SOMEWHAT FRANK

Web 2.0 Expo This Week In SF

Web 2.0 Expo is this week in San Francisco from March 31st - April 3rd. This year at the Web 2.0 Expo there are 3 new components which include:

1. A new Government 2.0 Joins the Web 2.0 House track for anyone looking to explore how technology is being integrated into the government.
2. Sunlight Labs Hackathon where attendees build an application that promotes transparency
   in government. You can vote now for the application you want to build (or think needs to be built).
3. Revion3 Tekzilla LIVE at Web 2.0 Expo as Patrick Norton and Veronica Belmont bring you hands on reviews of the latest gear, tips and tricks that improve the tech you already own, and conversations with the most informative experts around.

Use code websf09trt5 at online registration for 30% off any registration package.

Finally, I will be giving away my extra ticket this week to the lucky reader. Hope to see you there!

Web 2.0 Expo San Francisco Is Coming Soon

Web 2.0 Expo is at it again and this time they are back on the West coast in San Francisco on March 31st - April 3rd. I was invited to attend the semi-annual conference and expo targeting all those involved with the development of the next generation web: designers, developers, entrepreneurs, marketers, business strategists, and venture capitalists from around the globe. Some of the most innovative and successful industry people and companies attend Web 2.0 Expo. This year at the Web 2.0 Expo there are 3 new components which include:

1. A new Government 2.0 Joins the Web 2.0 House track for anyone looking to explore how technology is being integrated into the government.
2. Sunlight Labs Hackathon where attendees build an application that promotes transparency
   in government. You can vote now for the application you want to build (or think needs to be built).
3. Revion3 Tekzilla LIVE at Web 2.0 Expo as Patrick Norton and Veronica Belmont bring you hands on reviews of the latest gear, tips and tricks that improve the tech you already own, and conversations with the most informative experts around.

I last attended Web 2.0 Expo in 2007 and you can check out the photos to prove it. Read up on past SOMEWHAT FRANK Web 2.0 Expo coverage here, here, here and here.

Use code websf09trt5 at online registration for 30% off any registration package.

Finally, I have an extra ticket to give away so reach out to me on twitter @FrankGruber if you’re interested. Hope to see you there!

The 'my' Trend, How To Freeload at Web 2.0 Expo, Google Genetic Index Coming, AOL Top Ad Network By Reach & Is Content A Commodity?

Photo of the Week: This past weekend brought out some warmer spring weather which brought out the joggers like this photo captured on film in Chicago by my friend Araceli Arroyo.

SOMEWHAT FRANK Weekly Tidbits: 4.20.2008

2008 Web 2.0 & Technology Conference Calendar

UPDATE: Check out the full schedule and stay up to date here.

It is time to start planning your 2008 conference schedule. Last year, I pulled together a list as 2007 brought us many new conference opportunities. To make it easier to plot out your conference roadmap this year I have once again compiled a list of some of the best web 2.0, technology, design, marketing and innovation conferences and events scheduled in 2008. This list does not contain all the TECH cocktail events I will be hosting as they will be announced soon.

If you are a conference organizer interested in having Somewhat Frank as media sponsor covering your event or if I have left an event off the list please contact me as this is meant to be a living blog post.

2008 is going to be busier then ever - happy conferencing!

     

UPDATED: I have pulled together a shared Google Calendar of all the events in this list.

 

Personalize Your Photos With Graphita

Does the photo below look familiar? You might recall the photo of myself with my good friend and popular blogger Orli Yakuel, which I clowned with the Graphita tool-set for a TechCrunch article I wrote while at Web 2.0 Expo last April. Graphita has officially launched Live Studio to make it easy to express yourself through annotating your photos in high resolution. Personalize your photos and make them fun with Graphita's easy to use tool-set. Graphita CEO David Shantz had this to say about photo personalization:

"A personalized picture is so much more instantly expressive, allowing people to have a “visual voice” that can be shared in an instant."

Live Studio is open and free and is looking to integrate with leaders in the image hosting and sharing world – making it possible to save images directly into accounts at other sites. Once you are have completed personalizations to your photos users can export, e-mailed, posted on a blog or website, add them to a social network profile. Graphita also offers the ability to print on dozens of items like mugs, posters, shirts and calendars through the site.

UStream.tv To Broadcast Yourself Live

While online video upload sites have become extremely popular in the web 2.0 movement, it appears that live streaming video seems to be catching on fast. UStream.tv offers users the ability to create their own live web channel with live chat functionality.  Streaming video is by no means a new concept but the UStream.tv platform does make it easy for anyone with a web camera to become a real-life Truman Show like Justin.tv.

When I asked UStream.tv CEO Chris Yeh about their product he had this to offer:

“Our story is simple. We're bringing live internet video to everyone.  By removing the barriers to broadcasting, we allow the creativity of our users to flourish.  While many experiments will fail, UStream.tv is the test tube that will help build the future of media.”

Over the past week I have experienced the trend first hand as several people I encountered were using UStream.tv to bring streaming reality broadcasts to the web. At the Web 2.0 Expo I was interviewed by Jeremiah Oywang live via UStream, I also ran into Justin.tv at a couple of different events and Sarah Meyers, Lindsay Docherty and Brian Solis even got into the Justin.tv act. Blog veterans Robert Scoble and Chris Pirrillo are also getting into the act and leveraging UStream.tv to produce live broadcasts.

In attempting to watch UStream.tv I have experienced some poor video quality issues but I figure they will subside with time. I think that we are only at the beginning of what streaming web tv has to offer and UStream.tv is a vaulable part of the evolution process. Check out the end of my chat with Jeremiah Oywang in the hallway of the Web 2.0 Expo below to see the video quality I was referring to - it is a little choppy but still could be effective. 

StumbleUpon & Hitwise Acquired, Netvibes Universe Launches, Web 2.0 Expo Wrap-up, AOL India & Education 2.0

Photo of the Week: I snapped this photo of the West Wing while celebrating Earth Day 2007 on the White House grounds.

eBay Acquires StumbleUpon
StumbleUpon was acquired by eBay for between $40 to $75 million but it seems Google Google tried to rain on their parade with a toolbar update.

Hitwise Acquired by Experian for $240 Million
All of those great charts that Hitwise so freely provide us, have paid off big time for the web intelligence company. Information services provider Experian has announced their cash purchase of Hitwise for $240 million.

Netvibes Launches Universe: Customized Public Pages
Netvibes launched Universe, allowing users to create highly customized versions of Netvibes and publish them for public access. Netvibes has created 100 or so branded versions for the launch - users will be able to create these soon. Netvibes hosted a huge launch party this past Monday in San Francisco.

What Every Video Aggregator Site Needs
Here are a few things that every Video Aggregator website needs in order to stay afloat in this ever-crowding market.

AOL Launching Next Week In India
AOL President and COO Ron Grant is going to be in India next week for the launch of AOL’s India portal.

Google Feed API
Google Reader finally has its first official API. Any developer in the world can request the entire history of a web feed from Google's geo-distributed server cloud in a normalized response for inclusion in their websites or products.

Web 2.0 Expo: All Things Widgets
The Web 2.0 Expo included two sessions on widgets. Also, offline web apps could be the next big thing after seeing an Apollo demo, by Kevin Lynch of Adobe.

Web 2.0 takes On Colleges And Universities: Education 2.0
In the shift from an intellectual economy of push, to one of pull, the evolving participatory media are making their impact felt . It is no longer enough to pump out information like gasoline and expect authentic learning to take place - the new generation.

Popular Web 2.0 Video Explained

A few months ago, I highlighted an inventive web 2.0 video titled, "Web 2.0 ... The Machine is Us/ing Us"  by Kansas State University anthropology professor Michael Welsh. The brief article I wrote ended up on the Digg homepage which ultimately lead to its mainstream discovery - at last count over two million people have viewed the video.

Professor Welsh was in attendance at the Web 2.0 Expo this past week and spoke at the Web 2.Open, a platform for open discussion on a topic of their choice. The professor decided to explain his video and YouTube user brickysponge recorded the discussion.

After A Long Web 2.0 Week: How Much Time Did It Take Off Your Life?

After a long week of traveling from Chicago for TECH cocktail to San Francisco for a week of Web 2.0 Expo events as explained by Mike Arrington, I feel like I may have shaved a few days off my life. Is there a way on the web to find out the impact of this week of sleepless nights and long days at the expo? If you’ve ever wondered just how long you’ll be taking up space on project earth, several sites are available to project how long you will could live. Based on how you complete a series of lifestyle questions, the sites calculate a projected age you will live to celebrate, or put another less popular way, your death age.

Internist Dr. Michael Roizen is a pioneer with health related questions to determine how one’s daily habits contribute to their good health with suggestions on how to live longer. At Dr. Roizen’s Realage.com you can calculate your “real age” based on your lifestyle, eating and drinking habits, and even how often you floss your teeth.

If you want more information, including how long you will live, (and why would you really want to know that?) you can log on to LivingTo100.com for those under 50 years of age, and to Eons.com for those older then 50. Each site walks you through a series of questions on health, diet, exercise, family, attitude, etc. and then calculates how long you will live.

So keep eating the broccoli, taking the vitamins, blogging daily and having fun you should live a long and happy life on the web.

Photo Attribution: stephcarter via Flickr

Annotate Your Photos With Graphita

Graphita, a San Rafael, California-based startup, offers an online photo annotation product that will be launching in mid-May. Graphita is a Flash-based application that makes it easy for anyone to take a photo and add some bling to it via a WYSIWYG application with a toolbar that resembles a customized and simplified version of the Adobe Photoshop toolbar.

Overall, the product was easy to use and offered some creative enjoyment to an otherwise hectic day. I recently got a live demo of the service at Web 2.0 Expo and decided to write up a quick post for TechCrunch.

TechCrunch20 Conference Details

Looking for a fall conference to attend? Mike Arrington, editor of TechCrunch, has just announced the details of the TechCrunch20 conference at the VC 2.0 session he moderated at the Web 2.0 Expo. The conference is being co-organized by Jason Calacanis and Mike Arrington and sponsored by Sequoia Capital with the idea of highlighting 20 of the hottest startups at the event. GigaOm offers more details.The event will be held at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco September 17 thru€“ 18, 2007 with tickets ranging between $1,995 and $2,495 depending upon ticket purchase date. You can register now.

GigaOm offers some additional perspective on TechCrunch20.

If you are looking for other conferences to attend you might want to check out this roundup of 2007 conferences.

Google Acquires DoubleClick, 10 Hot Startups, Social Aggregators, FoundRead Born & Web 2.0 Expo Is Upon Us

Photo of the week: This San Francisco Trolley photo taken by, friend and co-founder of TECH cocktail Eric Olson, was the first photo I found on Flickr related to the Web 2.0 Expo this week in SF.

Somewhat Frank Weekly Tidbits: 04.15.07

The Web 2.0 Expo Is Upon Us
I just arrived in San Francisco for the Web 2.0 Expo. It should be an exciting week of sessions, demos and launch parties in the city by the bay. If you are in town and want to meetup tonight (Sunday) check out this little meetup but keep in mind, this is NOT a TECH cocktail event like the one we just hosted in Chicago - it is just a meetup in SF.

Google Spends $3.1 Billion To Acquire DoubleClick
Makes sense as Google is truly an advertising company. Google announced that they have agreed to acquired DoubleClick for $3.1 billion in cash. Microsoft was reportedly in a bidding war with Google for the company. That is a lot of cash. Rumor has it they are buying the Internet just after the 2016 Chicago Olympics. :-) 

Birth of the Social Aggregator
Social Networks, Blogs and Startpages have long been treated as separate categories of web-based applications. According to Widgify, it is about to change. 

10 Most Successful Web 2.0 Startups To Date
Rev2.org lists its take on the most successful web 2.0 startups. With FeedBurner’s domination of the feed management space I would probably add them to this list. But you probably know already I am a FeedBurner fan.

New RSS 2.0 spec site deployed
Dave Winer has been working on a project to "future-safe" the Harvard site that houses the RSS 2.0 spec. Yesterday, he redirected from the old site to the new one. Congrats Dave on the new site! 

Search for People Across the Social Network Sites
yoName is a search engine that allows you to search friends (not just) on these 6 big networks. 

Introducing FoundRead
GigaPapi GigaOm is at it again as he has launched FoundRead, a shared resource, where anyone can contribute, either through their posts, or experiences or comments. You can choose to contribute freely or anonymously. Great idea Om, congrats on the launch. 

Hot Startup Checklist: Spam A Lot?
An interesting chart of Valleywag (masters of the pie charts, graphs, slides, etc.) highlighting some of the most promising startups.