On of my favorite Seinfeld episodes is the one in which George’s two worlds collide. It’s the one where “Relationship George” and “Independent George” battle it out for supremacy, with the ultimate battle coming at a movie theater, where George’s fiancé Susan, Jerry, and Elaine have gone to a movie without him. George arrives late, and stands up in front of the wrong movie yelling angrily, until someone tells him that the same movie is playing on a different screen and maybe he should try there. He’s thrown out of the theater, dragged away by security.

The main conflict of the episode is that George knows what will happen when his two worlds collide: “Relationship George will kill Independent George”. Obviously, however, this difference is only in George’s mind, where there is a clear separation between his love life and his life among friends. It appeals to us because we somehow feel awkward when in the same situation: I certainly remember when I introduced my wife to my family and friends…I was pretty anxious. (thankfully, it turned out great)

The Seinfeld episode is analogous to the current non-struggle we’re having between our “digital life” and our “real life”. Our “digital life” is made up of blogs, email, subscription feeds, and aggregators. Our “real life” is, apparently, everything else.

Continue Reading: The Non-collision of Relationship and Independent George

This is a follow-up to my post 7 Reasons Why Web Apps Fail. As will the first list, this list is by no means a complete account of every reason why a web app might fail. There are countless reasons, I’m sure, and most are part of a failing strategy and don’t do the damage all by themselves. I have focused on reasons, however, based on the current situation we find ourselves in, one with extremely low barriers to creation alongside an explosion of social web applications. This combination is interesting and we’re seeing the evolution of social software in near real-time.

1. They’re never built.
   I’ve had the same conversation with many folks: good idea for web application, but not enough motivation to build it. In fact, I fall into this category. I have several prototypes sitting on my hard drive of little applications that could be something someday, and I’ve run out of steam developing them. I get distracted, start doing something else. However, this is probably a confidence issue as much as a time issue. We’re simply not sure if what we build would be successful and investing the time it takes to push it to completion is daunting. An interesting story cropped up recently about this: Michael Arrington of Techcrunch wrote about how Squidoo.com seems to be failing, suggesting that it cast a dark shadow over Seth Godin’s reputation as a marketer, and that it wouldn’t be long before Seth distances himself from it. In other words, Mike was equating Seth’s reputation with the product he built. This is precisely why it is scary to build something in the public eye. People can ridicule it, and often do. But even if Squidoo doesn’t succeed (which is uncertain) I doubt that Seth will see it as anything other than a learning experience. Now if only the rest of us could.
2. They’re modeling an offline activity incompletely.
   This happens a lot in banking web apps. I recently switched from my bank to one with better online features. It wasn’t that my former bank couldn’t handle the transactions, but they could only do so if I actually went to the bank and talked with a teller. This is completely frustrating. An incompatibility between an online app and an offline store doesn’t make sense. How many times have you tried to redeem a coupon or gift certificate only to find that you have to go to the store? Well, we’re so used to the online world now that the web app is the store, in both a physical and non-physical sense.

Continue Reading: 7 More Reasons Why Web Apps Fail

Dick Hardt:

“A goal of Identity 2.0 is to mimic aspects of identity transactions that work well in the physical world.”

First, the podcast: Microsoft, Google, and the DOJ Privacy Case (7.21 MB mp3 )

During a meeting today at the Microsoft Search Champs Conference in Redmond, WA, Yusuf Mehdi, Senior VP of MSN Information Services, discussed the recent blowup involving the U.S. Government’s subpoena of personal information from major Search Engines including MSN, Yahoo, Google, and AOL. This was not the first time that the U.S. Government has requested information from corporations in this manner. It was, however, one of the most talked about, spurred on by a press release from Google, who announced that they had turned down the request. Soon after, it was revealed that both Yahoo and MSN has complied with it, casting an instant shadow over those companies. In response, Ken Moss, general manager of MSN web search, provided a few relevant details of the case on the MSN Search Blog.

Continue Reading: Microsoft Didn’t Give User Data to DOJ in Privacy Case (podcast)

Here’s part 1 of a list of trends I saw gaining momentum in 2005 that I see growing even more important in 2006. Part 2: Synchronization and Local Store

This started out as a list of technological trends, with RSS, Ajax, and Ruby on Rails being the headlines, as all three had huge years in terms of implementation and being squacked about. But these things, while interesting, aren’t really trends in the way that people are using the Web. Instead, they’re trends in building. Nothing illustrates the disparity between technology and usage more than the what Yahoo had to say in their October whitepaper: RSS-Crossing into the Mainstream. They claim that while over 1/4 of all Web users consume RSS in one way or another, only 4% know it.

So, in the spirit of usage I offer the following trends, focused on the way that those in the curve use the Web. Those ahead of the curve are probably on to whatever will get mainstream next year…

Continue Reading: Trends to Watch in 2006

Alex Barnett and I were fortunate enough to get two of the foremost Identity thinkers on board at the same time for a podcast recently.

Dick Hardt is Founder and CEO of Sxip Identity, and is well-known for his Identity 2.0 talk he gave at the OSCon and Web 2.0 Conferences.
Kim Cameron is the Chief Identity [...]

Continue Reading: Identity/Attention Podcast