Riding the Storm
Video walk through now available
You can check it out here:
http://www.musestorm.com/demo/overview
Enjoy!
Nice analysis of the latest social numbers
Over on Caroline McCarthy’s blog “The Social” ... a relatively new blog on social networking that is part of C|NET and looks to be a promising resource on social networking.
Here’s the key chart - courtesy of Neilsen:
Here’s Caroline’s analysis:
The April 2008 iteration of those numbers that Nielsen releases each month about social-networking site activity indicate that growth on News Corp.’s MySpace continues to slow, and that kiddie virtual world Club Penguin--acquired by Disney last year for $350 million--is just about static.
The Nielsen numbers, which track monthly unique visitors to social-networking sites, found that MySpace’s growth from April 2007 to April 2008 was just 3 percent, and that Club Penguin’s traffic shrank 7 percent. If Nielsen’s numbers are accurate (which is always debatable with online metrics), that’s not good for News Corp and Disney. In August, for example, the same methodology from Nielsen found that Club Penguin had grown 250 percent year-over-year and that MySpace was still growing at a healthy rate of 23 percent.
The numbers also reveal that business social network LinkedIn, which may or may not be aiming for a billion-dollar valuation, is still growing rapidly, pulling in 361 percent more unique users than it did a year ago. Facebook is growing more slowly, with 56 percent more visitors--and keep in mind that April 2007 was just a month before the company announced its developer platform and “exploded,” at least in terms of Valley chit-chat.
Music-focused social-media sites Imeem and Buzznet are also notable, pulling in 92 percent and 104 percent growth respectively. Over the past year, both well-funded sites have been pursuing ambitious development strategies: Imeem has been inking licensing deals with both music and video content providers, and Buzznet has been acquiring blogs like Stereogum and the formerly Gawker Media-owned Idolator.
Source
The Social a blog by Caroline McCarthy
MySpace moves to limit spammy applications … just like Facebook did
MySpace may once again start to take action against third party applications that disrupt the user experience (or their revenue streams), it seems. Back before MySpace Platform this was limited to the occasional widget provider that got out of line. But third parties now have a broad arsenal of features to attack users and get additional installations and clicks. Messaging users is among the most effective, and most annoying.
Cofounder Tom Anderson is making a rare blogging appearance on the MySpace Developer blog this evening - outlining changes to their developer guidelines regarding how third party applications can communicate with users.
This is a a problem that Facebook has had to deal with extensively, including early changes to their platform to limit what we called “black hat” activity by application developers. Facebook has continued to refine the rules over time, but has also shown that they are willing to break their own rules when revenue is at stake.
MySpace has added a new section the guidelines called “Application Communications.” Specifically, applications are now restricted:
- No incentives may be given to a member for sending a message, bulletin, comment, or any other form of communication. This includes “points,” “bucks,” increased standing, or even features within the app.
- It must be very clear to a member what they are sending, when they are sending communication. “Share with friends” is not sufficient messaging, the link must state “send comment,” “send bulletin,” and so on.
- The “no popups” rule we have had in place since day one applies to messaging windows. This means no more popping up a messaging window the first time someone tries to use an app. No popping up messaging windows without a user clicking on a very clearly marked link.
Source
TechCrunch
Distributed media … it’s the new black
According to brand marketers (blue) and agency leaders/publishers (white), the new black in interactive media is distributed media like widgets. Results come from a study fielded to attendees at the 2008 iMedia Brand Summit in Coconut Point, Fla.
Widgets are one of the fastest, easiest, and least expensive way to pick up your brand and distribute it across the web. More and more marketers are finding that if you build a dynamite website, people will not necessarily come and that instead, you must bring your content to where your customers spend time online, be it on sites like Facebook, Bebo, MySpace, YouTube, blogs, or other special interest sites.
Source
iMedia Connection
Excellent post on what openness means on the various social networks
Over on Marc Canter’s blog. As Marc explains, data portability is in the eye of the beholder, or in this case ... varies considerably depending on which social network you are talking about. You can read his excellent analysis here:
http://blog.broadbandmechanics.com/2008/05/the-religion-of-bringing-social-to-software
If the entry gives you a headache - as it does me - imagine how hard it is to develop widgets that tightly integrate into the social graph at each and every social network and you get some idea of the complexity we deal with daily here at MuseStorm. OpenSocial - is starting to force definition of social graph APIs - but the standard is still too new and too loose. Even as the standard get mature and tightens up experience tells us that each social network will continue to advance and enhance its functionality ... making integration an ongoing challenge.
Brand new website (and blog)
They’re have been some changes at MuseStorm of late ... and more changes are on there way for May. In preparation for this, we’ve updated our corporate website and the blog with a new look and feel and site architecture. Watch this space for more details on new product announcements which will be forthcoming later this month.