Archive for the 'startup' Category

How to land a job at Google?

Published on 18 May, 2006 in my ideas and startup. 0 Comments

Do you want to work at Google?

Nowaday the surest way to land a job at Google is to do something that catches their attention and have Google acquire you.

We had already seen it happened to Writely. The latest (which may not be by the time I write this) is Gtalkr (see also list of sites ending with “r”) according to news from the horses mouth. TechCrunch spoke to Gtalkr founder and gained some insights.

The Gtalkr team, Dudley Carr and Wes Carr, now pursue new projects as Google employees.

Meebo perhaps has lost a chance. Or will Google do a MeasureMap again?

We already know that Sean, the developer of Gaim, works for Google on Google Talk.

Start thinking. What else does Google still need?

Stumble and Annotate Along

Published on 25 March, 2006 in idea sites, ideas, startup, thoughts and web 2.0. 0 Comments

Wikalong

The idea behind Wikalong, as they put it, “a wiki-margin for the internet“.

Wikalong is a Firefox extension. When installed, it links to a wiki page on the sidebar of Firefox corresponding to the site that you are looking at.

For example, this is how this blog look like with the Wikalong on the sidebar.

Anotation can be added, in wiki style, corresponding to the page. In this way discussion or commentary on the page can be added.

One thing to note though, Wikalong cannot distinguish between http://59ideas.com/blog and http://59ideas.com/blog/index.php. Although the same page, it will lead to different Wikalong page.

An interesting aspect of Wikalong is that the wiki page store can be customised. This means that the annotations can be saved to a different server other than the default.

Can you see any applications for this?
It can certainly use it to comment on web projects among a group of developers.
Annotation and surfing with a Firefox extension is not a new idea. Another similar idea, StumbleUpon, had been around for a while and is also more advanced.

StumbleUpon also creates conversation around a website although not in a wiki manner.

After installing the StumbleUpon extension, users can annotate or leave comment corresponding the the page they are looking at.

If you have StumbleUpon installed, you can share 59ideas.com by clicking on thumbsup .

This will lead you to this page (screenshot right) where you can leave comment.

But that is not all. StumbleUpon build upon the social aspect of surfing. By linking sites and people together, you can meet people that go to the same site or explore sites visted by people of similar interest.

Now I am thinking, del.icio.us and StumbleUpon, each has features that I like. Wouldn’t it be cool if there is a tool to integrate them.

Riya – face recognition photo search

Published on 22 March, 2006 in beta, idea sites, ideas, startup and web 2.0. 0 Comments

This is a good week to release beta. Last night I receive the invite to Riya. I downloaded the Riya Uploader but I do not have that many people photo to upload.

I take mainly scenery photos. The few people photo I have I do not want to upload for privacy reason.

The idea behind Riya is really cool, Check out the Tour. This is one of those Web 2.0 ideas that actually has serious technology content.

What I mean by technology content is that there is some technology not within easy reach of scripting wizards.

This is not to say idea that social bookmarking, photo sharing, online calendar are inferior. It does mean that however that there will not be many Riya look alike as compared to, say, Digg look alike.

Zoho Sheet

Published on 21 March, 2006 in beta, idea sites, ideas and startup. 2 Comments

Zoho Sheet

Receive an invite to Zoho Sheet yesterday. You can get one here.

Since Google acquired Writely 2 weeks ago, web office suite is getting hot. Now, will Zoho Sheet be the next target?

Interestingly, Zoho has a very nice suite of applications in Zoto Writer, Zoho Planner, Zoho CRM, Zoho Virtual Office. Maybe owning Zoto Writer can be detrimental to acquisation by Google since they now have Writely. But hey not everyone is after Google.

My first impression of Zoho Sheet is “Wow!”. A every well done interface. Function wise it is nowhere near a fullbrown spreadsheet like OpenOffice Calc.

Online sharing is an interesting aspect that web applications like to highlight. Right now however I do not see myself having a use for an application like this.

Another RAM saving application snapped up

Published on 12 March, 2006 in beta, ideas, startup, thoughts and web 2.0. 2 Comments

2 days ago I mentioned about how web applications like GMail, 30Boxes, Meebo can save some RAM on the computer and are replacing desktop applications.

Of course saving RAM is not the only motivation for web application. No install required and up-to-date software are very attractive factors.

Writely is a web word processor like Word. And guess what?

It is the latest in the line of web applications acquired by Google.

What is Google thinking? Many people have their guesses. Predictions of Google dominating the desktop had been floating around for a long time.
No, not by creating an operating system. But by domainting the web. Web applications that is.

Now let see who Google acquire for the web-based spreadsheet and presentation application.

Oh, have you heard? They are already rumoured to be creating a calendar application.