More musings on the not-better-RSS-aggregator
One correspondent asked: "Isn't this what bb:library is about or Technorati Blog Directory or egs. like Corante Web Hub, Global Voices, World Changing?"
Well, it might be a reinvention of those wheels. I don't know yet. I know I am not interested in reinventing wheels. But let me play some more. Here's what I wrote back:
"But I imagine this new product/service if it is built, will have in it's plumbing information like what we have in the library and also an rss aggregator.
But the idea is that this thing will never include the words rss, opml etc. To give you and idea, some of the names I've played with are:
feed.tv
omnivor.us
the daily ME
eclecti.ca
Why? Because I imagine this being something that someone who loves to keep up looks at daily and finds stuff of interest. Corante Web hub is kind of like that, but for a few (3 I think) topics. Also they have original content.
This thing is more like a tv with 1000 channels that you can pick from depending on what your interested in.
By the way the target for this would be very different than for BlogBridge. BB is for power feed readers, this thing would be for people that barely know how to check their email.
Am I nuts? Please stop me before I go off the deep end again :)"
By the way, which name speaks to you the most? None of them available anyway, sigh...
Comments
I am still with you (btw, one comment got lost on the first of the series).
OK, you are talking about a news stand and not about the publishing industry, not to mention the printing branch. In other words you want to sell the feeling of driving a car and not the technology or infrastructure behind it.
In the following I want to get away from technology aspects and paint a picture of a pleasant news shopping surrounding.
Let's brainstorm the virtual human future a little bit. Imagine somebody coming to Second Live (SL) for the first time, learning to walk, learning to fly, learning to touch and create things. The people behind SL are using analogies so that newcomers are not too overwhelmed by the new virtual possibilities. SL uses billboards, touchable posts with a big flying question mark and chat. You walk up to somebody or something and start a chat. Chat can be one to one or personal. Those things are pretty impressing because you immediately get a 'being here' feeling because of those analogies. But that virtual world in Second Life is BIG and COMPLEX and NEW. How would you present news (from SL or Real Live)?
I would create multimedia news channels (text, audio, video and personal guides) - which in SL already exists. But how to make the discovery as easy as possible? How would you visualize it?
Imagine you have a 3D warehouse or even a mall where you can 'shop' news items just from the shelf. In my imagination it would look like a mixture of a huge international news stand like you find them on international airports and a classical well known super market around the corner (7eleven, Walmart).
The key is to produce intuitive 3D analogies like 'walk through', 'aisles', 'boards' and 'items'. You might even create 'news lounges' for groups of people ...
The interesting thing is that the model already contains natural revenue models and all the marketing aspects you will need because they already exist in Real Life and everybody is used to it. Publishers will be interested to put news into the shelfs. Readers will be interested to go news shopping.
I call that "Grand Central News Lounge". The acronym (?) is GCNL which might become "Juicy News". The central hub where people will show up from everywhere (teleport to in SL) will be the icon/symbol of the central info counter at Grand Central New York City.
Where is the VC to start that thing :-)
Posted by: Markus Merz | October 15, 2006 08:00 AM