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Posts by Mark Trapp

Review

BuddyFeed, a Native FriendFeed Client.

Date: January 16, 2009 - 7:56am (Last updated: January 16, 2009 - 8:35am)
Author: Mark Trapp

One of the things that's been missing from FriendFeed has been a native iPhone client. Sure, there's the iPhone version of the website, and there's FFToGo, but they both miss a lot of administrative features of FriendFeed and don't provide the lustery UI of a native app. Recently, a third-party FriendFeed iPhone app came out called BuddyFeed.

Review

My Perfect FriendFeed: Meme-less.

Date: January 20, 2009 - 6:10pm (Last updated: January 20, 2009 - 6:32pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

A couple weeks ago, one of the founders of FriendFeed, Paul Buchheit, asked the world their ideas on the perfect FriendFeed.

Review

All Likes Are Not Created Equal.

Date: February 10, 2009 - 8:24pm (Last updated: March 3, 2009 - 5:42pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

Recently, Facebook released a feature in its newsfeed that allows people to "like" newsfeed items. As it's described by Facebook's program manager Leah Pearlman, the feature allows you to tell your friends you approve of what they posted:

This is similar to how you might rate a restaurant on a reviews site. If you go to the restaurant and have a great time, you may want to rate it 5 stars. But if you had a particularly delicious dish there and want to rave about it, you can write a review detailing what you liked about the restaurant. We think of the new "Like" feature to be the stars, and the comments to be the review.

This feature prima face copies FriendFeed's "like" functionality, right down to the interaction and the verbage. Not surprisingly, FriendFeed's supporters were outraged and appalled at Facebook's Machievellian drive to copy FriendFeed. But I think it's important to take a step back and talk about the value of a "like".

Review

URL Shorteners Are Playing with Fire.

Date: April 4, 2009 - 11:24am (Last updated: April 9, 2009 - 11:04am)
Author: Mark Trapp

Yesterday, Joshua Schachter had an excellent piece on the perils of the URL shortener: it's clear, concise, and scathing. Jason Kottke and Dave Winer had a few suggestions on how to mitigate the problem, or get us on the right track to eventually deprecating the use of URL shorteners.

I agree with Schachter's assessment, and I think Kottke and Winer are on the right track, but I think the URL shortener problem is far greater than what Schachter enumerates: no longer satisfied with controlling the initial click, URL shorteners have decided to add toolbars to promote ther content or to sell adspace: the most notable and recent addition to this group is Digg's toolbar, DiggBar. Dubious utility aside, they are trampling in the garden of an angry god.

Review

Real-time Killed the Web 2.0 Star.

Date: April 6, 2009 - 6:40pm (Last updated: April 6, 2009 - 7:03pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

Today, FriendFeed unveiled a redesign of its product, focusing on real-time communication as a principle design goal. Expectedly, there are more than a few detractors of the decision to place real-time at the forefront (see Steven Hodson's post on Inquisitr, Michael Arrington's post on TechCrunch, or do a search on FriendFeed). I think they're stuck in a paradigm that's lasted for years that real-time has now rendered obsolete: the "follow."

The Web

Dr. Private Message.

Date: April 15, 2009 - 11:54am (Last updated: April 15, 2009 - 12:06pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

Or: How I learned to stop worrying and love the web

Today, Alexander Van Elsas had a sort of 95 Thesis/20 Questions amalgam about a host of issues involving the state of the internet today. One set of questions provoked a couple points of discussion from Rob Diana and John Bredehoft:

The Web

OAuth for Dummies.

Date: September 17, 2009 - 12:30pm (Last updated: September 17, 2009 - 8:19pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

One of the projects I've been working on instead of updating this blog has been a set of modules for Drupal that allow FriendFeed users do all sorts of interesting things. While I'm not ready to release the details of those projects, one of the biggest mind-benders I've experienced in my work has been OAuth, a technology FriendFeed uses as its preferred authentication mechanism in the latest version of its API.

The Web

The Dirty Little Google Voice Secret.

Date: October 12, 2009 - 12:42pm (Last updated: October 13, 2009 - 12:18pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

If you use Google Voice, have an iPhone, or are interested in smart phones, you’re probably aware of the ongoing spat between Apple, AT&T, and Google over network neutrality and Google Voice on the iPhone (c.f. Apple’s take, AT&T’s take, and Google’s take). If you’re like me, you don’t really care who’s to blame for why you can’t use Google Voice on your iPhone: they’re probably all at fault.

You may not be able to use a shiny application for Google Voice on your iPhone, but you can use relatively new or unknown features of AT&T and Google together and against them and wind up saving a nice chunk of change in the process. This is for all phones, not just the iPhone, but if you’re an iPhone user, I’d say it’s not a bad consolation prize. I’m going to talk about two features: Google Voice’s outbound calling and your wireless carrier’s calling circle feature.

Review

Twitter Lists Make Twitter Dangerous to Use.

Date: October 29, 2009 - 1:43pm (Last updated: October 30, 2009 - 3:38pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

Updated at the end.

The big buzz in the social media world lately revolves around Twitter's rollout of its "list" feature, which allows you and others to create lists of your followers: easily tagging them so you can share those lists with others. Robert Scoble thinks it's a game changer, and is pushing the value proposition for them hard. But I think lists, because they have no consent mechanism and because they can be made public, are boneheaded, broken, and ultimately make Twitter a dangerous tool to use for anyone who values their reputation.

Great Moments

Steve Jobs on the new AT&T data plans.

Date: June 2, 2010 - 5:07pm (Last updated: June 2, 2010 - 5:29pm)
Author: Mark Trapp

This morning, I checked TechMeme and saw the big news: AT&T decided to restructure its data plans to remove the option for unlimited data. This disappoints me greatly: I, like I'm sure thousands of other customers, bought the iPad WiFi + 3G based on the deal Apple struck with AT&T to offer a no-contract, $30/month, cancel-and-activate any time you need it plan. Like Gizmodo said, the purchase was insurance in case I ever needed to be on 3G exclusively for a while.

The new plans, I believe, are a total bait-and-switch. I don't begrudge AT&T's right to change their prices, but I do find it disappointing that they did it no more than a month after the iPad WiFi + 3G launched, and a couple weeks after the return window ended. So, I decided to write to Steve Jobs in what I thought would be a vain release of my frustration: