Sharing Breaking News with Twitter
Greetings Readers!
Like many of you, I heard about the Chino Hills, CA earthquake via my Twitter friends. After watching all the reports from my twitter friends scroll across my window, I realized the value of Twitter in emergency situations.
Never before have we had such a medium to share breaking news as it happens with thousands of people at once. The ability to get news out instantly has always been in the hands of television and radio. With services like Twitter, you can now get information out quickly and you can get the viewpoints from countless people. This is a great way gather reports from thousands of first party reports about any incident, whether its an earthquake, tornado, hurricane or any other kind of disaster. With reports of cell phone outages in the L.A. area from the earthquake, it is now clear how much value Twitter has as a means of telling your family and friends that you are ok.
While Twitter seems to get a real workout during major events like the Super Bowl or MacWorld, I have never seen my feed move as fast as it did today with the earthquake. Considering it was down earlier in the day, im very impressed that Twitter didn't go down under the pressure. Assuming Twitter remains stable, I think it will continue to have an increased impact in breaking news situations. From letting people know what is going on, to saying you are ok, to organizing disaster efforts, Twitter will continue to carve out a place as a tool for spreading disaster information.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Cuil Is Not So Cool
Greetings readers!
In case you spent the day away from you feed reader or failed to listen to any news, a new "Google Killer" search engine has sprung up. Cuil is a new search engine created by former Google employees which has an index of 120 Billion pages in an attempt to provide better quality search results than Google. It is this task that Cuil fails miserably.
While I have heard of a few search success stories with this new site, they seem to be in the minority. Not only is it harder to find what you are looking for, far fewer results are returned compared to google as demonstrated by TechCrunch. This is expected to be a Google killer?! Give me a break! Cuil claims it crawls 120 Billion separate pages, which while it sounds impressive, is nothing compared to Google's 1 Trillion.
When I tried the service, I noticed two major issues. First, the layout is far more appealing to the eye than Google. This is the only thing that has impressed me so far with this new service. The second was the inaccuracy of search results. I decided to do a bit of vanity searching and had somebody else come up with my name. When I used my personal brand, pcnerd37, I received results that were me, but many were small quotes from chatrooms that are not relevant to searching myself in general. I decided to goole my various websites and blogs, and recieve no results relating to my various projects. Everything was from other websites that had nothing to do with what I do.
Who is really going to SEO their website again to improve their results in a service that has next to no maketshare. I dont know about you, but I dont think it is worth it. Cuil is going to have to do a much better job before it can be taken seriously in the search space.
I dont see this company being around very long for three reasons. First, Cuil is an absolutely horrible name. The average joe is not going to remember how to spell something that sounds like one word but is spelled completely differently than anybody has ever seen before. Unlike Google, Cuil does not have that ring to it that you can tell you friend to go "Cuil it!" Second, they seem to have no monitization strategy. Even if they decided to run ads similar to google, there is a huge problem, privacy. While that doesn't sound like a bad problem from a user point of view, it is killer for the company. If you dont know what im talking about, Cuil has announced they they do not keep record of the search results you make, unlike Google. While this sounds great for the user, this makes serving relevant ads extremely difficult. If they are unable to serve relevant ads because they don't have an idea of what their users search for or how, they will die, even if they do have $33 million in venture capital. Last, Cuil will likely be purchased by a search giant such as Microsoft. The creators previously sold their search idea to Google and while they say this is not for sale, I am a firm believer in Ferengi Rule of Acquisition #59: Every man has his price. With Microsoft looking for any way to gain ground against Google, this would make for a natural acquisition for them. If Microsoft can't get Yahoo's search business, it might be a good idea to buy a small company such as Cuil before they get really expensive. No matter what the reason, I don't see Cuil having a long existance.
If you are looking to find good search results, stick to Google. If you want to be frustrated with finding something, give Cuil a shot. Personally, I will be sticking to a combination of Google and Mahalo for when I want to find what im looking for.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Has Twitter Replaced Instant Messaging?
Greetings Readers!
Over the weekend, I had the realization that I almost never use instant messengers anymore. A year or more ago, I would have had at least three instant messaging conversations going at all times on top of everything else I was doing and all of the chatrooms I would be hanging out in. Now, I almost never use instant messenger. I am lucky if I have a single instant messenger conversation in an entire day. When I sat back and thought about what was to blame for my reduced IM usage, I found that the biggest reason was probably Twitter. While I will admit that my social circle has shrunk a bit since I left college, I attribute the majority of my internet based conversations to Twitter.
Twitter is far more efficient at spreading information than instant messenger. Before you start yelling at me, I said it is more efficient, not more stable! While IM is realtime, if you have to pass along information to a group of people, it is far easier to do on Twitter where you only have to say something once rather than repeat the information to every person who needs to be kept informed. It is also much easier to rick roll a large group of people at the same time! Of course, if I need information to be relayed in real time, I will still use IM as I hate the phone.
While IM still has its place, I think Twitter is far easier to manage than multiple conversations, especially when you use applications like TweetDeck. Being able to manage you communications is the key to getting things done. While IM may be better to use for topics that need lots of discussion, Twitter is probably the ideal way outside of a chatroom or message board to pass around small bits of information to a large number of people. Twitter will never replace IM, but it is a great supplement that will continue to become a larger communication medium for the foreseeable future, no matter how unstable the service is.
Has your IM usage been affected by services like Twitter and FriendFeed? If so, how? I would love to hear some feedback on this topic.
TweetDeck, the Best Twitter Client Yet!
Greetings Readers!
For those of you who dont follow me on Twitter (www.twitter.com/pcnerd37) last night I was introduced to a new Twitter client called TweetDeck (Thanks TheWebPixie!). Not being a huge fan of desktop Twitter applications, I was a bit skeptical. While I do use Twirl every once in a while, generally speaking I have always prefered the web interface combined with an auto-refresh plugin for firefox. Starting today, that has all changed.
TweetDeck
TweetDeck is a database driven Twitter client built on the Adobe Air platform. It is built to allow you to better manage your experience. You can now create topic or group specific columns to more easily follow all the great things happening on Twitter. You start out with a column for all your tweets, one for all your replies and another for all the direct messages you have recieved in the past 48 hours, but you can add many more columns! With the program being built on a local database, it also allows for better offline capabilities. The database is also searchable! You can search for words or phrases that have shown up in you twitter stream in the past 48 hours instantly! Not only does it search locally, but you can set it to search Summize as well! Before there is any confusion, the default is 48 hours which is the maximum, but you can certainly go to far less than that if you choose. When you create new groups or columns, it is populated with what is already in the database rather than having to wait for it to fill up with new tweets. While the database aspect of this alone is enough to make it the next killer Twitter application, there is much more that makes this program a must for any hardcore Twitter user.
The support for easy and quick replies and direct messages is there like every good Twitter client should have, but where it really stands out in basic functionality is a button for retweeting. Now, you can retweet with a single button! Gone are the days of using copy and paste to retweet one of the people you follow. TweetDeck also has a built in URL shortener which uses any of five different URL shortening services. It also has several resizing buttons to further customize your display. The ability to move columns around is nice as well. It also detects the number of allowed API updates and sets itself to refresh at the allowed rate, which is also nice.
That said, there are a couple of things that aren't so great about this application. To start the list, the self adjusting refresh rate that I just mentioned is just as much a flaw as it is a great feature. Since you are unable to adjust the refresh rate yourself, if you wanted to run the application or multiple twitter applications on different computers or at different locations, you will find it very difficult as TweetDeck is already using your max number of API requests. Next, by clicking the replies and direct messages buttons more than once, you will end up with multiple columns filled with the same thing, which is just plain useless. Also, rather than columns being created when you need them, they remain there at all times but in a blank state until used. It doesn't make sense being able to scroll to a bunch of blank columns. Those are some of my primary gripes with the software, but there are a number of features that other Twitter applications have that TweetDeck lacks.
Although I hear it is in the works, there are no pop-up notifications at this time. According to their voting feedback system, this is by far the most requested feature. You are also unable to minimize it to they system tray. This is a feature I greatly value as I value my taskbar space which usually has at least a half dozen things open on it at all times. At this time, there is no support for Twitpic, but I hear that is in the works as well. I would also like to see drag and drop functionality for adding to groups, an idea the creator seems to really like as well. Showing new messages as soon as they are sent is missing but has been added to the list of things to implement. There is also no way to favorite tweets at this time, but again it is in the works.
While this is without a doubt the most useful Twitter application I have come across so far, it does have some drawbacks and a number of missing features although that is to be expected in a version numberd 0.152b (beta). Once some of the more requested and common functionality such as notifications gets implimented, this will, without a doubt, be the best Twitter application out there. The grouping and database idea behind the project would do wonders for services such as FriendFeed. If you want to keep up with the latest TweetDeck developments, check out their blog.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
E3, Another Year of Disappointment
Greetings readers!
In case you have been on vacation or just hiding under a rock, this week was the Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3 convention in LA. The convention is where a majority of the major gaming announcements for the year are unveiled. While there were some interesting announcements this year, the event ended up being another big disappointment.
For those that missed the press conferences, here is a quick rundown. Microsoft showed off Fallout 2, Gears of War 2, a new Xbox Dashboard, and had two major announcements. Microsoft has partnered with Netflix to bring streaming movies to the 360 by way of your Netflix subscription, and they announced that Final Fantasy XIII will be coming to the 360. Next, Nintendo did their announcements which included a Shawn White snowboarding game using the Wii balance board, the Wii Motion Plus attachment, Wii Sports Resort and Wii Music. Last was Sony. Sony didnt have much in the way of interesting game announcements other than one of my personal favorites, a new God of War game. They showed off two new Resistance games but nothing that spectacular that hasnt been shown before. They also showed off Little Big Planet and Playstation Home. Sony's bombshell announcements (outside of God of War 3) were the unveiling of a new video store on the Playstation 3 and a new PS3 with a $100 price cut.
Lets start with Microsoft. I will admit that Fallout 3 looks awesome, especially with the Fat Man gun and the ability to target individual body parts and shoot people with teddy bears. Gears of War 2 and Final Fantasy 13 looked impressive but not in an 'I need to change my pants' kind of way. The real announcement here was the changes to the Xbox and Xbox Live itself. The new Dashboard interface looks very simple and clean compared to the current version. This is nice but im not sure its something that really matters. With this, they also introduced Avatars. Avatars are the Mii's better looking cousin. I can't give Microsoft credit for originallity here, but at least they are better looking and more human like than Nintendo's Mii characters. I will admit the whole Party concept is great, especially with the ability to watch your friends Netflix movies. Speaking of Netflix, that announcement didn't suprise me in the least. Such a deal has been known to be in the works for many months and while I am glad there is finally an announcement, it didn't have any unknown suprises with it.
Nintendo on the other hand, was a complete snooze. Much like Microsoft, there was a bunch of boring sales data that, while interesting interesting in the past, has lost much of its meaning with monthly NPD data being released to the public. Being a Shawn White fan, I will admit it was cool to see him. Being a fan of snowboarding games since 1080 for the N64, I think this looks interesting although I'm not sure it will make me want to buy the Wii Balance Board. Wii Sports Resort looked interesting when coupled with the Wii Motion Plus, but seemed to lack the really fun games that were apart of the original Wii Sports. Wii Music on the other hand just looked terrible. Not only is it ugly and look strange, there seems to be no skill involved in the game and seems to be about as involved as playing the air guitar. I dont see this game selling very well at all. The most disappointing part of the whole Nintendo event was that they said that the Mario and Zelda teams were working on something, but said nothing more.
Finally, we come to Sony. This was probably the best event out of all of them. While they didnt have any shocker announcements like Microsoft announing Final Fantasy XIII, it was a solid confernece. Unlike the boring data that Nintendo and Microsoft had, Sony talked about their stats and Greatest Hits games using Little Big Planet, an idea that was absolutely brilliant! The movie store was a great announcement as they went directly to the movie studios rather than through Netflix in a move that I see as a huge Screw You! to Microsoft and Netflix. The pricing feels about right for the movies and even feels like a bargain when you find out you are now able to put a copy of the movie on your PSP to take with you anywhere while still having a copy on your PS3. A God of War 3 Trailer was shown off, which made me scream with joy. No ship date though. Finally, their major hardware announcement was a new, 80GB PS3 with the same features as the 40GB PS3 for the same price as the 40GB PS3. Essentailly the 80GB PS3 will now be available again outside of the Metal Gear Solid 4 bundle and for $100 less. What is still unclear to me is that if it has the same features as the 40GB, I assume that means that there is no PS2 backward compatibility that has previously existed in the 80GB PS3 units. While I would like some clarification on this, this is still a big announcement and the only major hardware announcement of the event (Microsoft made their announcemnt a day early, so im not counting that).
While there were some decent announcements and solid game demos, compared to years past, there seemed to be a major lack of excitement with the conference. There were very few major game announcements, and the major Halo announcement that everybody was expecting was pulled at the last minute. Hopefully there will be some better game announcements at other shows or this could turn out to be a very disappointing holiday season for gamers.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
Demanding a Higher Standard of Service from Twitter
Greetings Readers!
At the risk of being flamed, I decided its time to do another Twitter post. No, this is not another part of my Twitter Etiquette posts. This post is about why we put up with the horrible service on Twitter and how we need to demand a higher level of service from the popular micro-blogging service.
I have been using Twitter for many months now and there is one constant that I have noticed with the service, instability. I would say that probably 50% of the time that I try to reach Twitter, I get the dreaded whale or no page at all! This is very frustrating when I need a way to share important information or get information that others are trying to share with me. If that wasn't bad enough, many times I cant see my replies or old tweets because pagination has been disabled. What is really surprising is that with all of the "fixes" and "improvements" that they make, there seems to be less reliable functionality now than there has ever been. What is really sad is that people continue to rely on the service and use it like its the best thing to hit the internet since YouTube. Whether its using Twitter to promote a blog, podcast or to get sprung from jail in Egypt, people continue to rely on the service like its a necessary part of life.
While I will admit I like Twitter and the concept behind it when it works, I think becoming reliant on such an unstable service can be disasterous. Whether you are stuck in an Egyptian jail or using Twitter as a way to communicate with your customers, it should not be relied upon as a primary means of communication. Relying upon an unstable service can cost you a huge amount of time, money and frustration for both you and others. What if other communication services such as telephones, email, or instant messenger had the track record that Twitter has? Would we be where we are today if the phones only worked 50% of the time? If Twitter is going to be the next big thing that it is heralded to be, the users must hold it to a higher standard of service than it currently has.
We wouldn't tolerate downtime like this from other products and services, why should we put up with it from Twitter? We couldn't function if our operating systems were this unstable (no blue screen of death jokes please) or our web browser or our email. Before Twitter and services like it can ever mature and be built upon as the next great platform, users must hold it to a greater standard of service. Stability and reliability are the keys to any communication mediums. If these cannot be achieved, the service must die so it can be replaced by one that can achieve those qualities.
If Twitter cant gets its act together, it should be abandoned.
-Jeremy "pcnerd37" Bray
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