March 30, 2005
Testing photoblogging
Using Flickr. This is a naked Homer Simpson Chia head.
Yeah, yeah
Coming out of the fog. I thought I'd get the urge to update over spring break, but even that didn't happen. I did get a camera phone though, so look for some moblogging to occur here soon, once I get everything figured out.
What I have been doing instead of homework is test driving Yahoo!360, the social networking service my team starting working on before I left. Not sure if you can view my page without logging into Yahoo, but give it a try. And on that note, invites for 360 (which is in private beta right now) are for sale on eBay. Heh heh.
Of course I'm biased, since my friends developed 360, but I think it's great - there was a ton of learning from other sites' mistakes here, and while many of us were worried about missing the boat and taking too long to get the service live, I think ultimately waiting so long was a benefit. The hype has died down, and IF people find these services valuable (beyond for just voyeurism, which as Friendster proves, gets old), then I think Y! has all the right ingredients.
The question I've been asking over the past year in relation to social networking sites is "Ok, now what." Sure, we're all connected, but now what do we do? After the voyeurism factor wears thin, as most sites prove, not much. Including blogs, lists, photos, and reviews in 360 will help keep people engaged and the content fresh IF people find this stuff interesting. Some will. And at Y!, with a zillion users, "some" is enough for substantial numbers.
Here's the sample page:
