The web's third age may not include facebook

Before I proceed I should probably explain what I'm defining as the third age of the web. I tend to deliberately avoid using the term web 3.0 as I’ve always felt trying to define the web with software upgrade terms is troubling. I do however believe we’ve entered the third age, or at least the third big evolution of the web.

If the first age was the passive published web and the second age - often known as web 2.0 -  was the interactive web then the third age is immersive, omnipresent and enabled by mobile. For want of a better term we’re going to call it the everywhere web.

Erik Jackson at Forbes argues that the first wave web properties failed to make it far past the dotcom bubble into a brave new web 2.0 world because of the time and way they were conceived. In a similar vein Facebook may have exactly the same problem in evolving from the second stage to the third stage.

Facebook was at the vanguard of creating the ultimate web 2.0 experience, but because they have had to back fill on their mobile experience it would appear that they are struggling to fit into a world where the web is everywhere. The mobile experience continues to be frustrating and fractured when compared with the desktop experience and in a world that is increasingly going mobile the massive focus on timeline implementation seems a little odd.

As we’ve mentioned in previous weeks the lack of mobile innovation at Facebook caused concern in the run up to last week’s IPO and the scrabbling that seemed to be going on with the purchase of Instagram and the announcement of App Centre seemed to suggest they knew it. Last night in a slightly bizarre move Facebook announced the launch of Facebook camera, an Instagram clone that appears to have been in development prior to the Instagram purchase which goes someway to explaining the huge sale price. However, at first glance it lacks many of the really good aspects of its acquisition.

The struggle that Facebook seem to be having with mobile, coupled with some of the criticism levelled at it since its stuttering IPO, about being just another ad funded site add up to problems. When MIT and Forbes are saying that you’re going to disappear and each for different reasons it’s time to start worrying.

1:9:90 - you're so 2006.

Used the 1:9:90 model for participation model recently?

Felt slightly uncomfortable with the figures as intuitively thes figures simply don't feel right?

 Enter stage right Holly Goodier, Head of Audiences at BBC Future Media. She presents the results of an 18 month study of 7,500 individuals resulting in that old model being blown out of the water.

This fascinating talk reveals that the 1:9 element - the much quoted 10% - of the stat is actually now 77%. The talk is 23 minutes long, but if you're interested in the shape of those contributing on the net this provides most of the answers you've probably been looking for.

The danger of the new digital oligarchies

Last week Samsung launched the Galaxy S3. The handset has been almost universally applauded for its innovative feature set and fantastic application of the Android OS for smartphone. What it also means is that it has effectively consigned Nokia, Sony and other former major mobile telephony players to the margins. Many are also saying it sets up a duopoly in the hardware market between itself and Apple with the iPhone.

This trend is becoming increasingly prevalent in the digital world and even more so online. If you look closely at the traffic on the web, there is a monopolistic trend emerging.

Think social networking, think Facebook, which now controls over 1 in 7 online minutes .

Think search, think Google. Think video delivery, think Youtube. Think shopping, think Amazon. Think reselling, think ebay.

This is not necessarily a huge surprise given the prevalence in Palo Alto of these huge web properties. What is more concerning is just how interconnected (or should we say nepotistic) these companies have become and how reliant successful new startups have become on those company connections. This great mashable infographic  shows just how entangled the big companies and the huge start-ups are.

If you take the recent acquisition of Instagram, Kevin Systrom was an ex. Google employee with strong connections to Facebook and the $1bn purchase price had the feel of a deal made over a chat in a coffee shop -  rather than a full due diligence led process that resulted in a realistic market value.

There is no doubt that many of these services are highly innovative and massively valuable. But, as the industry increasingly eats itself, there is a danger that the dream of an open democratic web where all players have their say and an equal platform, is becoming almost the opposite. The fact that companies are now so reliant on Google and Facebook for their future online success should be a worry. It means that companies are no longer in charge of their own online destiny.

The recent switch by Facebook to timeline is a classic example of the control the platform can exert. Companies had no choice but to spend, in some cases, hundreds of thousands of dollars re-engineering their Facebook presence, so that it existed effectively post-timeline implementation. In turn it means that web users start to experience a very limited view of the world as their experience is controlled through a myriad of different behavioural techniques applied by these key players.

So far, so depressing. Of course there's always a positive side and in this case it comes in the form of this very interesting analysis that came to my attention last week tracking the rise and fall of the web's huge superpowers, since its inception 20 years ago.


Via: CenturyLinkQuote.com

While we should be wary of these emerging monopolies,  online empires have already come and gone and as is the case with most things online, it happens far more quickly than in the offline world.

Loving Spotify play button

Absolutely loving the latest development to come out of Spotify.

Spotify are on a real roll at the moment. The new expanding app suite, the integration through Facebook and now this, 'the play button', making it easy to embed tracks straight into your site.

So below, I've added my - ever-changing - favourite playlist 'Middle Class Dinner Party'. If you have a Spotify account then when you click the play button, Spotify will open (or instantly start playing if Spotify is already running) and then start playing the song or play list. You can pause or skip tracks directly within the player interface or control music through the Spotify desktop app.

And if you want to embed your own stuff take a look here to find out how.

Enjoy.

Patent Battles

BBC News - Patent wars: Stripping the iPhone bare

The battle for content over style plays out in the increasingly bland looking devices.

Google+ launches pages

So five months after it was promised, possibly the most anticipated social platform launch of the year, the great hyperbole that is Google+ pages finally arrived last week.

It met with the now expected polarised coverage from:

"Why Google Plus Pages (Will) Beat Facebook. And Twitter"

to

"Google+ Is Dead"

Frankly how one can make predictions this early on (we smell linkbait) is beyond us.

So the facts are that Pages provide organisations with the ability to broadcast and interact with their customers in much the same way as Facebook pages. As Robert Scoble points out though they currently appear to be more suited to small companies or companies with a small social presence rather than large corporations, as the management options for multiple logins are currently absent meaning companies with advanced social strategies touching many parts of an organisation will find the management tough at present.

These types of tools will arrive over time but for now the key benefit (which is why we can't understand the ‘Google+ is dead’ headlines) is the baked in search boosting tools, which is where Google+ really has an advantage over other social platforms.

Companies that are serious about natural search rankings have the opportunity to really consolidate through their presence on the platform and this is where we think the real growth will start. The attraction of improved natural search will inevitably attract companies to set up stall (61% of the top brands already have) and if they start to run promotions through the platform the users will follow, which means there will be a natural activation of what is currently a relatively inactive Google+ consumer base. Interestingly this is the Facebook growth model in reverse.

So after 5 months of wondering we now know what Google’s ambitions are and the next year is going to be a fascinating spectacle.

The true price of free

If you've visited Facebook or read any business or technology pages in the past couple of weeks you will be well aware that facebook has made one or two changes.

The changes have been discussed at length so we're not going to explore them in any great detail, but instead consider the furore that has engulfed the user community. A survey of 1300 users noted that 84% of the base didn't like the new changes. But so what.

As Adrian Short pointed out last week if you haven't paid for the service then you have no real say. Certainly you don't have rights. As a facebook user you're merely a tenant, you don't pay anything to be there so you need to expect things to change. If you want to control your web experience then you're going to need to be prepared to pay. facebook answers to its advertisers and those advertisers are the ones looking for more time online, better targeting, greater engagement and that is what the interface change is designed to deliver.

The radicalism of the change is something that brands have to be vigilant about. For years facebook has provided a free platform to develop your brand space on. If this is the decision you're making, you need to be prepared for the unexpected. You don't get anything for free and if there is a decision in the future to change things this could affect your wall, your apps or any tools you build in and fundamentally the brand experience you're building. With a long rumoured IPO in the near future, monetising the site has never been more important for facebook and one thing we can expect is more of these types of changes in the future. facebook has been a fantastic innovation for brands, but its best to remember facebook are doing it for facebook not for your brand.