Lumpy's Sticky Site

Stress Says:

June 3rd, 2008 at 11:55 am

I cry too because ms make things that look "beautiful" and then do sweet fuckall. Yay. For once, a complete product would be nice. Feel free to start with XP and move on to everything else. Notepad is ok.

Dream Incubator » Blog Archive » Five Google-Whacking Ideas for Microsoft » ドリームインキュベータ Says:

May 25th, 2008 at 10:53 pm

[...] Telescope. How about making a telescope that peers into the past? Better: A time machine. Then Robert Scoble would have something to really cry about. Send a Terminator chick into the past and have her become girlfriend to either, or both, Google [...]

Rafael Valdez Ley Says:

May 18th, 2008 at 8:58 pm

Muy Interesante que tengo que hacer para obtener el programa y poder utilisar este telescopio

The Center Of The Internet » Tom Raftery tries out WWT Says:

May 17th, 2008 at 12:24 am

[...] if you recall, was the thing that made Scoble cry. I guess he must have been using DirectX 10 (again from Tom's comments) "Tried [...]

mj » Blog Archive » Tom Raftery tries out WWT Says:

May 14th, 2008 at 1:22 am

[...] if you recall, was the thing that made Scoble cry. I guess he must have been using DirectX 10 (again from Tom's comments) "Tried [...]

My lappy has become a virtual telescope by Microsoft's worldwide telescope. « Junal on the run Says:

May 13th, 2008 at 1:10 pm

[...] 14, 2008 · No Comments I have been waiting for this moment since the day i read this article from scoble's blog. I was wondering why he cried after seeing a software. Software can make you cry? I couldn't [...]

Nerd Alert! The WorldWide Telescope » Undress Me Robot Says:

May 13th, 2008 at 2:33 pm

[...] is simply a desktop version of Google Sky. It's just…a lot more robust, detailed, and inspiring to [...]

Telescope » Microsoft Gives You The Sky With WorldWide Telescope

2008-05-13 12:23:56

Amy Gahran said:

Thanks so much for posting this, Jack! This whole thing kinda reminds me of the blind men and the elephant -- people are staking out parts of the problem without seeing the whole picture.

Of course, the whole picture here is very technically thorny, especially where blog comments and forums are concerned. But that's no reason not to chip away at it!

I like your term "me collector." In fact, as a modest incentive to ambitious geeks, I just bought the domain mecollector.net. I'll give it away to anyone who can show me a tool that does what I want it to do.

Yeah, you're right -- It's my stuff, let me play with it.

Blogged you back, BTW.

Thanks!

- Amy

July 31, 2007 1:24 PM

Tara Anderson said:

Jack, thanks for the mention and for trying us out. I'd love to hear any suggestions that you may have for ways that we could improve what we're doing. It makes me happy to know that my Lijit evangelizing didn't fall on deaf ears at BlogHer.

July 31, 2007 2:59 PM

smorty71 said:

Jack,

Actually Profilactic is pretty close to what you're talking about. And the parts we don't have yet, like trends and advanced friend management, are coming in v3.

Right now, we aggregate all of the content you create online. We support over 55 sites by default and you can add unlimited custom sites. As long as it has a URL and/or an RSS feed, you can pull it into Profilactic.

We also allow you to pull your friends content into Profilactic and mash it up into a single stream. We are working on tools to allow you to choose which feeds you care about for each friend. So if you don't like someone's photos, but you love their blog and want to see their twitter updates, you can do that.

In addition to aggregating the content you and your friends create, we also allow you to "clip" stuff about you. So if you wrote an article or someone posted a photo of you, you can clip that item and store it in Profilactic.

Of course, we also give you badges so that you can take your mashed up content with you to your blog or website.

Check out my mashup here to see what it can do:

http://www.profilactic.com/mashup/smorty71

Again, it doesn't have everything you mentioned (yet); however, it is better (IMNSHO) than the other sites you mentioned.

Thanks.

July 31, 2007 7:13 PM

Lumpy said:

wow

lots of good info in this post. Now I have more stuff to try.

Is this not very similar to what was discussed in the book "Future Shock" and termed "information overload" many years ago? Maybe the more recent term (circa 1997) "data smog" also applies? The ease of content generation continues to require less effort. Thus more is generated. The rate of generation continues to increase. One's own content is enough of a challenge but add shared bookmarks and comments to the "Me Collection" and it gets even messier.

I use delicious to track what you, Amy Gahran and others are bookmarking and sharing. I start almost every day by looking over my network in delicious. Have you ever attempted to use the subscriptions in delicious? By the time you add one link to your delicious account, the entire subscription page has likely changes.

At present, the rate of content generated COULD actually exceed our ability to store it. IF this actually does happen, how do we decide who's "Me Collection" gets deleted? I am an optimist and am confident that there shall arise a solution to this problem.

Thanks for writing this. BTW, have any of you heard about Parakey? It is not out yet but it is supposed to make the web integrate seamlessly with your desktop. Facebook just bought this not even in beta startup. I am pretty new to Facebook but I can see how, if Parakey lives up to the hype, how this might actually bring us a step closer to the "Me Collection". Nonetheless, it sure is going to be fun to participate in and watch.

August 1, 2007 6:13 AM

jackvinson said:

Thanks, Lumpy.

You make a good point about information overload, as having all this stuff collected in one place could look overwhelming. But look at the intention behind Amy's request. She is looking for a central repository of everything she does online. The intention, I think, is for "me" first: it's an archive, a launching point, a means to deal with the personal stuff overload.

How are delicious subscriptions different from following the RSS feed for an individual or a tag? Is it simply a nice way to collect all the feeds I follow in one place?

Parakey got a lot of notice when Facebook bought them, but I haven't any direct experience. It might be nice to include "my desktop" in a central collection, but the security and confidentiality issues can become a problem (client work; personal matters).

August 1, 2007 10:46 AM

jackvinson said:

It's hard to believe I forgot to reference Jim McGee's excellent Weblog as my backup brain. He wrote this five years ago, and I think there are a lot of connections to the above. The shortcoming, of course, is that it doesn't act as a Me Collector, it's more of a place for Me Documentation.

And back at Amy's original post, commenters have mentioned hanzo:web, a service that is geared around saving your web content. And Dandelife that collects lifestreams into one place.

August 1, 2007 10:53 AM

Nancy White said:

Sorry I did not make it to Chicago and Blogher. Bah!

As I read this post, I was struck at how much it addresses a challenge we are looking at from a communities of practice perspective - how to manage one's multimembership in many communities and networks. I've tagged it multimembership to keep in my growing collection!

August 2, 2007 12:29 PM

jackvinson said:

Thanks, Nancy. I missed you too - I was hoping you would be among the many people I would get to meet at the conference. C'est la vie.

Interesting thought -- extending the "Me Collector" to a "We Connector." Obviously, the requirements would be different. But, I think some of the core principals are related. Look at how many places people discuss "communities."

August 2, 2007 2:14 PM

Daniel Sweet said:

Another piece of the puzzle is Google Reader. It's a typical web-based RSS reader except that you can tag content to re-share with the click of one button.

Then, anyone that goes to your personalized share URL can see all of the stuff from everywhere that you tagged to share.

It doesn't really have the discovery aspect (unless you set up a Google Alert for "Jack Vinson" and then use the RSS feed to track it), but it's another step closer.

Dan

August 3, 2007 3:15 PM

Lumpy said:

I agree with you about the "me" part. I want the same.

Ironically what is missing here is what I have said elsewhere.

It just dawned on me that I never tend to post what I blog to delicious. I was reading what you, Amy Gahran and Robert Scoble wrote as I was writing a post over at lockergnome.

I am also dealing with two abandoned kittens that distract me often. Then I notice they have fleas. Then I have to bath them. Then I notice my couch has fleas. Then I have to rush to work and post what I was writing...

The result is I completely forget to mention what I was actually saying and doing at another blog. I don't see any trackback regarding what I said elsewhere here. I think, IMHO, it might have made my poor communication better. A Me collector would have saved me.

I also missed the comments here that were made after mine. It seems I need to hit refresh to make them show. What a mess. Not the point I was trying to make at all. I agree and want the same thing.

I also agree on the privacy issue. Can there not be some simple way to make at easy as switching desktop views in linnux? Heck, I think it would even be great if, provided both parties agreed, to make all aware of any e-mails sent back and forth regarding the topic. Even if the case be missing the mark, as in my case, it still is "me". BTW -->

http://www.lockergnome.com/nexus/lumpy/2007/08/01/a-me-collector-i-want-one-badly

August 3, 2007 10:40 PM

links for 2007-08-02 at contentious.com - August 1, 2007 @ 7:54 pm

[…] A Me Collector? I Want One Badly ~ webbits "How do we manage all of this and how do we sort through the data smog? More specifically, how do we even manage what we write, read and wish to follow? Amy Gahran stated that she has a pipe dream regarding this issue." (tags: mycoverage content+tracking) […]

Jeremiah Owyang Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 4:35 pm

Another concern, apart from my post is that these third party developers (like the wordpress one) now have access to your blog, and they are not affiliated with wordpress.

What's stopping them from doing something devious? slipping in some light SEO code? or putting up a goatze?

On the other hand, when I see several of my friends using one application (and facebook is great for that) my level of trust goes up, as I see my peers using it.

Trade offs either way.

mario romero Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 5:51 pm

I'm still not getting why people insist that facebook, as a platform, is a "closed system", am I missing something???

A)anyone can develop apps on said system, no need for authorization

B)anyone can access information from their users and display it on an external site, of course not all-data is available, but that would make no sense because of the privacy issues

There are certain parts of FB that of course aren't open (like the user's profiles outside of FB)but that's FB the site, not FB the platform.

Jeremiah: I don't know how that wordpress app is implemented, but if it's just crawling the feed of your blog it can't really write anything on it or access any information that isn't already public. The developer could however "put up a goatze" on your profile box, but that's as far as it gets (I realize it would be pretty bad, but I guess you should only install apps if you trust the developer as on any system). As for SEO code, first I don't think google indexes or could index user's profiles and also FB caches anything that goes on the profile boxes so they wouldn't allow it).

peace,

mario romero

Colin Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 6:14 pm

This is interesting. Wondered something similar when i hooked up WP this morning. I wonder if we have to think about horizontal social networks, such as FB as aggregators, and vertical networks such as WP, or Lending Club, as capabilities that folks will pull into their horizontal networks. I'll stop there before my brain explodes.

Scripting News for 7/19/2007 « Scripting News Annex Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 6:26 pm

[...] he says Facebook is a black [...]

John Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 6:31 pm

Oh my god! Facebook again, you should working for Facebook, I think.

anon Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 7:44 pm

"Oh my god! Facebook again, you should working for Facebook, I think."

Yeah, I miss the Robert Scoble that went on a no "GYM" binge and pointed out that Techmeme tends to aggregate popular/press release stories over the little guy.

At least he straight up admits that he plans to talk about Facebook and the iPhone as much as he wants. On the bright side, it's there are PodTech videos thrown in the mix.

Basically, Scobleizer@Microsoft > Scobleizer@Podtech.

Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft? Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 10:28 pm

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black whole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to [...]

Jeremiah Owyang Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 10:54 pm

Mario

The wordpress app requires you to login to your wordpress account from their app. This means they know your wordpress account info.

This means they could modify your blog on wordpress (outside of Facebook)

It's a semi-closed systems, you can build on top of Facebook, but they still retain a tremendous amount of data you can't easily export. Be sure to read my post that Scoble linked to.

Dave McClure Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 11:15 pm

heh. just saw this a few minutes ago; added links back to you + Jeremiah + Duncan Riley on my Facebook isn't AOL, it's Visual Basic post from earlier this evening.

guess we're all drawing the Facebook = Microsoft analogy, especially those of us who used to drink the MSFT developer koolaid :)

those were the daze, eh Robert?

(the SDForum Visual Basic SIG still lives on in a special little place in my Borg heart ;)

- dave mcclure

http://500hats.typepad.com/

Joseph Scott Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 11:20 pm

The WordPress app in Facebook is in an iframe. At no point does Facebook ever get your WordPress.com username and password.

If you login at wordpress.com and then go to the app you'll skip the app login page entirely.

Robert Scoble Says:

July 19th, 2007 at 11:42 pm

Dave: great blog post, thanks, I put it on my link blog. I have a special place in my heart for the Visual Basic SIG, too. One speech there has made me more than $100,000 so far.

rumford Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 12:39 am

Robert,

Just read your blog comment on techcrunch. Why do people think it is all hype… guess they have not used facebook and can't "get it"…

As you said…. Siemens doe s not have thousands of people on facebook if there is no value. ;)

Robert Scoble Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 1:17 am

Rumford: a couple people admitted at the conference today they are dragging their feet because they are tired of trying to keep up with everything new.

Julian Bond Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 1:31 am

More evidence that FB is a Black Hole.

Nothing escapes.

FB is hidden behind the login wall. It has almost no RSS. There's no way to export anything about your friends. And so on.

Steven Livingstone Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 2:00 am

Yup. I talked about this a month ago or so.

http://tinyurl.com/yqbetp

It's not just Facebook you know. Closed data silos are something we've had for years which is why FB doesn't excite me.

Robert Scoble Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 2:02 am

Steven: Facebook isn't your father's closed silo, though.

But, no problem, you'll get dragged into Facebook eventually even if you resist.

Steven Livingstone Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 2:37 am

Robert - i'm already dragged in (it actually reminds of of Ecademy when i used to use that) :)

I DO like the idea - but i'm not convinved it's a platform as such. I like Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Internet Service Bus, OpenID etc - those would be my service platform.

Jeremiah Owyang Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 5:22 am

Joseph

Thanks, just for clarity, (read my comments carefully) I was suggesting that the third party application creator to WordPress has access to Scobleizer.com.

Gawr - Scott Oertel » Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft? Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 5:56 am

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black hole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to [...]

Facebook Considering an Offline Version? | Marketing Pilgrim Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 6:11 am

[...] both Robert Scoble and Jeremiah Owyang are concerned that Facebook is a black hole of data - it all goes in, but [...]

Elroy Jetson » Facebook: a Data Black Hole? Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 6:31 am

[...] Robert Scoble and Jeremiah Owyang are making this claim. I agree that Facebook doesn't let data out, but is [...]

kiddie Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 6:36 am

Ok, I smell scobie got some juicy offer for IPO stock from facebook and he is contributing to the hype.

Say it ain't so rob?

Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft ? | LiveTheLife.Tv | Jeffreys Bay Surf Travel & South Africa Property... Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 6:38 am

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black hole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to [...]

Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft? - internalmi6.com - technology news xbox 360 ps3 software hardware unix windows Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 9:22 am

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black hole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to [...]

I.T. Catholic Mom » Blog Archive » Manic Tech Week Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 11:29 am

[...] are: when will facebook synch up with LinkedIN? And is facebook the internet equivalent of a 'Black Hole'? Apparently so, according to Robert Scoble. Perhaps that's why I'm feeling the [...]

Is Microsoft the new Dark Horse? | WinExtra Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 11:48 am

[...] all as Robert's data gets sucked into the black hole of Facebook he writes off Microsoft as any force to be reckoned with in this brave new shiny world [...]

Tom O'Leary Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 1:54 pm

I don't know. For me, too many options and too many apps confined in one space. I don't like being stuck in a closet full of widgets. RSS and tags already bridges me to content that I want, links me to niche experts and relevant conversations.

But then, I'm not an early adapter; and perhaps I will 'get it' in a few years when the other 900 million people on the Internet do.

All the best

Tom

Tips Dr.com Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 2:11 pm

Todays Tech Notes 7/20/2007

Digital DNA could finger Harry Potter leaker A few lines of 'digital DNA' could allow the publishers of Harry Potter to find and finger the person apparently responsible for leaking the final adventures of the boy wizard.

Opera Software Op…

lamarguerite Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 2:12 pm

I love Facebook. And I am getting overwhelmed by all these new apps. Regarding the WordPress app, I was already feeding my posts into my profile page, so I am not sure about the difference with the new app. I guess it makes it easier for people to leave comments?

marguerite

http://lamarguerite.wordpress.com

Robert Booth Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 4:45 pm

So what was the old data black hole

Top Posts « WordPress.com Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 4:58 pm

[...] Facebook: the new data black hole Oh, my. I added the WordPress Facebook Application a few days ago. Now my blog, and your comments, are showing up on my […] [...]

Robert Scoble Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 7:27 pm

#30: Pointcast?

Can you trust Facebook to be your Social Operating System? : whirn Says:

July 20th, 2007 at 7:41 pm

[...] can you recover? If Facebook is a black hole then anything you've contributed solely within their world is now inaccessible. Facebook, [...]

Facebook: Social Network Domination? - Mediazilla Says:

July 21st, 2007 at 7:53 am

[...] Robert Scoble's view, who sees Facebook as a 'data black hole': I added the WordPress Facebook Application a few [...]

B. Diramt Says:

July 21st, 2007 at 8:28 am

I'm pretty much naive when it comes to FB because I don't like the lack of control it gives the user. I signed up for an account more than a year ago at this point and I think I've been on there all of two times. But this obviously is a concern especially when it comes to how much privacy you can setup.

B. Durant Says:

July 21st, 2007 at 8:29 am

Horrible spelling above ^^

TechCrunch en français » Facebook pourrait-il devenir le prochain Microsoft? chronique d'un futur possible Says:

July 23rd, 2007 at 6:38 am

[...] cette acquisition signifiait pour Facebook au sense large. Robert Scoble affirme que Facebook est la nouvelle bête noire des informations personnelles, en précisant que beaucoup de ces applications web favorites sont sur [...]

GM.com » Blog Archive » Facebooks keeps growing at incredible rate Says:

July 24th, 2007 at 5:43 am

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black hole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to [...]

alan p Says:

July 25th, 2007 at 1:49 pm

Check out the terms of service and be afraid (blogged it here)

Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft? | Tekjuice.com Says:

August 1st, 2007 at 1:10 pm

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black whole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to [...]

Wordt Hyves ook leuk? at TibsBits Says:

August 2nd, 2007 at 4:33 am

[...] dat ik al snel onder de indruk raakte van de mogelijkheden die Facebook biedt, en kan ik me het enthousiasme van mensen als Robert Scoble dan ook helemaal voorstellen: je shared items uit GoogleReader, [...]

Could Facebook Become The Next Microsoft? | Tekjuice.com Says:

August 2nd, 2007 at 12:39 pm

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook in the broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black hole, noting that many of his favorite apps are now appearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to [...]

Closed Social Networks as a Guilded Cage - everwas Says:

August 6th, 2007 at 7:54 am

[...] Facebook as a more updated version of the AOL walled garden and others such as Jeremiah Owyang and Robert Scoble calling it a black hole because all your data goes in but there's no RSS [...]

» Facebook, social capitalists and open networks | Between the Lines | ZDNet.com Says:

August 6th, 2007 at 2:39 pm

[...] Scoble: Facebook-the new data black hole [...]

Facebook, Social Capitalists and Open Networks :: The FilipinoDutyFree.Com Blog Says:

August 6th, 2007 at 4:05 pm

[...] Scoble: Facebook-the new data black hole [...]

Digest of the Social Networking Space: August 15th, 2007 Says:

August 15th, 2007 at 7:29 am

[...] Data Concerns Data is power, so this is an area or intense scrutiny, we've suggested that Facebook is a black hole, but it appears that they are opening up so some data can be returned. On a personal onlie [...]

New Media Signal - Today's Top Blog Posts on New Media - Powered by SocialRank Says:

October 1st, 2007 at 3:07 am

[...] Facebook: the new data black hole « Scobleizer [...]

trademark registration Says:

December 19th, 2007 at 2:27 pm

It seems like there are more facebook widgets and applications than there are grains of sand in the oceans. The more you add, the more information gets added to your page and at an increasing rate. Pretty soon they're going to run out of places to store all the information.

Dulpi ���˷�չ�ռ� - ���ֲ��� » Facebook ��һ��΢�� Says:

January 2nd, 2008 at 12:50 am

[...] been said on what the acquisition means for Facebook inthe broader sense. Robert Scoble says that Facebook is the new data black hole, noting that many of his favorite apps are nowappearing on Facebook. Facebook is starting to become [...]

My bad. The extension is coComments and still is buggy as heck. So is there service. On my end, the co.mments is still not working right.

The co.mments bookmarlette works but I still have issues with it. It is slow, the page doesn't always refresh right and sometimes either the applette doesn't apear or disappears so quickly that I don't see it. Again this may be on my end caused by something else.

Nonetheless, I don't think one should have to even hit refresh OR wait regarding tracking conversations. The refresh issues are the same on two other machines I have and I run zero extensions on those machines.

The co.mment bookmarklette also has another minor annoyance. I like to have a slew of tabs open at once. I use the favicon extension so that they take very little space. My Firefox automatically opens 7 pages each time I open it. When I open Firefox, I have to hit refresh on the co.mments page to see it anything hase changed. IMHO, they should have the page refresh automatically.

Also, if I use the bookmarklette to start tracking a conversation and then click on the "click here" to check on things (in the applette that opens,) it opens a new tab. Again, I simply want more control than that.

I am not trying to be a whiner here, I am sure that these things can be worked out. Anyhow, I am trying some of the services mentioned regarding this matter. I am sure I will have more to say on it.

[Reply]

3. Lumpy on August 4th, 2007 at 4:07 am

Hey Lumpy, hope that tooth is healing up!

You wrote: "I am not sure if I would term it "some progress' regarding co.mmmets. At least on my end, the FF extension doesn't work seamlessly and I must use manually get the conversation to track. (DISCLAIMER: I run many extensions or "add-ons" they can interfere with each other.)"

OK, I just want to be sure - we're taling about co.mments here, not Cocomment, which is a different tool, right? I've had problems with CoComment, and CoComment is what Scoble criticized recently, but so far co.mments is working ok for me.

- Amy

[Reply]

4. Amy Gahran on August 1st, 2007 at 2:20 pm

Oh, more tools for me to check up on, such a hardship….

- Amy

[Reply]

5. Amy Gahran on August 1st, 2007 at 2:17 pm

thanks again for the link love…

I bet I will join in with Dr.Vinson (and you) on this… right now I am actually pretty medicated recovering from a tooth extraction that infected. Percoset is taking it's toll. either my space bar is dorked or my thumbs are not working.

I agree with you about content being lost. I think the issue is just as bad for what is out there and not actually lost but can not be found or tracked easily. Even if it is sitting in the Internet Archive or a cache somewhere, if it can not be found, it is just as practical as having been deleted.

I am not sure if I would term it "some progress' regarding co.mmmets. At least on my end, the FF extension doesn't work seamlessly and I must use manually get the conversation to track. (DISCLAIMER: I run many extensions or "add-ons" they can interfere with each other.)

My pipe dream is very much like yours… I want seamless integration. At present, I can track this conversation by using the bookmarklette but not the add-on. I have this post and Dr. Vinson's with his comment box open in separate tabs. This one shows up. His does not. It is likely because I did not hit post on either but I tried the same routine this AM (actually yesterday morning now), after hitting post, I got the same results. Not what I desire.

The bookmarklette will show the conversation but the add-on will not…. The only difference is my not yet posted comment. When I want to track a conversation, I do not care if I have posted. I want it to show up for me just as if I had commented even if I have not. Often listening to a conversation is just as important as participating.

We have come a long way in what you aptly call the "connectivity era" but unfortunately we have also entered the era of "information overload" and "data smog". What you term the problem is going to be a great challenge for those who create the "back end" of the web.

[Reply]

6. Lumpy on August 1st, 2007 at 3:51 am

There is also http://www.Dandelife.com which also allows you to create an APML file based on your lifestream.

[Reply]

7. Chris Saad on August 1st, 2007 at 3:43 am

Hi Amy - I like this post!

This is very relevant and encouraging for us at Hanzo! We build web archiving tools for just this kind of need - to enable people to capture and preserve their web content.

For example, for bloggers and individual publishers, we offer Hanzoweb, a free web archiving service. You can sign up at http://www.hanzoweb.com and archive all your content there. Hanzoweb provides a number of ways to trigger the archiving: manually with a bookmarklet, archive all that you blog about with our open source wordpress plug-in, drive the archiving programmatically via our open API, or pick stuff up automatically with our RSS archive tool. The latter is very handy, for example, you can archive your del.icio.us feed, or a specific tag in your feed, and we collect the bookmark and archive it for you.

Just as you request, you can make your archived items public or private. All public items are shared. Indeed all our archives are stored in open, standard archive files, so to take sharing to the extreme, we donate our public archives to the Internet Archive, so they'll be available through the Wayback too. So your content is not only shared, it will be very safe for a very long time indeed. All archived content has a unique URL composed of the name of the archive (Hanzoweb in this case), a timestamp, and the original live URL. We also generate feeds so you can share it that way.

We don't yet have analysis tools, but we do have an API, so let us know what'd be useful to you.

If you have a large requirement, you can buy additional quota.

We also do more sophisticated tools to enable institutions, publishers and corporations to archive their total web presence. More on that here… http://www.hanzoarchives.com

[Reply]

9. Mark Middleton on July 31st, 2007 at 12:31 pm

Thanks, Tinu. From what I understand, integrating the blog comments, forum posts, and e-mail list contributions is what would be a real pain.

I hear via Lumpy's corner that co.mments has made some progress on the blog comments front. I'll be checking that out.

- Amy

[Reply]

12. amy on July 31st, 2007 at 10:06 am

There isn't anything quite like that yet. The closest you'd come would be tools like Page Flakes or Net Vine. Then there's Facebook folding a lot of the social apps into one place, but it doesn't do everything.

I thought it would be neat to try and build a service that does something like this, but I just haven't found the right programming team/developer yet. I really need to crawl into past emails and look at software partnerships I've formed in the past that weren't ready to take off at the time.

By the time I get mine together, there's almost certain to be one.

If I see anything, I'll let you know.

[Reply]

13. Tinu on July 30th, 2007 at 11:40 pm

By contentious.com - Lijit search: Good start as a "me collector" on November 11, 2007 at 2:01 pm

[...] the summer I wrote a post, I want one place for all my content: Pipe dream?, where I bemoaned the fact that since most of my work is distributed across various sites, forums, [...]

By contentious.com - Community site shuts down; whither goes the content? on August 25, 2007 at 8:21 am

[...] this experience seems like one more reason why a good "Me Collector" tool or service is [...]

By Time out (please?) · No Straight Lines on July 31, 2007 at 8:15 pm

[...] if that isn't enough, a recent post by Jack Vinson - commenting on a post by Amy Gahran - now has me thinking of another issue raised by all this: How do I keep track of it all? [...]

By Jack Vinson on the "me collector" at contentious.com on July 31, 2007 at 11:14 am

[...] response to my post yesterday, I want one place for all my content, knowledge management guru and very cool guy Jack Vinson (who I finally got to meet at BlogHer) [...]

By Knowledge Jolt with Jack on July 31, 2007 at 10:21 am

The elusive Me Collector…

Amy Gahran says, "I want one place for all my content: Pipe dream?" She mentioned this at BlogHer as well….

Its RSS feeds in a roach motel for people who can't figure out RSS.

Posted by: coleman hines | Friday, August 24, 2007 at 12:47 AM

I totally agree - sometimes you just have to break it all the way down for people to understand.

Posted by: Eric | Friday, August 24, 2007 at 01:04 PM

Dave, you hit the nail on the head.

How is it possible that most of the world doesn't 'get' RSS or feeds, but when you look at it in a very simple way ("people see shit other people are doing in the Feed, and then they click on that shit.") it becomes crystal clear.

Thank you for a fantastic observation.

I think the more that people become used to feeds (in their email, on their PDAs or on the web) the more they'll be addicted. I am, having worked with Attensa for a few months on their enterprise 2.0 RSS platform.

The cool thing? From safe, inside the firewall, you can have the same kind of interaction and attention that millions of people turn to Facebook every day for - what's the shit today?

Cheers, and thanks for your perspective.

Posted by: Janet Johnson | Saturday, August 25, 2007 at 04:20 PM

Dave, you hit the nail on the head.

How is it possible that most of the world doesn't 'get' RSS or feeds, but when you look at it in a very simple way ("people see shit other people are doing in the Feed, and then they click on that shit.") it becomes crystal clear.

Thank you for a fantastic observation.

I think the more that people become used to feeds (in their email, on their PDAs or on the web) the more they'll be addicted. I am, having worked with Attensa for a few months on their enterprise 2.0 RSS platform.

The cool thing? From safe, inside the firewall, you can have the same kind of interaction and attention that millions of people turn to Facebook every day for - what's the shit today?

Cheers, and thanks for your perspective.

Posted by: Janet Johnson | Saturday, August 25, 2007 at 04:21 PM

Hey Dave,

I like your insight on the dynamics of the feed. I don't think the platform in itself is anything unique or special as it's just another Web 2.0 API, but creating a news stream of all of your friends' activities is indeed revolutionary. I remember the uproar it caused initially, but it's become the finger to the pulse of Facebook.

In the future it's foreseeable that Facebook might develop into a peer news network (i.e. news about your peers) more than a peer communication service. I wonder what kind of social engineering impact it might have...

Posted by: Aaronontheweb (AjaxNinja) | Thursday, August 30, 2007 at 03:14 PM

I'm really trying toget into facebook, but useing it for marketing for my bar programs like http://www.myfriendbuilder.com don't work with it.

Posted by: my friend adder | Friday, September 28, 2007 at 11:39 PM