Basho Co-Founder Antony Falco has raised $3 million for Orchestrate.io, a database API similar to Twilio in its capability to ease the complexity of adding features to mobile and web applications. True Ventures led this initial round joined by Frontline Ventures and Resonant Venture Partners.

Falco, who left Basho a few months ago, said Orchestrate.io solves the problems that developers face when building feature-rich applications. Often it means adding multiple databases for geo-spatial, time series or any number of other features.

The database problem has been ongoing. It in part stems from the limits of scale with relational databases. Over the years, companies like Amazon and Google reached their own ceilings and were forced to develop new kinds of databases for high-volume queries. The result is a lot of time spent babysitting databases so the applications run well.

Orchestrate.io acts as a service on a service, abstracting the database layer. Twilio successfully simplified the way developers accessed services, such as SMS and voice. Falco sees a service that also allows developers to add features by pulling the data through an API . “The comparison with Twilio and Sendgrid is not around the problem we solve but the pattern,” Falco said in an email interview. “We are taking a complex and burdensome task — running lots of databases — and putting it behind an API that programmers can use to more quickly build apps. Twilio and Sendgrid both do a similar thing, vastly simplifying the complex, for telecom and email infrastructure, respectively.

Orchestrate.io uses in-memory technology for its service. “Memory — storing indexes and hot data in memory — will be critical to performance,” Falco said. “There are three tiers – the active data and indexes in memory, disk storage for durability and data less often accessed, and as data ages and becomes inactive, a cheaper tier of fault-tolerant storage. The more we serve reads out of the memory, the better our performance will be and, without a lot of latency, users will be able to execute relatively rich queries that might require three or four queries, made sequentially, to separate databases.”

Orchestrate.io is using open source databases to build the service. “We aren’t going to build databases,” Falco said. “The databases themselves can change; we are not tied to any one database. Riak (a Basho service) is of course ideal for this use case — for forming part of the foundation of this service. But other than that, we aren’t really tied to any one thing.”

The company will use multiple data centers for its service to help get the data as close as possible to the application and the user. That makes sense considering the potential performance issues that may come when a large enough group of users are using a service that is just in one place.

For example, an application may be installed in Amazon Web Services East region, and there might be a large number of users in London. Orchestrate will have a large enough data center footprint across different providers to accommodate users no matter their locations.

The interesting story for me is about the future of the database. The real gold is in the data, but it is like a pool of oil without a way to access it. Databases access the data, organize and make it available for query. It’s inefficient. And that’s just when a developer is dealing with one database. Add a few as the features build out and the developer faces a Rube Goldberg system. It’s about getting the work done, not herding cats in a data center.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Emotions play tricks on our memories, making our recollections of events much happier or heart-wrenching than they actually were. Smartphone app Expereal seeks to cut through those cognitive traps by allowing you to rate your day on a 10-point scale and organizing that data into easy-to-read charts.

The iOS app (Android and Web-based versions are planned) is the brainchild of Brooklyn-based digital strategist Jonathan Cohen, who was inspired by psychologist Daniel Kahneham’s 2010 TED talk “The riddle of experience vs. memory.” Kahneham argues that our memories are often distorted by cognitive biases. For example, one bad day can completely spoil someone’s memory of an otherwise pleasurable two-week vacation.

When designing Expereal, Cohen decided to stick to a 10-point scale to help users keep their ratings objective.

“I could have potentially asked people to pick a word to describe their mood, but what I like about numbers is that in order to get the full breadth and benefit you also have to enter tags and give meaning to it,” says Cohen.

Expereal’s first screen allows you to rate your day (or part of the day, depending on how often you use the app). Then you can note your location and the people you are with, add tags and snap a photo. A drop-down menu takes you to a set of charts that visualize your ratings by day, week or month, and compares your numbers to all of Expereal’s users or your Facebook friends who also use the app (data is aggregated anonymously). The “Expereotype” option is an album of your in-app photos with embedded ratings, tags and locations.

Cohen says Expereal fills the gap left by journaling apps and life-tracking wearable tech products like Jawbone UP and Nike Fuelband.

“None of these services in my mind really address the fundamental question–’how is my life going and how is it trending over time?’ I thought that by having a better understanding of this over time, it would be an interesting way to look back in order to move forward,” says Cohen.

Of course, Expereal is only as useful as the data you enter into it. The app’s notifications can be set to remind you to use it 1-5 times per day. While testing the app out, I found I was more likely to enter a rating if I was having a bad day because adding tags allowed me to vent. If my day was going okay, however, it was tempting to ignore Expereal’s prompt on my iPhone.

“It’s not immediately sticky,” Cohen admits. “But for many of us who are relatively happy in our lives, I think there is value in those moments of self-reflection.” He adds that Expereal is meant to “counterbalance to the immediate promises of contemporary best-selling self-help books and programs.”

I committed to using the app five times a day for two weeks and was surprised by my data charts. A couple days I had written off in my memory as a total waste of time (because of a headache or a task left undone) were actually rated quite high, and I realized I’m much more pessimistic than I thought I was. I already use Timehop as a scrapbook and Step Journal to keep track of my daily activities, but I like Expereal’s focus on mood tracking because it’s already motivated me to stop being so negative.

Cohen tells me he is continually working on the app’s data analysis so that the aggregate numbers aren’t skewed toward any particular part of the day or people who log onto the app more consistently than other users. He declined to give me specific numbers, but says Expereal currently has several thousand users.

Aside from being a handy life-tracking tool, Expereal is also beautiful, with minimalist graphics inspired by mid-century California design, graphic designer Reid Miles and Monocle magazine. The app was bootstrapped by Cohen, who is currently looking for investors and investigating several revenue models. Cohen envisions Expereal as part of a larger ecosystem that will eventually include books, seminars and other tools that tap into people’s desires to improve their lives.

“If you look at the world of self-help, that segment of the marketplace, there are all of these amazing books by behavioral psychologists out there,” says Cohen. “If Expereal can capture a piece of that marketplace, I think the potential is huge.”

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

People around the world are hoping their friends in Boston are safe after today’s horrific bombing. But calling and texting friends can clog phone lines, hindering response crews. Facebook offers an alternative. By Graph Searching “Friends in Boston” or viewing the Boston Page, you can pull up friends who live there, see if they’ve said they’re safe, ask if they haven’t, and pass along some love.

Graph Search was designed for finding people with a specific characteristic. Unfortunately, the new feature is still in the early phases of its roll out. It’s currently only available to a small percentage of English-speaking US users. The inability to handle this kind of query underlines how much Facebook needed to revamp its search product. Luckily there’s a workaround for everyone else. Visiting the Boston, Massachusetts community Page brings up several lists of people including a tab for “Friends Who Have Lived In Boston”. It’s not a current list, but at least it’s inclusive.

All of the TechCrunch staff’s hearts go out the victims of today’s tragedy, and personally I was shocked when I first heard the news. But it was when I Graph Searched “My friends who live in Boston, Massachusetts” that the gravity of situation really struck me. I have 12 friends currently living in the city that could have been affected.

Remembering all of them would have been tough but Graph Search jogged my memory and filled me in on who had recently moved there. Most had already given some sign on the social network that they were safe. I posted short notes of hope on the walls of the rest, and all have since responded that they’re fine.

Anyone else who visits their walls will see those reassurances too. That means the people most likely to know someone who was hurt, or who could volunteer to help in person might spend less of their day fielding panicked texts and calls about their own well-being.

That’s important because if cell phone lines near the site of the explosions get too congested, it could be harder for response crews to get their own vital calls and texts through. So instead of racking your brain for who you know in Boston, or clogging the cellular lines, consider checking on your friends digitally. And if you want to help, the Red Cross has the Safe And Well person database, plus opportunities for you to donate blood or money to help victims on this dark day.

For breaking news on the situation on Boston, TechCrunch has a live blog post of updates.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Cloud application platform Heroku is coming off a streak of bad news after it was accused of misleading its customers about how some aspects of its service worked and potentially costing its users quite a bit of money in the process. Today, Heroku is putting the spotlight back on features again, with the launch of the public beta its larger 2X dynos, which, in some ways, will also help alleviate the job queuing issues that sparked the recent debate.

The 2X dynos (dynos are basically the containers that run an application process on Heroku) will offer exactly what the name implies: twice the memory (1GB instead of 512MB) and also twice as many CPU shares as the basic dynos (now called 1X). During the beta phase, the 2X dynos will cost the same as $0.05 per hour as the 1X dynos. After that, they will cost, as their name implies, $0.10 per hour. Heroku is also exploring the option to launch even larger dynos (4X+) in the future.

Heroku argues that these larger dynos will allow for increasing concurrency on single-threaded Rails apps using the Unicorn HTTP server for Rack applications. Heroku also says that the larger dynos will work well for JVM languages that can take advantage of the vertical scale the 2X dynos provide. In addition, the company says, this should help with performing memory-intensive background jobs for image processing and geospatial processing.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

At least Facebook didn’t break anything, but the extra feeds and search box it recently launched have yet to drastically improve my experience. The homepage redesign is pretty, but I keep forgetting the Photos and Music feeds exist since they’re buried in the sidebar. And Graph Search is great when I need it, but I rarely do. With some design tweaks, though, Facebook could unleash the potential of its hard work.

When you’re talking about a service where one-seventh of the world’s population has developed deeply ingrained behaviors, not screwing up is kind of an accomplishment. There are a dozen ways Facebook could have made its new features overbearing or interruptive. They’re not, or at least don’t seem like it to me. Both are rolled out to just a tiny percentage of all users, though, so if there’s panic and outrage to be had, it’s still on the horizon. Here’s what the homepage looks like if you have both of the new features. Note that even among the few people with the rollouts, there are many different design variants in testing.

The feed redesign and Graph Search aren’t steroids for your social network, all juiced up and braggadocious. They’re more like a nice pair of running shoes. They’ll improve your performance, but they need breaking in and they’ll only help if you remember to wear them.

But that means their true value will be overlooked by most, like a pair of sneakers left in the closet. Just some quick-fading feel-good novelty. That’s a shame for two products Facebook spent a helluva lot of time and money developing and that could make the service much better. With any luck, Mark Zuckerberg and company will be able to strike a design balance that serves their purpose without making them imposing.

Graph Search already got a subtle but significant tweak last week. Rather than search prompt text floating in the blue sea of Facebook’s top navigation bar, some Graph Search users now see an anchored navy box. It’s a bit more obvious that it’s something you should actually, you know, click.

Still, Graph Search’s greatest barrier to usage is unfamiliarity with pecking in semantic queries like “Cafes in San Francisco visited by friends of friends.” Facebook has tried to school us with blog posts of suggested searches and automatically opening a random results page when you click the Browse bookmark in the sidebar.

To make people really grasp the potential of Graph Search and purposefully contribute, it may need to be a bit more forceful. One way would be to pre-populate the search box with a great sample query rather than the generic “Search for people, places, and things.” A single click would show off the unique strength of its Unicorn search engine, and the prompt’s presence could spark our imaginations.

Another way would be creating a graphical user interface for Graph Search — a series of check boxes you could toggle to formulate a query. It could be like Facebook’s old Advanced Search page. Select ‘Places’ then ‘Cafes’, ‘visited’ rather than ‘liked’, ‘friends of friends’, and ‘San Francisco’ rather than other popular cities or places you’ve lived. Voilà, the GUI query builder constructs “Cafes in San Francisco visited by friends of friends.” That could be much easier for some people while simultaneously teaching them how to search semantically. It could all be stowed within a Graph Search drop-down.

So what about the feeds? When I talked to one of Facebook’s lead designers at a party at Facebook’s Austin office, he said the biggest question is how to remind people these powerful new content-specific feeds exist without cluttering the homepage or making everyone feel overwhelmed.

On mobile that won’t be as much of a problem, as Facebook confirmed to me the feed selector will sit right at the top of the news feed / homepage. But right now on the web, the folded-up feed selector slapped in the sidebar is far too easy to ignore. At first it only shows one additional feed to choose until you click to slide it open. Start scrolling down the homepage and the selector minimizes to just the currently viewed feed.

Despite my voracious Facebook usage and hyper-awareness of the new feeds (I know – I just won’t shut up about this social network), I’ve only opened them a handful of times. They’re not annoying me, so uh, kudos, but with the current design they might not give Facebook’s time-on-site and engagement much of a boost. I’m not going to make you cringe with my crummy mockups, but I bet Facebook could dream up an interface that gets me exploring these new content streams more often.

Extra feeds could make Facebook even more informative, and Graph Search could squeeze fresh utility from its vast data set. Their back-ends are built. Now Facebook just has to fiddle with their designs until they’re firmly cemented in our cerebral cortexes. Most of us could Like a status or scroll through photos in our sleep. Let’s see if these new features can become a reflex, too.

Additional reading:

Facebook Launches “Graph Search” To Give You Answers, Not Links Like Google

Facebook Graph Search Makes Privacy Seem Selfish

Facebook Launches Feeds For Photos, Music, Friends-Only, And More

Facebook’s Riskiest Bet Yet. Can It Uproot A Billion People’s Behavior?

[Image Credit: Mark Tedin / Magic The Gathering]

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

The Wii U only sold around 64,000 consoles in the U.S. during the month of February, according to a new NPD Group report out today. That’s a far cry short of how many sales it achieved from the time it launched through the end of last year, Ars Technica reports, and it even looks like it’ll be under Nintendo’s own projected sales estimates, which it revised down at the end of January.

This should be taken as a wake-up call for Sony and Microsoft as they undertake the process of launching their own next-generation consoles, which began with Sony’s unveiling (without an unveiling) of the PS4 this past February. It should also act as a clarion call for independent hardware makers and software developers: the flagging interest in mainstream gaming platform means opportunity for startups.

Ouya is still being treated with a healthy dose of skepticism from many industry watchers, and while it may not be the one to succeed, the concept is sound. People who are now used to free-to-play and extremely inexpensive games on their mobile devices would likely feel most comfortable with a similar sort of offering based around their home living room entertainment setup.

Other opportunities like the ISP-based cloud-streaming of games that Agawi has in mind could present more opportunity for developers looking to spread their mobile titles to other platforms. And the increased commitment to technologies like AirPlay and Miracast are helping bring mobile gaming to the TV more easily. Samsung also demonstrated that it’s fully committed to making its Galaxy line a full-featured mobile console alternative, with the introduction of a new Bluetooth controller designed to cradle and work with the Galaxy S 4.

A lot of people argue that comparing console gaming to mobile gaming is comparing apples to oranges, but consider that the iPhone didn’t exist when the Wii originally launched, and the same goes for the Xbox 360 and the PS3. Discounting the effect of mobile tech on this market is sticking your head in the sand at this point, but that’s great news for startups and independents hoping to make a dent in the gaming world.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Mark Suster (@msuster), a 2x entrepreneur, now VC at GRP Partners. Read more about Suster on his Startup Advice blog: Both Sides of the Table

By now many of you know the Harlem Shake.

It is a YouTube phenomenon that in just two weeks has gone from nothing to on air on both Jon Stewart & Stephen Colbert and collectively the Harlem Shake has been viewed around 200 million times. Two weeks. 200 million views. Suck it traditional TV.

But there is a much broader trend to be aware of and what we have seen on YouTube has mirrored my general views on how TV will work in the future.

Summary Version
Global audiences of prosumer video producers will create content that is viewed by global audiences in numbers far in excess of traditional TV. TV will enter the era of “participation” which is a much more important trend than “social video” even if it seems less sexy or less fundable.

It means the “torso TV” consumption patterns will be more important than the head or the long tail for the next era of media companies.

TV of the future will not always have linear stories. I know that’s hard for many people to accept but when the medium changes from one-way broadcast to the millions to the ability to interact with each other through video it is unlikely that the future will resemble the past. Why would it?

I have started thinking about what the future might look like and I’ve started imagining what I call, “MMOV” or massive multiplayer online video.

Sure, the revenue & margin will be significantly lower than traditional TV.  You should only worry about this if you’re a large, traditional media company with fat margins. The future of TV will follow the rule of Deflationary Economics as I outline influenced by the book The Innovator’s Dilemma.

It will enable the naturally creative but geographically and socially disenfranchised to make money doing what they love – participating. Maybe small amounts of money for what founders reading these pages dream of but life-changing for many.

Gangnam Style Meets Torso TV
Of course you know Gangnam Style, which is now the most viewed video in history at 1.3 billion views. Before this South Korean wonder spread across the globe I had written about a trend in global audiences that exists when the costs of production are nearly zero and the costs of distribution are also nearly free. I called this trend “Torso TV” because the “head” of consumption (largest number of views) was dominated by platforms that had massive distribution (think TV stations, radio or retail outlets that sell CDs and DVDs. think Apple. think Amazon) and therefore hits with high production costs were more suited to the medium.

The problem with the “long tail” content is that only the platform provider (ie YouTube) makes money. So if you want to be a content producer and want to make money you can develop content for global “niches” of watchers who might like: Japanese Anime, South Korean drama, Bollywood productions, reality TV on any topic – fashion, cooking, travel.

I saw this trend with the growth of companies such as Viki, Drama Fever, Crunchyroll and the like. Global niches that turn out to be much larger than you’d imagine.

Gangnam Style is the manifestation of this trend which turned what should have likely been a medium size global audience into an global phenomenon like we’ve never seen. The Macarena on steroids. Every now and again you can strike lightning in a bottle. Who knows why hits turn into memes? But it shows that when content is unleashed we can all appreciate it no matter of the country of origin.

Harlem Shake
For those who still don’t know the origins, the Harlem Shake started as a small skit from a YouTuber named Filthy Frank (10 million views as of this writing) on January 30, 2013. It was then popularized into an Internet meme 3 days later by text an Australian group of guys called Sunny Coast Shake  in what garnered about 300,000 views in a short period of time (now at 11.3 million views).

But then the Harlem Shake went batshit crazy when Vernon Shaw of Maker Studios saw the video on Reddit and suggested that Maker should, well, make a video of the Harlem Shake in an office environment. That video is the most viewed Harlem Shake (with more than 15 million views as of today). It was loaded on the channel of Hi I’m Rawn, a long-time YouTuber.

At 12.30pm in the afternoon the idea to create the video was hatched. They taped it at 3.30pm for 2 minutes. 1 take. Then back to work, people!

It was uploaded at around 4pm.

Maker’s talent started commenting on it and sharing it. ShayCarl (a Maker Studios co-founder) in particular. And then …

Boom.

It made national news. Maker was contacted by every major news outlet. And suddenly every office in the country was doing their own version of the Harlem Shake.

And here’s the thing. This is not Gangnam Style, a catchy tune consumed by billions.

This is Harlem Shake, a catchy tune produced by tens of thousands. As of this writing nearly 50,000 versions have been created and uploaded and watched by some 200,000,000 people. Yes. Two followed by eight zeros.

It is the production angle that is most fascinating to me and the biggest unspotted trend by most venture capitalists and traditional media executives.

I have been talking about the battle for the living room for years and then followed up with Why the TV Market is Ready for Disruption with a more recent discussion about Hollywood vs. Silicon Valley here (the video version with an LA interview that can be viewed here and then a subsequent session in NYC with Jon Miller which can be viewed here).

And I’ve opined on why the traditional media companies aren’t well poised to win at this new TV world. and again here.

So here’s the thing

The Broader Trend
While way too many startup companies (and investors) are focused on “social TV” or on “Instagram for TV” I believe they are missing the more fundamental shift in our industry.

There is a world filled with professional producers of video content who are extraordinarily talented but lack access to Hollywood. In fact, that’s how Maker Studios got started in the first place.

I first wanted to invest in this trend by backing a company called Filmaka. I didn’t end up investing but I always loved the concept. They help find talented film makers globally, enter them into competitions and advance the best of them toward winners that get to produce full-length films. Filmaka is the creation of Deepak Nayar who is the producer of films such as Buena Vista Social Club and Bend it Like Beckham.

But when you think about the movement we once called “Web 2.0″ it was the recognition of the fact that media doesn’t only want to flow one way.

Media in an age of:

• low-cost capture from mobile devices
• cheap post-production process by tools (think Pro Tools for audio, Instagram filters)
• cheap local storage (without which media creation is not possible)
• available bandwidth for uploading (which is assumed away as easy but only in recent years has been solved. most Internet connections have been asymmetric & optimized for downloads)
• cheap or free cloud storage (YouTube, DropBox, Facebook)
• easy sharing (through social networks or platforms like YouTube)
• social amplification (from which memes are spread) by Twitter and the like; and …
• commenting

means specifically one thing. People are going to want to participate. Participation. We are the media. We want to be in it. Create it. Take part in it. Have a say, a vote. Think American Idol voting, where the audience gets to feel like they’re participating. And where they’re willing to pay by dialing a paid number to feel like they’re, well, participating.

And the end of the Maker Studios show, Epic Rap Battles of History, the end the show ways “Who won, you decide?” where the audience gets to weigh in. Participation. At whatever level.

Serialized TV with Audience Participation
I’ve been thinking a lot about what I want to fund in the video creation world. One idea I’ve been searching for is a platform that enables the creation of serialized programs with audience participation.

And this is a concept that has been at work since at least the 17th century. An example of a great serialist was Charles Dickens in which Oliver Twist & Nicholas Nickleby and others were written and distributed serially.

From Wikipedia on Charles Dickens

“The instalment format allowed Dickens to evaluate his audience’s reaction, and he often modified his plot and character development based on such feedback”

I have talked to several YouTuber’s about my idea but haven’t yet gotten any takers.

Here’s what I imagine. You create a narrative episodic show and do the first four episodes to get the story arc and characters going. On the fifth episode the audience gets to create it’s version of the next show. You look at submissions and pick the best one. You reshoot that episode with a higher budget and your original cast but that producer now gets a financial take in the show or gets to participate in the production or whatever. Then you move on to the sixth show with new submissions.

You need to build a platform that allows submissions, workflow, multiple story flows, awards, producer profiles and the like. It can’t just be videos on YouTube but I’ll be that YouTube is the distribution platform.

Here’s the thing – if well done I think you could see the Harlem Shake effect where many people want to have a go at participating on the production. Most won’t be of the quality that you want but you now have tons of material and inspiration for your show and you own all of the submitted IP. You share financial results and/or fame as the incentive to participate. It’s American Idol for makers.

The first time you do it the participation will be light. The next time you’ll get more. And the fan producers all help market your show because they too want the attention. Whether they are selected or not! I repeat – free marketing. Done by the masses.

And finally you could stitch together multiple narratives or versions of shows for people who WANT to watch all of the derivative shows. Your costs of production of these additional versions – zero.

To all of the traditional TV people who keep telling me this “low cost, low quality YouTube content will eventually go away. The production quality is terrible” I say, “Please study The Innovator’s Dilemma because it predicts the disruption of your industry presciently.” Let me remind you of the math: Gangnam Style = 1.3 billion views. Each episode of Epic Rap Battles of History gets between 30,000,000 – 75,000,000 views.

And to those who keep telling me that the CPMs are too low to make a business please stop thinking about two-way entertainment in only CPM terms.  There are many more ways to monetize an audience of fans that simply pre-roll ads.

Think creatively. Study the video game industry. The music industry. Your world is changing, too. And you have so many examples from which to build your future that you have no excuse to put your head in the sand.

MMOV
The other theme I’ve been playing around with in my head (and in the numerous debates with media execs who aspire to do startups) I’ve started calling MMOV.

It’s a play on MMOG (massive multiplayer online games, think World of Warcraft).

What exactly is World of Warcraft?

It’s entertainment. With rich graphics and characters. It has a story, a world, that unfolds. It has interaction with other players. It is – by definition – participation. It exists precisely because there is a network. I grew up in the era where we got to play video games alone. I was inspired by Zork. It was a computer challenging my imagination and crying out for logic and participation. It was text-based. And anything but MM or O. But it scratched the same need – participation. Engagement.

And when the O is attached and thus other humans are on the other end of your game and when graphics are professional it is the ultimate in computer entertainment with other human beings letting young people all over the world who feel disconnected from other human beings form friendships.

I once heard a father describe how his son played World of Warcraft. He said this to me, which formed an impression, “My son leaves World of Warcraft to play other video games with his friends. But then they always come back to World of Warcraft to talk about it with their friends. WoW is their home base.”

So WoW in a way is his son’s social network.

I imagine MMOV this way.

You start out watching video. And this might be humans but it might also be animation. It might feel like TV or might feel like an animated video game or maybe there is no difference? You start watching with friends, peers or strangers – who might become friends or peers in the future (think that’s weird? check your Twitter stream. It’s filled with people like this. Aren’t all online communities like this?).

You watch the first “episode” together. Then you discuss it with those in the room with you. They are watching it synchronously. It is your job to get them watch the next video based on plot or character development you want to see. Which way do you go next? The audience decides.

And the show develops like this. No linearity. Only the evolution through a video game board with other players trying to agree how the story unfolds. Maybe for a fee you get to choose your own direction without the crowd?

Don’t like how Homeland has become a total farce like 24? Chart a different path. Don’t like that a characters in Downton Abbey gets killed or another might get banished from employment? Chart a different course.

In an online world, why wouldn’t we?

Television today is being charted by those who grew up in a one-way world of: we decide, we write, we broadcast. Doesn’t that sound like the websites of yore that implored us to read their stories?

We have too much evidence from the text-based Internet that this model doesn’t hold in an online world.

Think Zork. It’s how things were. Then think World of Warcraft. It’s how things will be. It’s why we use Twitter, Facebook, Instagram. To be part of a conversation. And even if it’s only very occasionally that you want to chime in, it’s why UGC works. 1/9/90.

And read this MG Siegler piece on TechCrunch. He’s one step ahead of the rest of the market. And he’s spot on with this analysis about how Apple will enter the TV market. Spoiler – video games.

Online Events
Finally, I’m fascinated with the future of live events. We’ve only just scratched the surface. As you now know 8 million people tuned in to watch Felix Baumgartner jump from 24 miles above the Earth in a Red Bull capsule.

It will always be a milestone in the Internet, YouTube, Twitter, Mobile world etched in my memory. And that of my two boys.

Like many of you we were laying around watching NFL football games. And also paying attention to the Twitter. Watching only is so one-way. With our second screen we suddenly have … participation.

And that’s where I first saw it. I know many of you knew the Felix was going to jump. I hadn’t been paying attention.

But Twitter cried out that I MUST! Tune in. NOW. As only Twitter can dictate.

So on my iPhone I clicked on a link and saw Felix going up. WTF? What is that guy doing?

I called my boys over. We sat transfixed to my iPhone. Was he really jumping from outer space? Is this real? Is this really live? Did I just click on a button and watch a man prepared to jump from that little capsule watching real-time streaming from my mobile device that I only knew about because random people (some of whom I’ve never met in real life) demanded that I do so on Twitter?

I was sincerely amazed by all of those things. And we watched. And watched. And watched. And the NFL seemed so uninteresting at that moment. I’ll never remember who was playing or who won (probably not the Eagles).

But along with 8 million people globally we shared a moment. And then another 32 million people (at least) watched on YouTube afterward.

That fascinates me. Twitter. YouTube. Mobile. Live. Watch this space. It’s going to form a larger part of our future.

Oh. And it won’t be brought to you by Comcast. That interests me, too.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

A new patent filing uncovered by AppleInsider today shows that the company is still thinking about ways to upgrade the smartphone camera experience and deliver the best possible pictures you can get on a mobile phone. The invention would make it so that as soon as you open up the camera app on your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad, the device starts grabbing full-resolution pics and storing them to a memory buffer, meaning when you finally push the shutter you’ll have a wealth of different images to choose from.

The design would use continuous image capture to try to improve quality, and to compensate for what are currently essential failings in the way mobile photography works. For instance, Apple’s patent describes how when taking a photo, the camera’s virtual “viewfinder” shows a partial resolution version of what’s being captured, and then when the shutter is pressed there’s a delay as it switches to full resolution mode to actually take the pic, which means what you see is not often what you get. If camera software begins immediately snapping high-res photos and storing them to a temporary cache, it should be able to match the proper frame with the moment a user intended to capture.

Apple’s system would select from the buffer of photos based on timing, but also on quality. It would score images automatically based on factors like contrast, resolution, dynamic range, exposure time and more to try to logically derive which is the best, most in-focus shot. The device will then purge the memory buffer after a certain amount of time, or when it hits a pre-set threshold to clear room for future captures. In one of the embodiments, the user is given a full resolution preview to approve or deny immediately after the photo is taken, and then presumably presented with other options.

It’s a technology that could easily be integrated into iOS without much outward change, but it would likely merit some fanfare from Apple if it were already in use, especially now that Android and other OEMs are beginning to compete more aggressively for consumer attention with advancements to onboard mobile camera tech. And others in the industry are already using similar technology to accomplish different things: BlackBerry 10′s face selection for Z10 camera pics is one example, and Nokia uses much the same technology in its own Windows Phone 8 devices, after it acquired the company that created the system in the first place.

Picking the best of multiple exposures is one way to improve on mobile camera tech, but it’s not the only means. There are plenty of other improvements which could make considerable differences, including Lytro, which is clearly interested in licensing its selective focus tech to OEMs once it’s ready. But the camera is an area where iterating quickly can have a big impression on consumers with each successive hardware generation; improving things on either the hardware or software side is imperative if Apple wants to keep ahead of the game, and this patent (filed in October of 2012) indicates it’s actively working to make sure that happens.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

Facebook’s newest feature Graph Search (so new it’s still in beta) can apparently tell you lots of stuff. Which of your friends are into surfing, hiking or drinking cups of tea. Or, delving into darker territory, which of your friends are sexist or racist — as this Gizmodo article points out. (Ewww.) But Graph Search also shines a massive illuminating spotlight on something else: why Snapchat has captured people’s imagination. And the answer is simple: because it does something Facebook does not. It lets data disappear, rather than stockpiling it until it starts to stink.

Snapchat is a photo-messaging app that lets you send a missive that automatically deletes itself after a set amount of time (from one to 10 seconds). Which means your Snapchat buddies’ proclivities and peccadilloes linger mostly in your memory (and any screengrabs/photos you’ve been able to take – but that’s a whole other story). Snapchat’s existence — and apparent popularity — is fascinating in an age of indelible digital footprints. YOU may not remember that in 2007 you (jokily) liked ‘Barbara Cartland novels’ on Facebook but Facebook sure as hell does. And now that we have Graph Search lots of other folks can know something about you that isn’t true.

Facebook’s algorithm isn’t actually that clever, so it can’t figure out that you were being ironic when you clicked the like button. Leave your humor at the door, all who enter here. (As an aside, there is a huge festering issue for Facebook and its advertisers in the form of so-called ‘dirty data’ – the site is awash with people playing deliberately fast and loose with the truth. Teenage girls who are ‘married’ to their BFFs. People who work at ‘Rydell High’ or ‘Charlie’s Chocolate Factory’. Or who look an awful lot like Brat Pitt. And that’s before you even get to the whole fake likes issue – explored in some detail here. In short: just because it’s called a ‘like’ doesn’t mean someone actually likes it.)

The rise of Snapchat — Google Play lists its Android app as having clocked up between one to five million installations in the past 30 days which, while no Angry Birds, isn’t trivial either — runs counter to claims that young people don’t give a damn about their personal data being perpetually published online. We don’t yet have detailed demographic data on Snapchat users but there’s plenty of anecdotal evidence its use is being driven by teens and young people (13 to 25 year olds). In other words exactly the group who were supposed to have been born post-privacy. Don’t R.I.P. privacy – we’re coming with a shovel to dig you back up.

The surprise success of an app that deletes rather than retains data suggests there is potential for other startups to get themselves noticed by letting data decay. By building more transient, human technology that seeks to mimic the privacy of memories – which remain, for now at least, locked safely in our skulls. Evidently there is an appetite for digital footprints that – like a real footprint – gently fade and crumble away, leaving little or no trace of your passing. After all, even Facebook decided it needed to clone Snapchat – with Poke. So let me say that again: startups, there’s an opportunity here. Think about ways to humanise technology. To make it a little bit more forgetful, a little less 1984. Seize the day. And you too might have Zuck and Co. running scared.

Technology that’s a little more human, a little less stalkerish could have a very bright future, indeed. Especially as more and more companies start to join the dots of people’s personal data – illuminating the implications of continuing to contribute to a single catch-all data bank. What is actually in it for the user? Not necessarily much of value when that data is dubious or paranoid or both. I explained Graph Search to a twentysomething U.K. Facebook user who grew up using the service as a teenager. Her response was a question: “How does this Graph Search benefit the people who use Facebook?” How indeed. If you aren’t already aware that your surf board-owning friend likes surfing, or your travel-mad friend went to New York City for New Year’s Eve, are you sure you’re actually friends with them?

After Facebook unveiled Graph Search, my colleague Josh Constine argued that not sharing your likes on Facebook is now a selfish act because you’re depriving humanity of your own humble contribution, insights, knowledge, tastes and so on. In my view the exact opposite is true: by sharing anything on Facebook you risk over-sharing more than ever – which means that Facebook risks making more of its users think long and hard about every little thing they contribute to its data banks. The visibility of Graph Search contributions can apparently be controlled in the privacy settings, but as is always the case with Facebook and privacy, it’s not immediately obvious who will be able to see what — meaning you have to put the leg work in figuring this stuff out on Facebook’s behalf. And that’s just annoying. This uber joined-up social network is hacking your life back together without asking – and probably making a hash of it (i.e. you) in the process.

Tools such as Graph Search – and more broadly, whole social networks designed to make it easy to browse through large chunks of personal data, chronologically and/or by slicing and dicing it in various ways, while simultaneously making it insanely complex to opt out of putting personal stuff in the public domain (networks which take individual bits of data and sew them together to make a Franken-YOU) – are playing with fire. And promising far more than they can realistically deliver.

By contrast, one of the best things about Twitter is that it knows the importance of limits: 140 characters per post, and a site structure designed to take time and effort to go delving back into a user’s catalogue of tweets adds up to a service that feels more respectful of its users.

Cumulative, joined-up data is simply not the same beast as data that’s distributed and at least partially disconnected. And by pretending that joining up all those disconnected dots is no big deal, Facebook is being dishonest and dumb. Plenty of people won’t care what quasi-identity Facebook gives them, but there will be others who decide there’s no benefit to them of being on Facebook’s public record. Indeed, that removing their contribution is the most sensible response to its behaviour. In real life only stalkers and psychos keep databases on their friends.

Share out pieces of a jigsaw puzzle between your friends, family, lovers and strangers and it would need a freak accident to gather the whole odd-ball collection in one place to put the picture together. But even that metaphor is way too simplistic. The point is: there is no one you. And any algorithm that tries to create one by joining your disparate dots is pitifully reductive – and doomed to fail by overpromising, under delivering and being really really creepy while it flounders around trying to impress you.

Article courtesy of TechCrunch

I’ve signed into Myspace using my Facebook account. They said you could use your Myspace ID, but apparently, my memory doesn’t stretch that far back. The site asks me to identify myself. Am I “curator?” A “venue?” A “brand?” Nope, but funny that all those choices are above “fan.” I decide to be more honest, and select “writer/journalist” because it’s the closest thing to “blogger.”

I’m in. Justin Timberlake is staring at me. It’s a little intimidating. He looks angry that I’m here, even though it’s supposed to be my own homepage.

There’s a play button to hear his new song. A link to buy it on iTunes.

I don’t care for Timberlake’s music, but I’m not quite sure how to make him go away. Is the new Myspace just a giant ad for Timberlake? I wonder, while starting to look for other content. Or maybe Justin is just the new Tom. Everyone’s first friend. Tom seemed so much happier, though. More carefree.

The homepage doesn’t fit on the screen of my MacBook Pro 15-inch. I have to scroll over to the instructions. Discover, Search, Connect, the site says. The design is beautiful, I have to admit, if a bit odd with its horizontal scrolling and disjointed navigation.

Where to begin?

Discover. Here, Myspace promises I can “find emerging artists.” I remember when it used to do that. It was what it was known for. Okay, I’d like to find some emerging artists, I think. I click the link.

There are four: Little Night Terrors, Parker Ighile, Buke & Gase, and Ester Dean. Big pictures, each with a little blurb.

Wait, how does Myspace know I would like these?

Is everyone seeing the same ones? Did Justin pick them out for me? Are my friends listening to these guys? I have no context here. I don’t understand why they’re recommended. I decide to move on.

Alicia Keys and another Justin (this time, Bieber), are peering out from the side of the page. I’m curious. They aren’t emerging artists. Didn’t I just click a link that clearly read “Find emerging artists”? I scroll to the left, and there’s a long list of well-known names. A seemingly endless list, actually. It’s all the top artists on the website. It stops at 198, Gucci Mane, if you’re wondering. I guess “Discover” includes finding the artists you already know, too. Good to know.

But I want to really discover. Maybe it gets better when you add friends, I think. Maybe then, like Spotify, you can peer into what other people are listening to. Otherwise, I’m probably going to end up playing 90′s rock, reminiscing, hoping for a grunge comeback.

How do I get back to my profile? I mistakenly click the Myspace logo. (How rebellious of them to put it counterintuitively at the bottom of the page.)

Oh, I’m back to Justin. He’s still just so angry. Maybe that’s his smolder. I don’t know. Am I too old to be here?

I distract myself in the Settings for a minute. Edit Profile. Edit Cover Image. Image must be at least 1024