Socially Speaking

This was a great discussion. You can listen to, and download, it here. Bonus: a few other places where Seth is popping up.

Another great question (not to mention, answer) from the ‘cast with Seth:

“Does Yahoo! have a chance?”

Well, wait a second. Yahoo! makes millions and millions of dollars every day. They have more register users, I think, than just about any other site in the world. And, they deliver huge amounts of information on finance and everything else. Millions and millions of people have Yahoo! mail.

If someone wanted to hand me the keys to Yahoo!, I’d be happy to show up. They’re not doomed, by any stretch of the imagination.

The real question, I think, should be: what’s Yahoo!’s next Dip, and how do they get through it? Is Yahoo! on a dead end in which they’re going to keep cranking out money but not become a superstar in something new. Or, are there Dips that the people at Yahoo! could focus on and put their huge resources behind, and push through. Or, is it a better strategy for them to do forty things, and hope that one of them pops?

And, based on what I’ve said so far today … the way you win on the Internet and everywhere else is to find an area that people are going to choose to talk about, overwhelm it, push through the Dip and then erect a barrier behind you – what I call the Valley of Death – so it’s harder for the Microsofts and the Googles to catch up with you.

This is an incredibly exciting announcement for us: legendary marketeer, writer and speaker Seth Godin will be Waxxi’s next guest. If you’ve never seen him speak, either live or on video, we strongly recommend taking a look at him in action, here at the Googleplex.

Seth’s blogging, books, and speeches have helped transform businesses and organizations by challenging people (CXOs, students, workers, leaders in government and academia, and so on) to think differently, and then do something about it — like going to the edges and being (truly) remarkable.

If you haven’t yet become addicted to reading it, his is one of the most highly regarded business blogs in the world. He’s the man behind Purple Cow, Permission Marketing, Unleashing the Ideavirus – and now, The Dip.

As the title states, The Dip is A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick). We’ll have more coverage on The Dip in future posts, but for now we’d recommend checking out the book’s blog.

On June 6, 2007 at 1:30pm ET, you’ll have the chance to talk to Seth directly (via phone) and/or ask him a question (via IM in the chat room). Here are the details:

WHAT: Waxxi ‘Cast with Seth Godin
WHEN: Wednesday, June 6, 2007, 1:30-2:30pm EDT

HOW: Register here. But hurry! As always, it’s free but spaces are limited.

Bonus read: Guy Kawasaki’s 10 Questions with Seth about The Dip.

The April 5th Waxxi cast with Jimmy Wales is up, and available for your streaming (or downloading) pleasure, here.

At just 32 minutes, this was the shortest cast we’ve done so far, and the first one we haven’t had to cut in two parts. Although the reason for the shortened cast had to do more with Jimmy’s schedule than anything else, it’s a refreshingly nice length.

It’s a fascinating conversation, and while it’s (again, for the first time) just mine and Jimmy’s voices you’ll hear, the interactivity and participation was awesome.
One question, for those of you who prefer text, came from the live chat:

Steve asks: What are the pros and cons of a transparent search algorithm? Are the advantages of having an open book approach to how search is performed worth the risks of some who will use the information to “game” the system?

JW:

Yeah, so that is a really core question. And, in a certain sense, the success or failure of this entire concept hinges on that question: which actually will work better in the long run?

So, there are a couple things that I think are pretty clear. When you have an transparent, open search engine with freely licensed software, when people find that there’s a problem, there’s a potential for people to actually correct it – and actually have oversight into what’s gone wrong and how to fix it – that you really don’t get in a proprietary search engine, unless you hire lots and lots of people.

The political implications are, well, they’re important to me. And I mean political with a small ‘p’, not really talking about government, but talking about the organization of society, and the organization of information in society. I think as citizens and consumers and producers in the world, we should be concerned about secrecy around such a core piece of the infrastructure of the Internet. So that’s one of the major pros.

Now, if you talk to security people – so, people who work in computer security – they’ll always tell you that “security through obscurity is a bad idea.” In other words, if the way you’re keeping something secure is by keeping it secret so people can’t game it, well you’re always subject to people to figuring it out and gaming it without you noticing. You’re subject to that kind of attack all the time.

One of the reasons we trust the encryption algorithms that we use is that they’re published. They’re public, and they’ve been tested by many, many mathematicians and computer programmers. Everybody can throw what they want at it, and try to find a flaw. If you’ve got a secret encryption algorithm, well…you just don’t know: I mean, has it really been tested thoroughly? And so forth.

So, I think the same idea applies to search algorithms. If the only reason it’s good is because it’s secret, well, that never lasts. What you really want is to truly begin to solve the problem in a more systematic way. For that I think the open approach is the best.

During the Jimmy Wales ‘cast, some of the fundamental questions involved his new project, Wikia, the future of human-powered search, and competing with Google. Some fantastic content awaits you in the podcast, which will be up on Waxxi very soon.

Can you tell us more about Wikia?

Basically, Wikia is my new project. We are building thousands of Wiki communities in parallel. The way that we like to describe it is that Wikipedia is the encyclopedia, and Wikia is the rest of the library and the magazine racks. So, it’s a totally new organization completely separate from Wikipedia, and growing really quickly. [We’re] spending a lot of energy in trying to improve the software and make it easier to use, to try to push this whole free culture revolution out to the next wave of participants.

How will human powered search work?

So, the search project is one of the projects of Wikia, and basically what we’re looking at is everything is open source software – all free software. We want to publish all the algorithms; we want to bring some transparency into the search business.

There are a lot of people who are trying to do human powered search, or trying to do new algorithmic search, but I don’t know of anybody who’s really trying to make a radical commitment to being open and transparent in the sense of free software. So, that’s basically what our goal is.

How it’s actually going to work? Well, that’s yet to be determined. I mean, we’re still in the open design stages. It’s not the kind of thing where we labor for twelve months in stealth mode, then build it all out and announce it in a flurry. It’s a project to build a search engine, so anyone can participate and we’re discussing and debating how to go about it.

How do you plan to successfully compete with Google? A question via chat, from the incredibly participative Rick Myers:

Um…I have no idea! I mean, I think the real answer is, if you believe as I do: that quality search is becoming a commodity. So, if you take a look at the results from Yahoo!, look at the search results from Google, from Ask – they’re really quite similar in many respects, and that’s been increasingly so in the last couple of years. And then you look at some of the stuff that’s been going on in the open source world, around search engines. I think we’re in striking distance of having good quality search in a free software package.

If that’s true, then it’s really a matter of just having the servers and people that manage them, and then you can really compete. If that’s true, then competition is not about having the most money and the most rocket scientists. It’s about having open transparency: search results people can trust because they can understand how things are ranked and sorted.

So that’s basically the approach we’re taking. I don’t normally think much in terms of competition, I think more in terms of finding something cool and fun to do, and doing it.

We had another great interactive experience at yesterday’s Waxxi ‘cast. Jimmy Wales, as you might expect, was a fascinating guest. We’re truly grateful that he took the time to join us, and share his thoughts and ideas on Wikipedia, Wikia, search, culture, the web, Google, and more.

It was interesting to see the level of interaction via IM vs. phone. This was the first Waxxi ‘cast where most all of the questions came in via chat or private IM vs. the phone (just two callers who ‘raised their hand’ to ask a quesion, one of whom we couldn’t hear because his headset’s mic was muted – woops!). Since most of the participants were true power-users/early adopters, IM is simply more natural a communications method than the phone.

We had a great showing of NYC’s ‘next generation of digital movers and shakers’ – otherwise known as nextNYers. One of them, David Evans of Civil Netizen, says of Waxxi:

If basic podcasting is like standing, then Waxxi’s interactive podcasts are like flying…

He also blogged about his experience yesterday:

The chat was moderated by Tracy Sheridan of Waxxi, who performed the job masterfully like a great conductor, bridging the worlds of phone callers, online chatters, studio guests, and staff into a fluid experience for both Jimmy and the guests. The event was reminscent of a good talk show where the host and guest interact with both a live studio audience as well as with phone in callers.
…

I’ve never felt so drawn in to an interactive online event like I was today. For an hour, I felt like I wasn’t even sitting at my desk, but rather as a part of a live studio audience. Suddenly, listening to TWiT on the train ride home just doesn’t sound as exciting as it used to…

Wow. We’re absolutely blushing! Thanks to David, to our guest Jimmy Wales, and each person who participated. We had a lot of fun. Till next time!

This is why we do what we do.

Yesterday’s mention (Thanks, Mike!) officially counts as the second time we’ve been TechCrunched. Even if on somewhat a smaller scale, what to say about it? Don’t let anyone fool you — it’s a whole lot of fun.

Here’s a geographical representation of some of the people who’ve signed up to participate in Waxxi’s interactive podcast with Jimmy Wales, on April 5th:

• Perth, Australia
• Reykjavik, Iceland (!)
• London, UK
• Dublin, Ireland
• Taipei, Taiwan
• Wellington, New Zealand

Canada: Montreal, Toronto

China: Beijing, Ningbo

India: Mangalore, Nepal

US: New York, NY; San Francisco, CA; Washington, DC; Boston, MA; Chicago, IL; Seattle, WA; West Hollywood, CA; Ellington, CT; Artlington, VA; Menomonie, WI; Vista, CA; Belchertown, MA; West Lafayette, IN; Wilmington, DE; Stonemountain, FL; El Segundo, CA; Reston, VA; Potomac, MD; Greenwich, CT; University Heights, OH

If you’d like to register, go here (but we’re rapidly running out of space, so hurry!) And, thanks to everyone who signed up to be a part of the conversation. Talk to you soon.

Wikipedia founder and visionary Jimmy Wales has become one of the most prominent names on the web. As if helping create and grow what is now the single largest source of information in history — along with one of the world’s most influential brands — wasn’t a big enough challenge, there’s something even grander in store.

His for-profit endeavor, Wikia, basically takes the core of Wikipedia and expands upon it. If you imagine Wikipedia as an encylopedia, then think of Wikia as an entire library. It’s all of the collaborative media (books included) that people might create, together. If it can be done with an encyclopedia — that, Jimmy believes, is just the beginning.

Wikia Search, a ‘pillar’ of Wikia, is a very big idea. It’s all about making search participatory, transparent, and free (free in the sense of free speech, not free in the sense of free beer). Human-powered search.

We’re incredibly proud and excited to have Jimmy join us on April 5th. During the ‘cast, you’ll have the chance to ask Jimmy a question directly via phone and/or IM in the chat room. Here are the details:

WHAT: Interactive Podcast with Jimmy Wales

WHEN: Thursday, April 5, 2007, 1:30-2:30pm EST

HOW: Register here. But hurry! As always, it’s free but spaces are limited.

Forbes named Jimmy Wales as one of the Top 25 Web Celebrities for 2007, and he was the first person listed in the “Scientists & Thinkers: the lives and ideas of the world’s most influential people” in Time magazine’s May 8, 2006 issue.

Given that, he’s an incredibly comfortable and ‘real’ person to speak with. Please join us, if you can.

The Waxxi ‘cast with Cory Doctorow is up for your listening pleasure. There were more questions coming in via IM/email this time than via phone, which is an interesting dynamic. Cory really delivers an incredible amount of knowledge, thought and sharing in answering one question, never mind dozens. Have a listen.

For those who prefer text, here is another (great) question from the chat, by Diggal:

(1) Why do you think Boing Boing is so popular, and (2) do think online blogs will take over print, TV and other traditional media?

So, Boing Boing I think owes its success to a few factors. One is, we have good taste. I think we pick out neat stuff. That’s cool. I think, though, that there are lots of people who have good taste, and one of the things that we do that goes beyond having good taste, is we are very, very, very explicit in our headlines and our summaries. You can tell from reading a Boing Boing headline exactly what the Boing Boing story is about. You can tell from reading the first sentence, everything that’s in the story. You can tell from reading the whole post, everything you need to know about the link.

And that’s, I think, an enormous advantage over other blogs, which often post things like, “Funniest thing I’ve ever seen. Can’t describe it, just go look.” When you’re looking at 10,000 undifferentiated headlines in your RSS reader, it’s really hard to pay attention to those things. They don’t alphabetize well, they don’t make any sense, as compared to these very, very explicit headlines.

There are other reasons of course. Clay Shirky famously described the power law distribution of blogs. His thesis is that the rich get richer when it comes to inbound links and to attention and traffic. Which is to say, the more links you have pointing at your blog, the more chances there are that any given person will find your blog; the greater the chances that any given person will find your blog, the greater the chances that someone will make a link to your blog; the greater the chances that someone will make a link to your blog, the greater the chances that someone will find your blog. So, in other words, we’ve been around a long time, and that makes us popular, too.

Will blogs take over traditional media? I think the future composts the past. You know, opera wasn’t’ taken over by radio. It might have been overtaken by radio, but it wasn’t taken over by radio. By the same token, I don’t think traditional media will disappear, but I think that the role that it plays will be greatly shifted.

There are certain kinds of stories that you might want to tell, and certain kinds of messages you might want to convey that are just better suited to being discussed and conveyed in a distributed fashion by individual bloggers and small groups of bloggers who have this distributed conversation linked together by services like Technorati, Google Blog Search, trackbacks, and comments that just aren’t as well suited to being distributed and promulgated by big, monolithic broadcast media.

We’d like to thank everyone that attended Monday’s interactive podcast with Cory Doctorow, including of course, Mr. Doctorow himself. Some joined by IM, some by phone, and many – both. As expected, it was a fascinating, reeling conversation. Someone once said of Cory, quite accurately, that he was the ultimate interviewee. Fire off a question and what you get back is clear, concise, and brilliant mindshare; an explosion of thought, passion and analysis.

We discussed topics from Disney to DRM, the world of science fiction to the world of the copyfight, Google Book Search, Wikipedia, his upbringing, and (much) more. We’ll post some of the conversation here, and of course the podcast will be available on Waxxi, shortly.

Interestingly, during the recording we experience a slight technical glitch. Suffice to say, it felt more like twelve or so podcasts worth of technical difficulties all rolled into 10 minutes’ time. But what happened in the end is actually the fun part of the story. A participant named Rich (calling from the UK) swiftly took over the conversation, asked Cory questions, and took some from the crowd – like he had done it 1,000 times before. The crowd went wild! They loved it. And, after listening to this great banter for a bit, I came back in when the timing was just right, and continued on. Now that’s participatory.

We’ve always said at Waxxi, the Floor is Yours. We believe the interviewer should take a back seat, and the people should drive the conversation.

Our gratitude again goes out to Cory, as well as a few others:

* the dedicated, hard working, fun loving Waxxi team, which includes our partners-in-design, Inflatble3

* the participants, who included bloggers, students, entrepreneurs, executives, journalists and a fantastic on-the-fly-moderator, Rich (you’re hired!)