multi-step registration form.

KISSMetrics

KISSMetric’s form shows a great example of web form design along with JavaScript validation. When you make a mistake, you’ll know about it right away.

MobileMe Sign In

Apple’s MobileMe login form is a great example of form design. The call-to-action button is clear and the :focus style on the form field is clearly visible.

Web Form Tools and Resources

Here are a few resources and tools for working with web forms.

Wufoo

This web app allows you to generate your own forms and gives you the code necessary to embed the form in your web pages. They handle analytics and even payments for you!

Contactable

A jQuery plugin that lets you easily create contact forms and feedback forms anywhere on your site. It’s extremely easy to use and provides a great result.

Changing Form Input Styles on Focus with jQuery

This is a tutorial showing you how you can use jQuery to let your users know where in the form they currently are.

Form field hints with CSS and JavaScript

A tutorial that will teach you how to show form hints when users click on a field. This is a great way to show your users specific formats for phone numbers and other fields.

LiveValidation

A way to easily provide live field validation as the user types with JavaScript. You can configure it to work in pretty much any way you want.

Related Content

• 25 Stylish Examples of Web Forms
• 20 Websites to Help You Master User Interface Design
• 40 Exceptional jQuery Interface Techniques and Tutorials
• Related categories: Usability and User Interface

About the Author

Raphael Caixeta is a PHP and iOS developer and co-founder of Grip’d. He likes to blog about web and iOS development at raphaelcaixeta.com. If you’d like to connect with him, you can follow him on Twitter @raphaelcaixeta and add him on Facebook (raphaelcaixeta).

Go to Source

Which analytics app do you use and why? Read on to see if there’s anything more fitting for your needs or if you have something you’d recommend.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics

Perhaps the most well known and most used, Google Analytics is king of the hill. It’s one of the most powerful analytics apps available and remains free, which makes it the most popular choice to date. There are plugins, tweaks and third-party apps for just about every platform available so integration should be a snap.

Among its greatness, it also has drawbacks and many argue quality flaws. Keep reading to see eight great alternatives for your analytics needs.

• Price: Free
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: Third-party iPhone app (iTunes)
• Real-time data: No
• Requirements: None
• Developer: Google

Mint

Mint

Every time I’ve looked into analytics apps several people always tell me they much prefer Mint over Google Analytics. Mint is self-hosted, so you have more control in that respect, but also offers real-time tracking and is extensible. Mint’s interface is clean and easy to read and navigate, so it’s a breeze to use.

• Price: $30 per site
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: Third-party iPhone app (iTunes)
• Real-time data: Yes
• Requirements: Self-Hosted (PHP, MySQL)
• Developer: Shaun Inman

Reinvigorate

Reinvigorate

Reinvigorate is one of my favorites and actually my personal analytics app of choice. The app offers real-time tracking, visitor “NameTags” (great for seeing who’s on your site), a desktop app and even heatmaps. The app design is fantastic and it’s a breeze to use; although it can be addicting watching your real-time data flow in.

• Price: $10 per month, 14-day free trial
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: No
• Real-time data: Yes
• Requirements: None
• Developer: Sean McNamara

Clicky

Clicky

Clicky probably offers the most features of any app listed here, including real-time tracking, various plugins, mobile apps, website widgets and a whole lot more. Along with piles of great features, Clicky also offers more price plans than other apps to best fit your needs and your budget. Clicky’s interface design wasn’t too appealing for me, but it does a great job at accomplishing its goal.

• Price: Free, $6.99-$19.99 per month
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: Yes
• Real-time data: Yes
• Requirements: None
• Developer: Clicky

chartbeat

chartbeat

Chartbeat, like several of the other apps here, also offers real-time tracking but features an interface that’s more enjoyable to look at than just a pile of numbers or the typical line graph. It’s a clean looking and easy to use app that will be much more appealing to the average user rather than hardcore analytics users.

• Price: $9.95 per month, 30-day free trial
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: iPhone app (iTunes)
• Real-time data: Yes
• Requirements: None
• Developer: Chartbeat Inc.

Woopra

Woopra

Woopra takes a different approach to analytics and requires that you download a desktop client to handle your site’s incoming data. The app offers real-time tracking and a dark color scheme for its interface, making heavy use of icons and vibrant colors. With the features offered, Woopra is a great choice, especially since it’s free.

• Price: Free
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: iPhone app (iTunes)
• Real-time data: Yes
• Requirements: Desktop compatible with desktop client
• Developer: iFusion Labs, LLC.

Piwik

Piwik

Piwik is an open source analytics app that you’ll have to host yourself but offers everything from real-time tracking to mobile apps for iPhone and Android and is even offered in over 30 languages. It’s directly intended to be an alternative to Google Analytics and does a pretty dang good job of it.

• Price: Free (open source)
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: iPhone (iTunes) or Android app
• Real-time data: Yes
• Requirements: Self-hosted (PHP, MySQL)
• Developer: Piwik

GoingUp

GoingUp!

GoingUp! takes a slightly different approach by pushing SEO tools along with the regular analytics app tools. The interface could use a some refinements but overall gets the job done. Among the piles of features the app sports, real-time tracking, heatmaps and mobile apps are nowhere to be seen. The app is free though so if you need easier to understand SEO tools, this might be worth checking out.

• Price: Free
• WordPress Plugin: Yes
• Mobile App: No
• Real-time data: No
• Requirements: None
• Developer: GoingUp!

KISSinsights

KISSmetrics

While KISSmetrics is an analytics app, it takes a very different approach by focusing on the people visiting your site rather than pageviews. KISSmetrics does a great job of helping you focus on your visitors, site conversions, where future development should be and more aspects that truly help your site and your visitors.

• Price: Free
• WordPress Plugin: Unknown
• Mobile App: No
• Real-time data: No
• Requirements: None
• Developer: KISSmetrics

What Do You Use?

Each of these apps are fantastic in their own way and make for pretty great alternatives to Google Analytics. Do you use or plan on trying out one of the apps listed here? Or maybe you use an app we haven’t listed that you think should’ve been?

Go to Source

Each and every person who owns a website will likely have some sort of Analytics script installed to monitor traffic. And it is probably Google Analytics.

Don’t get me wrong, Google Analytics is an Awesome packages and gives you tons of data about your visitors but just sometimes you need something different (or you don’t like Google and want to host your data elsewhere ).

Whatever your reason, you need look no further.

8 Worthy Alternatives to Google Analytics

Piwik (Free)

Piwik is my favourite alternative for 2 reasons –

1. Open Source
2. All the data sits on your DB
(3. and it’s real time)

Yahoo! Web Analytics (Free)

An enterprise level solution.
Real time data

Clicky (Free up to a limit of 3000 page views a month)

Clicky is designed to be the easiest web analytics service you’ve ever used. Services like Google Analytics do everything except take out the trash, but you probably don’t know what any of the data means. With Clicky, everything just makes sense.

Optimised for iPhone

Woopra

Woopra is the world’s most comprehensive, information rich, easy to use,real-time Web tracking and analysis application. We deliver the richest library of visitor statistics in the industry through our innovative desktop application. But Woopra is more than simply statistics

Includes a Desktop Application

Mint (Low-Cost)

Mint helps you identify where the most interest is being generated and over what.

Chartbeat

Used by some big players.

Stuffed Tracker

Reinvigorate

Realtime
Heat map Technology
Desctop App

Conclusion

I would personally still stick with Google Analytics however would also give Piwik a try as I’m sure the Piwik community have developed some great extensions to it!

Go to Source

Take this one question quiz:

What should be the first step in developing a website?

1. Creating a design to use as a basis,

2. Deciding how the content needs to be integrated and managed,

3. Gathering content from corporate collateral,

4. Developing a strategic plan for your specific needs, or

5. Choose the most cost-effective hosting plan.

In just about any profession other than website development, your answer would be choice 4. After all, you couldn’t build a house without considering the layout, number of bathrooms, and features of the home. You wouldn’t create a design for a major advertisement and then plan the content and message of the ad. Yet, when it comes to website design, often the design comes first and the strategic plan for the site comes last.

Being a veteran of about 20 years in marketing and design, this issue has perplexed me for years. It seems to me that the development process should be:

1. Discover the reason a business needs a website and the expectations of the business.

2. Understand your typical customer and what influences their purchasing decision.

3. Have a clear understanding of how the website fits into the marketing plan.

4. Research to find what customers are searching for in Google, Yahoo in relation to the business (keywords).

5. Carefully plan a site architecture which is best for the demographic, online search trends, and have a site that’s easy for search engines to follow, is designed with the target market in mind, and has clear definitions of conversion goals.

6. Create a design which speaks to the target demographic.

7. Launch the site and begin an internet marketing plan to fulfill realistic expectations.

8. Modify strategic marketing plan as needed in response to real-time data.

Then issues such as server configuration, hosting service, domain registration variables, proper site construction, CMS, SEM, PPC, Social Media, and many other features need to be researched and fine-tuned. For example, choosing a hosting package with an IP that has been associated with a “bad neighborhood” in the past (bad neighborhoods are pornographic sites, etc.) can cripple your website marketing plan before it begins.

Instead the plan is usually:

1. Create a design.

2. Add content. (most plans end here because there usually are no marketing goals for a site.)

3. Contact SEO firm who performs keyword research based on content of site.

4. SEO firm proposes keywords.

5. Site is optimized by SEO firm by editing original site to make it more SEO friendly.

6. Results vary.

7. Usually followed by redevelopment IF business doesn’t lose faith in the internet.

All the details are usually never dealt with because the average designer doesn’t know they exist.

I think the reason the internet world can get away with a backwards strategy is because the design portion is fun, is more tangible, and looks impressive. It gives a client the opportunity to suggest colors, logo position, interactive media, position of the navigation system and other elements. The process usually goes smooth because the developer gets the excitement from the client and the client is impressed by the nice design work. BUT… that’s also why over 99% of all internet businesses FAIL.

Because there is no quality infrastructure and strategic plan in place. Either the site is poorly marketed, keywords are unfocused, or it doesn’t fit into the overall business marketing plan. In most cases, this is where the business owner begins to think the internet is all hype and will not work for their particular business. They disregard stunning statistics, such at 65% of all Americans begin their search for local services on the internet FIRST. This is followed by a competitor leveraging the internet as a strategic advantage and ultimately leads to a loss of revenue by the disillusioned company. So What’s the CURE?

Your website needs to be planned. A thorough understanding of your expectations, target demographic, and geographic influences have to be considered. The proper research needs to be done to assure your internet marketing plan has the right infrastructure and architecture and then you can eat the “cake” (design).

BUT…

This is easier said than done for the following reasons:

* It’s more expensive to create the right plan.

* It’s not as fun to start off with planning, expectations, and realistic goals.

* A good team to create your plan has to understand design, marketing, social media, SEO/SEM, custom development, and customer service to get the job done.

* Most website developers mask their weaknesses. Some are good at design, others technical work, others SEO, but few are good at it all…

* College students and novices practically give away website design which is hard for the business to turn down.

* Consultants usually do not have a complete understanding of the entire process.

AND THE WORSE PART…

Is now the internet developing world has realized that cheaper, do-it-yourself systems sell better than a comprehensive plan. (See our article on “canned solutions.”) So companies like Intuit offer “simple solutions” (because it is high profit, low overhead), and the only one who ends up suffering is your business. Be Smart and Eat Your Vegetables First… Then have Dessert.

Proper planning is the only cure. Hiring an experienced company to help you is the only way you will truly have an opportunity to dominate your market online. It will cost a little more, it won’t be as fun up front, but it will be worth it in the end.

Post from: SiteProNews: Webmaster News & Resources

Website Development Strategy That Will Drive Customers

Go to Source

The garden hose has a query rate under the free quote limit of Google App Engine, Google says. "As such, many more developers will be able to easily get their hands dirty on this great source of real-time data," says Google’s Eric Steinlauf.

"Second, we’ve created an API to return the people associated with a particular activity query," he adds. "That is, you can now search for people who have recently created a public post that includes an arbitrary string or related geo-location. For example, if you wanted to see the people associated with Red Sox near Fenway Park, you could use this URL for the JSON response."

Google has also enabled users to discover content related to particular posts. Developers can access and deliver search results related to the post’s topic.

More information on utilizing these features of the Google Buzz API can be found in the documentation.

Go to Source

Welcome to this morning’s edition of “First To Know,” a series in which we keep you in the know on what’s happening in the digital world today. We’re keeping our eyes on three particular stories of interest today.

Saudia Arabia Bans Blackberries

Saudia Arabia has issued a ban of Blackberry services for national security reasons, effective August 6. According to Arab News, approximately 750,000 devices are currently in use in Saudi Arabia [via WSJ].

Motorola and Verizon to Launch TV Tablet Device

Motorola is reportedly working on a 10-inch, Android-based tablet device designed with TV consumers in mind. The device could launch in the U.S. as early as this fall [via Financial Times].

Hail a London Cab on Twitter

A group of London drivers have built up a 100-car black cab service on Twitter. Users of the microblogging platform can tweet or direct message @tweetalondoncab to hail a car. Cabbies are also using the service to aggregate and share real-time data about demands and surpluses of cabs around the city [via The Guardian].

Further News

• LinkedIn makes its first acquisition.
• You can now drag-and-drop attachments from Gmail to save them to your desktop and review your recent Google searches on your mobile device.
• Facebook has released a much-needed update to its Android app and secured the domain Facebook.me. Is a new product in the works, or will it only redirect to Facebook.com?
• Verizon has started rolling out over-the-air updates for the Motorola Droid.
• Flickr has released its major photo page redesign to all of its users.
• The new Hotmail is now available to everyone, the product team announced [via The Windows Blog].

This series is brought to you by HTC EVO 4G, America’s first 4G phone. Only from Sprint. The “First to Know” series keeps you in the know on what’s happening now in the world of social media and technology.

More About: blackberry, cab, first to know series, london, Motorola, saudia arabia, Tablet, twitter, verizon

For more Social Media coverage:

• Follow Mashable Social Media on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Social Media channel
• Download our free apps for iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

Almost every websites built these days are embedded with analytic tracking codes to monitor and record details of visitors to a certain level. If you are not using one, you are losing out a lot of information about your visitors. Google Analytics (GA) is probably the most commonly used services out there when it comes to web analytic services. But here’s one problem if GA – data are not quite real time.

It is absolutely fine to have another real time analytic service tracking along side with GA or any web analytic services you are using. Here are some situations where real time traffic monitoring can come in handy:

• Traffic spikes – Abnormal number of visitors indicates your website is having a traffic spike. It should also tell you where these visitors come from, and what page they are currently viewing. You might also want to take measures to prevent the site from going down.
• Social media effect– Real time data allows you to analyze and track the responses of your Facebook shares, Twitter tweets or any other social media sharing instantly.

Here we’ve collected some of the top web analytics services that give you real time result of your traffic. And the best thing is – they are free. Full list after jump.

Clicky

Clicky is one of the most popular real time web analytics service. When you login and view your website statistics then you are seeing statistics which are refreshing every minute.

ShinyStat

With ShinyStat you can measure the traffic of numerous sites at the same time in real time and you can also enjoy particularly advantageous resale conditions.

Reinvigorate

Reinvigorate provides users with one of the best quality real time statistics. This service tracks active users, active pages and also search engine hits and referrers, which help to check where the traffic is coming from. It’s also possible to create multiple groups and to add unlimited amount of websites to track. There are a lot of positive responses about this service. There is also available a desktop tool “Snoop” and a WordPress plugin for your WordPress blog. Despite the fact that this service is absolutely for free, you still have to wait for an invite before you can start using this service.

StatCounter

Real time detailed web stats with highly configurable hit counter. Insert a piece of their code on your web page or blog to analyze and monitor your website in real time. 500 logs and 250’000 page loads per month on your website are for free.

Woopra

Woopra is very comprehensive statistics tracking program. This program offers some interesting features, such as live chatting with visitors, event alerts among other things, real time analytics. These features are very impressive. Unfortunately, you can track only 10’000 page views and have a limited availability for public users.

Performancing Meters

Performancing Metrics does its real time statistics job nicely. This service is pretty decent. You can track current visitors, incoming links or referrers, search engine traffic and so on. This service is for free to use, however there are some features which are only available if you use their paid service. If you use a free account then they restrict the amount of statistics you can view to the last 31 days. There is also available a WordPress plugin for your blog.

Spotplex

This service shows you real time traffic statistics and it also shows how you rank between your competitors who are using this service. There is also a great feature that you can even check the most popular articles of the day on Spotplex website. Quite impressive!

Piwik

Using Piwik, you can easily build your own website analytics plugins by adding new features and removing the ones you don’t need. Piwik is installed on user’s server and that’s why user owns his data. The data is stored on his own database and he can get all the statistics using open APIs. You can fully customize your user interface by dragging and dropping the widgets you want to be displayed.

SiteMeter

This is another popular real time traffic tracking service. This service is for free with its basic statistics but if you want more detailed analysis of your website traffic then you need to pay for the premium account.

TraceWatch

TraceWatch lets you keep track of the visitors to your website in real time. It has detailed statistics and deep analysis using an innovative user interface. This service is for free and it helps you to make your website more effective.

Whos.Amung.Us

Using this service, you can see not only real time number of visitors but also if you click on it, you’ll be brought to a real time list of URLs visitors are currently on. This is impressive feature.

DaCounter

DaCounter is a website counter and traffic analyzer with real time traffic statistics. This service provides reports such as online visitors, visitor statistics, system statistics, content statistics, demographic statistics and also traffic source statistics. It’s easy to install, all you need to do is to sign up for this service and you will be given a code which you will need to add to your website.

Histats

Histats provides unlimited and unrestricted website statistics which are updated in real time and numerous unique counters to choose from. It provides these reports: traffic, visitors, referrer, last 20, special. To get Histats, you will need to enter your site details and then choose a counter. After 20 seconds you will be given a code which you will need to add to your website.

W3Counter

W3Counter provides website statistics and analytics 2.0 style in real time along with a website counter. There are available various reports such as online now, live map, latest refferers, latest searches, content, navigation, visitors, sources. W3Counter also provides a WordPress plugin for your blog for easy integration. To install W3Counter, first of all, add your website then choose your counter style and after you have chosen a counter style, add the code to your website. If you have less than 5’000 page views per day then this service is for free but if you have up to 1 million page views per month then you will need to pay $9.95 per month to use this service.

Feedjit

Feedjit is website statistics which is built for bloggers to monitor their visitors. They can see who are their visitors, where they are coming from and what is the most impressive, is that you can see what your visitor typed in the search engine to get to your website.

Chartbeat

Chartbeat is a revolutionary real-time analytics service that enables people to understand emergent behaviour in real-time and exploit or mitigate it

VisitorVille

First of all, this service is NOT for free but there is a 3-day free trial. The reason why I added this service is because it’s unique. This is real time, visual website analysis which brings your website to life where each building represents a web page, each bus represents a search engine, and each animated character represents a real visitor to your website, just brilliant! This service provides types of reports such as click analyzer, statistical, traffic flow, ad campaign, broken link detector, search term. Just download then install the free trial. After installing the free trial, you will need to create a site map on VisitorVille. It has a huge list of unique features, since it is basically like a “Sim City” version of your website. If you are interested in prices for this service then here is a list of prices: $19.95 (less than 2,000 unique visitors per day), $29.95 (less than 6,000 unique visitors per day), $124.95 (unlimited unique visitors per day).

Go to Source

Kraig Swensrud is senior vice president, product marketing at salesforce.com, where he is responsible for marketing strategy and execution across all products, including Salesforce Chatter. You can follow him on Twitter at @kswensrud.

While Facebook and Twitter are often cited as distractions for employees, the networks’ immediacy, collaboration and community offer great hope for business. Today, a massive technological shift is underway — led for the first time by employees — to bring these benefits to the workplace.

And this change has happened only very recently. Facebook has surpassed 400 million active users in just six years and Twitter counted 105 million registered users in just four. These networks have trained a generation for a new style of collaboration through profiles, status updates, groups, feeds, lists and filters. As such, they have changed our expectations of how we should be able to connect with others and collaborate in real-time.

But when we come to work, we throw all of this out the window. The concept of immediacy doesn’t exist here, and arguably, this is where it matters most. Many businesses are stuck in the past, using antiquated technologies that were put in place before the web even existed. For new graduates entering the workplace, it’s counterintuitive to have to revert to these slow forms of collaboration. As a result, we are more productive with our personal networks than we are with our colleagues and customers.

Bringing the Workplace Into the Social Era

Why shouldn’t we expect real-time collaboration at work? Business happens in real-time. Market shifts happen in real-time. Data changes in real-time. Why shouldn’t collaboration and learning in business happen in real-time, too? That question is the inspiration for new social tools entering the workplace that have the same look and feel as Facebook or Twitter. These social tools offer a new way to collaborate with people at work that is private, secure and relevant to business.

Because we all use the public networks, there’s no learning curve. Instead of following friends or celebrities, you follow people on your team, the activity in your top customer accounts, your new marketing campaigns, and your critical business documents. You’re able to gain the insights you need from a real-time feed, all within a completely secure environment. And because these new social tools are based on the web, you can access them from anywhere, whether you’re on your laptop, iPad or iPhone.

Imagine Facebook and Twitter-style collaboration in the workplace:

Employee-Powered Change

Unlike past technology shifts, this one isn’t being led by IT departments, but by individual employees like you and me and our need for meaningful and simple collaboration tools. With new enterprise social tools, we can harness the power of real-time social networking to rebuild the workplace and create a collaborative forum where we can be inspired by real-time engagement, real-time innovation, and the strengthening of our workplace communities. It’s a daunting challenge, but an exciting, much-needed one.

More Business Resources from Mashable

– HOW TO: Evaluate Your Social Media Plan
– Why Your Next Business Card May Be Virtual
– HOW TO: Improve B2B Sales Productivity with Social Media
– HOW TO: Use Social Media for Lead Generation
– HOW TO: Use QR Codes for Small Business Marketing

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Yuri_Arcurs

More About: business, collaboration, facebook, small business, social media, twitter

For more Business coverage:

• Follow Mashable Business on Twitter
• Become a Fan on Facebook
• Subscribe to the Business channel
• Download our free apps for iPhone and iPad

Go to Source

Real-time search outfit Collecta has just announced a $4.7 million Series B round of funding from Dace Ventures.

Funding will be used to help grow the company’s team, strike more content partnership deals, and increase the level of engagement and time spent on its sites. The company’s products include user-friendly widgets, custom Site Search and several APIs.

Collecta will also be moving its headquarters to LA, advantageous for creating and strengthening relationships with big, traditional media companies. To date, one of the company’s greatest strengths has been its ability to broker deals with and create value for companies such as CNN and FOX. We look forward to seeing what kinds of partnerships are forged once the staff has settled into its new home.

“This funding is a great validation of both Collecta’s technology, as well as the company’s core vision that real-time data applications are fundamentally changing how we access information on the Internet,” said Collecta CEO Gerry Campbell.

Collecta’s leading real-time platform is based on the open messaging standard XMPP, and its platform gathers real-time content from a network of more than 15 million content sources, including Twitter, WordPress, Flickr and other social sites, along with news outlets such as the Associated Press and Reuters.

Collecta’s Series A came in the form of $1.85M from early-stage VC firm True Ventures and other individuals last spring.

Tags: collecta, funding, real-time, real-time search, series b

Go to Source

Combining location and real-time data is hot, according to Joe Stump, CTO and co-founder of SimpleGeo — so hot, in fact, that it was the topic of his talk at The Next Web ‘10 this week in Amsterdam.

Intrigued by the possibilities highlighted by Stump during his speech, we grabbed the former lead architect of Digg for a more in-depth look at the future of real-time location and where the big growth areas might be.

1. Leveraging Cell Phone Sensor Data

Your cell phone is constantly sending geodata back to its carrier base, but that’s not all most handsets are capable of recording. The iPhone alone boasts not only a location sensor, but also a light sensor, proximity sensor, compass and accelerometer. Take into account there are over 50 million of these devices around the planet; the potential amount of data that could be captured with them is immense. While there’s potential in improved leveraging of real-time location data from phones now, what’s even more exciting is the increasingly sophisticated sensors coming to future phones, such as temperature meters.

2. More Location Tagging

As a memory trigger, location can be as powerful as smell, says Stump. Geo-tagging items such as e-mails or business meeting notes would be a clever way to remind users about events or conversations. For example, you may not remember meeting Bob Smith and discussing his start-up (and almost certainly did not if it happened very late at a The Next Web party after a few Dutch beers!) but if the method of communication was tagged with a visual reminder of the bar you stood in when the conversation took place, you’re going to have a better chance at recalling it.

3. Platforms Merging

Stump does not suggest that Gowalla and Foursquare are about to become FourWalla, but we may well see social gaming platforms merge with location-based services. For example, two games or a game and a service could live in the same virtual world if the team-up was mutually beneficial and added value for the user. For example, love-it-or-hate-it Facebook game Farmville could see players check in to a local farmer’s market to sell their produce. These kind of cross-platform mergers would increase a game’s long-term interest and stickiness.

4. Games Going Beyond the Checkin

So you’re mayor of Bob’s Coffee Shop, woo-hoo. Although the relative freshness of location-based social games is keeping folks interested now — and is in fact attracting new players by the droves (Stump says that Foursquare sees 100,000 new users every 10 days while MyTown sees 100,000 new users every day) — this won’t always be the case. The games are going to have to go beyond checkins to increase interest. A current example of this is stickybits’s integration with Foursquare. Stickybits lets you tag an object with a QR code and then map it with an image that goes with you around the world. Expect to see more developments like this soon.

5. Making Sense of Location Data

As it’s a new area, not all companies are being an intelligent about location data — especially real-time examples — as they could be. We will soon see more connections made from the information and more graphing done to understand it. We will begin to ask not only where people are going but also why they are going to certain places. As interest in a fellow user’s location declines the further you are from it, and interest in an event likewise declines the further in the past it was, a way of capturing and using real-time location data is needed to best leverage the potentially powerful information.

Tags: foursquare, games, gowalla, joe stump, location, real-time, simplegeo, stickybits

Go to Source

"Developers have built some amazing applications using data from Twitter’s network," says Collecta CEO Gerry Campbell. "Collecta’s API allows developers to extend their tools far beyond Twitter, to the rest of the real-time web."

Collecta’s Twitter-compatible API delivers real-time web results, in a format the company says is simple to integrate into any desktop app, mobile app or web app. This means third-party developers can now integrate fresh streaming results from Collecta’s base of social media, established news, and unique content sources directly into their applications.

Sites like CNET and MySpace, and apparently thousands of others are already using Collecta, and today’s announcement will allow many more to join them.

"We want to support the explosion of creativity in the real-time space," says Campbell. "We love seeing new, clever ways to take advantage of Collecta’s real-time data. We’ve done a lot of the hard work to create the real-time stream so that app companies can focus on their specific ideas."

More information about how to implement the Collecta API can be found here.

Go to Source

photo by Scott Beale / Laughing Squid

”How many of you are happy?” —Ryan Sarver

More than 100,000 registered applications have been built leveraging Twitter’s API, so when Ryan Sarver, director of Twitter’s platform, looks out at a packed house of developers at Chirp it’s a risky question to ask.

Twitter is growing up, it’s acquisition of Tweetie and openness that core features, previously filled by external apps, are now being built in-house. This transition renders many applications, some built by developers in the audience, irrelevant.

So, really, how many of you are happy? Run Ryan! Run!Facilitating and growing a developer ecosystem is a new bold world in the business of technology, and Twitter’s few core features created abundant opportunity.

For it’s first three years, developers fed into Twitter’s success engaging users and explaining Twitter through interface design and data organization than Twitter could do on its own. There’s tension in the room, and the number of times today’s speakers have used the term “empathy” could make for a great drinking game. The thing is there is empathy in earnest, and to hear Biz, Ev, and Ryan talk about change, both fun and frenetic, the developer ecosystem clearly remains a priority.

Ryan carefully and exuberantly outlined five new areas where the API is getting really good and where he and Twitter hope developers will go with gusto to innovate:

• Annotations—will allow developers to make the most of metadata
• Places—a curated database of places around the world that will allow developers to drill deeply and exploit content around locations (go further than the check-in model)
• @Anywhere—primarily for connecting publishers (ex. HuffPost, Guardian, MSNBC) with audiences through hover cards, sign in, tweetbox, and integration
• User Streams—all real-time data from DMs to Retweets, and it’s going to be opened up for the hackathon (get ready to see some inventive apps and ideas)
• dev.twitter.com—rolling out today, the new site organizes, teaches, and encourages development around the growing possibilities provided by the API. A side note, previously handwritten data is now replaced with examples generated by live code.

Twitter’s commitment to it’s APIs and to facilitating and growing an ecosystem where developers can innovate and new businesses can be formed is genuine. To illustrate that commitment, Ryan shared the stage with Aaron Gotwalt, co-founder and engineer behind CoTweet.

Aaron told the CoTweet story, which begins with a string of great ideas and apps that led him and his partner in design Kyle Sollenberger to Twitter.

After trying to share a Twitter account to promote one of their experimental non-Twitter projects, they capitalized on creating a work-flow, and with the addition of Jesse Engle as CEO, a business quickly grew. (CoTweet was recently acquired by Exact Target.)

It’s clear that developing on Twitter’s APIs is as precarious as it can be profitable. Ev shared a video to illustrate just how hard Twitter really is for users to understand, use, and share. By growing core features internally and encouraging developers to leverage the APIs to do more work around areas that they know best the goal is to grow the user base to increase the opportunities for app development.

There’s a lot of love in the room, it’s almost like people are determined to hug it out, and though it’s clear that “celebrate the developer” prevails, let’s be honest, Ryan, have you ever met a happy developer?

Go to Source

Having access to real time data on your site userbase is a dream to any webmaster. Tools like Google Analytics give a great perspective on your site’s reach, but lack the real time feel a simple widget like this can provide.

Requirements: PHP, MySQL, jQuery Framework
Demo: http://demo.tutorialzine.com/2010/03/who-is-online-widget…
License: License Free

Sponsors

Pixmac: Stock Photos, Royalty Free Pictures and Images

Go to Source

We had the opportunity to interview Evan Britton. Evan is a longtime internet veteran who founded Sency in 2009. The goal of Sency is to bring real time content, links, and tools to internet users in an organized and simple fashion. I’ve been fascinated by how Sency’s tools can be put to use by bloggers and we wanted Evan to share some thoughts with you as well.

FYB:

Evan, tell us a little bit about your own background. How did things develop in your life to the point of launching Sency?

Evan:

I went to the first ever Twitter conference in Los Angeles – seeing the functionality that was offered through their API motivated me to build Sency.

FYB:

And why is the real-time web such a big deal? In other words, why should bloggers be taking notice?

Evan:

For years, many companies have tried to launch a search engine offering a new way to search. These new engines picked up steam because they didn’t offer the user something new. The real time web is different, it gives you a window into people’s minds at any time in regards to any subject matter. Bloggers have the ability to utilize this real time data to add in functionality to their site and learn more about what is being said right now in their respective niches.

FYB:

How do you see real-time search results shaping the future of how people browse the internet and utilize services?

Evan:

Many searches will always be best performed via Google. If you want to shop, or learn information about something, Google is the way to go. However, if you want to see what is being said right now about any person, event, sports team, or anything else – a real time search is the way to go. This new way to search is unique in that today the results will be different from what they were yesterday. Its instant, you are seeing what is happening right now in regards to a given keyword.

FYB:

What tools are available to help bloggers get a handle on the real-time web, and tell us in particular what Sency offers?

Evan:

There are a wealth of tools out there. I wrote about several real time web tools here. Sency offers bloggers the ability to have automatically updating, real time information, scrolling on their blog for any keyword. This information can add value to a blog instantly.

FYB:

If you can, give one example of how a blogger might utilize a real-time tool like Sency for research and blogging?

Evan:

Visit RealTimeBball.com. Click on your favorite pro basketball team, and you’ll see content scrolling for that respective team. So, a blog about the Knicks, can have scrolling automatically updating content for anytime someone mentions the knicks on the real time web. The second half of this youtube video gives a great tutorial for how to use the Sency widget.

FYB:

What other insights can you share about the power of the real-time web? What haven’t we covered?

Evan:

I think that bloggers should make a point to perform real time web searches in regards to the keywords of their industry weekly. Doing this can show you what people are saying and this can lead to ideas for future blog posts. Also, implementing real time web tools into a blog can have several benefits and over time, these tools are going to improve with time so it will be beneficial to get involved in the early going.

Sponsored by

Advertise on Fuel Brand Network.
Fuel Brand Network 2010 cc (creative commons license)

Blogging and the Real-time Web

Go to Source

Related Blogs

• Related Blogs on Blogging and the Real-time Web

"MySpace sees huge value in real-time data and believes sharing it will mature the socialization of content on the Web," said MySpace COO Mike Jones. "MySpace is building the next-generation content distribution platform and is opening up our floodgate of public data for developers to make compelling real-time experiences around the Web."

The Real-Time Stream API allows the full MySpace activity stream to be pushed to third party sites in real-time. It is already being used by Google, OneRiot, and GroovyCorp.

"MySpace made it really easy to integrate public MySpace data into our search engine," said Tobias Peggs, GM of OneRiot. "With access to this real-time data, we’re offering more comprehensive and meaningful search results to our users."

"MySpace users are making a huge contribution to the realtime, social web by sharing millions of links with their friends each day," said Peggs. "We’re delighted to have access to that information through the MySpace Real-Time Stream API."

We’ve already seen what Google is doing:

The Status and Mood Commenting API lets third party sites use MySpace status and mood updates and allows people to comment from those sites. Comments then appear in the user’s MySpace activity stream, and users can interact with that stream without leaving the third party site.

The Open Search API allows third party sites to include public MySpace profile information in search results. Users can search for people by name, profile type (such as musician, celebrity, comedian) or email address and filter search results by gender, age and location.

The Photo Upload API lets users upload photos to MySpace from third party sites or MySpace Apps. It also enables creation of public or private photo albums.

The updated version of the Post To/Share on MySpace API allows for the sharing of content from third party sites with a MySpace user’s friends. When a user posts content from another site, it goes directly to his/her MySpace activity stream, creating a link back to the third party site.

MySpace is even going so far as to host a " developer challenge " competition starting January 4 to encourage developers to come up with some cool apps utilizing the APIs. Developers will have the chance to win cash prizes and promotion on MySpace.

These MySpace APIs could go a long way in keeping MySpace relevant in the era of Facebook and Twitter. Frankly, they are long overdue. The APIs mean that there can be a lot more useful apps implementing more functionality with MySpace. That means more ways users can keep using it. This and MySpace’s acquisition of imeem could be huge for the future of the social network.
 
Do you think MySpace is helping its future with its recent announcements? Comment here.

Related Articles:

> MySpace Buys imeem, Rolls it Into MySpace Music

> Showtime For Real-Time With Google

> MySpace Upgrades Users’ Mobile Experience

Go to Source

Related Blogs

• Related Blogs on New APIs Should Help MySpace Stay Relevant

Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the British physicist who first designed the way web servers deliver pages to web browsers nearly 19 years ago, sees great promise in HTML5, the much-anticipated rewrite of the language used to build web pages.

“I think (HTML5) is great,” he said at the Worldwide Web Consortium’s (W3C) annual member gathering, taking place here this week.

HTML5 is a mixture of several different technologies that allow content creators to do more with web pages. It defines rules for presenting video, audio, mathematical equations, complex layouts, 2-D animations and non-standard typefaces. Each bit of technology has its own working group within the W3C chartered with developing that one component.

“We’ve had the pieces for a while,” he says. “Seeing all these things finally coming together is exciting, and it multiplies the power of each one,” Berners-Lee says.

HTML5 also enhances the way browsers can store and process data, which has led to the creation of more complex and rich web applications that run in the browser like Gmail, Facebook and apps that allow real-time data sharing, like Google Wave.

“Yes, this is a markup language for web pages,” he says, “but the really big shift that’s happening here — and, you could argue, what’s actually driving the fancy features — is the shift to the web becoming a client-side computing platform.”

The HTML5 specification is close to completion. The most recent releases of browsers like Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Opera all support most of the technologies being rolled in to HTML5. Microsoft’s Internet Explorer supports fewer of HTML5’s advancements, but it’s catching up. HTML5 is expected to become an official recommendation by late 2010 or 2011.

Now that the web has been elevated to a more powerful computing platform by HTML5, Berners-Lee says it has also given rise to complicated security issues.

“You got a piece of code from site A, and you’re person B running a browser you got from company C, and that code wants to access data stored with company E for the purposes of printing it on a printer owned by company D — How do you build that so that it’s not susceptible to all kinds of nasty attacks?”

“The technology is very exciting, but there’s actually a lot of work to do in these corridors to make it work on the real web in a secure way.”

See Also:

• W3C Drops Audio and Video Codec Requirements From HTML 5
• Google Throws Its Weight Behind HTML 5
• Google Waves Goodbye to E-Mail, Welcomes Real-Time Communication

Go to Source

Bing's touch-friendly mobile interface lets you browse movies with your finger.

(Credit:
CNET)

Microsoft on Friday released a refreshed version of its mobile search site (m.bing.com) that’s optimized for touch-screen devices. The new page includes finger-friendly buttons that are easier to both identify and to press, as well as a movie finder that lets users browse by what’s near them by time and theater.

So far, the only devices that work with it are the iPhone/iPod Touch, T-Mobile G1, Samsung Omnia, Verizon Imagio, and the Zune HD. Microsoft says support for other phones and portables is coming. In the meantime, phones that can’t access the touch-friendly interface get defaulted to a simpler version.

Also worth noting is that the touch interface is only available to users in the U.S. for the time being.

Along with touch, Microsoft also added two new search query types that pull from near real-time data sources. This includes a way for users to check on NFL football scores and flight status. Users looking to get an updated score or player stats just need type in the team or player name. As for flights, you’ll need the airline and flight number and it will cull the most recent information about arrivals, departures, or delays.

Now how about fitting some of that neato visual search action on the mobile site too?

Originally posted at Web Crawler

Go to Source

Today the Bing team announced some new updates to Bing for mobile. Although m.bing.com has always offered a mobile-optimized way to do local searches and view maps, the updates integrate some of Bing’s killer features.

Some of the new features include live NFL stats, flight status searches, and an optimized Bing for touch devices like the iPhone, the Zune HD and the T-Mobile G1.

Bing has always included the ability to do local searches from its mobile site (something Google added last month) and now they are bringing some real-time data to the mobile site as well.

For instance, if you type in an NFL player or team name into the search bar, you’ll get back stats or see upcoming games. If a game is in progress, you can get real-time updates on plays. The NFL feature is only available in the US, but it’s a pretty cool way of getting real-time info quickly. You can also search for an airline and flight number and get the latest departure and landing times.

Perhaps the biggest overhaul is for touch devices — like the iPhone or the ZuneHD. Bing mobile now has an optimized interface that is more graphically enhanced than the standard site and also offers some nice touch features for browsing through content.

What really stood out to me, however, was just how much better Bing’s results for certain content looked when formatted for mobile as compared to Google. For instance, if I search for movie times in both search engines on my iPhone, I’ll get mobile-formatted results from both devices. However, if I want to see upcoming times for specific films, the experience is totally different.

Look at this image to see what I mean:

Google hasn’t optimized its actual time showcase for the mobile browser, meaning I have to zoom and scroll in order to see what’s going on. The Bing interface is much much nicer.

The only real problem with Bing for mobile is that most mobile browsers don’t offer any way to change the default search engine. I might prefer to use Bing rather than Google – but on my iPhone, I have to go to the site every time, rather than having access in the search bar.

Still, by bringing some of its best features to mobile, Bing might be able to carve out a niche by offering a better experience than Google. What do you think of Bing for mobile?

Tags: bing, bing for mobile, Google, iphone

Go to Source

The site has enhanced its Share feature — the tiny “Share this on Facebook” widgets seen at the bottom of blog posts, videos and photos — to include live stats tracking. Starting Monday, publishers can see a live count of how many times a particular post or piece of media has been shared on Facebook.

The new live stats counter for Facebook Share closely mimics Tweetmeme’s popular “Retweet” badges, or the live widgets that show the number of Diggs or up-votes on Reddit a piece of content has accumulated.

Facebook Share is getting some analytics tools, too. In addition to learning how many times Facebook users have shared a post, publishers can also see whenever somebody “likes” the shared post, leaves a comment, or clicks back to the original site from within Facebook.

It’s not the only tweak to Facebook’s real-time data flow the company has made to its site within the last few days.

On Friday, the Facebook home page for logged-in users was redesigned to show a filtered stream of updates. Rather than just showing a stream of every status update, every post and every “like” from within their network, Facebook users can now choose between a streamlined, filtered view and a raw, unfiltered view.

This change basically incorporates the old “Highlights” feed — the most important posts from your friends — into the main News Feed. The result is a stream of the most interesting or important stuff that’s been posted within the past couple of days.

The new filtered News Feed is now the default. The more times a post is commented on or liked, the more “popular” it becomes. An algorithm determines what goes into the feed and what stays hidden. The old “Highlights” box is being removed, as it’s now redundant.

The Live Feed, which can be accessed by clicking on the new “Live Feed” tab at the top of the home page, gives a more immediate, Twitter-like stream. It displays all of the recent activity, posts and updates from you and your friends, regardless of popularity.

The odd thing here is that one of these changes brings Facebook up to speed with its competitors in the real-time content sharing game, while the other change sets it back.

Publishers want to know how their content is doing out in the wild, so the new Share tools make sense.

But in altering the News Feed in the way it has, Facebook actually becomes less of a real-time news source for its users. By adding popularity filters, important stuff might not bubble up into your News Feed for hours or days. I just looked at my News Feed, and the newest item is four hours old. If I really want to know what my friends are doing, reading, liking and talking about right now, I have to switch over to the Live Feed. Luckily, this is as easy as one mouse click.

But what does this say about the proliferation of real-time data streams on the web? Publishers always want better real-time data, but do users? Are regular people by and large tired of the massive firehose of updates their favorite sites now all offer? Is it all becoming just too much?

If so, Facebook made the right move with the News Feed changes. If not, hey, there’s always the Live Feed option one click away. Or there’s Twitter. And if you want a real-time stream you can filter even more minutely, you can turn to FriendFeed or Cliqset or Plaxo Pulse.

If the changes to Facebook’s stream bothers you — and judging from the comments of my own Facebook friends, the changes aren’t being seen as that friendly — they are easy to alter. Facebook Insider has an excellent post showing how to change your feed settings. Additional tips are in the comments.

See Also:

• Bing Is in Your Facebook, Indexing Your Status
• Let’s Be Friends: Facebook Acquires FriendFeed
• Facebook Cracks, Here Come the Apps

Go to Source

Among the new features is the ability to narrow any search down to spans of a mere five minutes. While it’s not for everyone, if you’re trying to find better ways to filter the fire hose of information that is real-time data, Delicious’ new search tool is an easy way to do it.

There’s also a very cool new interactive graph for filtering bookmarks around larger chunks of time. For example, if you wanted to see all your bookmarks added on this day last year, just click the interactive graph, select the start and end points and then click the search button to narrow the results.

While narrowing by time is hardly a new feature, the graphical interface is considerably more intuitive (and cooler) than simply plugging your dates in a text field. If nothing else, it’s a nice example of how much careful attention to interface design can improve a website.

In fact, the new Delicious seems to have something of fetish for charts and graphs. Charts also appear on each link’s “count” page, showing who has bookmarked it. For example, the Webmonkey homepage has been bookmarked over 5500 times, but the new chart (click the chart icon to see it) reveals a huge spike in June 2008 shortly after we relaunched the site.

Delicious’ new charts aren’t limited to the site either. There’s a new “Tagometer” widget that allows you to embed a chart on your own pages showing the number of saves over time and the most frequently-used tags. Right now you’ll need to cut-and-paste some JavaScript into your pages, but it probably won’t be long before someone creates a plug-in for WordPress and other platforms.

The final change Delicious has unveiled is an iPhone-optimized mobile site. The site is geared toward making it easier to bookmark pages on the iPhone, so you can read them later. While we prefer Instapaper for that sort of thing, the Delicious mobile site has other options — like quickly browsing recent bookmarks — which heavy users will appreciate.

See Also:

• Revamped Delicious Turns to Twitter for Real-Time Search
• Send Web Video to Boxee With Delicious Bookmarks
• Delicious Gets New Look, Loses Dots

Go to Source

My premise started when I read a UK Techcrunch story about a Google / Twitter mashup. This was in February and there was a major snow event blanketing the UK. But if you were to try to get a satellite image of the snowfall in real time, you couldn’t. That’s because the cloud cover prevents the satellite from seeing the ground. So this genius named Ben Marsh comes up with the mashup. In brief, the idea was to get the general UK Twitter population to report on the snowfall at their location in the UK. Respondents reported their postcode and then selected a number from 1-10 to rate the snowfall amount. Ben’s mashup then graphically displayed the results on a UK Google map. Then it hit me – this Twitter data is yielding superior search results for the amount of snowfall in the UK than any other source. So will this type of real-time data stream become a rival to Google in search?

Daniel Foster is the co-founder of 34SP.com – the website hosting service that kept Ben Marsh’s mashup online during peak bandwidth usage during the February snowstorm. I asked Mr. Foster if he thought that Twitter could overtake Google in search, based on his experience with the Ben Marsh mashup site. Mr. Foster replied, "While this use of Twitter was certainly unique at the time and created a superior data set for UK snowfall for that time period, it is still a long way from a true search product. Google clearly has a corporate mission that drives search-related activities. Twitter just asks "What are you doing?". I don’t see Twitter search overtaking Google unless the business directives change."

Here is what a few of the other Internet and search experts I contacted had to say in answer to the question: "Will Twitter Replace Google in Search?".

Rand Fishkin is a legend in search marketing. As the founder and CEO of SEOmoz.com, Mr. Fishkin was recently included in Newsweek’s list of Best Young Tech Entrepreneurs 2009. His involvement in search marketing began in high school, and he is now generally regarded as one of the world’s authorities in search. Mr. Fishkin commented, "No. Twitter is not a search engine and cannot answer the vast majority of queries sent to an engine like Google, Yahoo! or Live. Twitter searches a single stream of user created data in 140 character slices. While searching this database of information can be fascinating and even relevant (particularly for those who are interested in what Twitter users are saying about a particular topic or person), it is not even an attempt to replicate the functionality or application Google provides. Google answers an inherent need that has existed since the web’s inception: users must navigate to web sites and pages that contain desired information. Twitter cannot achieve this function and therefore cannot be a replacement for Google in search."

Michael Gray is President of Atlas Web Service, a full service website and Internet marketing company. Michael has worked in website development and marketing for over 10 years, and shares his thoughts regularly on Graywolf’s SEO Blog. Mr. Gray opined, "Twitter is never going to replace Google for searches there simply isn’t the breadth of information available there. For example say you need to know: "Who was the 3rd Vice President of the United States?". Unless you happen to have a history buff in your stream – very few people are going to know it’s Aaron Burr off the top of their heads. It’s simple and easier for you and everyone else to type the question into Google and have it spit back the answer. However, if I have a tech related search like: "How do I backup my Firefox profile?" chances are I’ll get a few answers from my users. One way that Twitter is better than Google is if I know my followers and trust them. I might not trust Yelp or CitySearch when they tell me what a good seafood restaurant in San Francisco, but if someone who follows me gives me a recomendation, if I know who they are, I’m much more likely to trust their response. The one caveat is the trusted relationship of the person giving the response. 20 people I don’t know telling me someplace is good is never going to outweigh the 1 person I really trust telling me it’s bad."

Danny Sullivan is often regarded as a true pioneer in search. His seminal 1995 work published as "A Webmaster’s Guide To Search Engines" laid the groundwork for his career as an often cited expert in search. Mr. Sullivan he has been quoted in all the major media outlets such as The Wall St. Journal, USA Today, The Los Angeles Times, Forbes, The New Yorker, Newsweek and ABC’s Nightline. Here are Mr. Sullivan’s comments, "No, Twitter won’t replace Google search because it simply doesn’t cover enough of the topics out there. It can be used for question answering, but that’s largely limited to the number and quality of your followers. I do think it’s an excellent additional search tool, however, http://searchengineland.com/how-we-search-with-twitter-16920 has much more on this."

Andy Beal is an online reputation management consultant, award-winning blogger, and professional speaker. Mr. Beal shares his expertise via his blog at www.andybeal.com, and he is also the founder and editor of Marketing Pilgrim, an award winning news publication that covers internet marketing news and trends. Mr. Beal added, "Twitter’s real time data certainly compliments Google’s search results, but I don’t see it ever replacing it. Twitter’s data stream should be looked at in the same way as Google News or Google Blog Search. There’s tremendous value in tapping into a fresh, up to the minute content, but people still rely on the structured, ranked data that Google’s web index provides."

Neil Patel’s email identifies him as a ‘professional web surfer’. I know him as an incredibly charismatic, smart and friendly Internet, social marketing and search expert. He has also been named a top 100 blogger by Technorati, and was also one of the top influencers on the web according to the Wall Street Journal. His current company is KISSmetrics, and Mr. Patel shares his insights in his blog – QuickSprout. Mr. Patel offered these thoughts on Twitter overtaking Google in search, "Twitter will not replace Google in search. You can use Twitter to find up to date information, but I doubt you will ever use Twitter to find products to buy or figure out how to fix a technical problem. Just the other day I had to search Google on how to program my router. I don’t think I will ever be able to do that on Twitter."

Todd Malicoat is a Marketing Consultant and on the SEO Faculty at MarketMotive.com. Mr. Malicoat is an Internet entrepreneur who has spent "near obsessive amounts of time on Webmasterworld.com, and Threadwatch.org. Here is Mr. Malicoat’s response, "I think Twitter definitely has an opportunity to swipe a bit of market share from Google on certain TYPES of terms. Anything very time sensitive, Twitter gives very good results for. I think Google will likely be a suitor, but they likely don’t want another youtube over-valuation debacle. Twitter has definitely raised some eyebrows, and what it does do is fill the need for ‘guided search’ that several companies including trexy.com, mahalo, and even yahoo answers (to an extent), and many others have been trying to do for years. Twitter has done this with a different model of getting the guides first with the critical mass of people, and the organization will come later. Most search results, however, don’t NEED a search guide or expert, so for now, Google is perfectly safe, but has the potential to lose out on some niche expert traffic to the new kid on the block."

By way of fairness, I did contact the PR department at Google requesting a comment for this piece. As of the writing of this article, they have not responded.

So there you have it. Practically no one thinks that Twitter will overtake Google in search. At best, in very time sensitive events – perhaps Twitter can be a good companion reference to Google. Of course things can change quickly – and if they do, I’m sure we can all check in with Twitter to learn about them. My thanks to all the experts who participated in this article.