IDEA #98 – Live Music Concert Tracking
January 30, 2009 | 3 Comments
I wrote this email to the founders of Tourfilter, but had never sent it. I’ve sent it now and thought I’d republish here. This was from a few months ago, so some of these may have been carried out. Also since then, some competition by LiveKick has come into play. Tourb.us was tackling this problem, but they seem to have disappeared.
I’m still a very frustrated individual that I miss-out on knowing about music concerts in my area. It’s a sincere pain point for me. I’m obsessed with music, particularly live shows, so if anyone is ever creating a website to solve this problem, shoot me an email and I’ll gladly give my thoughts.
Some suggestions to make Tourfilter the ultimate concert-awareness tool:
- I hate having to input all my bands — why can’t I just tell you my last.fm username, you go to that page, scrape my rss feed, and give me a confirmation screen with little boxes next to each artist [just to ensure i'd even want to be notified about those artists -- because sometimes i listen to stuff, but don't like the band it turns out].
- Ditto for hypem.com – just input my username.
- Recommended artists — based on what I listen to now, tell me about other concerts coming to my area that I might like because of my taste in other artists. [maybe pull this from last.fm? Or future -- when enough users use your service, it'll recommend based on other user's interests compared to yours].
- Twitter integration — let me give my credentials, so you verify I’m that user — and then send me ‘direct messages’ when a new artist is coming to my town that I’d want to see. [This is for the super enthusiast that wants to really be in the know].
- Affiliate links to stubhub and ticketmaster. Link to craigslist as a search in that city’s craigslist for that artist name. You appear to be using Stubhub, but I don’t think you’re using affiliate links so that you can earn money from referring users to buy tickets. [Are there API's to show # of tickets/matches on each of these services?]
- A concert/event page with simple discussion boards; let people post tickets for sale. Display some ebay links matching the artist’s name [for shirts, etc].
- Widgets/badges — an artist could update their tour dates here, and then post it on their myspace page, etc. Allow easy distribution/access of the tour dates by other services [ilike, fb, myspace].
- “I’m attending!” — let users claim that they are attending that concert. Last.fm does this.
- Encourage promoters to use the service and keep the concert info up-to-date — give them free ads; let them choose from templates and display/promote a concert.
- Wiki for each event — people can update details of an event. Promoters can provide links to tickets; info on where/how to purchase tickets.
IDEA #97 – Tagging All Photos with people, places, objects
January 29, 2009 | 1 Comment
Fred Wilson discusses a (great!) band that he went out and saw the other night — and he brings up a great idea in it, which seems pretty obvious and I don’t understand why it’s not going on now.
“You’ll probably see a few AVC community members in this photo. Too bad we can’t all tag ourselves in it.”
People embed photos all across the web — on their blogs, MySpace pages, Kodak pages, Walgreens pages, Picasa pages, Flickr, etc. Facebook is great with their photo tagging process. Google’s Picasa now lets you do it, but I think the people have to be Google users?
Anyhow, my idea on this would really only be for blogs and it does get hairy. Blog owners would include a snippet of JS on their page — when an image is found, a visitor could click on a part of it and tag it with a user or anything else (celeb; object; etc). But it gets hairy, because it might see any image — even a heading image; so somehow the blog owner would have to designate that the image could be tagged. Then where do the tags come from? Maybe you could tag it with a user from twitter or mybloglog, or any other service that has public users (last.fm; disqus)?
Or maybe you use Facebook Connect on your blog pages somehow, and are able to tag the photos with Facebook users? (I don’t even know if that’s feasible).
Maybe this idea isn’t practical at all 
IDEA #96 – Agent Intermediary between Celebrities & Web Startups
January 29, 2009 | Leave a Comment
This idea sounds like a dream job if you’re a techie and looking for access to spend other people’s money
Manage getting celeb’s to work with various startups … ensure their name goes with a well-funded startup; negotiate equity percentage and take 15% of whatever the celeb gets, for yourself. Walk them through the various services that you represent or are trying to work with. Educate the celeb and tell them why you feel they should be apart of a particular web startup.
Work with their legal to ensure they don’t violate any existing contracts of theirs. Negotiate what they’ll have to do in order to get equity — maybe it’s right off the bat with additional % if milestones reached.
How can things be tracked to ensure proper credit given to the celeb’s influence?
Another idea: Bring multiple celebs together. Start a fund to fund startups and utilize their collective celeb influence.
Pitch different startups to a room of celebs; or individually to the celebs to walk them through. If they like something, have them contact you — and you’ll let them know how they can get them.
You become the visionary for these celebs — you help them get involved.
I bet Ashton Kutcher would like to be involved in something like this; he understands web startups a bit and could get some of his Hollywood peeps involved.
Google: Chrome should use Gmail as my default mailto!
January 28, 2009 | 3 Comments
Dear WTF,
I can’t believe Google hasn’t fixed this mess. I’m using Vista and it loads up Outlook when I click on mailto links in Chrome; apparently it taps into Vista’s default. OK, so I want to use Gmail [specifically Gmail in Chrome] — why isn’t there an easy way to do this, rather than having to edit my registry?
Anyone know an easy fix for this? I’m surprised Google hasn’t put this as an option in their ‘Options’ link in Chrome.
Sincerely,
-STP
IDEA #95 – URL Filter for filtering Adult websites using Google SafeSearch
January 28, 2009 | 7 Comments
It seems to me that there should be a web app with an API that I can easily send it a URL and it’ll toss back to me whether that URL is an adult website, or has been scanned and has adult keywords on it, or the URL has been officially designated by the company as a website with adult content.
I realize no filter will be great, but I’d like to have an initial filter. Google has ‘SafeSearch’, which will eliminate URL results if you have it turned on.
Does anyone know any actual web services that do what I want?
Otherwise, here’s an initial solution (which someone could create quickly I’m sure and I think it’d be useful to some people; ah-hem):
Do a Google search with the parameter of either ’safe=off’ or ’safe=active’ [these are hidden vars, but also appear to work in the query string].
What you could do is a ’site:(url)’ search with SafeSearch turned off, then with it turned on. If Google shows anything with SafeSearch off for that URL, then you know Google has the domain in its index. If then it shows nothing with SafeSearch turned on, then you know Google has blocked the site for adult content.
Here’s an example with SafeSearch on and subsequently, off.
I guess the easy way to parse Google’s results for whether this is works is the keyword phrase “did not match any documents.”, along with “Make sure all words are spelled correctly.” [just to make sure that phrase wasn't in the actual results].
I’m likely going to get this programmed as I need it for my startup. I have a great domain for this idea (IMO), FiltURL.
Update 1: Sam built this quick and it works great! We’re going to put it up at FiltURL — anyone want to make this page look semi-decent graphically? I’m picturing the homepage of this site to have a URL box with a submit/go button. The homepage will have info on the app, as well as how to use it [like tinyurl]. We’ll also throw some adsense code on there. There doesn’t even have to be a 2nd page, we could just show the result in ajax on that page if the user inputs a url on our page manually.
Update 2: Nate comments below that AWIS can provide this info at $0.15 per 1000, but I wonder how limiting this is, because Alexa’s site doesn’t contain every single URL out there (and does it tell if a site is adult or not — if so, wouldn’t it be listed under their ‘adult’ category?). It would need to be tested. The Google route is good, but as mentioned in the comments, Google may block the IP; but we’re not profiting from Google.
IDEA #94 – Dear WTF (aka “Dear Abby for Techies”)
January 28, 2009 | 6 Comments
I really like this idea and thought I was going to really move forward with it. But it’s amazing how such a simple idea can get involved (see my sitemap at bottom of this post). I still believe this idea has potential for a nice niche of users. I own the domain ‘dearwtf.com’ (I released ‘dearwtfchuck.com’, the original name of this idea). I was going to use Pligg, but then it sounded like Drupal would be the better option. I see the digg/techie crowd jumping all over this — they like to bitch about shit, and that’s what this site would be all about.
This is a spoof on ‘Dear Abby’ and is for you to rant to the world on topics — could just be tech stuff; could be products, services, the customer service of Sprint, why there are so many ads on a certain website, why this, why that. Stuff you don’t agree with. Stuff that shows you’re smart and aware of bugs, glitches, etc.
Here’s an example and here’s another:
Dear WTF,
Why doesn’t Google Maps use a tinyurl service when they give you a directions/map link? I mean, could these URLs get any LONGER?!
http:// maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=las+vegas,+nv+from+buffalo,+ny&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=39.320439,77.519531&ie=UTF8&z=5
Sincerely,
TRYING-TO-MAKE-MY-NAME-LONGER-THAN-A-GOOGLE-MAPS-URL;OH-F-IT,I-CANT-DO-IT from BUFFALO, NY
The typical format should be: title, question/rant, possible solution, signature that includes or does not include a link to the poster’s website.
I’d see this similar to digg, in that users would ‘digg’ [agree] with ones that they feel are the best. Those would get voted up to the top and appear on the homepage of the site.
Bonus Idea: Allow people on Twitter to post these rants and use the ‘#dearwtf’ tag, we’ll find them and auto-post them to our site.
I’d worry about implementing the Twitter functionality until way after. Someone needs to pull a graphic designer and programmer together, and do this idea up. I know I’d use it if it was created properly.
My sitemap specs (click image to see full-size version):
IDEA #93 – 125×125 Ad-ditional Info Skins (IntermediAds)
January 27, 2009 | 1 Comment
This was not my idea, this was another idea of Boris (founder of twittercounter and thenextweb). This idea is actually called IntermediAds. He’s looking for a partner to help him run with it. This post is published with his permission.
He’s already built a bit of a prototype, click here. Or animated gif of the experience below:
The concept is that a 125×125 ad on blogs isn’t enough for the advertiser, or the visitor for that matter. It allows the visitor to get more info on the advertiser without having to leave the blog or visit the advertiser’s website. The thought is that there’ll be a higher CTR of the ads, which benefits the advertisers.
The problem is how do you scale this for adoption by blogs? Blogs don’t all use the same system for their 125×125 ads. This might be something that just needs to be a free plugin for Wordpress, or via a JS include on a page [maybe some sort of JS 'onmouseover' parameter in the img or 'a href' tag that then loads the additional info]. It seems like a bit of a tricky mess; not sure how it could really scale.
It makes sense though; advertisers I think would love it. As a Publisher [techcrunch for example], they wouldn’t care; they aren’t getting paid on a click-thru basis and would rather give Advertisers a better chance. Maybe advertisers would find that their CTR reduced but higher conversion rate; but maybe that’d be a good thing [less evasive to consumers; more consumers may learn about their company -- and/or maybe they'd find a higher CTR actually because more users are able to learn a tad bit more than a 125x125 can tell them].
AdToll is selling 125×125 spaces– or managing them rather — maybe this is really more of a feature for someone like that. Maybe an AdToll [or someone else] could become the place where 125×125 ads are hosted and served from, so there aren’t tons of systems used.
Personally, I’d love to use it as a visitor. Sometimes I don’t click an ad, because it’s just not enough info — but sometimes they intrigue me, and I’d like to learn more.
The additional info badge could also pull in an RSS feed from the advertiser — possibly showing the 3 latest blog posts from their blog.
Below are more notes I had written Boris back in January 2008:
I can’t think of a way for you to monetize this. Having the publisher pay you to use your technology, possibly — but it seems like someone would then eventually just build this functionality and make it open-source. I could see it becoming an addon to OpenAds possibly. Also, publishers wont want to deal with creating these additional info spec sheets on their advertisers — advertisers will want full control of this; and publishers will want to give it to them. Advertisers will also likely want different “additional info spec sheets” for different publisher sites that they are advertising on.
I think how you make this work is the following — the publisher [i.e. TechCrunch] grabs a snippet of javascript that they put at the bottom of their webpage; they never have to touch this again. The advertiser then provides the publisher with a URL that they want their 125×125 ad to go to — and the advertiser also inputs this into an interface at Intermediads. The javascript snippet in the publisher website looks for any URLs in their system by advertisers, and if that link is found on the publisher’s webpage, it displays the additional info “ability” behind that ad. [Maybe the advertiser specifies to Intermediads the publisher's domain as well, so that the load is lower on Intermediads on pageloads -- so that Intermediads [on load of a webpage at techcrunch.com] only checks those advertisers that said they are currently advertising on techcrunch.com – or reverese, techcrunch just specifies the links/advertisers that are using Intermediads [or can use Intermediads --maybe your service is an upsell to the advertiser via the publisher -- and you give a % to the publisher, and keep the other % for yourself.]
If you look at TechCrunch, or JohnChow.com, etc, they aren’t even using OpenAds [or any platform for ad tracking; which is shocking]. They just post the 125×125 ads each month. And TechCrunch, since he uses the Snap preview stuff — he has to specify on the anchor link around those 125×125 images the class as ’snap_nopreview’, which means if your . TC also has an onclick event already for urchin tracking; which I’m sure you can have a 2nd, but this starts adding some complexity. But if TC just had to add some code once, no problem probably.
But you may want to think about this being an extension/addon to like OpenAds?
Virtual Gifts – icon clipart needed
January 23, 2009 | 4 Comments
I need some icons [clipart] that could act as virtual gifts. Anyone know where I could find some for sale?
IDEA #92 – Virtual BarCamp (meeting of tech minds)
January 23, 2009 | 1 Comment
A virtual BarCamp went down in 2006 where it was in real-time and people logged in, blah blah blah. This is not what I have in mind.
I want someone to create a simple website that likely taps into the YouTube API, and allows people to record 2-5minute videos on any topic they want, just like they would at a BarCamp. It allows others to learn what interests you, and you’ll likely make new techie friends. Plus you’ll learn from other’s presentations!
Visitors of the site can then easily browse through the videos in a random nature, or they could browse by category. [Maybe you just make it all random, as it would be at a real Barcamp -- but maybe you show 4 thumbnails of the videos coming up, along with their titles]
Entrepreneurs could use this site to find possible startup partners. Employers could use this site to find applicants/employees. People could use this to find possible love relationships.
ClickJacking – ideas for this sneaky hack (Twitter, etc)
January 22, 2009 | Leave a Comment
Here we go with another little browser exploit/hack. It’s called ClickJacking and as Scott Jangro puts it, “like carjacking, but with clicks.” Scott has a great post with a screencast that shows how ClickJacking works. Thanks to @esnagel for making me aware his post.
Basically, you can create an invisible (opacity=0) IFRAME over a ‘click here!’ image/button/link [or over anything you want]. In the example (which comes from James Podolsey’s blog), they show a ‘click here!’ image, which has an IFRAME that’s invisible and shifted using CSS, so that the ‘update’ button of twitter.com/home is over the ‘click here!’ image. The update then has whatever you want in it. The user then clicks the ‘click here!’ and actually submits the update without knowing they just did that.
This of course assumes the user is logged into their Twitter account, which most users are — if they have Twitter.
There are some sneaky things you could do with this — blackhat of course:
- You could do this with Facebook as well, because most users are logged into Facebook. Stuff could go to the user’s newsfeed possibly.
- Tweet out something actually relevant, with an affiliate tagged link to earn commissions. [Although that'll be trackable back to you]
- You could have the user click a search result without them even knowing it, and collect the CPC. Or force a click on Google AdWords. Or force a click on a display ad.
- You could potentially force the user to thumbs up / stumble a webpage you determine.
- You could submit a comment to a blog with prepopulated data that you filled in (maybe pulled from a DB, so that you already had different data for every user you scam into clicking).
- You could submit positive or negative reviews — prepopulate a review box and get the user to click it.
- You could get the user to click an Amazon, EBay, etc, referral affiliate link, so that a cookie gets set on the user’s machine.
But you could do whitehat stuff — that ‘click here!’ button could be almost like a ‘ShareThis’ link on a blog article page. You could encourage users to ‘tweet’ that they are reading this current webpage — they’d simply have to click a button ‘tweet this!’, and it’d post as a tweet, without the user leaving the page they are reading. Rather than the user clicking a link that includes what the tweet would be, the user then going to their twitter page with the update filled in, and then having to click ‘update’.
What ideas does this hack give you? Share in the comments.
