Author Archive

Social Design Efficiency

Noah Brier: “I’ve been wondering for a while when it became socially acceptable to meet people from the online world in meat space. Way beyond the small likemind and coffee morning gatherings are 40 million Americans engaging in online dating. Ten years ago if I told someone I was going to meet an online friend […]

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Web as Platform

Tim O’Reilly is returning to the definition he started with: Web 2.0 is the Web as Platform. This is the definition that got me interested in Web 2.0 in the first place. It makes sense, easily contrasts with “desktop as platform”, and is accurate: we are seeing a tremendous platform move to the Web. Unfortunately, […]

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New York Times Goes Social

From the Seattle PI: “The New York Times unveiled a new service today that allows readers to quickly post stories that they find on the newspaper’s Web site to Digg, Facebook and Newsvine. It marks the first time that the country’s third-largest newspaper has added a news-sharing tool to its Web site, allowing readers to […]

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Yes Virginia, there is SPAM on Digg

When social design works, you get SPAM. When it works well, the community helps get rid of it. Cnet’s Elinor Mills, in a piece describing Digg rigging on a wide scale, writes: “dubious Internet marketers are planting stories, paying people to promote items, and otherwise trying to manipulate rankings on Digg and other so-called social-media […]

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XBox Wireless 360 Controller Winner

Bokardoan Lena Arvola has won the XBox 360 Wireless Controller contest. She was the lucky winner I chose at random last week to receive the prize. Lena runs On Task Technologies, a home based business that provides services in: graphic design, photography, photographic retouching and restoration, Website development and scanning. Congrats, Lena! I want to […]

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Why iTunes Needs an “Album-Only” Enema

How the “Album-Only” restriction on iTunes is getting out of hand and ruining the experience of true music fans…and what you can do about it. I’m a huge fan of U2. I’ve listened to them since I was a sophomore in high school, when I purchased the Achtung Baby album after hearing One and Mysterious […]

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Surowiecki’s In Praise of Third Place

Lots of folks have been linking to this, and it’s really good so I thought I would, too. James Surowiecki, author of The Wisdom of Crowds, has written a great piece: In Praise of Third Place, which details Nintendo’s innovation while being in third place in the gaming industry…a position they fell to after their […]

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Zeldman on Usability

Update: Changed some wording…some folks thought I was arguing with Zeldman. Actually, I was agreeing with him, and finding that his post echoed what I’ve found to be true. Jeffrey Zeldman on how he softened up to usability: “Like many design professionals, I rejected usability when I first encountered it. That’s mainly because I first […]

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Caterina of Flickr on Communication and Freedom

From a fascinating interview with Flickr’s Caterina Fake: “We wanted to build a web-based game that would take the social web to the next level. When we realized it was the communication that was so important we changed direction” Web apps are tools with which people communicate. Of course people do some task with them, […]

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Podcast on Social Design with Brian Oberkirch

I recently got the chance to virtually sit down and have a chat with Brian Oberkirch about social web design, including lessons we can draw from Digg, Delicious, MySpace and some of the other leading social apps. Brian asks some really good questions! Edgework – Joshua Porter 59MB MP3

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