Spock is Tops at Web 2.0 Expo Launch Pad

The Web 2.0 Expo organizers took a page from American Idol today and encouraged the audience to vote for its favorite of three pitches:

Spock.com is an editable people directory. Each person on Spock is tagged, has a biography, etc. Machines do most of the work by harvesting the web for whatever it can find on a person, then humans inform the system by adding or voting on tags, adding new people, etc. The service is built using Ruby on Rails, and Jay Bhatti threw out a pitch for Ruby talent. The company is also sponsoring a $50,000 prize for whoever comes up with the best solution for entity resolution, one of the more obvious, yet difficult, challenges that must be overcome.

WebEx Connect is a collaboration platform that wants to 'revolutionize how application suites are built and sold.' The company sees its long-term opportunity around modular, people-centric, and flexible forms of collaboration. WebEx has 3.5 million WebEx users, and this launch is clearly a way to start monetizing them for more than just Web conferencing.

Humanix released inpowr, a web site designed for consumers that want to 'create balance' for self-exploration and well-being. Users answer questions about their day or their views, then rank their well-being at that moment. After 21 days of adding data, the system purports to show the links between your daily actions and your well-being. (If you have a marketing hat, this is a clear application of conjoint analysis.) Folks in the techie audience appeared skeptical of this one, but who knows -- the LOHAS (aka cultural creative) market is growing rapidly.

At the end of the pitches, the audience could text to vote for their favorite pitch. My pick for the best demo was Spock, which had a clear application, broad appeal, and a practical guarantee that every US consumer with broadband will visit the site to check on their profile and tags. I expect that they've kept track of the popularity of personal Google alerts and will combine this propensity for navel-gazing with new social media norms.

Note: the text-to-vote didn't work in real time as the organizers hoped, so I'll update this post later if they circulate the audience's vote.

Comments

[Tony Casanova]

Thanks for the Spock link. Interesting web site!

[Rupert Schiessl]

Hi Christine!

Interesting post.

Fore me there a two developments possible concerning people search engines:

-) Webpages like Ziki.com or soon Spock.com will make their user's lifes easier by helping them organizing their personal contents and feeds. This will allow them to become some sort of content hubs first and stand-alone social network pages in a further evolution.

-) Their attempt to link users amongst them on their websites will fail and their services will be used by their members to create an online ID card (or resume) in order to become more visible on the web, for instance, to appear amongst the search results for professional head hunters. In this case, Ziki and Spock.com will have to position themselves as pure people search engines for a more business driven community.

I am using Ziki.com to aggregate my whole web content and as an online ID card. Ziki's also offering a free online referencement on the main search engines(Google, Yahoo!, MSN) and content networks to its users.

[SorenG]

OK, I had never tried to add myself to Wikipedia, and did not know how much they allowed. I think it is customary to not add oneself, so I never did.

But this may be freebase's territory, no. I have not tested the limits of their system, but if it is an "open, shared database of the world's knowledge" this would likely include people. If they use the same general guidelines as Wikipedia, then I can see the role of Spock.

[Launch: Silicon Valley 2007]

SVASE and Garage Technology Ventures

Co-present
Launch: Silicon Valley 2007- Your Gateway to Funding & Beyond

Create the Buzz; Raise the Money and Build your Business

www.launchsiliconvalley.org
June 5, 2007
Microsoft Campus in Mountain View, CAI

If you think you have developed a cool technology and want the world to discover you, this is the time to do it. SVASE and Garage Technology Ventures open the doorway to success for you -Launch: Silicon Valley, (www.launchsiliconvalley.org ), Bay Area’s premier launch event, on June 5th at Microsoft campus in Mountain View, CA, presents the most keenly awaited event by VCs and investment community. This event is designed to give you an opportunity to meet, network and showcase your product to all the Movers & Shakers of not only the venture world but also the corporate world and the Blogosphere.

Business Benefits:

By attending this event, you will have the opportunity to:
To make a presentation directly in front of VCs, Angel Investors, M&A Executives, Senior Corporate Biz Dev Executives, Bloggers, Press and potential business partners.
In addition, the CEOs of the companies voted “most promising new company” in each of the six sessions at the event will also receive invitations (for two) to attend the prestigious Ernst & Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” Gala Dinner on June 29 at the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco.
To showcase products and services
To be recognized as one of the most exciting startups

Please forward this invite to others who could benefit. Thank you.

Please submit 2 page executive summary before May 3rd, 2007.
Launchsv@svase.org

[Andrea]

@Angie: A bunch of us walked out of the Spock demo feeling "tagged"...and speculating that Spock was nothing more than a tits&ass search tool (sorry for poor language).

[Leanne]

Spock also disparages women on it's web site while trying to recruit people to work for them. See http://www.spock.com/do/pages/jay and http://www.flickr.com/photos/lwaldal/463750916/

[Christine]

@Soren: Wikipedia is human-powered, but just try adding yourself to it. Individual profiles on Wikipedia are deleted if the person is not deemed to be societally relevant in some fashion. e.g., if you're not a politician or some other well-known public figure, the community will erase you.

@Angie: I definitely agree with you about the poor taste shown in Spock's onstage demonstration. There are plenty of other celebrity-focused or amusing examples that they could have chosen to use. How about American Idol contestants or NFL players? Clumsy marketing aside, Spock's business offering was still the most promising of the three, and I can see many socially POSITIVE uses as well. Too bad they weren't demo'd.

[Angie Chang]

While the product is interesting, can't say that Spock's choice of search terms ("Victoria's Secret models" vs. "Sport's Illustrated models") at the Web 2.0 Expo demo was really one of good taste.

[SorenG]

Congrats for being the first (that I saw today) to report on these. I cannot get into Spock as it is private beta so my info on it is limited, but is this need not addressed by Wikipedia, though all human powered.