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Hogs get Fatter, Pliggs get Slaughtered

Posted on August 23rd, 2007 in Looking Bad by bstew

videosiftlogo.png


Just a week after the Digg clone script company, Pligg, announced it was up for sale, VideoSift, which claims claimed to be the biggest website currently not currently using Pligg’s software, informed Pligg by email that it has developed its own software and would not longer need Pliggs services. Ouch.

Here is the aforementioned email:

Pligg is a good general CMS, but there were a few considerations for moving off:

We started VideoSift shortly after Pligg was ported from the Spanish language Digg clone Meneame.net written by a talented Spanish coder, Ricardo Galli. ( http://meneame.net/) Pligg has gone through a lot of revisions and changes since then - and we haven’t moved with them.

About 2 months ago, there was a serious security breach at VideoSift (and other Pligg based sites) that compromised part of our DB. The breach was based on a simple hack that would have been found by analyzing the Pligg source. Although the Pligg community was quick to respond and patch the problem- This pushed us farther down the road to closed source.

And lastly, although we were well on our way to writing our new software, we have some misgivings about the pending sale of Pligg. Pligg is licensed under the Aferro GPL which is pretty strict about the re-sell of code.

The new VideoSift has been rebuilt from the ground up to work well around video aggregation. Our community loves it, and we can’t wait to launch it this Friday.

Thanks and cheers,

Brian Houston
VideoSift
Sydney, Australia

Terrible news for the Pligg sale. Despite some obvious weakness, like the security glitch a few months back, Pligg is a great script, and I wish the developers well in their endeavors  in selling.

Check Point Security Software’s New Logo

Posted on August 16th, 2007 in Looking Bad by bstew

Now, I may not be one to talk, because I don’t even have a logo for this site, but no logo at all is surely better than the one Check Point security software has come up with. The CEO of Check Point reportedly allowed his 6 year old daughter to come up with a logo for the company, and this is the result.

Notice to Investors: if you have any money whatsoever in this company, pull it out now! If the CEO is making poor basic decisions like this, how is he going to operate in the future, when he must make a multi million dollar decision.

Before anyone says "It’s just a logo", please realize, it is more than a logo, it is a corporate brand, and if all I had at my disposal were logos of companies when attempting to figure out which company to go with, I would vomit as I passed this logo by. But like they say, any publicity is good publicity, so here are your 15 minutes Check Point. Use them wisely.

USA Today Social Network Failing

Posted on August 16th, 2007 in Looking Bad by bstew

If you are a major player in any facet of the media (either network or cable TV, or the print media), please heed to my advice:

DON’T ATTEMPT SOCIAL NETWORKING!

It’s simply a recipe for disaster. If we have learned anything from the NBC’s poor attempt at a social network aimed at comical videos, AOL and Netscape’s attempt compete with Digg, and the various other giants who have attempted to compete with the Web 2.0 successors, it’s that they don’t work, plain and simple.

The USAToday launched what they considered a social network for news, and since that time they have had a 29% drop off in unique visitors (from 14 million to 10 million) per month. Obviously, this is not a direct result from the newly created website, but the site obviously didn’t help business at all. Sometimes companies need to realize they have a certain audience for a certain reason, and any changes may lead to the business’ demise.

THe USAToday will rebound, but it’s going to be difficult to compete with the NetVibes of the web.

The Real Reason Second Life will Fail

Posted on July 16th, 2007 in Looking Bad by bstew

Pardon my bluntness, but the real reason that Second Life will fail (I use the term loosely and should probably replace it with ‘will not be a tremendous success’) is really quite simple; real vagina is better than cyber vagina. Sure, there is a niche of introverted hermits sitting inside their homes attempting to make connections with other similar people, but this is hardly enough of a demographic to establish the numbers huge corporations are looking for to expand their businesses.

I made this prediction the very first time I learned of SecondLife a little over one year ago (but unfortunately had not started this blog yet). And unpromising numbers have recently come out for SecondLife. The LA Times reported that the maximum number of users on SecondLife at any given time is 40,000. The most popular corporate destinations on SecondLife peak at 10,000 visitors per week. With the cost of owning and maintaining real estate of SecondLife, what this boils down to is that essentially SecondLife is not economically efficient whatsoever.

SecondLife will not be a failure. However, don’t expect it to be the economic powerhouse experts once believed it would be. It’s just too weird for mainstream success.

Hello world!

Posted on July 12th, 2007 in Looking Bad by bstew

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