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For many people, Twitter offers a larger, more diverse stream of constantly flowing data than they've ever had to deal with before in their life. Depending on how many people you follow and how much they tweet, the information can become unmanageable. To that end, we have user lists, third-party clients, Twitter tools and search. And today, it looks like Twitter has begun working on making this last option - search - more useful for its users by offering the ability to percolate popular search results to the top of the page. Sponsor Jennifer Van Grove at Mashable noticed an update in the Twitter API Google Group this morning that alerts us of a soon-to-come search feature - popular tweets. From the post on Google Groups: Until the popular tweet feature all search results have been sorted chronologically, most recent results at the top. If a search query has any popular results, those will be returned at the top, even if they are older than the other results. Basically, the API will now offer a variable named "result_type" that can will return either "popular" or "recent". Programs will be able to use the variable to either return search results with popular tweets at the top as default, show only popular results or show only recent results. Also added to the Twitter API this week are two other variables for the retweet API. The first will return up to the first 100 user representations of those who have retweeted the tweet specified in the url by :status_id. The second will return just the ids of those retweeters for the cases where that's all you care about. Perhaps these have some sort of implication in how tweets will be deemed popular, but even if not, it could be useful in watching the trickle-down spread of a tweet. Discuss
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Twitter Search Is About Popularity
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Today at the South By South West festival in Austin, three finalists competed in the Microsoft BizSpark Accellerator finals in the "Innovative Web Technologies" category. The companies, RecycleMatch , Siri and Skimble argued their positions on stage in front of three judges and tonight the winner will be announced at 6pm CST. Sponsor The Accelerator competition is in its second year and started out with a list of 32 finalist companies in three categories. While all three categories have some strong entries, we wanted to check out the innovative technologies to see what was, well, innovative. RecycleMatch First, Chad Farrell, co-founder of RecycleMatch, showed off the web solution that we hope takes off solely so it can help save the world. RecycleMatch, the only of the three that is not an iPhone app, is an online marketplace that helps match up waste materials with recyclers and manufacturers that need those materials. "There's really no place to do this now," said Farrell. "Let's say I've got this piece of polyester fiber waste but I don't know anyone around who can use it. It's the perfect use of the internet - to connect people like that." We can see this not only having a great impact on the world, but certainly stepping into the ever popular "green" genre and sticking around. Siri Up next was Dag Kittlaus with the digital, voice-activated personal assistant software Siri. We think Kittlaus' introduction says it best: "For decades, Hollywood has been paintinh this picture of machine assistants with Hal 9000 - what Siri is doing is taking some steps to make that a reality," Kittlaus said. As our own Frederic Lardinois has written before about the iPhone app, Siri is "one of the most ambitious mobile services we have seen in the last few years." You simply hold the phone up, hit a button, and tell it what you need and it translates your speech into text, uses natural language processing algorithms to determine what you need and then launches the appropriate services. Whether you want to schedule a taxi pick-up, make a dinner reservation or remind yourself of that Monday morning appointment, just ask Siri and it will do it. "What if you could make it easy to ask your phone to do something?" asked Kittlaus. "It's all about simplification." While the app looks to simplify your life, the technology behind it is anything but simple and it makes us feel a little bit like we've finally arrived in the future. Skimble The final contestant to take the stage was Skimble and if there's one thing we can say, it's that co-founder Maria Ly did it with style, back-flipping and dancing to the 'Mission Impossible' theme song before putting both legs behind her head and doing push-ups. Yes, you heard that right - she did push-ups with both legs behind her head. This woman is living what she's preaching, that we can attest to. "We would like to inspire active lifestyles across the board," she started off in her explanation. Skimble is a hybrid social network, physical fitness tracking app, that lets you track your physical activities, whether running, doing yoga, or playing kickball and compete with your friends. As you keep track of your activities, you can compare with your friends on a leaderboard and even compete to win real-world prizes. As with Siri, Skimble is primarily an iPhone app, although it has an accompanying website with additional features. Our Pick We have to say, Siri takes the cake in this category and we're going to have to call it early. If the digital personal assistant doesn't take the prize, then it's only because it's too good and just doesn't need the start-up funding to continue. That almost seemed to be the line of questioning from the judges - why would something as impressive as Siri need to win this competition, with the funding and functionality it's already showing? All Siri needs to do, in reality, is start a bidding war between Google and Apple and it has it made, the judges half-jokingly but half-seriously said during the on-stage interview. For the final word on what company will take the top prize, watch live tonight at 6 pm CST or check out the Microsoft BizSpark Accelerator page. Discuss
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BizSpark Accelerator Finalists: Our Pick for 'Most Innovative Web Technology'
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Andrew Keen is no stranger to controversy. He has irritated bloggers by equating Web 2.0 with communism and enraged citizen journalists with his best selling book, Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet is Killing Our Culture . Naturally when I saw Keen's core conversation "Is Innovation Fair?" on the SXSW program, I knew it would incite lively discussion. Sponsor SXSW and the term "read-write web" are perhaps the antithesis of what Keen has become known for. While we as a publication (and often as a community) celebrate the participatory culture of Web 2.0, Keen sees the rise of amateur publishers as the fetishism of change-based culture and the breakdown of centralized moral authority. In less diplomatic circles, he's accused of being an elitist. When an intimate 40 person setting of bloggers like Stealthmode Partners' Francine Hardaway and legendary futurist Bruce Sterling failed to erupt into an angry mob, I was surprised. In addressing the question "Is Innovation Fair?" Keen maintains that there is no definitive answer. He says, "If you asked a peasant whether innovation was fair during the industrial revolution, he'd answer no. But history is written by innovators." Keen explains that the voices that have legitimized change from the industrial revolution to the late 60's, have been those of the cultural elite. Professional poets, musicians, academics and writers have always had a place in creating the histories surrounding major paradigm shifts. Nevertheless, as the digital revolution rapidly destroys the barriers to creating historical narratives, a new elitism has emerged in the form of a-list bloggers, social media experts and web developers. While digital utopians generally see technological innovations and social media as vehicles for democracy and positive solutions, Keen argues that the proponents of innovation tend to forget the victims of change. "Innovation doesn't lead to justice and fairness. I'd argue there is a more dramatic inequality now then there ever was during the industrial revolution. We have fetishized change, but we are unfettered. If anything, the new media is less transparent and less accountable...I don't have a problem with Twitter or new media, my problem is that digital utopians have dressed up their ideology to sound like democracy...Google has become the master of seeming like an altruistic and public company and yet laughing all the way to the bank." Keen argues that because established elites are being displaced by the digerati, the web ecosystem is suffering from a crisis in authority. He believes that a lack of thoughtful skepticism and the overwhelming emphasis on real-time sound bites rather than academic treatise is leading to the vast majority of netizens consuming only mulched versions of the truth. Says Keen, "You can't get nuggets of truth in 30 seconds on Twitter...Skepticism requires deep thinking. We have an increasing nihilism when it comes to traditional authority and yet few of the new authorities are doing the reading or groundwork. ...When we simply assume that all traditional structures are wrong, we risk the populism of a Sarah Palin..." As a blog with an audience of entrepreneurs, self-publishers and technologists, we know Keen won't hold you back from innovating. But he may make you question whether or not you have enough information to accurately assess your life decisions. Love him or loathe him, let us know your thoughts about Keen's assertions in the comments below. Discuss
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Is Innovation Fair? Andrew Keen Says No
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Last week we talked about managing split teams with Danny Wong of Blank Label , a site for creating custom men's dress shirts and a startup in the growing field of co-creation. These types of startups, which have gained more traction overseas than in the U.S., run on a model of on-demand production, which allows them to become cash-flow positive in a relatively short period of time. Wednesday I had the chance to talk about co-creation with Carmen Magar, a German woman living in New York who works for chocri , a German startup that sells customizable chocolates. Sponsor According to Magar, Germany is quickly becoming a hub for co-creation startups while the U.S. and the U.K. have been much slower to adopt them. Before setting up shop in the U.S., custom t-shirt company Spreadshirt actually began as a startup in Germany. Magar, who has spent significant amounts of time in both countries, says that while the difference in cultures has been an influence, the main reason that co-creation has taken off in Germany is the country's smaller market which allows startups to make a larger impact. "What happened in Germany is that there were a lot of startups doing co-creation; a lot of companies that didn't have a production process in place that were really flexible and could talk to their customers directly," Magar told ReadWriteWeb on Wednesday. "In the U.S., the way it was proselytized was that soon in the future every big company would change their production process to enable mass customization, but that's actually a really risky thing to do. What I think will happen is that the startups, the small companies that are nimble, will lead the way to bring that control to the consumer." Another reason why co-creation and mass customization may have taken root in Germany is that the country, like many in Europe, suffers from a severe lack of seed level funding, while the U.S. has incubators and VC firms across the country targeting early stage companies. As we mentioned last week with Blank Label, most co-creation startups use a business model that lets them produce products only as they are ordered, keeping costs down and allowing the company to have an early cash flow. In a region like Europe, the need to bootstrap businesses from the ground up like chocri (which started with €25,000) is much higher, and co-creation is a great way to accomplish this. American startups may be less likely to go down the route of co-creation because the investors are more willing to take risks on less proven businesses. Magar, who lived in Germany most of her life and came to America to get her MBA, believes that Germany's propensity towards mass customization is also part of what led chocri to hire her as their representative in America. The company just happened to be looking to expand their presence to the U.S. when Magar called to express her interest in the company. "I think why they chose to have a German on the team is because I saw a lot more of this happen, and I understand more about mass customization," says Magar. "Because I live here I've experienced the American market, but it was more important to them to bring in an understanding of the concept." This is an important concept for startups to grasp, both in the U.S. and abroad. When looking to expand overseas, it is important to find someone with familiarity in both regions who can survey the new market and who can grasp the core values of your business. As a German, Magar completely understood chocri's co-creation strategy, and studying in America made her a great choice to help the company find a presence there. Is co-creation finally beginning to catch on in the U.S. with companies like Spreadshirt and Blank Label? Or perhaps co-creation is more alive in America than we realize? Or is mass customization a startup model that will continue its struggle to gain traction in America? Let us know what you think about co-creation and spreading startups overseas in the comments below! Discuss
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Is America On the Verge of A Co-Creation Invasion?
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