Web 2.0 Service: Craigslist Remixed

This new redesign mockup of Craigslist by Ryan Sims presented at SXSW and my own frustration with forum classifieds got me thinking. Craigslist hasn't changed much since its founding in 1999. Not that it's necessarily bad, but I feel it might be up for a nice tuneup - not only aesthetically but also functionality. A counter-movement has been arising in response to the globalization of many services. With the advent of social networks, there are users taking shelter in smaller communities, such as forums. Essentially small networks, they would benefit greatly from scalable classified systems. While Craigslist's scope is much larger, it would be great to adapt it to forum classifieds.

Eight years is a long time. There has been much change since its founding, but there are a few relevant behaviors that will essentially guarantee its success or failture. Shopping has grown to become extremely visual, primarily shown by eBay's thumbnails and Etsy's galleries. Thus, it is essential to have an intuitive shop-by-sight design. Though Listpic has implemented a great visual hack for Craigslist, only around 5% of all of classifieds include pictures. Furthermore, people have been spoiled with the ease of online payment such as Paypal and Escrow. So add a few payment options, but also leave room for bartering (probably a separate system of offers/trades). Adding all types of filtering, searching, recommending, and sorting will add greatly to its functionality. Remember the anti-institutionalized movement I mentioned earlier? Try to avoid overt globalization and pushing logos and obtrusive advertisements. Make everything customizable, with only the carefully camouflaged ad (paid to the service) standard.

Checklist:
- Scalable system
- Include API so it can interface with common forum systems, open-source or otherwise
- Make it easy to post (drag-and-drop form, browser plugin)
- Shop by gallery (Require pictures)
- Customizable everything
- Add built in payment options
- Add filtering, searching, recommending and sorting

Feel free to add/comment.

Web 2.0 Service: Final Linksource

We all now have 5 email addresses, 20 memberships to various social networks, and not enough time on our hands. With the advent of OpenID, they tried to confine multiple username/passwords to one login; however, the issue of net anonymity has prevented from widespread use. Likewise, social networks have been created to incorporate other social networks, but it is just as easy to umbrella these umbrella social networks and create more work for the user.

There is a simultaneous draw to provide relevant net presence but also keep an anonymity. A service to provide "linksources" would be the solution - a basic, though final profile to link social network profiles, blogs, resumes, portfolios, etc. Certain options could make information only accessible to friends and contacts, and further checks could divide sections up for business and play. I must stress that this will not be another social network (or else it will be prone to being added), but a list of links linking to all subscribed social networks.

Other ideas:
- incorporate OpenID
- create business cards with USB contacts that automatically link to site when plugged in
- visual links (thumbnails for all the links) on profile site

Feel free to add/comment.

Software Product: Distributed Work Gaming

Whoever figures out how to capitalize work disguised as gaming will be a billionaire. If you look at the game hours spent on conventional MMORPGs, particularly World of Warcraft and Second Life, it is rather disgusting how many hours are wasted on such a type of entertainment. It would be great if there was some design implementation that would create such a draw, but at the same to produce a viable commodity.

One idea - Since most games require top-of-the-line computers to run properly, there is a large processing potential for other work. Due to the fact that though a particular game may require high processing power, usually it is in short spurts which leaves much untapped processing power available for other purposes. Much like the Seti@Home or Protein Folding projects, such distributed computing could be utilized for commercial interests.

Or there could be a complete redesign of the product model, actually paying or offering for free a game that included real work such as design or small form of management.

Free free to add/comment.

Web 2.0 Service: Societal Game

Catch27 looks like it's doing pretty well for itself, besides the frequent server overloads. Capitalizing on the fact that much of the adolescent social life seems to be a popularity contest, it becomes a virtual economy of people. Profiles are rated by "hots", "smarts", and overall persona. Needless to say, the network is populated by the beautiful yet not the brightest (if bright, not the most mature). Neat idea, though rather twisted. It works due to its social networking element; however, it is in lack of a goal to complete. Well, I correct myself. There is a goal, to collect 27 people with some distinguishing characteristic, but to me, that doesn't seem all that worthwhile.

Say remix Catch27. Take the virtual economy and add a few other goals (business, dating, play, etc). Add more elaborate profiles, separated by games, and you have created a viable, interesting social network. Businesses could hire, while getting a picture of the social aspect of their lives. Dating might be more practical - you can rule out all the penniless, Bohemian writers. Interests can be shared, while at the same time seeing that your online poker buddy is actually a CEO of a large corporation. By adding an all-encompassing element, people will have not only an accurate grasp of a whole person, but also a rough estimate of the person in a particular field.

While I'minlikewithyou defines games as short questions, it would be great if the idea was extended. Business "Games" could include competitions for the best design, or the best programming implementation given a problem. Dating "Games" could include witty conversation competitions, friend matchmaking, or an online speed dating session. Similarly, any other type of game could help gauge the person in a particular field and increase/decrease the rating to the most accurate evaluation.

Though trading dates/employees may seem rather insensitive, it may work if implemented slightly different per topic category. Trading dates in the "Dating" goal may increase your dating pool and send those "good ones" to somebody that they would be more compatible with. Obviously, there would have to be some tact, subtly designing the site to have less impact of the rating, but more on the person's characteristics (such as having previous dates tag them as "funny" or "charming"). Obviously, each goal would have to be implemented differently since they call for different social measures.

Monetization could be through ads, links to networks, business competitions, dating features, etc. There could be small fees to some of the games, but the majority of the social network-generated would be buying new packs of profiles.

Feel free to comment/add.

Web 2.0 Service: Design Donations

From a psychological standpoint, symbiotic relationships make for good business. Case in point: Those who make do and those who design - The ones who tolerate bad function and horrible design have to grit their teeth and get constantly frustrated and the designers irked by the lack of fluidity and overall performance of the original purpose. This feeling so strong many times designers will hand out donations of redesigns, which could be utilized for the good of others. (see: One Laptop Per Child, Design for Good, and Design for the Other 90%)

So where do you connect the need and the product? Programmers and Graphic Designers have auctions for freelance jobs, so why not a recognition-payoff forum for charities and the generous? Charities post their need, and those who have the resources and skill make their bid in terms of time and resources.

Obviously, this doesn't have to be confined to design work - it could be applied to volunteers, equipment donations, and various other needs. It would be great if charities could spend less money on organization and streamlining their work and more to meet the need of others.

Other ideas:
- include mashup/collaboration with charity directories

Feel free to comment/add.

Redefinition

I apologize for the lengthy hiatus. I have been working on many projects which call for my immediate attention, but I have been re-evaluating the purpose behind this site. Since my goal is to promote new ideas by the community at large, my future posts will be much more concise, though may include incomplete thoughts which may spark other ideas. Thank you for reading and look forward to a much more casual, community-based idea generator.

Web 2.0 Service: Crowdsourcing Task Connection

While social networks and content-based communities churn out marketable material for free, some company has got to be scratching their heads. I'm going to sound like a money-fueled corporate sellout, but it's fact that people have an incentive of showing their individuality to add to these communities and that companies, very subtly, sell it right back to the masses. Look at threadless - they got the community designing every shirt, they print it and peddles it right back to them. (I'm not bashing threadless, I love them for creating a method for designers to get their designs produced.) There stands this gap for all the remaining products (besides t-shirt and hoodie designs) for somebody to connect the dots. The company need and the community solution can work hand-in-hand to increase quality and awareness. If implemented correctly, a large community may prove better than a set number of hired workers in terms of quality, efficiency and cost.

A middleman company would be great to meet the needs here. The key is to create communities, contests for everything from designing wallpapers to politics, yet retain the creativity, honor, and individuality. Or offer intangible inherent characteristics of companies - fame, fortune, or whatever. This can work in multiple ways - an underground approach and a large streamlined approach. Though it may sound extremely sketchy, an underground approach would work due to the inherent nature of the idea - mask the worth of information to gain a profit, much like how many companies that assemble trend reports operate. (I by no means am trying to vilify this industry - they put an extreme amount of labor into these reports which amounts for the high costs, but many times they receive the information free) A large streamlined approach may receive flak due to a revival in the rebellious stick-it-to-the-man/anti-corporate/individuality movement, but may work well if implemented correctly due to increased interest due to involvement. Furthermore, theoretically-infinite simultaneous task/community solutions can be in process.

Okay, enough lofty ideas, this is what I'm getting at: Motorola says, "I want a product that not only oozes industrial-design sexiness but implements innovative human-factor and has high engineering performance." So Motorola hires Company A. Company A responds by creating a community where Artist A speaks with Engineer B and Psychologist C, whom in the interest of fame and potential job offer, combine their talents to come up with The Product. The difference between this community and just a design contest is not only is judging determined by the public, but every single process of the product cycle has input from the entire community. So after the community kicks it around, and finally decides on a few iterations, Company A takes the final product and packages it with all the process notes, comments, community interactions, and delivers it back to Motorola. Motorola recognizes each member who added input, and gives them an award, adds key members to the product team, and a little compensation monetarily or in new unreleased products. Sales skyrocket due to high quality and high performance and high awareness due to community interaction. Motorola is happy, the Community is happy, and Company A is happy.

So still not morally sound? Well, how about a middleman for non-profit organizations? Design contests for much needed products, writing contests along the journalism vein, community braintrusts for ideals, idea centers for future vision. Same idea, just streamline it into social communities and create subcultures that encourage community service work.

Market: A broad range of people, but specifically college students looking to get ahead in the career market, or high school/junior high students seeking celebrity status on the web, or even the engineer that secretly aspires to be a fashion designer.

Competition: YouTube could easily work with movie studios, and MySpace could easily work with record labels. As mentioned before, Threadless does this well for t-shirts, but there is no product/task-independent system for every single task. Cambrian House creates crowdsourced companies but doesn't work with a specific need of a larger company or organization.

Potential Expansion:
- If a system can be created so that it is general enough to include all tasks/products, possibilities are limitless.
- This could be applied both to general tasks (help plant more trees) or specific problems (design this product with these constraints).
- Partnership with Ning may prove useful since they have a very good understanding of streamlining social networks and have the coding backend.

Other Thoughts:
- Crowdsourcing might just be a temporary trend that is the result of the renewed hipster movement, which encourages individuality through DIY.
- There must always be an even trade between what the community is offering and what the company is offering.