Death to All Tweets
May 15, 2013
Do not get the pitchforks and torches ready, instead set a countdown clock and wait for the explosion! The Verge tells us that you can “Give Tweets A Death Sentence With Efemr.” Efemr is a web app that gives tweets a time limit and then it is permanently deleted. The idea is replicating SnapChat’s popular idea: snap a photo, add destruction time, and it is lost to the ages. Once you download Efemr, you give it access to your Twitter account and you create the time limit with hash tags.
Despite the momentary life span of its content, Efemr has a purpose:
“The web app is advertised as a means of making your Twitter activity more fleeting, but also as a tool to “protect your e-reputation.” That latter point is somewhat questionable, since all it takes is a retweet to ruin any attempt to cover your tracks on the popular service. SnapChat has shown there’s demand for this type of erasable social media, though we’re not convinced trying to shoehorn the concept within Twitter is a good strategy.”
The demand is that people want these social media Web tools to be more life real conversation, momentary and fleeting. Social media documents everything and leaves visible evidence that used to disappear. The Library of Congress will not like that, because when the tweet “goes boom” there is nothing to search for.
Whitney Grace, May 15, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
Acceptability of Pen Names Today
May 15, 2013
Gawker reports on an intriguing story taking the concept of a pen name (of sorts) to a new level. The Australian Legal Business, a publication owned by Thomson Reuters has seen many articles published by fictional journlalist, Michelle Boatley. Boatley is simply a nom de plume for editors and is not a real person according to the article, “Thomson Reuters Just Making Up Reporters Now.”
Boatley covered layoffs in Bangkok, mergers in Shanhai and hiring in Dubai as a reporter assigned to the topic of business news in Asia and the Middle East. However, as stated by Jim Romenesko, she was simply a guise for the publication to look as if they had a larger staff — and so was her Facebook page and email address.
The article continues discussion on this odd situation:
“A source told Romenesko that Boatley was probably added back to the bullpen after a real journalist had recently left to join a law firm. On top of that, the “reporter” got things wrong in stories that sources were unable to correct (because there was no contact info for Boatley, because Boatley is not a person). Is this a widespread phenomenon? Related: How many Gawker writers are simply an alias of one of the editors? Almost all of them.”
In a sense, this idea is similar to a nom de plume. Of course, historically pen names have not been regarded as a anything offensive but rather indicative of other issues. Think women not being regarded as serious authors and using male pen names in order to publish and sell copies. The point is that attention should be placed on what problems are causing the fabrication of more reporters than actually exist.
Megan Feil, May 15, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
What Everyone Wants to Know: Who is the Average Facebook User?
May 15, 2013
To many users, Facebook may be seen as simply a social networking site with the occasionally annoying targeted ads. However, the marketing and advertising potential is nothing short of fulfilled. The Daily Dot offers a look at the results of mathematician Stephen Wolfram’s Personal Analytics for Facebook — an important step in the direction of the actualization of marketing potential. We were not surprised to see that “This is the Average Facebook User’s Life According to Big Data” seems at least a little creepy.
Wolfram found that people have, on average, about 342 Facebook friends. This number peaks for people in their late teenage years and then declines. What we found most interesting is that Wolfram compared his data on relationship statuses with those collected by the United States census and the two datasets were almost identical.
The article shares more on how and why this information was collected:
“Wolfram gathered this data from more than one million Facebook subscribers who signed up for Wolfram Alpha Personal Analytics for Facebook, a tool that takes a person’s facts on the social network to create personalized reports. He then parsed this information to create a series of very revelatory graphs. ‘I’ve always been interested in people and the trajectories of their lives,’ Wolfram writes. ‘But I’ve never been able to combine that with my interest in science. Until now.’”
Marketers and Facebook users alike are intrigued by what the characteristics the average Facebook user has. It comes at little surprise that people voluntarily signed up to participate and that the interest to collect this kind of information has materialized.
Megan Feil, May 15, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
Spotlight on Access Innovations Living Up to Name
May 14, 2013
New York-based print and digital educational content company, Triumph Learning, has struck up a partnership with taxonomy development leader Access Innovations, Inc. Together, they will be creating a new taxonomy designed to align standards-based instructional content for the k-1 education market. The news release, “Triumph Learning Partners with Access Innovations on Common Core Standards-Integrated Taxonomy,” explains more.
Content management can be a difficult challenge for companies like Triumph learning but Access Innovations facilitated a more efficient management system by developing and building taxonomy out of a structured vocabulary for math and English.
We learned about how the Common Core State Standards apply:
The Common Core State Standards provide concepts and terminology that Triumph Learning writers and editors can use to link pieces of content such as instruction and practice activities, as well as other supplemental material, to corresponding grade-level standards. ‘By using Access Innovations expertise we will be able to properly align our content for both teachers and students,’ said Aoife Dempsey, Chief Technology Officer at Triumph Learning.
For a company that has been around since 1978, Access Innovations truly lives up to their name. Their database and taxonomy creation capabilities and semantic integration technology stand out among others and it looks like their spotlight will continue to shine — especially now that they are involved in bolstering educational reform on a national level.
Megan Feil, May 14, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
Updates to Apache Lucene Solr Released
May 14, 2013
Apache Lucene and its compliment, Solr, are highly used open source software components, particularly for search. Both have received an upgrade to version 4.3 as of the second week in May. The update enables even more powerful full-text search. Read the full details in the ZDNet story, “Apache Lucene and Solr 4.3 Released.”
The article says:
“Lucene/Solr 4.3.0 was released and made available for immediate download. The 4.3.0 package includes improvements in numerous areas, including query performance, spatial processing, and the read-side schema API. 4.3.0 also includes numerous enhancements to Lucene’s faceted search capabilities, whereby dimensions can be used in search, much as they are used for drill-down analysis in data warehouses and OLAP cubes.”
These updates provide great news not only for developers who utilize Lucene/Solr as components, but also for users of value-added open source software built on the Lucene/Solr platform. One such value-added solution is LucidWorks, offering both Search and Big Data solutions. LucidWorks is built on the solid foundation of this widely supported open source software, but also boasts an industry-trusted support and services team.
Emily Rae Aldridge, May 14, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
List of New Open Source EHR Software Solutions
May 14, 2013
The innovative community of open source software developers have created many new applications in a variety of fields, but a recent Datamation article narrows in on one field in particular — health care. “50 Open Source Replacements for Health Care Software” shares a rundown on all fifty electronic health record software solutions.
A study from PricewaterhouseCooper revealed that 79 percent of health care execs expect to see an increase on their technology spending this year. EHR capabilities are a major area in need of an upgrade at many health care institutions but still others anticipate needing analytics to help improve care for patients. Costs may be an issue for some.
In light of expenses, the article states:
“However, expensive, proprietary software isn’t the only option for these sorts of initiatives. The open source community has a wealth of projects related to EHR, imaging, and hospital, laboratory and practice management. Small practices and facilities in developing countries, in particular, have found that these applications met their needs while minimizing their expenses. We’ve put together a list of fifty of these applications and noted proprietary applications they resemble.”
We found this to be a useful resource. While it may not be completely comprehensive it appears to be a step in that direction, which is always beneficial in such ever-evolving marketing like health care technology.
Megan Feil, May 14, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
Target Market for Google Glass Discussed
May 14, 2013
Urban professionals and early tech adopters may be the target audience Google has in mind for Google Glass but the writer of a recent article from ZDNet, “Old Age is the Killer App for Google Glass,” would not be surprised if the aging Baby Boomer generation becomes the most enthralled with this new technology.
The problems of old age are no secret and ZDNet glosses over a quick list: dementia, difficulties walking, brittle bones and more. Remember the ”Help, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” ads in the 90’s? We’ll let you put two and two together on that one.
According to the article:
“The possibilities for Google Glass are huge in this older market. Why do companies chase the 19 to 25 year old demographic? Those kids have little money and the entire generation has lousy job prospects. The Baby Boomers of Generation A are the largest and wealthiest demographic of them all. They will love Google Glass. Google’s rush to Google Glass makes perfect sense if you consider that founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin are 40 and 39 years old, respectively. With every day, they have more and more in common with 60 year-olds than with 20 year-olds.”
ZDNet suggests that Google has brought Ray Kurzweil on to ensure that they are getting the inside scoop on the complete integration of biology and technology — the singularity. This, in addition to the other posits made, is a very harsh assessment and makes us question the entire list of assertions in the article.
Megan Feil, May 14, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
Holy Grail of Search and Big Data?
May 14, 2013
A Business Wire press release caught our eyes recently as it announced the distribution of LucidWorks Search with the MapR Platform for Apache Hadoop. “MapR Technologies Distributes Enterprise-Grade Search with Hadoop Platform” shares that now customers will have predictive analytics, search, discovery and advanced database operations at their fingertips on a single platform.
Integrating LucidWorks technology with MapR beefs up the added value that LucidWorks Search offers as far as security, connectivity and user management. Additionally, MapR announced that the M7 Edition is available; this combines unprecedented Hadoop and NoSQL capabilities together in one platform.
According to Ben Woo, managing director, Neuralytix:
“Integrating search capabilities into Hadoop is an important milestone for the industry and represents tremendous opportunity for customers to find new insight and derive value from Big Data. This is an enormous step forward especially in time-sensitive processes such as fraud detection where Big Data must be searched as it streams into the enterprise.”
MapR’s chief application architect tells us that using search and big data is not just about analyzing social media content and Web traffic. We wonder…big data and search: has the holy grail (or one of them) been found?
Megan Feil, May 14, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
Google as the Authority for Mobile Content
May 13, 2013
I my Google monographs, now out of print, I covered some of the early systems and methods Google developed to rank and identify “good” content. Now keep in mind that “good” is not the Manhattan Smith grad type of selectivity. Google’s “quality” processes involve mostly numerical recipes, data about who wants to advertise and for how much, and some “configuration” functions which give the algorithms some spunk.
I read “Google Launches Content Recommendation Engine for Mobile Sites, Powered by Google Plus”. The write up hooks the systems and methods to Google Plus, which is what makes sense. Google wants to make Google Plus a go-to social network, either crushing or buying such outfits as Facebook, LinkedIn or others. Google Plus is also working overtime to remain hip, timely, and relevant.
Information which is ready to heat and consume. No time consuming reading, analyzing, and evaluation. Image source: http://goo.gl/Tyy8a
What better way to achieve this that making Google Plus into the 21st century identify of what’s important and (more importantly) what’s not important. I think that those who think their content is important may have an opportunity to purchase some traffic, which is definitely supported by the Google infrastructure. Google is about revenue, not about objective search in my opinion. Your mileage may vary.
Here’s the passage in the write up I highlighted:
As Seth Sternberg, Google’s product manager for the Google+ platform told me last week, the team set out to create an “awesomely seamless experience to find more content” on the mobile web. On mobile sites, he argues, publishers often see high bounce rates because users have a hard time finding interesting additional content to read on a site once they have finished reading an article.
I like the use of “awesome” and I circled the “high bounce rates”. Yes, definitely an opportunity to deliver a better solution to mobile users. Those tiny devices just don’t delivery content and user access the way my three wide screen monitors and old-school, clicky Rosewill keyboard deliver the content bacon.
Several observations:
First, the application of Google recommendation technology to mobile is indeed a very significant step for the Google. No one expects humans to keep pace with the new content flooding the tubes of the Internet. The simplicity and appeal of “let Google do it” may make life tough for some folks.
Second, due to Google’s significant footprint in mobile, wherever Google goes has a significant impact. The mobile aspirations of outfits with fewer resources than Google are going to have to work overtime to make their business models hum. Online has a charming quick. Online services tend to form monopolies, squeezing out secondary and tertiary services the way weeds choke the trees next to the Harrod’s Creek post office, which still is open on Saturday.
Third, developers may just find it easier to embrace the Google. Yahoo is allegedly suffering a mild form of eczema from the Microsoft search deal. As Yahoo valiantly tries to deliver on the former Googler’s business strategy, Yahoo may just find it better, faster, and cheaper to open the door to Google’s walled garden.
Fourth, users who are now struggling to read above the 8th grade level may just take what the giant services deliver. Who wants to think about a query and then read a list of results. Once that’s done, the user bristles at the thought of opening documents, ingesting them, and then analyzing the content for the needed information.
Nope, just nuke that information burrito in the Google microwave. Recommended content is ready to consume. Very modern and very, very appealing to advertisers and those who will pay to be included.
Stephen E Arnold, May 13, 2013
Sponsored by Augmentext, the original flash frozen information burrito.
Principles of Open Source and Social Media Align
May 13, 2013
One of the newest major paths of technology, social media, owes much to a well-established model, open source. Giovanni Rodriguez draws many similarities between the two technologies (and ways of thinking) in his article for Forbes, “What Social Media (And the World) Owes to Open Source.”
Rodriguez finds some application:
“First, the principles of open source are not just restricted to technology projects; they can be applied — and have been applied, even before the OS movement got its name — to almost any market that depends on an ecosystem of different players. Second — and this is something that so many tech-marketers and non-tech social media marketers ignore, forget, or never quite got: the principles don’t just apply to online engagement, but offline as well.”
At the beginning of the article, the author states he was inspired to write the piece after attending a conference. The event that the author references is Lucene Revolution hosted by LucidWorks. LucidWorks is a great example of how these two worlds collide. Their value-added software is based on open source Apache Lucene/Solr, and their devoted developers and users form a strong social community. These types of value-added solutions are strongest when reinforced by the principles of both social networks and open source innovation.
Emily Rae Aldridge, May 13, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Beyond Search
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