louisgray.com

The crowded world of online RSS feed readers is one that's been dominated by names like Google Reader, Bloglines and Netvibes. But underneath that layer you have a few interesting innovative players, including FeedEachOther, and Shyftr. Shyftr came to prominence this spring, drawing attention for a shared comment stream on linked items, and has been quiet for the last few months as they worked on enhancing their platform. Today, they woke up in a big way, revamping the service, while adding an API, activity streams and widgets for bloggers.

Shyftr's main draws continue to be the same. You can add friends on the service, and see which RSS feeds they are following, or have "Shyfted". You can see who else is reading feeds that you have added, which you can do manually, or by OPML. And despite your reading your feeds in your own space, you can make comments and see them shared with the broader Shyftr community, much like other aggregation tools, including FriendFeed and Strands do. But unlike those services, Shyftr deduplicates, providing a single instance for each unique URL.

In addition to the social aspects of Shyftr, the service offers what they call a Pocket blog, the equivalent of a Google shared links blog, letting you see what friends have found interesting, as they "pocket" new items they discover.



Today's announcements set the foundation for Shyftr and for outside developers to further enhance the service. The API can tap into just about every aspect of the service, except for actually reading feeds, Shyftr reported in a blog post this morning. Among the first introductions is a new activity stream, which shows your activity, or that of your friends, as they "Shyft" new feeds, "Pocket" new items, or make comments.



Like FriendFeed and other social tools, you can filter whether you want to see "Everyone's activity", "Friends activity" or just your own activity. You can also view a single individual's stream if you like.

The last addition are embeddable widgets. Every Web service under the sun has a corresponding widget these days, and Shyftr is no different. You can make widgets for your activity stream, for a specific feed, or to show all activity on Shyftr itself.

As Shyftr founder Dave Stanley wrote in this morning's post, the development of an API was critical to expanding the site's social features, and bringing it to be much more than a passive RSS reader. While the service remains small in the shadows of giants, it has set the groundwork for growth. You can see my profile here: http://www.shyftr.com/profile/louisgray.

Labels: API, RSS, Shyftr

Sunday morning, I had the opportunity to participate in a podcast with Wayne Sutton and Kipp Bodnarf for their Talk Social News broadcast. During the discussion, we talked about how the economy could possibly be impacting Web companies, whether or not living in Silicon Valley has its benefits for tech bloggers, how to use multiple social media networks, and to still find time to take care of family and work obligations. The conversation also touched on what could be coming next in terms of social media innovations, and the accumulating pressure to perform as you become more visible. The duo also, less successfully, tried to get me to pick which companies might be in real trouble during a global economy downturn.

As I find it's good practice to listen to podcasts you participated in, to learn from them and do better in the next round, I found myself listening to the Talk Social News recording yesterday, while on the plane from San Jose to Texas, where I am staying through Thursday. Luckily, I still found the discussion interesting as an audience member.

You can download the podcast here or read their recap on their Web site. The interview with me starts about 10 minutes in after Wayne and Kipp do some upfront work.

After you've listened, let me know if you think my opinions were wrong or off base. And we're always looking for feedback. On the next podcast, what do you think I should try and get discussed?

Labels: Finance, Personal, Podcast, Silicon Valley, social media, Startups

Since he launched The Inquisitr just under six months ago, Duncan Riley has taken some innovative approaches to sharing news on the Web. (See: Duncan Riley's First Week at The Inquisitr Is Inspiring) Not content to simply repeat "the news of the day" and hash over the same tired subjects, Riley has added spice to the mix, covering celebrity news, and taking new approaches to finding new ways to present hot topics outside of his own site - through QMeme, which tracks popular items on FriendFeed, and Inquisitr IQ, which, in a fashion similar to AllTop, features posts from some of Duncan's favorite blogs.

Today, Duncan took another innovative step, becoming the first to harness the new ReadBurner platform by integrating the service's top stories within his site as content - not by embedding the full content on the Inquisitr, but instead, letting his readers click out and find new sources for top tech news, at their original source.


You can see ReadBurner headlines alongside The Inquisitr news

The ReadBurner partnership is part of a new, revamped, look for The Inquisitr, which now features the tagline "a better mix", hinting at the breadth of coverage available.

Clearly, in my advisory role at ReadBurner, I was aware of Duncan's plans to incorporate the service's content, but one of the most intriguing pieces of the partnership is that Duncan proactively reached out to our team rather than us asking him if he was interested in carrying the content. Duncan, looking at the options on the Web, selected ReadBurner, and presented us with an innovative way to get the best of the Web and make it portable.

You can see the new look for the Inquisitr here: http://www.inquisitr.com/

Also, the official blog post by Adam Ostrow, ReadBurner CEO is here:
Introducing the ReadBurner Platform v0.1 with The Inquisitr!

I'm both looking forward to more innovation from The Inquisitr and, of course, more developments at ReadBurner. I bet there is more to come from both sites.

Labels: Inquisitr, ReadBurner

By Mona Nomura of Pixel Bits (FriendFeed/Twitter)

Cyndy Aleo-Carreira just posted a great piece about women in tech and how we shouldn't sell ourselves short. I would expand on that, but haven't been around tech bloggers and journalists long enough to give an informed two cents.

But...

I have been in IT for a while. Quickly approaching 10(!) years, to be exact. Wow. Heck back when I started, it was so uncool to be in tech -- even employed by a well known software corporation. My friends made fun of me, my work place was male dominated with the geekiest / nerdiest but brightest engineers. (Think worn out, raggedy dingy white t-shirts and too tight stone washed jeans.)

Fast forward to today, IT is definitely not what it used to be.

Geeks are no longer just white T-shirts with jeans, there's now a "scene", and even a gossip rag! Since becoming fairly active in Social Networks and especially being based in SF, I've been invited to countless Tweet-ups, and parties. Cyndy pinpoints the exact reason I choose not to go. I may be unfamiliar with the blogger / social network / entreprenuer circle, but definitely not new to partying. I've been there, done that, and very aware of what people assume upon first meeting me. I refuse to fall in the: "gaining notoriety by what I'm wearing or who I'm dating rather than gaining respect for my knowledge and insight" category. I am also 100% with Cyndy on how "we (women) don't need to sell out to make it in tech".

That said, I don't see tech turning into a mini-Hollywood a problem.

Within every subculture, there is always sub-categorizing -- just like school. I really thought once I finished schooling, the in-crowd vs nerds / geeks vs weirdos, etc., would be done with it. I don't know about you, but I still deal with all the things I hated about school on a daily basis. Think about it: from our workplaces, social circles, online communities, to even within our own families, it surrounds us everywhere! At least now as adults, it's easier to not get involved or care (at least for me), but that doesn't mean it's nonexistent.

So for the tech scene to have its own mini-Hollywood means the tech circle is growing larger. With that, comes the array of labels, sub categories, and classifications and I couldn't be happier. I love tech and everything tech related, so the expansion and growth is welcomed!

Now, it's up to us.

Us being anyone who blogs, reads blogs, or active members in Social Networks, to change with the way the industry is changing. Especially, since data is democratizing. Whether you're a blogger, a reader, a commenter, content provider -- however which way you want to participate, we have more and more choices to read who we want to read, listen to who we want to listen to, and "follow" who we want to follow. Data is no longer consolidated and centralized like it once was, and moving forward we're only going to get even more choices. Hence, it's up to us.

After all, just like Hollywood, the tech starlets, groupies, and wannabe starlets wouldn't be a part of the mini-Hollywood if it weren't for an audience, right?

Read more by Mona Nomura at Pixel Bits.

Labels: Internet, social media, Social Networking, Web

By Cyndy Aleo-Carreira of Shakespeare I Ain't (E-mail / Twitter)

More than a few friends sent me a link to one of Loren Feldman's videos, assuming, I suppose, that I would be set to grab my torch and pitchfork and go after him yet again. I can't remember a video that he's done that I've agreed with, and have, on many occasions, found his videos in poor taste, yet his commentary on the now-infamous "Cypress" video was, while still a bit over the top, dead on the money.

There are several journalists and bloggers I look up to, and Kara Swisher is usually at the top of my list. Kara is who I'd like to be when I grow up, mixing an irreverance with an unflinching eye. I've mentioned her code of ethics statement in posts on more than one occasion, because she manages to walk the fine line of socializing in the industry with grace. Her commentary on the video, however, seemed to shy away from the issue of ethics, and whether that was because the journalist in question worked for her employer or not, I'm unsure. It left me disappointed.

In the echo chamber of the tech industry, impressions are everything. While the Silicon Valley crowd meet and greet all the time, and most of the big players interact at conferences, for many of us, the only interaction we will ever have with each other is online, and without that in-person interaction to base personalities on, those impressions left online are crucial. Even my writing here on the occasional basis is a shock. I told Louis, when I met him at Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco this year, I like him a lot better in person than I did based on the impression I had of him online.

The problem that we are running into is that tech has attempted, in nearly every way, to reimagine itself as a mini-Hollywood. The companies who have gained a lot of press are the ones being run by young, attractive people. It's become just as, if not more, important to look good than it does to be running a company that actually makes money in this climate.

In that same vein, it's become important to throw young, attractive reporters at those entrepreneurs. Tech still hasn't lost its male-dominated culture, and let's face it, when wooing young male entrepreneurs to spill their inside secrets, nothing works better than a pretty face. In some (but not all) cases, that young, pretty girl doesn't have the background or the experience necessary to really work the beat and remain objective. I'm in no way saying this is the case based on the Cypress video, but impressions are in the eye of the beholder, not the people who know the actual people involved.

It's disappointed me, time and time again, to see the parties and the groupies (for want of a better word). It's easier for girls (I just can't bring myself to call them women) to cozy up to an entrepreneur than a Hollywood star, and sites like Valleywag have made them famous in this tiny little realm. It's the wannabe Hollywood, complete with wannabe starlets.

But every time a story like this one comes out, with people questioning the principles of a journalist making silly videos with friends whose company she covers, or someone makes the front page of Valleywag as she climbs the social echelon of Silicon Valley, it reflects badly on all of us. For every woman in tech I respect like Kara or Orli Yakuel, there are more who are happy to skate by, regardless of the disrespect they receive. I can't imagine taking pride in gaining notoriety by what I'm wearing or who I'm dating rather than gaining respect for my knowledge and insight, and I wish that the women who do would think better of themselves than they do. We don't need to sell out to make it in tech.

Read more by Cyndy Aleo-Carreira at Shakespeare I Ain't.

Labels: Cypress, kara swisher, Loren Feldman, Valleywag, women in tech