Business-related problems associated with web 2.0

The likelihood of which users need to pay for themselves

micro-payment is another important tool for web 2.0 development
-it provides a platform for spontaneous transactions




The Spirits of web 2.0
-To transform ourselves through adopting web 2.0 online
-also about the idea to share and to be open & to be original in blogging

What I'm going to talk next has more relevance to you.

What constitutes the web?
We believe that we are the pillars of the web. think of the case of blogging.
We have blog posts, pictures on delicious, to-dos on 43things, and reviews on Deouban
We use our own information to form the content, posting on our personal pages thus constituting different websites

1.microcontents, 2.personal pages, 3.websites
Leads to: Personal database center, personal portal -> we the web

Users have become important contributors to webcontents, reading list, blogroll and thus making them important and this is why we need to have more users-centered design

Social Relation:

Microcontents: blog, bookmarks, photos, todolists, podcasts

Social relations: individual, kin, friends, classmates, colleagues

How to we structure the vast amount of information of the microcontents?
tags and in particular RSS. Bookmarking is also one of the tool.
Distinction with BBS and the newly-emerged use of SNS Social Network (synthesis?)

Web 2.0 application in entertainment , human resources
We can see that the tools that manage microcontents can be put as tools for information/knowledge where as the way we form social network (group, SNS, community, IMs) belongs more to social network formation. Of course the distinction is not clear-cut . We would talk not just about information, but also the social implications embedded in it. For interpersonal relationship, internet would enlarge our definitions of social structures





Now i would proceed to the most interesting part of the talk
****semantic? Contextual web****

contextual web
Semantic web: contextual web

social relation intergrate into internet
Social relations have completely diffused into the internet sphere
Any person's post or link has complex semantic relationship.

we have enlarged semantic meanings for the contents online
we would know that there is a living person writing it, and we would know the social relations of this person would that be a PR passage trying to pretend that it's a neutral blog?

semantic structure
- 1, knowledge
- 2, personal relations

Reading habits: link-driven world. Mutual reinforcement and repetition the linking and semantic web are the main reason why newspapers are threatened, because our reading habits have been completely changed by the web of links example: talkdigger.com & also http://tech.memeorandum.com

questions: can the semantic web scale?
also: what is being recorded (saved)?
can look at the relationship between information/content and the time when it appeared, etc.

Horse shows a table showing different services and their usefulness for different kinds of searches
semantic? contextual web... far away...





he now wants to talk about his personal observations about the semantic web
things to watch in social behavior on the web, analyze user behavior

how people manifest their personal identity online
look at how people represent themselves online and how they create their identities
look at social relations online

many people ask about what will the social and political implications be of these changes?
horse thinks that it will be very subtle and slow, bubbling up from the bottom and hard to point at concrete changes initially
creativity, dialogue are key terms

things that are anti-web 2.0
unfair business practices

horse thinks that the government actions arent as threatening
he doesnt think that the law will prevent people from doing most things
more concerned about business practices: spam, copyright laws

the key to protecting web 2.0: let the individual become the "points of light" and protect them
his website http://zhanbin.com

Tagged: cnbloggercon, 中文网志年会, CBC2005

Chedong is talking about the nonprofit web activities and describes the cnblog experience:




- its hard to set up nonprofit organizations in china
- the legal structure isnt set up for it
- fund raising is also a big problem
- big problem for nonprofits to fundraise, especially on the web
- Chen Zhiwei runs a blog media company (kind of like gawker)

Chedong thanks Zhang Erning


Lao Mao is now taken over the mic and is sharing his experiences:




- He blogs at www.uuzone.ocm/blog/mao & moblogs at http://www2.uuzone.com/blog/mao
- He says that every blog is a person
- the links are "guanxi" - your connections with people
- trackback is communication
- so blogs are a huge social network
- future blogs will be very different that what we have today
- but the main thing is that they will create relationship links and web amongst people






Topku Chan has started delivering his session & now he apologizes bcause he's Cantonese, he says his mandarin isnt very good.

- hes talking about why companies should care about blogs
- as blogs develop in china society will be =come more and more individualistic so companies will need to diversify their p.r.
- the web is distributed so companies need to have dialogue with networks of users/consumers ets
- companies must communicate with people in their own language
- companies need to learn the art of linking
- they should see what their inbound links are saying about their products
- companies need to be smarter about using google search, tags, rss, links and etc.
- you should look for negative things that bloggers are saying about your product and use it as feedback for improvement, rather than try to control or stop the negative views





Topku talks about 2 points companies need to understand:

- the very nature of p.r. is changing
- keyvoice is bigger than "keyword"
- "keyvoice" is his own invention
- you need to pay attention to the key voices talking about your product

Kevin Wen is starting, introducing himeslf and welcoming foreign particvipants like Rebecca and Owen from feedster.




Kevin is now talking about the development of cnblog. Kevin says blog is another kind of document web - rss, xml and as a result pepole can connect to each other through links and rss feeds in ways not possible before. Hard to tell where the future is going , but we seem to be going in the direction of semantic web blogs: qblogs

skipped a couple of slides


He's talking about the "click" phenomenon
In the beginning you could only click on links within sites.
Then search helped us find things we were looking for ability to search information

"express intent. does not depend on result" (from slide)
stage 3: tag - we can label items to manage, remember, and share





How we start? (how his company started):
They started with a brainstorm session in small apartment.
And formed an organized team.
Felt that they should help more people do blogs
Their whole team met each other online.
They hadnt ever met in person and had various online meetings then figured out how they could develop a product to help users blog. Thats how they created blogdriver. It was a whole group with no marketing but developed 400 thousand users.

But some things that seem simple are much harder than you imagine
When youre working remotely with people how do you pay them?
Communication was always big challenge



We used a lot of im and skype and studied how u.s. startups work
Then went to south-by-southwest conference in austin in 2004 and had a chance to interact with other startups for the first time. We met six apart, feedster, etc. and learned how they work.

The biggest lesson: learn from users otherwise you cant develop a good service or product idea of a "personal portal".

In the brainstorms saw that there was demand in china. The startup was tough period: more efforts we put in, the more responsibility we have. After working for a year or so, had to make tough decisions, either find vc or merge with another company. It hit a point where they had to decide whether to merge or get round of vc capital. They realized they had no managerial and operational experience and the necessary connections, etc. So they decided not to seek next round of funding, and instead decided to merge with blogchina
(now bokee).




They felt it was a good platform, with lots of good management experience and Kevin feels that it was the right decision:
- lessons of entrepreneurship:
- learning by doing
- nobody is an expert
- professional amateur
- you must keep your mind open as you move forward
- this is much more effective than book learning before you start something

next lesson: focus.
know the value
you must specialize and be clear on what your differentation is

partners: you need good trusted partners focusing on one thing, do it very well and enjoy it a quote from david sifry

innovation: he is going to play a video of tiger woods
everything is possible, just do it
what innovation is not
just because you have new tech doesnt mean innovation
nor is just r&D
not just creative playroom
innovation is a process
its not just having an amazing idea



seed of innovation: understanding, imagination, action


Kevin is showing the "read my lips" remix video (the one with Tony Blair and George Bush mixed over "endless love"):










...Kevin finishes with his presentation .....





...and the Panelists are geting ready to start.....