How to build the Open Mesh
Webcom- Montreal
May 13th, 2009

Open is the new Black
• Exposing social graphs, activity streams and
conversations via Open APIs
• Open platforms on which to build on
• Cloud computing commodization
• Widget channels
• Users control their own data
• Single sign-on, with privacy controls

Open is the buzzword du jour
• Facebook is leading the charge
• Forcing Google to play one upmanship
• MySpace and Yahoo align with Google (and others!)
• Then Microsoft opens up Windows Live
• While Plaxo and SixApart lead the way….
• Twitter says it’s open, but folks are wondering
• FriendFeed is the new belle at the ball
• Did I tell you about my friend Evan?

You know you’re in trouble when…
• You can’t decide whether you should answer your
email via iPhone, RIM or Gmail
• Where you should update your status first?
– Facebook
– Twitter
– FriendFeed
• You can’t remember if you uploaded your photos to
Flickr or Facebook, and where that video went?
• Which username/password to use on Dig?
• Which blog to post from?
The poor life of the early adopter!

The Chaos that is……
• BigCo platforms
• The user’s desire to control their data
• The next big thing
• Staying alive, sucking up to the boss
• Real-time conversations
• Media sharing
• Persistent content
• Cloudy weather ahead……

Open Mesh is…..
• What happens when we connect the BigCo
platforms
– together….
• With our Open Stack
The people united are the open mesh

The Open Stack
• Open standards for an Open Web

Building the Open Mesh
• Cooperating with your competition
• Working with whatever APIs you can find
• Supporting other’s standards
• All with the user’s best interests in heart

Software is NOT about making money
• Software can change the world
• Change people’s lives
• Yes – we can make money from it
• But that’s not the most important thing about
software

Finding things in common
• When everyone is doing it, make it a standard!
• Find common constructs and elements
• And at LEAST agree on common notions

10 Tenets
Users, their ID, your personae – your friends
• 1.
– Groups, Communities, People
– Your profile
– Your history
– Your stuff
– Your conversations
All software is about
people

2. Persistent Content
• Everything is a URL:
– every photo, painting, illustration, drawing
– movie, animation, game
– all text, tags, books, magazines, letters
• All there, all the time, forever

3. Structured Content
• People – who?
• Directories – what?
• Geo info – where?
• Events – when?
• Conversations – why?
• Reviews – how good?
• Comments
• Tags

4. The Live Web
• Real-time conversations
• Webcams, Webcasts
• VideoConf, VideoMail
• Video Phonecalls
• VoIP

5. New kinds of Tools
• Community built-in
• SaaS, Scalable, Help
• Outliner based:
– Edit all kinds of data
– Normalize accounts
– Create new dynamic
• General purpose
• Pers. Knowledge Base
• Multiple biz models
• Display all data types

6. Dashboards
• Inter-changeable tools, modules and UIs
• Start page for all; individuals and entities
• Includes an outline – for distributed connectivity

7. Infrastructure
Social Software
Infrastructure

8. Constructs
• I - Configuration
• II - ID Hub
• III - Social Info
• IV - Feeds/Channels
• V - Access Privileges
• VI - Content
• VII - Media
• VIII - Modules
• IX - UI Elements

9. Marketplace
• We need lots of ways to make money, NOT
just advertising!
• Open standards for eCommerce, ads, items
• Attention Trust

Lots of ways to make money
• - 20% advertising
• - 20% on-demand content - movies, music, art, news, info
• - 17% eCommerce - selling stuff
• - 12% marketplace - long tail sales, auctions, listings
• - 8% cloud services - storage, persistent profiles, computing
• - 6% subscription fees - pay per month for premium features
• - 4% gaming, virtual worlds, experienced based fees - just fun
• - 3% tiered freemium services - ’software tools’ -
• - 3% contests, promotions, giveaways
• - 2% real estate related revenues - new ways to buy/sell homes
• - 2% travel related revenues - travel to where you’re going
• - 2% attention marketplace - users monetize themselves
• - 1% Misc.

10. Standards
• Connecting it all together
• The glue that meshes us together
• People are hard at work

What’s happening right now?
• Activity Streams
• OpenID UX improvements
• Show the value of being open – to vendors

What’s next?
• Two-way APIs
• Laconica acts as DNS-like backbone
• Underlying ID layers
• Growth in
Health software
• All brands must
become platforms

Two-way APIs
• Pull data out just as easily as Push data in
• Level playing field – two-way street

Digital City project
• Technology, System Integration and Content
• Focused on Tech Jobs and Local foods efforts
• Dashboard environment with built-in:
– Live Video Help
– Points system
– Tied to local events, content projects, job training
– Family Activities
– Virtuous Circle
• Produce Live Events and Content projects
• Pilot program = Cuyahoga county (Cleveland)
• Learn by doing

Citizen Dashboards – for all
• Integrate
• Aggregate
• Customize

Principles of the Open Mesh
• Social features in ALL software
• Open:
– Standards
– Data
– Source
– Ideas
• Two-way APIs; tagged and scalable
• Distributed and widgetized
• International in scope
• Privacy, security, access controls
• Relevant and inclusive for all – affinities, ages,
cultures, race, gender, locale, demographic