Posts FromMarch, 2009

30
Mar 09

Ruby Happy Hour this Thursday, April 2

Posted by Cory in General — View Comments

April’s Ruby Happy Hour is going to be on Thursday this time, instead of Wednesday, to avoid conflicting with CloudCamp NYC.  Other than that, it will be the usual format: an informal environment for NYC Rubyists to hang out, with pizza and beer provided by Pivotal Labs.

Where: outside.in offices, 20 Jay Street, Suite 1019, Brooklyn, NY

When: Thursday April 2nd, 2009, 7pm – 9pm

Hope to see you there! Please RSVP in the comments so we can get enough food.

Also, please let us know in the comments if you’d like to see any changes to the format, like some more structure (lightning talks, e.g.) during the event in the future.

17
Mar 09

Tech Update: Juggling and Delivering

Posted by in Development & Features — View Comments

It has been a particularly busy and exciting couple of weeks here at Outside.in HQ. CEO Mark Josephson and co-founder/Chairman Steven Johnson both spoke about the future of news and media to key audiences; Mark at NAA and Steven at South by Southwest. Steven’s speech is available to read here. They each addressed the problems the news industry is facing head on, and not surprisingly our company has a lot to do with the future they portrayed in their messages. In this post, I’ll share some of the efforts the OI engineering team is executing to bring Steven’s and Mark’s notion of Aggregation/Curation/Networks to life.

Software development in a technology startup is a constant juggling act. One aspect you can always count on is the need to balance infrastructure/scaling work with development of new features and evolution of old ones.  We have key initiatives on all of these fronts going on right now.

Keeping infrastructure humming under loads that increase week over week as our user base grows is ideally what I call a “dollar solvable” problem, meaning we simply bring up some additional machines, watch work distribution kick in, and get back to our software engineering work. The reality is that in any large system, bottlenecks and hotspots develop such that adding hardware incrementally is not always effective, and at those junctures code is refactored or replaced. In both cases, it is critical to have a computing environment that is as agile as possible; it must be simple and cheap to bring new machines into clusters, even simpler to remove them, and trivial to spin up small networks and environments for testing and experimentation. To achieve this, we have moved to a “cloud” environment for much of our live product presence. About 2 weeks ago, on a calm sunny Sunday in New York, we seamlessly migrated from a fixed data center model for hosting to a very flexible virtual environment. By the end of that afternoon we officially flipped the switch and watched our traffic migrate to the new network, and we haven’t looked back.  Virtual hosting isn’t a panacea, and it is certainly no substitute for good architecture. But it does make many of the tasks around managing growth inexpensive and much faster.

Architecture is a daily focus. I’ll detail some of the innovations we’re making in subsequent posts, but the summary is we’re constructing new data models to account for curation of content. Data structures can generally be made fast for data capture or retrieval, but not for both simultaneously. We have some techniques in mind for optimizing the user experience for our partners and readers of content aggregated with our platform. It is a data design and transformation problem, and with our cloud environment we will be benchmarking and honing our approach. The goal is fast, responsive UI for all of our products built on top of an engine that maximizes throughput for very fast processing and publishing of news and local information. I think we have it all figured out, and you’ll be able to grade us in short order.

And this brings us to the salient point for you, our user. The product that brings the aggregation/curation/networks vision to the forefront of what we do is in active development, and it will be announced very soon. “Very soon” means the engineering and product teams are gunning for an aggressive release date, and the tone in the office shows that to be the case; average caffeine intake is on the rise and the whiteboards are full. The release will feature our best work on all fronts, and that work will also raise the bar for the central Outside.in website, our iPhone application, the Geo Toolkit (which just got a slick facelift), and our partner offerings.

Lastly in this installment, I want to applaud OI co-founder and VP of Engineering Cory Forsyth who is off to the sold-out Scotland on Rails conference at the end of this month. Cory is presenting a talk on image processing in Ruby (read more here). Outside.in has become a fixture in the NYC Ruby community, fueled by our monthly Ruby Happy Hour meetups and events like Cory’s talks. Look for more from us in the Ruby and Open Source realms in the coming months.

Now, back to the juggling act! I’ll post again soon.

13
Mar 09

GeoToolkit & StoryMaps: Bigger, Faster, Stronger…Easier

Posted by Jared in Announcements / Development & Features — View Comments

We have three exciting improvements to share with you today: an improved GeoToolkit interface, two new default timespan options for StoryMaps, and a faster, more reliable feed editor.

We’ve spruced up GeoToolkit to make it super-fast and easy to get a StoryMap for your blog! Our changes have streamlined the process of signing up for GeoToolkit and grabbing a StoryMap and clarified the connection between the pins on a StoryMap and the geotagging done in our feed editor.

How did we get here? In November, we brought three New York bloggers in to do usability testing on the process of signing up for StoryMaps: Natalie of Little Miss Moonshine, Evan of The King is Naked, and Shawn of The Hatter’s Rant. None of these bloggers were familiar with outside.in or StoryMaps, so we showed them the lovely map on Gotham Gal‘s blog and asked them to try to get one for their own site, recording their actions with Silverback and watching to see where the process could be improved.

The most exciting revelation was the disconnect all testers felt between the StoryMap and our feed editor. Since all three of these bloggers only write about place occasionally, none of them had pins on their StoryMaps and didn’t know they needed to go to the feed editor to add places to their stories. Their reactions and feedback were invaluable to our improvements to the signup process and interface for getting a StoryMap.

Many of you already familiar with StoryMaps have asked us for options to map breaking news or go deeper into your archives. Well, guess what! We listened. We’ve added two new default timespan options: one day and one year. If you already have a map, the new timespan options have appeared automatically. How’s that for science? If you don’t have a map, go to outside.in/geotoolkit, register your site, pick the time frame and the size of your map, click update, and voila!

Wondering how to ensure pins will be on your map? First, write about places, mention them by name, and publish a full text RSS feed. (For more on full text RSS, see this post.) Second, take control of your geotagging with our vastly improved feed editor. Under the “Place Your Stories” tab, you can add places, neighborhoods, towns, and cities to your posts and bring in stories that have been skipped. We’ve solved the mystery behind “this story has been deleted since it was originally accepted” message, so your posts will no longer be accidentally deleted. The whole system is faster and more stable. With it’s new reliability, you have all the more reason to use this great tool!

GeoToolkit and StoryMaps are better than ever, easier to use, and free. So, go get a map for your blog.

13
Mar 09

SXSW Twitter Map

Posted by chrysanthe in General — View Comments

Are you in Austin for SXSW this week? Or just want to keep up with where everything’s happening? Check out our Twitter map of where SXSW attendees are hanging out in the city famous for BBQ and live music.

Check out the full size map!

Want to see your tweets show up on this map? Just include the real name of the place you’re talking about (capitalization is nice, but not necessary) and #sxsw. 140 characters of fun!

Want to grab our map for your sidebar? Just copy and paste this code into your blog template:

<iframe src='http://outside.in/geotoolkit/embed_story_map/9807/period/fortnight' frameborder='0' height='300' width='160' scrolling='no' style='border: 1px solid #333;'></iframe>

Some of the outside.in team will be in Austin this weekend. Say hi if you see us! Co-founder Steven Johnson is giving a talk on how to improve on the current news model, The Ecosystem of News, on Friday at 3:30 pm that will cover “MacWorld mag circa ’87, old-growth forests, 92 election, Obama’s race speech, hyperlocal, and more!” CEO Mark Josephson will be around, so be sure to give him your two cents about aggregation, curation and the future of news.

Are you a blogger or outside.in user? Community Coordinator Chrysanthe Tenentes (that’s me) wants to talk to you! Introduce yourself, ask questions, and I’ll tweet your blog URL, so make sure to follow @outsidein on Twitter, along with Steven and Mark. And don’t forget, #sxsw for all your tweets while you’re there!

12
Mar 09

Newspapers Need to Aggregate!

Posted by mark in General — View Comments

Another day, another story about the future of newspapers.

I’m going to chose one quote from today’s story in the NYT and dig in a bit.

“Industry executives who once scoffed at the idea of an Internet-only product now concede that they are probably headed in that direction, but the consensus is that newspapers going all digital would become drastically smaller news sources for the foreseeable future.”

That does not have to be true.

There are thousands of local bloggers who are living in, involved with and writing about their local communities and neighborhoods.

These are the stringers of the future for these news organizations!

They will not be on payroll.  They will not require proactive editorial oversight.  They will bubble-up stories that the fully-staffed newspapers of old would never have found.

What they do require is traffic to their sites via links from newspaper sites and, ultimately, revenue generated by newspaper sales teams who can leverage their great relationships with local advertisers.

Newspapers, please aggregate what is already being written in your markets.  You can then point your readers to the best and hold on to your position as the arbiter of what’s important.

Of course, we at Outside.in would be happy to help.

Go to http://outside.in/publishers for more info.

11
Mar 09

Aggregate, Curate & Network

Posted by mark in Announcements / General — View Comments

Earlier this week we wrote about one person’s ideas on what newspapers need to do to survive and thrive.

Today we want to talk more about the opportunity for a new model for local news, one that provides as much value to the the traditional local publisher as it does to local bloggers and hyperlocal content sources.

We think there’s an opportunity for a virtuous circle where publishers connect with local bloggers and content to bring hyperlocal content and ad impressions to the publisher and traffic and revenue to the bloggers.  Make no mistake, if a new model is going to be successful it needs to be a two-way street.

I was on a panel this afternoon at the Newspaper Association of America’s mediaXchange conference in Vegas (baby!) where I proposed three pillars for a new model for news.

Those pillars are:

  • Aggregate

Local media companies need to get “more local” or hyperlocal to compete for audience.  The current biz model and editorial cost structure don’t allow them to hire reporters to cover every neighborhood.

Couple that with the explosion of hyperlocal content, literally hundreds or thousands of “stringers” in every market that are craving more traffic and more revenue and there is opportunity.

That opportunity centers on Aggregation.  Dynamically sourcing every single local piece of content and organizing by discrete neighborhoods can immediately make make you hyperlocal.

  • Curate

But, every publisher has a different editorial voice and a different audience.  And, how do you make sure you are featuring only the content you want and not sources or posts that don’t fit your editorial vision?

That’s where Curation comes in — being able to sit at a dashboard and pick and chose, highlight and suppress — make editorial decisions on top of a massive aggregated data set.

Historically, editors make curatorial decisions about their own internal content — which stories to assign, what to feature on page one.  Going forward, those types of curatorial decisions will be made on other people’s content as well.

  • Networks

But how do you solve the revenue and inventory challenges these companies face.  One way is to build Networks.  Local sales is done best by local sales teams.  Period.

Local inventory is being commoditized by the national ad networks who are driving prices down.  Local sales teams have the best relationships and the greatest opportunity to create solutions for their advertisers, if they only had the inventory that ad networks have.

So, become that network.  Partner with the blogs and hyperlocal media properties in your market and represent their inventory.  You will have different margins (more on that in a future post), but you could stand to have 10x the inventory.   Say what you will about ad networks, but they are big, growing and profitable.  Local newspapers should be too.

I was also able to preview our new product that helps publishers build their business on the pillars of Aggregate, Curate and Networks. We’re really excited about how we can help facilitate these relationships and can’t wait to announce it in more detail soon.

Until then, we are working with a select group of local publishers in our beta version and invite you to join us.

If you are interested in joining the beta, drop me a line at mark<at>outside<dot>in or visit http://www.outside.in/publishers.

11
Mar 09

Niche Blogs

Posted by Jared in Uncategorized — View Comments

There’s something pretty special about bloggers who pick one very specific piece of information to report, stick to it, and do it well.

NachosNY is a great example.  Its duo of nacho connosieurs tours New York City in search of excellent combinations of tortilla chips and toppings.  They write about every nacho they taste, so when you’re in the mood for a messy, salty snack, you know where to go.  What’s more, their proselytization of the nacho loving faith is not merely virtual.  Lee and Rachel have organized a Nacho Crawl for this Saturday (March 14th) during which they’ll bring their readers to some of their favorite spots on The Lower East Side.

Sounds like a blast.  If only we could get Lost Taco back on the blogging horse.  Then we’d have a full Mexican meal.

Do you have or know of a great niche blog?  If so, leave it in the comments and get a map for your blog.

9
Mar 09

Newspapers Should Leap, Not Stand

Posted by mark in General — View Comments

This morning in the NYT David Carr shares his dream for how newspapers can save themselves.  It involves standing together and trying to stem the tide of the inevitable.  Instead, they should leap to a new model, one that fits with consumer and advertiser behavior and scales long term.

The news and media business is undergoing radical change and yet Carr dreams of turning back the clock to try and undo the bad decisions and missed opportunities made in the past.

Problem is that his wish list misses the point about what’s happening out there and by perpetuating fear, potentially slow down the change that needs to happen.

Here’s what is going on out there:

  • The cost to create and distribute information has dropped to almost zero.
  • Consumers don’t go find news, a recent study (I’ll find attribution) quoted someone saying “if the news is important enough, it will find me!”
  • Audience and therefore ad impressions are diffused to thousands of sites, including, yes, blogs.
  • Ad networks have more inventory in any given market than the big newspaper in town.

Unfortunately, Carr’s wishes for newspaper decisions don’t address any of those crucial needs:

  • “no more free content” — this ship has sailed.  Consumers are not going to pay for something they can get for free elsewhere.  Info and data wants to be free and embracing that will help them grow bigger.

Also, do you think for a second that if every newspaper in us started charging for its web site that there wouldn’t be a huge effort by faster, more nimble, more scalable start-ups to undercut them and take their audience.  Oh wait, that’s already happened.

  • “no more free rides to aggregators”.  This one hits a bit close to home.  At Outside.in we aggregate local media, but we also add value to that media by organizing by location to make it easier for consumers and for newspapers themselves. (We then pass all that extra metadata onto anyone who wants to use it: newspaper or blogger.)  The problem with Carr’s idea here is that consumers have already decided that they expect an incredibly customized and personal news experience.  It’s “Me-centric” not “newspaper centric”.

Consumers are disaggregating the newspaper and folks like Outside.in, the Huffington Post and others are putting it back together in a format that works better.

Now, at Outside.in we’re trying to share this model with newspapers and we hope it helps.

  • “no more commoditized ads”. Carr bemoans the rise of networks and ad exchanges but glosses over the fact that there are billions of impressions in every market that are not being sold by the best sales teams in those markets — the local media companies themselves!  They’ve ceded their leadership in the local market by trying to hang on for too long to high cpms and scarcity.  That’s not going to last.

Local sales needs to embrace the fact that ad networks are a good thing.  They roll up audience at scale that sales teams can bring to their advertisers.  Sure, the margins are different, but ad networks are profitable and growing.

I’m not informed enough about his last point about the Newspaper Preservation Act other than to say it too seems like an effort to save a model that needs to change.

Think less about paying for your existing newsroom and more about what your new newsroom should look like.

Scream less about the impact of ad networks on your revenue and scream more at your sales team to go sell like an ad network.

Newspapers need to make bold decisions and need to rethink their editorial and sales models and their cost structure.

I’m going to the NAA conference this week where, among other things, I’m going to be previewing a new product from Outside.in that attempts to address the needs of local newspapers and present a new model for how they can survive and thrive.

I’ll post the presentation here and look forward to your comments.

4
Mar 09

Food Blogs

Posted by Jared in Uncategorized — View Comments

When I’m looking for a place to go out to eat, I narrow the choices down by location first.  Whether it’s my neighborhood, a friend’s neighborhood, or somewhere in between, location provides the primary criterion. Therefore, I’m always looking for easy ways to find restaurants by location.  StoryMaps on food blogs fit the bill.  With a quick glance at my favorite food blog’s StoryMap, I can see if there are any reviews of places in the neighborhood where I want to eat.

I like restaurant reviews on blogs because the posts are usually all written by the same person. By reading just a few posts about places I know, I can quickly learn her taste and deem her trustworthy (or not).  Her StoryMap isn’t just showing me restaurants in my area of interest, it’s showing me vetted restaurants.  A GoogleMap search, on the other hand, will show me restaurants in the neighborhood reviewed by people I don’t know and don’t trust.

Navigating a food blog with a StoryMap gives me a direct path to relevant content. Restaurant reviews are not time-sensitive, but blog posts are organized chronologically.  A blogger could have a slew of reviews that matter to me, but I’d have to dig through her archives to find them. The StoryMap brings those relevant posts to the forefront.  (I could also search the tags, but this involves several arduous steps, like typing, as opposed to a mere glance and a click.)

What’s good for the readers is good for the bloggers.  Here are some great food blogs that understand how the improved navigation of StoryMaps increases their pageviews.  As always, go to GeoToolkit to get your StoryMap and enjoy the benefits.  Don’t have a food blog but love reading them?  Leave your favorites in the comments.

Pleasure Palate (Los Angeles)

LA and O.C. Foodventures (Los Angeles and Orange County)

Foodaphilia (Philadelphia)

Writing With My Mouth Full (New York)

Adventures in Baltimore Restaurants (Baltimore)

River City Food and Wine (Richmond, VA)

Geeks Rate Food (Omaha)

Get a map for your blog.

3
Mar 09

The Real Estate Blogs

Posted by Jared in Uncategorized — View Comments

Real estate blogs were some of the fastest to catch on to the benefit of StoryMaps.  From the early days of outside.in, we always imagined that our site would be a terrific resource for people thinking about moving to a new neighborhood.  Want to know what it would be like to live in Lincoln Park, Chicago?  Go to outside.in/lincoln_park_chicago_il and see what the big news is, what people are thinking about, and if it’s a place that jives with your sensibility.  Real estate bloggers understand this too and see us as a natural partner.  Below is a sampling of some great real estate blogs that have StoryMaps.  Which do you like best and why?  Want to join the club and get a map for your real estate blog?  Go to GeoToolkit.

West Richland Real Estate Blog (West Richland, WA)

Kennewick Real Estate Blog (Kennewick, WA)

Tucson, AZ Real Estate Blog (Tucson, AZ)

MN Real Estate Update (Anoka County Lakeshore)

Phoenix Market Trends (Phoenix, AZ)

Get a map for your blog.

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