Tech analyst, AI & the web
I founded the tech blog ReadWriteWeb in April 2003 and ran it until October 2012. During my time running the business, it was well known for its cutting edge content (“What’s next on the Web”) and its influential global audience. At its peak, RWW was ranked among the top ten blogs in the world by Technorati.
This category contains all of the articles I personally wrote for RWW, now archived on ricmac.org for easier browsing and search. If you’d like to explore the original context, you can also view a year-by-year archive with links to the Wayback Machine
It’s not quite a Bloggers and Old Media lovefest yet, but at least people seem to have eased up on the ‘us vs them’ rhetoric. AdAge.com has a nice article explaining why Blogging vs. Traditional Media has been oversold. Scott Karp’s recent post entitled Bloggers Are So Wrong About Media raised some hackles, but in … Read more
A daily review of Web and Media news that crosses my path during the day. I need a better name for it – any suggestions? – John Battelle’s thinking ahead to the next Web 2.0 Conference and is seeking feedback for a byline. I may not be hyping the meme anymore, but I love the … Read more
This story warms the cockles of my heart, not only as a kiwi but a wanna-be Web millionnare 😉 AfterMail, a company from my hometown Wellington New Zealand, recently sold their web mail software to US company Quest for $14.7 million upfront and another $30 million in cash if it meets performance targets. That’s US … Read more
Sorry for lack of updates recently, I’ve been busy getting married 🙂 I see others have been busy too – Mike Arrington’s expanded the Crunch empire with a new mobile blog called MobileCrunch, Susan Mernit’s been hired by Yahoo! (does this mean I get my name on the 5ive page now? ;-)), Ben Barren’s launching … Read more
I’m not usually an Apple fanboy, but I decided to check out Steve Jobs’ Macworld keynote this year. The webcast was provided by Apple (nb: they force you to download the latest iTunes + Quicktime in order to watch it). Steve wowed us with some big numbers, including impressive iPod figures. Apple sold 14m ipods … Read more
A USA Today article reveals that MySpace has now reached 47.3 million members. The Blog Herald also reports that MySpace “is growing by an amazing 160,000 new users a day, according to MediaPost”. USA Today gives a rundown of numbers for SNS sites, c/o comScore Media Metrix. They note that “in the past year, the … Read more
Perhaps I ventured a bit too far out of my echo chamber, but today I came across 3 different conspiracy theory articles about popular Web companies. One was about e-commerce giant Amazon.com and the other two related to leading Social Networking sites MySpace and Facebook. The theories namecheck the CIA, the FBI and a non-showering … Read more
Yahoo continues to buy up all the great talent, this time they’ve snagged my blog buddy Lucas Gonze and his innovative music-sharing web app Webjay. As the Yahoo! Music Blog explained [via TechCrunch]: “Webjay is visionary and fantastic, but we are also keenly interested in Lucas the individual. He’s contributed a lot of great work … Read more
I used to think the Semantic Web was the Moby Dick of the Web. But now I think the Google OS and Office is. In the famous novel, Moby Dick is a mythical great white whale. It’s an embodiment of evil and power to Captain Ahab, whose goal is to hunt down the beast. However … Read more
There’s been a ton of CES news to digest these past few days, especially in the past 12 or so hours. Yahoo released Go and CEO Terry Semel made a speech at CES; Google released Google Pack, Google Video Player and Google Video Store; Larry Page did a speech at CES. As I trawled through … Read more
Yahoo! Go is being advertised as “a new suite of products and services for your PC, mobile phone and even your TV”. The main aim is to enable people to connect with their content (e.g. email, photos, music) across a range of devices. Right now the Go product range is limited. Upon clicking the “Get … Read more
Apologies for light posting over the past few days, as I had to move web hosts (not once, but twice!) at very short notice. Comments have been down and you may have noticed some site glitches recently. But, knock on wood, things should be back to normal by end of today. I have a few … Read more
This week will be awash with coverage from the CES 2006 show in Las Vegas (International Consumer Electronics Show). I’ll be quaffing down any interesting news about Web-based media and gadgets, along with feasting on my staple Internet bigco diet of Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, Apple. Bill Gates (MS), Terry Semel (Yahoo) and Larry Page (Goog) … Read more
Yahoo will broadcast a reality tv series called “Wow House” on their Web portal within the next few months. The SF Chronicle calls it an early step in Yahoo’s ultimate goal to create television of the future. Wow House has a technology focus, as families participating in the show compete to outfit their homes with … Read more
Looking at the media year ahead, the LA Times christens Google the new 800-pound gorilla – and also the Big Bad Wolf – of the media business. It’s an extraordinary article that predicts mega-billion dollar wheeling and dealing in the media industry in 2006. Here are some highlights relating to Web companies: Google PC, Cubes … Read more