Thursday, September 27, 2007

Animoto - DIY Mood / Brand Videos

I found Animoto this morning (via TIGS). It is perfect for the likes of me who have no video software talent whatsoever to make emotive content - spot on for brand presentations etc. Simply uploads some pics. Upload or choose some music. And hey presto.


Made this cutesy video of my little boy in no time at all.

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Bubble 2.0

Here's a completely unsubstantiated thought that I'd love some opinion on. Perhaps even a little evidence here and there may help!

As far as I can tell, a major cause of the first dotcom crash was limited access to affordable, high-speed internet connection. There were lots of good ideas, but they couldn't scale because hardly anyone could experience them.

Research group of one here! I remember being all excited about new websites cropping up but soon settling to a repertoire of favourites. Websites kept turning up, but they didn't offer anything new or interesting - that leap of innovation, or rather the mass acceptance of that innovation, was seemingly impossible without corresponding availability of high speed internet connection (imagine the success of You Tube with a dial-up modem?).

Broadband (etc.) enabled bandwidth hungry applications to thrive - not only to exist but also to spread and grow. The ideas that existed pre-crash could now work. This brought us "web 2.0". Multi-media experiences and connectivity that we (at least most of us) couldn't have imagined with a dial-up modem.

But are we now experiencing a second glass-ceiling - where the ideas are starting to be better than the delivery to the (mass) end-user again? Most of the new websites I've seen recently seem to be (more-or-less) copycats with frills on - they are operating within the same framework as the existing sites, limited by the same end-user parameters.

I'm sure some VC is funding a new video sharing website , a new social networking site. But why? People have settled into their favourites - Google, Facebook, YouTube etc. and it will take a massive leap in functionality to get them to change. And I doubt that this leap is possible without a significant increase in readily available connection speed.

So potentially we're heading for another crash, or at least a levelling of innovation and investment. Any views?