Show Me the Money behind Web 2.0
by Aner Ravon
Oren Friedman is a good friend who lives and works in Vancouver, Canada. Oren is a brilliant, well rounded person who also happens to be a successful Internet professional. Oren wrote me this:
“I’ve been following the blog for a while, and while I agree with many of the technology/product views, I’m somewhat clueless on some of the business aspects of web 2.0 (the word “bubble” comes to mind). Ultimately, you’re looking at either clicks (advertising) or subscriptions (premium accounts). Nothing new there. And as the ICQ folks learned firsthand, consumer loyalty is fickle at best - here today, on to the next one tomorrow. So, other than “great user experience”, “features”, “interfaces” and so on, what is needed is the switching cost component, the lock-in mechanism. Think eBay, which have the best lock-in mechanism all around - market liquidity. (more…)
Aner Ravon
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Can passion be designed into a product?
by Gil Rosen
Thursday March 30th 2006, 5:15 pm
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web 2.0I should probably come clean first. In my “other life” I am a co-founder of a start-up not yet covered in this blog (no big secret other then telling what we exactly do.. www.triplay.com). We are not even in Beta yet (an inch away) but are well into development and have worked a lot of sweat and tears to be where we are. Building a product from scratch is very difficult. Despite frequent popular claims, you must have a really good core idea. You then need to define the problem or situation your are addressing, how your product / service provides significant value etc. but then you already know that. One very important ingredient, however, gets overlooked too often - Passion. Simple, natural, basic passion. How and where does passion squeeze it self into the essence of the product? Everything seems to revolve around the technicalities these modern times. All so rational - define the market, your competitors, the features, the road map. I never, not once, not in a university classroom, text book or a VC meeting heard someone say or ask something about passion. (more…)
Gil Rosen
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eSnips - total can be simple
by Aner Ravon
Friday March 24th 2006, 7:51 pm
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web 2.0eSnips is a total content sharing zone. I will go out of character and won’t go into too much detail in reviewing, for a few reasons. First of all, eSnips has been reviewed by Michael Arrington of Techcrunch and by Pete Cashmore of Mashable already. Second, and more importantly, it takes much more time to write and read a review then to go into the site and get the hang of it. eSnips’ strength is in it’s simplicity. You register, get 1GB of storage and download the toolbar (optional) in less then 5 minutes. From that point on it’s genuinely friendly and self explanatory. Yael Elish, eSnips’ CEO shares has thoughts as well and provides the stage for fun yet serious discussions about the whole social sharing phenomena. Enjoy.
Aner Ravon
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Associates love it, Partners kill it
by Aner & Gil
Here’s one underrated glass ceiling I am sure many of you hit at least once. You come up with a great idea. You build a great offering with all the right ingredients – valuable, viral, economic, technically cunning, innovative, inspiring. You assemble the right core team and put together a proof of concept prototype. Proud yet in dire need for funds, you begin your VC tour which seems to be going phenomenally well. Or so it seems. The associates’ eyes are glowing but the partners’ smiles are a bit nervous (or so you think but quickly suppress). You then receive a bunch of follow-up homework assignments with a clear target of buying time. When it comes to getting the right partners on board – you wait forever, or until you run out of money or drive, whichever comes first. What is it that makes that glass ceiling? The “associates love it but the partners kill it”, impossible to break ceiling? (more…)
Aner & Gil
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Election Talk – Kadima, Boat on Wheels or Fusion?
by Gil Rosen
Thursday March 23rd 2006, 8:59 am
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web 2.0Quit now if you hate politics, tired of politics or heard enough of it. I must admit I am no huge fan either, but as a citizen of a country that has held 5 (soon to be 6) elections during the last 14 years (1992,1996,1999, 2001 ,2003 ,2006) I will let this post be my humble say. However, this will not be about the regular political mambo-jumbo. I elected (notice careful choice of words 
) to scrutinize the new Kadima party, under the “BOW vs. Fusion” microscope. (more…)
Gil Rosen
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Is there a point to the name.com party?
by Gil Rosen
Wednesday March 15th 2006, 5:25 pm
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web 2.0I’d like to set your expectations first. This posting is not about a hot news item, a recently techrunched company or a ”Fusion vs. Boat on Wheels” judgment. It is about a mind boggling situation which I am sure you can somewhat identify with. Every entrepeneur knows the situation. The founding team is assembled, the idea is there, the value proposition is on the whiteboard, the office smells of fresh paint. One thing left to do. Find a name. If the wedding planning is the first event in a couple’s life has good chances of leading to divorce, so is finding a name for a company. Recently, it has become a collective let’s-all-outsmart-each-other game. So much, that we should stop and ask ourselves if the “king is butt naked or what?”
Sorry FilmLoop, Take it from the top
by Aner Ravon
Guy Kawasaki is involved and in love. Michael Arrington is positive they’re a winner and dares us to quote him on that. Mike, Guy - here’s a dare!
FilmLoop is a free photocasting network, or in their words: “Tell your story in a live Loop and broadcast it to all your friends”. Praised by highly respected individuals and with the right mix of photo sharing, user centric, free, web 2.0, personalized… figured I’d better join the party and try them out. I did… It left me with a sweet and sour taste in my mouth and I wondered why. This morning I finally figured it out.
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Aner Ravon
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Question, Google - Is WAP a simplified version of the web??
by Gil Rosen
From a purely technological perspective I guess the answer is simple and short – YES. Then again that’s not our point. We are here to represent users and discuss fundamental issues of the web’s evolution beyond the PC.
The recent post in Techcrunch regarding Google’s new calendar (A.K.A CL2) got me thinking (I Techrunch - therefore I think) about how the folks at Google plan to mobilize their ever increasing plethora of services.
Now a confession, I am three connections away (based on my linkedin network) from being close to any Google insider (boo-hoo) so my review is based on what I know as a regular user. Out of all existing services the one that interests me the most is Gmail Wireless. This is a perfect example of what “can be done” vs. “should be done” when a communication service goes mobile
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Gil Rosen
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Boat-on-Wheels, Googlewhacks, and Creationism
by Spock
I’m sure some of you readers are looking at the title of this post and thinking “Huh? What’s with this? What do these things have to do with one another? It only makes sense that this comes from a guy called Spock”. But there’s a point here, and a story, so bear with me.
Something bothered me while reading Gil’s post about the boat-on-wheels. It took me a few minutes to understand what’s wrong, but finally it hit me:
A boat-on-wheels isn’t that bad of an idea.. (more…)
Spock
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Shozu - Fusion can be simple!
by Aner Ravon
Shozu is a simple, elegant, user centric service. They provide a mobile application which makes mobile picture posting easy. If you use Flickr, Webshots, Buzznet or Text America and if you have a camera phone, Shozu links the two together. Well, almost.
Let’s start with the positive Feedback. Shozu is a user centric service and it shows. Their mobile application is built for end users, does one specific thing and does it in a very insightful way. Their web site is very welcoming and easy to navigate. The help files are simple and effective and the counseling extends beyond the comfortable cocoon of their own application. For example, Shozu provides advise on how to avoid roaming charges and on how to use their application to send picture emails in a very cost effective way. That’s what I call an extra effort that makes a difference. Cool, user centric, effective.
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Aner Ravon
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Start ups and Google - Proper Inspiration
by Aner Ravon
Sunday March 05th 2006, 6:33 am
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web 2.0The “how to treat google” question is apparently mind-boggling a lot of innovators….Another important contribution from Spock:
One can only wonder whether Serge and Larry had a similar discussion when they decided to start a search engine in an already mature search market. Yahoo, Altavista, Lycos, Excite - all existed and had search engines, and the two geeks from hell (well we can all admit they are from hell now) didn’t really care. And I can safely assume that there were probably 100 other Laurel and Hardy’s that tried to do the same at the same time. The fact that they had such huge success is probably part luck, part business planning (oh yeah I’m sure some people will claim they had it all figured out from the get go), but mainly a real differentiator that gave them something nobody else had or could easily copy - a really really good search engine. It’s not just that they overcame the technological obstacle - it’s that they recognized that there was room for improvement in an already well established web-based tool.
So yeah, they have seem to gone through the anakin-gone-darth-vader, republic-turned-galactic-empire process, but in the core the Google story should be an inspiration and lesson for entrepeneurs, not the other way around. No single group of people has a monopoly on creativity, innovation or brains.
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Aner Ravon
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Socialist Roots to the Social Networks
by Aner Ravon
This contribution was originally entered as a comment by Spock. I thought his words were important enough to be added as a stand alone posting:
“Social” is the new buzz, I agree. It’s been around since the early days of the internet, but these days there is a new kind of “social” force on the web. Blogs, photo sharing, content-oriented encounters, social networks are all the initial forms of the new social revolution. It goes way beyond just making connections. Maybe even better described as “socialist”, not just “social”. There is a fundamental shift of power in the way the web is created, drvien and used. Society, communities, individuals and the networks they create take center stage side by side as equals with the old monarchs - centralized service and information providers, corporations, merchants and customers.
However, as far as personal networking is concerned, I don’t believe we should expect an all-in-one service. I make a distinction between making new connections, and maintaining useful ones.
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Aner Ravon
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Serge and Larry the new Bonnie and Clyde?
by Aner Ravon
I was having coffee with a good friend of mine this morning. “Mike”, a fellow digital citizen, who happens to be a venture capitalist these days. We were chatting about convergence and I was pitching and preaching about the endless opportunities current start ups encounter. The industry was never more inviting to new ideas and initiatives, and I was enthusiastic about the different angles of cross platform personal content sharing. As the conversation heated, we started brainstorming about one particular idea that, who knows, may actually hold water. Slowly but surely, I started noticing Mike’s face going gray. My confidence was beginning to erode, but I was still running hard. Mike, on the other hand, was going quieter and started drifting into his own zone. Finally, I couldn’t hold it back anymore and asked him what the hell was going on. He was silent for a sad, long moment, and then quietly uttered:
“This idea is actually good; Google will do it, what happens when they do?”
Ugh!
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Aner Ravon
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The search for the pioneer was up in the air for quite some time and now it is finally here. 
A disorder which causes victims to associate the utmost wisdom, wizardry and solid business foresight to any move Google makes. Physical effects of Googlebation include victim’s jaw to grossly expand, white froth to come out the side of their mouth, while mumbling…”did you see what Google just came out with…did you see…did you see!”.
An interesting new play in the convergence arena are the mobile access companies. The value proposition is focused around on enabling users to access to their PCs using an internet enabled mobile device as long as they are online with their PC at the same time too.