Live from Web 2.0

Tim O'Reilly at web 2.0

Web 2.0 is just kicking off in earnest. Seems like perfect timing for such a conference. The feeling of doing things again, but newer and better is in the air -- and lots of folks are ready to play.

Notes from Tim and John's talk:
  • "Architecture of Participation." Love that.
  • End of the Software Upgrade Cycle
  • Example: "Amazon Chat"?
  • iTunes: First app designed from the get-go to span from the handheld to the server
  • "The Power of the Tail: 1 million sites with 1000 users is far larger than 100 sites with a million users (AdSense, Affiliate models, et al" Hmmm...
...I missed some of the themes. Jeff Bezos:
  • Web 2.0: About making the Internet useful for computers. See amazon.com/webservices
  • 65,000 registered Amazon developers
  • Also launched Alexa web services. Sounds interesting.
  • Example app: Scoutpal.com -- a mobile service for people who find books at, say, garage sales that will look up what you could sell them for on Amazon, so you know if you can make money on it. Wow, neat! ($10/month for service.)
  • Imdb.com has web services, too (used by A9)
  • A9 has drag-and-drop server-side bookmarks, integrated with search. Didn't know that.
  • "It's still day 1, and the snooze alarm hasn't gone off"
Conversation w/Tim and Jeff:
  • "We want to find the useful guts of Amazon and expose them."
  • Tim: Amazon search got worse with search-inside-the-book. (I agree.) Jeff: Search-inside-the-book has improved sales significantly.
That's it for now. Will be a fun conference.