everwas

a blog by Ian Kennedy

Category: Work

  • The New News at Yahoo

    Richard MacManus of Web 2.0 has some initial thoughts on the redesign of Yahoo News. More branding for the content providers, clever uses of collapsing menus so that it’s easier to flick between categories and top headlines from different sources, and a new "drill down" feature which lets you run a Y!Q search on words and phrases that have been enabled within articles. There’s even a cool little slideshow feature that lets you play the through the top photos of the day (I see now this is not a new feature but it’s cool nonetheless).

    Yahoo’s editorial touch is evident as well with links to articles that have been pulled together to cover popular topics. Yahoo’s had these "Full Coverage" pages before but having them highlighted in the top right brings this feature to the fore. Links at the bottom of stories allow you to IM a story to someone and an interactive ranking system for each story no doubt feeds into the "Recommended Stories" section.

    RSS junkies would be happy to hear that almost everything you can think of is RSS-enabled so you can bring your own slice of what you see into your reader.

    I think I see Neil Budde’s vision taking place. Neil joined the Yahoo News team in November and was one of the original minds behind wsj.com. This is what happens when you give someone with editorial vision access to a team of talented engineers.

    Online Journalism Review coverage of Yahoo News
    Online Tour of Yahoo News

  • Mr. Smiley the Bus Driver

    One thing I love about living in the United States is the sense of humor that finds its way into daily life.

    The baggage handler at JFK that shouts out “Welcome to America!” at the top of his lungs as he hauls your bags off the conveyor belt.

    The Bart train driver who takes the time to explains the history of the West Oakland shipping cranes and how they were the inspiration for George Lucas when he designed the Imperial Walkers for Star Wars, all in the tone of a pleasantly brain dead Disney tour bus operator.

    The New York subway driver who tries to convince commuters from rushing into the same door at the bottom of the stairs by yelling into the intercom, “REVERSE PSYCHOLOGY. Everyone please jam into the same door at once!”

    Today’s wisecracking bus driver is the latest example of this very American humor. The ride back home on the Transbay bus is usually a mundane affair – folks are tired after a day in the work-a-day world and the muffled quiet on the bus is deadening as most just want to sink into their seats and reflect quietly on the day gone by. I have a choice of three buses to take me home so before boarding a bus I usually glance at my watch just to gauge if I should take the local before me or wait for an express. As I ran through the mental calculation the driver hailed me with a greeting and then said, “What are you lookin’ at your watch for, I’m on time. You want to leave earlier? I can do that too.”

    As I climbed on board he went on, trying to snap me from my post-work haze, “Hey, you dropped a $20 bill behind you.” when there was none there. Made you look is written on the faces of all the other riders already seated as I took my seat.

    Now alert, I patted the driver on his arm, thanking him for the joke and taking my seat. Each new rider was greeted with a new round of jokes and quips as he poked and prodded each commuter out of their automatic pilot.

    “I almost have enough, can I get on?” says a student. “I almost can take you, is that ok?” the driver shoots back.

    We’re pulling out of San Francisco and we’re all smiles, heading over the bridge with the sun setting behind us, a bus full of kids on a field trip.

  • We got Hats! We got T-Shirts!

    A shameless plug for the Six Apart Store. Be the first on your block (maybe the only one ever on your block) to wear a T-shirt that says “My other shirt is rebuilding” Shweet!

  • BBC sources photos from Flickr

    Steve Rubel over at Micro Persuasion notices that a recent article about Podcasting carried on the BBC website included photos that were taken by a Flickr user. It is not clear if they had gotten permission to do so from the user but they clearly were not credited as a source.

    This is the first time I can think of that an established media site included material without attribution and also brings up an interesting point about using RSS feeds and Search Engines as an alternative to the traditional newswires (AP, Reuters, PR Newswire) for sources of republished material.

    The article did not credit the photographer, camoby, so it’s unclear if the BBC purchased these images or if he works on staff or he simply let them use the photos gratis. His web site, however, does feature a BBC ticker. What’s known is that these images were not published under a Creative Commons license.

    As a friend of mine noted when the news of Flickr’s purchase by Yahoo was announced, “Who owns the photos on Flickr and is Yahoo or anyone else going to profit from the sale of images of my family without my knowledge?” Ads around Flickr images on either Flickr or Yahoo are one thing but distribution to other sites is another thing entirely. Let alone, did Adam Curry release these images as well?

  • Yahoo Generates Buzz

    The folks over at Yahoo Research have teamed up with O’Reilly and Newsfutures to run a simulated stock market, Buzz Game, where players can buy and sell companies, technologies, and other memes on an open market. You get a virtual $10k to start and the players with the most in their portfolio by the end of July get actual prizes.

    I just bought a bunch of stuff and already I’m down to $8k in less than 30 minutes which doesn’t bode well.

  • Yahoo to buy Flickr

    In other news this weekend, Yahoo has confirmed that it has purchased online photo collaboration and folksononomy pioneer, Flickr. Major cred points for the folks in Purple and Yellow. Write ups from Jeremey Zawodny at Yahoo and Caterina at Flickr. It’s now really getting interesting!

  • code or developer, chicken or egg?

    Found this by browsing the popular links page on de.licio.us. Google has countered Yahoo’s Search API page with a revamp of their own API page. Links out to sample APIs, documentation, and even a blog. One major difference is that they are also posting links to projects that they have released as open source.

    The URLs tell you something about the two companies.

    code.google.com or developer.yahoo.net

    At Google it’s about the code, at Yahoo it’s about the developer.

    PS. Six Apart has just launched its own version of the above. www.sixapart.com/pronet/docs/powertools so I guess that means we’re not about the code or the developer. It’s the tools and we hope you use ones that give you Power!

  • Yahoo API plugin for Movable Type

    It was only a matter of time. Ken McCloskey over at Pixelabra has developed a plug-in to allow you to search Yahoo! using their new API from within Movable Type.

  • Dining with Yahoo

    The folks at SFist write about their dinner with Yahoo where they get an insight into some of the economic shifts that are a result of the changes in the media landscape.

    Greg pointed out that in the past, papers could depend on classified ads accounting for up to 35% of their revenue. Now they’re lucky if it represents 15%. And Susan’s friend Bob, who was nice enough to give us a ride back up 101, noted that 93% of businesses in San Francisco have fifty or fewer employees, and that as print publications increase their ad rates to account for revenue shortfalls, small, local businesses are being shut out of much needed publicity, which opens the door for chains and franchises who can subsidize the increased media costs.