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
Earlier this week we looked at how the emerging Internet of Things, when everyday objects become connected to the Web, will affect product managers and marketers. Today we look at some of the implications for accountants and bean counters – those people responsible for revenue and expenditure in companies. A recent article by McKinsey, a … Read more
Analyst firm Gartner has just released its latest Hype Cycle white paper, detailing some of the biggest trends in technology this year. According to the report, cloud computing, e-books and Internet TV are at the “Peak of Inflated Expectations,” while this year’s biggest hit Twitter is said to have “tipped over the peak” and is … Read more
Some of you may be reading our series on the Internet of Things and wondering: what use is this to me in my daily work? So one day my fridge will be able to tell me when the milk has run out, when I travel my luggage will have an RFID tag and not be … Read more
We’ve been writing a lot about Internet of Things this year. It’s when everyday objects become connected to the Internet – taking us beyond the Social Web where people talk to each other, into a Web where things talk to each other (and us) as well. We’ve analyzed some of the theory, and experiments from … Read more
In this edition of the Weekly Wrapup – our newsletter summarizing the top stories of the week – we analyze the impact of real-time information on the Web, investigate ‘web squared’ (when web 2.0 meets Internet of Things), tell you why cloud computing is the future of mobile, look at Delicious’ new Twitter re-design, check … Read more
One year ago we reviewed a new health app called Practice Fusion, a free, web-based EMR (electronic medical record) system for physicians. This week Practice Fusion announced an investment, amount not disclosed, by salesforce.com. They also announced the upcoming launch of their patient health record (PHR) application on Force.com, salesforce.com’s cloud computing platform. With these … Read more
Recently Tim O’Reilly and John Battelle released a white paper entitled Web Squared: Web 2.0 Five Years On. It focuses squarely, pardon the pun, on the intersection of social web technologies with the emerging Internet of Things (real world objects connected to the Internet). The ‘web squared’ moniker is, commercially speaking, a none to subtle … Read more
One year ago we reported that music-based social networking site Imeem was experiencing strong growth and making key deals with record labels. Our conclusion at the time was that “Imeem’s growth rate and buzz is reminiscent of that of YouTube just before it got huge.” Big words indeed. To see if that You Tube comparison … Read more
In this edition of the Weekly Wrapup – our newsletter summarizing the top stories of the week – we analyze the deal to bring Microsoft’s Bing search engine to Yahoo, check out the latest social media and Twitter statistics, investigate the state of RFID tags and Internet fridges, look at Apple’s “interactive album” concept, and … Read more
In this latest installment of our ongoing series on the Internet of Things, we look at one of the big advantages of Internet-connected objects: trackability. In other words, knowing precisely where an object is at all times – and even better, its condition. This is important particularly for goods that are perishable, such as food. … Read more
RFID is an emerging standard for identification and tracking of goods. It’s one of the key underlying technologies for the Internet of Things. Yesterday we looked at the market for Internet fridges. Our conclusion was that until RFID tags become more common place on food items, Internet fridges will continue to be novelty appliances. In … Read more
The Internet fridge is probably the most oft-quoted example of what the Internet of Things – when everyday objects are connected to the Internet – will enable. Imagine a refrigerator (so the story goes) that monitors the food inside it and notifies you when you’re low on, for example, milk. It also perhaps monitors all … Read more
During my recent visit to MIT I met up with Henry Holtzman, Chief Knowledge Officer of the MIT Media Lab. We discussed the Internet of Things, which Holtzman has been actively involved in since the 90s. Holtzman said that consumer apps for Web-connected objects are becoming more common; he refers to this as an emerging … Read more
In this edition of the Weekly Wrapup – our newsletter summarizing the top stories of the week – we analyze why Amazon spent nearly a billion dollars to purchase online shoe shop Zappos, explain why IBM is an early leader in the Internet of Things, investigate whether the Google Chrome OS will finally deliver us … Read more
Earlier this week we brought you the story of the house that twitters. In this post we explore another experimental system that uses Twitter to automate tasks. Matt Morey, by day an engineer for Texas Instruments, has developed a two-way, home automation application using Twitter and ioBridge. We all know about Twitter, the now massively … Read more