According to this article in the globeandmail.com, MySpace plans redesign for next week
This is big news in that it is coming on the heels of announcements of facebook to change the design of it’s site too. And while you may think that MySpace is for kids…
” with about 110 million users worldwide, claims to be the most trafficked website in the United States, adding that about 300,000 people sign up each day.”
That’s big traffic, and big business. See the article and expect more developments on this story.
According to the New York Times:
“Twitter has raised a new $15 million round of funding, following a bidding war by venture cpitalists eager to get a slice of the micro-blogging start-up, according to an unsourced report from GigaOm.”
Further proof that twitter will continue to matter as a Web 2.0 tool.
Well, actually, check out Jott Links for a list of Web 2.0 apps that work with Jott. You will likely see one or two (or 10!) you have never heard of.
Katharine Q. Seelye of The New York Times had a good article on how Hillary Clinton — and others — are using blogs, twitter, and other approaches on the campaign trail. For example, Clinton…
“…held her first blogger-only conference call on Friday, phoning in to about 40 bloggers from the campaign trail in Oregon.
And the campaign has stepped up its use of Twitter, a social-networking service that sends short, text-based posts, to make real-time calls to arms.”
Businesses and other organizations could take lessons on how American politicians use social computing for their benefit.
P.S. For all those asking “why use twitter?”, you now have at least one (of many) answers.
There is a good article on cnn.com about IBM’s internal social computing software, Beehive. As CNN rightly says, a
‘Virtual watercooler’ makes workplace more fun
I was going to put more “bee” puns here, but I want you to read the article! 
While Web 2.0 and social computing is something that we focus on, there are many exciting emerging technologies besides Web 2.0. “Green” initiatives are also very big. IBM is doing many things in this area, and based on this article in TechCrunch, so are others. I expect to see many green initiatives underway at our clients in upcoming months.
For more on this, see Kleiner Perkins Goes Green With $1.2 Billion In Two New Funds
Creators of videos on YouTube will get alot more value with a new feature just announced. According to the New York Times,
“YouTube formally announced late Wednesday that it had added a free feature that will show video creators when and where viewers are watching their videos. With this, the company hopes to turn YouTube from an online video site into a place where marketers can test their messages, Tracy Chan, YouTube product manager, said.”
This can become a very powerful feature for people wanted to capture valuable metrics regarding the videos posted there. I expect it will drive even greater usage of YouTube. See the article YouTube Feature Tells Video Creators When and Where a Clip Is Being Watched on the New York Times for more on this exciting new feature.
Gary Brown e-mailed me this insightful manifesto from Michael Lee Stallard, an expert on client and employee engagement. In it, Michael describes the key ingredients of a connection culture: vision, value, and voice. More and more companies are focusing on developing deep, rich connections between their employees and their customers, and this document has a number of good examples of the benefits of this approach. Check it out at ChangeThis :: The Connection Culture: A New Source of Competitive Advantage.
Even if your answer to the article, So You Want to Be a Blogging Star? - New York Times is “no”, you can still gain some good insights from some of the blogging stars features in this article, which is about…
“…what a number of successful bloggers with successful nonblogging careers say are the ways to think about getting into the business of blogging.”
Well worth a look.
Business Week has a string of podcasts it put together monthly on “innovations impacting top execs”. Lots of good material here, including many on Web 2.0. There’s something on widgets, corporate wikis, vblogs (video blogs)…and more. See here:
O’Reilly’s Guide to Web 2.0