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  Ning's bubble bursts? Are you kidding me?

  Stii 7:49 am on April 16, 2010 | Comments: 3 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: business model (2), ning, online business, social networking

  Ning has a new CEO that decided it makes perfect business sense to cut their free social networks and only have paid for social networks in the future and the Internet goes “Bye-bye Ning!“. The free networks cost them money in resources and support. By cutting their free offering, they can effectively cut their staff compliment by a whopping 40%. Not only will they save money, but they have an opportunity to make more money too. Yet, for the bulk of people online, this makes no business sense.

  I’m not saying that freemium with a paid for value add is not a viable business model. It could be that Ning simply did it wrong by offering too much for free. What I am saying is that from a normal business perspective, this is probably the right move for Ning. Yes, they’ll make a lot of cheapskates very angry, but having used the occasional Ning network (The Silicon Cape initiative is using Ning) I can say that their product is rock solid and feature rich. They don’t have to worry too much. It would still be cheaper to create a Ning network than it would be to develop your own app.

  Unless I’m simply short sighted and missing the point. In that case, enlighten me so I can learn something new, please!

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  The flow of information

  Stii 5:37 pm on March 9, 2010 | Comments: 0 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: information, news (2), social networking, traditional media

  I found this article on UX Magazine very interesting. It is about the flow of information and how it changed from broadcasting to networked.

  Broadcast media structures take one critical thing for granted: attention. There is an assumption that everyone will tune in and give their attention to the broadcast entity, even though that was never true in the first place.

  It also shed some light on how information flows in a networked environment. We all know that when we tweet, our tweet isn’t necessarily seen by all our followers. Similarly, we don’t sit and watch our Twitter stream day in and day out to catch up on all thats being said. That would have been a broadcasting model. In a networking environment we decide what can have our attention and what can’t. Very tricky…

  Read it. It is well worth it! Streams of Content, Limited Attention
  
   
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  Another great African start-up secures funding

  Stii 8:24 am on August 12, 2009 | Comments: 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: chess, chesscube, invenfin, online gaming, social networking, startup (4), vinny lingham

  Chesscube, a Cape Town based start-up just announced they received a whopping $1.25 million in second round funding. That is great news for the guys and I’m happy for them. Chesscube is a great online chess playing community with more than 650 000 users in 207 countries.

  

  I registered a couple of months ago on behalf of my 9 year old son who loves playing chess. I myself sucks at chess. :P I was blown away by the features and the functionality it offered and it REALLY is any chess player’s dream. It is a great example of social networking meets online gaming and we all know that chess is one of the most popular games. If you are even slightly interested in playing chess or if you think you are a worthy adversary in the art of warfare then join! You’re bound to love it. If you think you’re hardcore enough, then join one of their tournaments. Believe me, I got my ass kicked in matters of minutes…

  Just looking at Chesscube, one can see a myriad of revenue possibilities which is fantastic! I think they have a brilliant future ahead of them and their investors are bound to be a happy bunch in the not-so-far future. Well done to Mark Levitt (CEO) and his team. Well done to Vinny Lingham for spotting this great opportunity and being an early investor.

  Oh, and if you play chess and would like to feel better about yourself by beating somebody into the ground, look me up on Chesscube…
  
   
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  Facebook revert back to their old Terms of Use

  Stii 10:04 am on February 18, 2009 | Comments: 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: facebook (4), social networking, terms and conditions (2)

  If you log into Facebook today, you’ll see that they’ve announced that they reverted back to their old Terms of Use. Pressure, boys, pressure… Get it right next time, okay? Our stuff is our stuff. No matter how lame or great. It is not cool simply claiming rights on it, okay?

  Over the past few days, we have received a lot of feedback about the new terms we posted two weeks ago. Because of this response, we have decided to return to our previous Terms of Use while we resolve the issues that people have raised.

  If you want to share your thoughts on what should be in the new terms, check out our group Facebook Bill of Rights and Responsibilities.
  
   
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  Don't talk back at me, I'll smack you!

  Stii 12:46 pm on February 16, 2009 | Comments: 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: coca cola, coke fest, social networking, socialmedia (7)

  This is what I read between the lines when it comes to big brands. Like @fearsumm one day said: “I can read between the lines. Even if it is only one line, I can read between it”

  Last week, Coca-Cola had a hissy fit about Jason Bagley running an “official-looking” site (mycoke.co.za) without their involvement.

  

  So, who’s fault is THAT?! Why didn’t the Coca-Cola company facilitate such a site from the word go? Could it be that people DO NOT TRUST brands to allow them so-called freedom of speech? If you read this from their official statement:

  The Coca-Cola Company appreciates all comments and feedback received from fans of the MY COKE FEST events and encourages discussion and dialogue about these events in open forums. However, the Company cannot knowingly permit such discussions to take place in conjunction with the unauthorized use of its trade marks which could ultimately result in harm to its brands and image.

  Now don’t get me wrong, I do empathise with that. There are some seriously anal people (a.k.a. Trolls) out there in the world that will try and find things wrong with everything and anything just for the sake of being anal. The question then becomes when and where do opinions cross the line and become trollish flamebait? Who is to decide that?

  Personally, I think that we love our fans to be positively vocal about our brands, but hate it when there are negative comments. Should we not trust our fans to address the negative comments as well? It is virtually impossible to address each and every statement made about you. Coca-Cola would have to have a whole department for community interaction. They should rather just focus on their champions and get them to help respond to negative comments. Users would also be able to identify and deal with trolls much easier.

  Coca-Cola should learn how to effectively use an uncontrollable community to their advantage, rather than forcing them to close down. See, the math makes no sense whatsoever. It is a big enough issue for them to get their lawyers to shut mycoke.co.za down. Do they seriously think they made ANY friends or fans with this type of action? Erm, I wouldn’t think so. I’d love to see them (fans) vent their frustration elsewhere. It should make an interesting read!

  Big brands, specially here in South Africa, still acts a lot like an old school headmaster. You don’t talk back at him. You WILL get smacked if you do. You are, after all, a child who knows nothing. Who needs to grow up?
  
   
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  Find your mates on Afrigator

  Stii 2:36 pm on February 11, 2009 | Comments: 0 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Afrigator (23), bloggers (6), Friends, search (4), social networking

  Right, this feature actually used to be (in some obscure way) in Afrigator, but was dropped. Don’t ask why. Seriously don’t. When we ran Afrigreater, Jeanette Verster said she’s love a way to find friends in Afrigator, but the feature was lacking. Well, now its back and SO much better!

  Let’s say I’m searching for Jeanette Verster. So I type it in the search box and hit enter.

  

  It returns the results as found in blog posts and news articles, but now, in the sidebar it will display all blogs found matching the criteria.

  

  What is really cool about all this is that not only does it find Jeanette’s blog, it also shows where she is mentioned. (as seen in the image below when Nerdmag interviewed Jeanette) NIFTY!

  

  I like to think about it as “one search to rule them all“. :P (its a joke… lots to be done still concerning search!)