If you don’t “get” Facebook and Twitter, read this NY Times article « Lightspeed Venture Partners Blog

If you don’t “get” Facebook and Twitter, read this NY Times article « Lightspeed Venture Partners Blog: "In essence, Facebook users didn’t think they wanted constant, up-to-the-minute updates on what other people are doing. Yet when they experienced this sort of omnipresent knowledge, they found it intriguing and addictive. Why?

Social scientists have a name for this sort of incessant online contact. They call it “ambient awareness.” It is, they say, very much like being physically near someone and picking up on his mood through the little things he does — body language, sighs, stray comments — out of the corner of your eye."

Helge: I agree about the "ambient awareness". People I follow on Jaiku, Twitter, Facebook, Friendfeed, and Pownce are somewhat closer than those who write long and informative stories and posts on their blogs. I got the link to this story from Robert Scobleizer over Twitter. We're not real world friends but I follow what he does and writes, look at his videos and webcasts.

Twitter vs Pownce | Four20

I use Twitter, Pownce, Jaiku, Facebook and Ning, Wiki, blogs and web pages. Four2o is comparing Twitter and Pownce. Let me take a look at his comments and experiences and add my own between the lines.

Twitter vs Pownce | Four20: "I have been using both Twitter and Pownce for a couple of months now. Most of the time I looked at both Twitter and Pownce as the same service. Yes Pownce was slower than Twitter and yes Twitter has more outages than Pownce. The more I use it the more I begin to understand the community that uses the service. This is what makes the two services different," writes Doug.

Helge: I try to think that Pownce is different and I'd like to use it in a different way. I'm a frequent Twitter user but tend to forget what Pownce might be good for. I've not yet found my Pownce voice. Outages? I didn't notice that while I use it less than Doug, I guess.

"Being a Digg user I learned about Pownce before Twitter, so I got a Pownce account first. Only having 2-5 friends on Pownce didn’t keep me interested enough to keep using the service. Then a couple of months ago I went through and began adding friends of friends. I looked at it like ‘if they’re friends of my friends, they might share some similar interests’. The outcome was great. I was meeting more and more people and I learned that these websites were basically social networks. Until then I hadn’t really looked at it in that way," Doug continues.

Helge: I've a Digg account but never really started using it. Twitter did come first, then Jaiku and Facebook, and Ning is also a part of my social media toolbox. Pownce is the last one. Still figuring out what I want to communicate through Pownce.

I began to see the potential of Pownce as a source of content. People post links to articles, pictures, and media that they are reading/watching that they liked. Using threaded comments was a cool feature too(since twitter didn’t do this). It is nice to put something up there and have one place for everyone to comment/respond.

Helge: "As a source of content..." I think the microblogs are rapid news sources. I'm connected to thousands of people around the globe through various Social Media sites. How much do I know about the individuals writing, posting, twittering, jaikuing, facbooking and Powncing? For me writing "traditional blog posts" about them brings the people closer. I learn things through writing. Hopefully people learn things about me through my blogs and microblogs.

Read more on Doug's blog.

Bio about Doug

My name is Doug, but you may know me as Four20. I am a geek and a stoner that works at a pizza joint. When I’m not at work(or sleeping) I’m on the internet. . .monitoring RSS feeds. . .digging stories. . .and watching/listening to podcasts.

Background

I first learned how to build a computer within the first month of high school. For the next four years I cleaned up viruses on the machines, upgraded the hardware and pieced together broken machines to make new ones. It was my sophomore year when I smoked pot for the first time. . .and ever since I have enjoyed learning as much as possible about both.

I have been on the internet since Aol 2.0(3-4 months before 3.0 came out). During the first dot-com days I remember learning how to build and repair computers at school. . .and in my senior year I began learning HTML.

I had a job at a Usenet(newsgroups) company where I did support(and some administration) for almost 3 years. During this time the internet was cracked wide open to me. I learned about this entire culture that I knew very little about before.

Fast forward to today and I am the computer guy at work and with family. . .as well as involved in web publishing.

Purpose

This website will be a ‘home base’ for everything about me. . .Fou20. I participate in many web 2.0 communities as well as publish content on a few websites of my own. . .and this will be a good place to link to all of my stuff.

Contact

If you would like to contact me with a question, comment, tip or anything else. . .please do so. Click here to contact me.

Kevin Rose Can’t Keep Up With E-mail; Blaine Cook Can’t Wait To Speak With a Human

Kevin Rose Can’t Keep Up With E-mail; Blaine Cook Can’t Wait To Speak With a Human: "On Friday, I moderated a fun panel at the Future of Web Apps conference in Miami. The basic premise was to try to come up with a compelling web app in 40 minutes. There were a lot of good ideas, but the best ones centered around communications and how to use technology to get around the frustrations of e-mail and phone calls.

It was clear that the panelists think these communication modes that we rely on every day may very well be in the process of breaking down. (CNet’s Caroline McCarthy, who was covering the conference, notes this as well).

Helge: Email and the Phone is what I feel has to change. We don't need to talk all the time. Email is a garbage sink.

A lot of the ideas were about getting around current communications bottlenecks. Leah Culver of Pownce came up with a white pages service that uses SMS text messages to look up phone numbers.

Helge: I'd like to see more people writing, blogging. The idea of having things documented is better than cold calls in the air.

Blaine Cook of Twitter suggested creating a call-back service that would, in effect, allow you call companies and put them on hold until a human answered.

Helge: Humans are avoiding phone calls?

In other words, you would specify what department you want to speak with at a company, and the software would call and go through the phone tree, and digitally push all the right buttons until it got to a human operator, at which point it would ring your phone. I thought this was brilliant.

Helge: Why not Twitter? I know why not, because there want be a response.

Leah Culver is the lead programmer for the messaging service Pownce. Previously she had worked at Instructables and gained internet notoriety from her laser-etched laptop project.

Mashable! - The Social Networking Blog - Pownce

Mashable! - The Social Networking Blog: "Pownce Launch Party Tonight - Pownce to Exit Private Beta January 16, 2008 — 02:45 PM PST — by Mark 'Rizzn' Hopkins.

Pete Cashmore will be joining Leah Culver and the Pownce team for their launch party this evening. A party, you say? What for? Pownce is opening up registration to the general public starting January 22nd, ending the private beta, and entering the public one.

The new version of Pownce will include a new upcoming event page, a mobile events section, and an improved desktop application, according to Culver.

As soon as details and images are available, we’ll be bringing them to you. In the meantime, if you’re hanging out in the San Francisco area, join Pete and Leah over at the Madrone Lounge for some $2 (or is it $1?) Pabst Blue Ribbons."