You will, no doubt, be plagued this holiday season by real-time conversations from real-time annoyances who claim to be members of your family. You will, therefore, be tempted to indulge in some excessive real-time drinking that might, just might, affect your sense of, well, the real time, the real place, even the real country you are inhabiting.
However, you will, I hope, be delighted that some very enterprising people have considered your plight and decided to offer you the latest hangover cures in real time. All you need to do is to have your smartest phone about your person at all real times and refer to the updates at Twitter.com/hangover_cure.
There, you will find contributions from, no doubt, hardened drinkers, hardened family therapists or, who knows, maybe hardened altruistic specimens who would like you to hurt less, party more, and not let your children see you looking like the inside of a bull's nostril after a stampede.
The Twitter page, sponsored by video-on-demand provider Blinkbox Entertainment, (yes, it's releasing "The Hangover," get it?), will offer you such gems as: "Try whipping up a Carrot Comfort (200g carrots, 1 apple, 1cm fresh root ginger & ice) & let us know."
All right, some of the suggestions might walk the thin line between holistic and horrific. But who could really fault the dedication and spirit of Christmas engendered by a suggestion such as: "Try the Honey Bun: Half a ripe banana, 1 teaspoon clear honey, 2 teaspoons natural yogurt & water; then tweet us the results!"
I feel confident that the Hangover Cure Twitter page will be a repository for scientific discovery that has not been seen since, oh, the Facebook Beacon program.
On Tuesday Digg announced big changes to its API that should make third-party developers happy--and maybe even rich.
The most major one being that the company has let up on its use for commercial applications, meaning that developers will be able to create services that take advantage of Digg's content and community without first having to ask for permission from the company. This includes pulling in content from the service and either charging to do so, or including on-page advertisements--two things which kept application developers from making a profit, or even charging for their creations.
The old and new grant of license for the Digg API. (Click to enlarge.)
The updated application programming interface also includes:
- • Access to the site's search engine which was overhauled back in early April. This lets developers add search to their own apps, and use all of the specific modifiers and domain filters that are found on Digg proper.
• Access to stories people have marked as favorites, as well as the related stories and keywords on any item they may be viewing. This is something that Digg rolled out late last year on its story pages and has kept more users clicking on other stories within Digg
Digg VP of engineering John Quinn says that following this release, the Digg API will finally be updated to allow third-party applications to "participate" on items on the site. This includes digging and burying stories, along with commenting, "favoriting," and marking stories as inaccurate or lame. Until then, even with these updates, all third-party applications are simply viewing activity from users who are accessing the site from Digg or Digg mobile.
The hottest hotspots in New York...for nerds.
(Credit: Sam Lessin)Just how powerful can the data behind a location-based application be? Extremely.
Earlier this month, the second annual Internet Week New York took place, and Dropio founder and certifiable data nerd Sam Lessin crunched a bunch of numbers based on what his contacts on urban navigation and friend-finding service Foursquare were doing. Lessin was working with a group of fewer than 100 contacts, almost all of whom are involved in the tech and new-media industries (this is the scene that birthed Foursquare and its predecessor Dodgeball, after all), and yet it's a fascinating peek at just how much this kind of data can reveal. He's posted it on his personal file "drop" on Dropio.
Lessin trawled through the data to find what time people checked into coffee shops in the morning (and whether they were doing this earlier or later on a given day), how much people "lost steam" over the course of a party- and conference-filled week, and how much the most popular gatherings actually matched up to the Internet Week New York official schedule. As it turns out, the hottest parties were impromptu, unofficial gatherings at the Standard Hotel and, um, Sing Sing Karaoke.
Obviously, this isn't perfect. Foursquare updates are voluntary, which means that data can't say a thing about what people are doing when they aren't telling the app about it. The presence of an app like Foursquare, too, can also skew social activity: word about the massive impromptu party at the Standard Hotel bar, for example, spread when the Foursquare check-ins started snowballing.
But when you have enough people participating--which, as of yet, Foursquare does not--the critical mass starts to correct some of those issues. It's a fascinating sneak peek at what sort of value this data could have down the road.
What we can also look forward to: pretty infographics, Orwellian privacy concerns. Eek.
Facebook plans to announce at a developer event Monday that it will open up user-contributed information to third-party developers, according to a report Sunday in The Wall Street Journal.
The move would allow developers to build applications and services that--with users' permission--access user videos, photos, notes, and comments. The move would be a significant change for the social-networking site, which had previously retained tight control over the site and how developers interact with it.
To allow developers to take advantage of the free feature, Facebook users would have to give the companies access to their data, and users' privacy settings would extend to new services built, according to the report.
Allowing developers to track shared data would be another salvo in its assault on micro-blogging site Twitter, which allows third-party developers to build applications and services on top of its service.
The move seems a continuation of APIs (application programming interfaces) Facebook launched in February that let developers access content and methods for sharing in Facebook apps including Status, Notes, Links, and Video.
Of course, all this hinges on persuading Facebook's 200 million users to share their personal data, a topic that ruffled some feathers in February. Facebook users threatened to revolt after the company announced changes to its terms of service that had meant that its license on user content--a longstanding but little-publicized claim to an "irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license" for promotional efforts--would no longer expire if a member deleted his or her Facebook account.
But facing a rebellion from thousands of users and a possible federal complaint from the Electronic Privacy Information Center, the social-networking service returned to its previous terms.
If you're looking for something "good" to do Thursday night, you're in luck. Volunteer-organized Twestivals are planned in more than 200 cities around the world.
The Twestivals are a loose coalition of fundraisers that aim to use the social-media tool du jour--Twitter--to raise money for Charity Water, a nonprofit devoted to bringing clean drinking water to developing countries.
It's not officially organized by Twitter, but enthusiasts are hoping that the series of Twestivals can be an example for future fundraisers and how the likes of Twitter can fuel volunteer and donor efforts. Word has spread largely through Twitter buzz. And given the current economic situation, many nonprofits are going to need to follow the example of the small-donor-driven Obama campaign in lieu of depending on a few deep pockets.
I should disclose that I've been doing some volunteer work with the New York edition of Twestival, helping write some copy for promotional materials. New York is Charity Water's home city, and the organizers are expecting more than a thousand people at a big nightclub blowout in the West Chelsea neighborhood. Other Twestivals will be smaller and more intimate gatherings, more like the "meetups" (or "tweetups," if you will) that local Twitter communities have been organizing for months now.
All in all, Twestivals around the world hope to raise a whopping $1 million on the night of the event and as a result of subsequent press throughout the rest of February.
Web party invitation and management service MyPunchbowl on Tuesday relaunched with a new look. While mostly a new paint job, the big, new feature is the invitation designer, which has been renamed as a "studio."
Where the service's former system had users simply picking colors, pictures, and some ready-made templates, the results of using the new tool resembles a real life paper invitation. Users can still select things like the coloring and background, but there are new flourishes like colored ribbons, textured backgrounds, and various form factors that mimic proper card stock.
The new designer lets you tweak each aspect of an invitation, right down to the ribbon.
(Credit: CNET Networks)All of this amounts to little besides the invitation page people visit. It doesn't show up (much) in the e-mail, and you can't have it printed and sent out, which would make the whole experience feel a little more fulfilling. Your newly designed invitation will simply sit alongside the party details. The company is pushing the "green" aspect of this, but it's a shame you can't get your handiwork turned into a real-world good. Like Moo.com's mini cards, there's something fantastic about quirky designs for everyday things that could make MyPunchbowl stand out from competitors like Evite, Facebook, and Socializr.
Speaking of which, I think the service is still running up against bad public perception. Many people I know simply go to Evite because it's what they've always used. Also, when MyPunchbowl first launched, one of its stumbles was the e-mail invites, which were promptly being delivered to people's spam folders. Since then, it looks like the problem has been fixed, as I tried sending out an invitation to Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Hotmail, and my work e-mail. All went through without a hitch.
The other big hurdle, which I've pressed on in the past, is the big competition from Evite and social networks like MySpace and Facebook which have integrated events management services. For many, including myself, this is just an easier option--even if it's not a better one. To its credit, MyPunchbowl has done a great job at letting people suck in contacts from elsewhere, then turn around and advertise it at those places from the very same tool. Going forward, it's simply going to be a question of whether or not people will be willing to go through all that just to have a better functioning invitation.
Here's a video of MyPunchbowl founder and CEO Matt Douglas talking about the new design tool. It's worth noting you can't use it unless you're a registered user.
Google video site YouTube is planning to host on November 22 a San Francisco gathering its active users called YouTube Live--"part concert, part variety show, and part party."
The event is scheduled to take place in front of an audience at the Herbst Pavilion in Fort Mason Center and streamed live on the Web, as well as in the air, on the planes of sponsor Virgin America.
This is notable because YouTube doesn't offer live-streaming technology.
YouTube co-founder Steve Chen announced earlier this year that live video would be coming to YouTube later in 2008, but several months later, there were scattered rumors that those plans had been scrapped.
An event like YouTube Live would indicate that live streaming is indeed still on track--though the company has not yet said anything about further live-video plans or whether the streaming will be handled through a partnership with one of the many start-ups that specialize in it.
Performers at the San Francisco event will include Web-birthed "celebrities" such as rapper Soulja Boy Tell'em, Tay "Chocolate Rain" Zonday, LisaNova, and William Sledd, as well as a few mainstream acts, such as Akon and Will.i.am, the Black Eyed Peas frontman whose Barack Obama-supporting "Yes We Can" music video was a wild success on YouTube. Will.i.am will also be unveiling a new "awareness" video created from user-generated contributions.
The ill-fated invitation.
(Credit: Facebook)Mark Zuckerberg, what hath thou wrought? A Facebook invitation for a massive beach party in Britain looked to ensure an event so wild and widespread that the local police felt the need to impose a 24-hour ban on liquor consumption.
When more than 7,000 people RSVP'd to an invitation for a "Night of Mayhem" in the British coastal region of Torbay, set to take place this Friday night, the local press started jumping on the story.
Finally, the local cops started to get concerned. According to the blog PSFK, a 2003 law enabled the police to impose a 24-hour ban on liquor in Torbay, meaning that the party hosts would've had to obtain a permit.
Organizers promptly canceled the event.
People attending beaches in Torbay on the weekend will be asked to leave or be arrested," the original invitation read. "Do not travel to Torbay. There will still be a high police presence around the coast. No event whatsoever will be taking place in Torbay, and we urge you to inform all others you know that are planning to attend that it is no longer going ahead."
Many invitations on Facebook are completely open to the public, resulting in the possibility that an event will get completely out of hand when large numbers of people show up.
This spring, a large amount of press ensued when a British teenager reportedly created Facebook and Bebo invitations to her parents' vacation house in Spain; hundreds of people showed up and subsequently trashed the place.
A helpful search for my favorite hard-to-find brew.
(Credit: BeerMenus)BeerMenus.com, I've been dreaming about you at night. And now you've jumped into my world. We're a match made in heaven.
Here's how it works. Much like a boozier version of Menupages, BeerMenus aggregates bars' beer lineups so that you can search for a particular establishment or for a particular beer to find out where it's on tap (or bottled) and for how much. For those of us who prefer their beer to be a bit more esoteric than Bud Lite or even Stella Artois, this is a godsend. I searched for my favorite variety, Allagash White (a delightful Belgian-style white ale brewed in Portland, Maine), and BeerMenus gave me a list of ten establishments where I could find it along with a Google Maps mashup.
For even more hops-and-barley fun, BeerMenus indexes special events at bars as well. That's something that Going, Upcoming, Yelp, and their socially prolific brethren already handle, but it's still a nice feature.
The nifty little site, which just launched Thursday, currently only extends to New York's prolific bar scene, and within that, it still only has about 150 Manhattan bars' menus available. And unfortunately, at the moment I'm across the country in San Francisco so I can't actually do a field test. I'm guessing it's generally accurate, but beer menus do tend to shift around more frequently than food menus do--that's an area where social-networking features like comments and reviews could help.
But really. Think about what could happen if this expanded: frequent travelers could learn where to find their favorite brews in unfamiliar cities, or learn where they can try out a nice pint of a regional favorite. The site also has plenty of room for recommendations, discovery features, and reviews--like a Snooth for beer.
You'd never have to drink a crappy beer again.
It might be a bubble if...Perry Farrell is your DJ.
(Credit: Michelle Thatcher/CNET Networks)The night club was filling up, free drinks were flowing, and Perry Farrell stood behind the DJ table. There was something distinctively bubbly at the TechCrunch/PopSugar "Geek Goes Chic" Meetup in Los Angeles last Thursday, and it wasn't just the personalities of the PopSugar readers.
The party's organizers are only the latest members of the Web scene to bring a little bubble love to Southern California. Social media blogs Mashable and Bub.blicio.us have both hosted LA events in the last month. The move makes sense: Aside from being at the center of the entertainment industry, Los Angeles is one of the fastest growing regions for venture capital [PDF link], and late last year the Los Angeles Times reported that the region had bypassed New England to rank second in the U.S. for tech investment. Plus, the tech community here has been gaining steady momentum since 2006; Tuesday marks the second anniversary of the LA Geek Dinner gatherings.
Still, the impression of froth at the TechCruch/PopSugar meetup was only reinforced by the fact that the most-reported story from the party seemed to be the rumored ejection of representatives of both Mashable and tech-gossip blog Valleywag--complete with debate as to whether the incident was in fact staged to generate buzz. ("If a blogger gets thrown out of a party, but no one cares, does the Internet make a sound?" asks one commenter on the Los Angeles Times story.)
Surely the event's many sponsors can't be happy with the distraction. But it was disappointing that so few exhibitors had anything new to talk about that night. In fact, most of the sponsoring companies were familiar from such past events as Twiistup and Lunch 2.0. The key attention-grabbers seemed to be recently out-of-beta Engage, which helps you connect with potential dates within your existing social network, and last-minute-add ArtistForce, whose reps smartly hung a huge banner to help raise visibility in an otherwise tough corner spot.
Don't get me wrong: I like free beer as much as any other self-respecting journalist. And there's something amusing about throwing a party that's explicitly, if stereotypically, designed to encourage geeky guys and fashionable women to hook up. But the geek/chic idea had its bumps--and grinds, as I discovered. While chatting with friends next to the stage, I was aggressively shoved out of the way by the insistent backside of a dancing attendee. From my vantage point I couldn't tell if it was chic or geek, but either way sometimes the concept is better than the reality.
