Cameron Moll’s Portfolio

Cameron Moll has released his updated portfolio and it sure is looking sweet. I like how it simply gets to the point. Clients want to see what you have done immediately and providing some screencaps is always a good thing.

Being 37signals for free

I was joking with Rundle last week about what would happen if all the designers and developers in the Network got together for a weekend and copied the 37signals suite of products and then we just released everything for free. Now I am sitting here and that thought really isn’t that funny because I am wondering why nobody has done this yet? All of their products are simple and I’m sure most developers who have used them are thinking to themselves that they could do something just as simple in a short amount of time.

We see copycat sites all the time. There are tons of new “Diggs” popping up because development time is much shorter with online websites and applications than what we are used to seeing with desktop apps. So where are the 37signals clones? Also, has Fried ever thought about the possibility of someone releasing their products for free? He preaches building products people are willing to pay for, but what happens when your product is released for free? What do you do then?

Copycat sites have the disadvantage of being second, third or fourth to the market so usually the first entry is the one that reaps the rewards of advertising. When your business model is based on subscriptions you are almost depending on a lack of competition because things get a bit difficult once you are getting undercut with regards to pricing. Now when I say “free” what I am talking about is having the source downloadable where people can simply install it on their own servers. If you want to do a hosted model you could still sell advertising and run things for free or you could simply just do it cheaper than 37signals and add your own features.

Is it just me or is it crazy to think that the 37signals business model could be wiped away by one weekend of hard work between a group of developers? Well obviously it wouldn’t happen in one weekend, but what I mean is it all could start from just one weekend of work. Help me out because I feel I am missing something here.

UPDATE: People are saying you can’t build Basecamp in a weekend and that really isn’t the point of the entry. Consider a weekend to be a week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks, I don’t care. Also this could apply to anyone that has created a service like 37signals, but they are the only ones that pop up into my mind. And unless 37signals decides to enter the content space I don’t have any plans of competing with them.

The launch of the wireless internet technology has revolutionized the work of ISP companies. The internet phone as well as credit card processing system also enables the user to make order for web design as well as to pay the domain registration bill from the comforts of its room. Among the prominent online businesses internet marketing is regarded the best which is also a result of communication advancements.

Reality Check 2.0

Rich Ziade discusses a topic that has been on my mind for some time now with Reality Check 2.0 where he looks at our Web 2.0 success stories to see which ones have really made a dent in the real world and not just within our own little geek bubble. Amazing how caught up we can get when we all read the same blogs and see the same websites being used by the same people only to realize that “the outside world” has no idea what any of these sites are.

But hey, if you are getting bought out for $30M does it really matter? Of course it does because of all the ones that are starting up, how many have a happy ending?

With Great Power Comes More Power

Everyone knows the saying, but let’s say it again for the sake of this article:

With great power comes great responsibility.

Or something like that, but in the case of the web world it doesn’t seem to apply that often. An issue that gets discussed occassionally on websites that I read is that of disclosure. Some people feel that if you are part of something and write about it you should disclose your role behind it and possibly your motivation behind writing it. For example, if you are writing about a product that is sponsoring your site, some people believe you should mention that. Some even go as far as to say that you should label all affiliate links on your site as well.

Recently I came across two examples of people in power that made me a bit weary of their reasoning behind writing. Now let me state this doesn’t mean that their writings have nothing but good intentions behind them, but sometimes we are motivated to do things for different reasons that aren’t apparent to the general public. The two examples I can think of Jason Calacanis and TechCrunch.

Calacanis

There have been rumors over the past couple of weeks (not sure if they have been confirmed or not) that Calacanis would be named CEO of Netscape and officially make it something along the lines of Digg. A social site with user-generated content is all the rage because nothing is better than getting the public to direct your website for you. Again, all of this is speculation and the only thing I could find on his site was a comment that just made things even more cryptic.

There’s been some speculation about the future of Netscape and my involvement in it recently. There are no details to share right now, but if that changes I’ll certainly let you know….

Lately he has been doing “Unfocused User Groups” and his first site review involved Newsvine. He also hits up Squidoo and Magnolia, but why? Doing UFGs on social sites seems like more than unfocused user group research to me, but that isn’t really the problem. The problem is going to be how he reports his findings on those sites, no matter if they are right or wrong.

If you read his writeup of Newsvine you generally would leave with a bad impression of the site, although he does say some kind words about it at the end. My point is though, if Netscape is building a social news site, isn’t there a major conflict of interests here no matter how objective his reviews are? This goes with any social site he reviews and not just Newsvine (which I don’t really use even though Davidson is a good friend of mine).

Arrington

I like TechCrunch because I get to learn about new developments rather quickly. I’m not very fond of his reviews about sites simply because too many times does he get the facts wrong (ie, which technology a site is using), but also because you are never sure what his interest in these sites are. You see, Mike Arrington is a VC (or was a VC, who the hell knows) so you never know if he saying great things about a site simply because it would make his portfolio shine a bit brighter.

I’m definitely not saying there is anything dirty going on, but it’s just a thing I question every time I read a site. Everything in the world can’t be that great and too many things just suck and don’t serve any purpose. However, with that much traffic you can say whatever you want to influence a good amount of people.

The only disclosure you get is that “company X came by and showed me a demo”, but did they come over with an expensive bottle of wine to loosen you up? Okay, I took it to an extreme, but that’s how things play out in my mind.

Blog Power

I guess for some reason just because we call them blogs and see them as independent, many of us might think that we are not obligated to confide to our readers why we have an interest in Product B and Site 523, but shouldn’t we? Arguably we hold more power than the MSM because we can target the alpha people sooner who in turn start to influence everyone else. How we use that power is something that I think will be a major issue over the years to come.

Comments are closed on this one because this was more of a rant on my part, but if you do have any thoughts don’t hesitate to send them to scrivs{AT}9rules.com.