Last week I joined zemanta, probably the first user-friendly semantic application.

Today, I semantified my blog with triplify.

With triplify your blog will have the possibility to create mashups, exploit semantic search engines and many more options not yet explored!

It all looks kind of new and I haven’t concentrated yet on how to use the triplify data, but here is my guide on triplifying your blog.

How to semantify your blog

• Download and unzip the triplify script.
• Make the cache directory writable: chmod a+w cache/
• Edit the config.inc.php file. If you are on wordpress, drupal, wackowiki, openConf or OpenJournalSystems there is a complete example to download at the documentation. I would suggest though, to read this documentation as well, since it explains all parameters very well.
• Upload the triplify folder to your root directory of your site and type at your web browser: http://YOURURI/triplify. This will register your new RDF data source.
• And you’re done!

Slight change in my Configuration

By default triplify uses this code to read your database:

$triplify['db']=new PDO('mysql:host=localhost;dbname=db','dbuser','dbpass');

This didn’t work for me, so I used:

$triplify['db']=mysql_connect('localhost','dbuser','dbpass');
mysql_select_db('db');

Upcoming and more information

I will return (hopefully) during the week with more information on triplify and its mashup possibilities with Yahoo!Pipes and other applications.

When I look at the Registry of triplify, I can see my blog but without any vocabulary or actual size. I suppose it just takes some time, until the data comes in.

I’m not sure though, so if anyone has any information on that one, it would be great.

I just joined Friendfeed. At first glance, it seems to be quite an interesting application. It supports 28 services about news (digg, reddit), social bookmarking (del.icio.us, su), music (last.fm), videos (yotube), etc.

Unlike other social sites, friendfeed is not about having a massive amount of friends. You just choose a few, which you know pretty well and you share the same interests.

It’s not about expanding your network, it’s about getting information you are really interested in.

Anyway, I think friendfeed is worth it. My profile is public, say hi anytime.

We are witnessing the commercialization, standardization of the web. Gradients, odd names, mirror effects and so on can be found everywhere online.

Although web 2.0 certainly brought an online revolution, the old times of cyberspace had also a flair of their own.

This is a list of “web 1.0″ sites. They are great sources of net art; some of them are full of theoretical essays, others are activist projects and there are even some who are extremely experimental.

You are warned, most of these sites are by no chance any eye-candy. If you are the visual type, who needs usability and simplicity to follow the concepts, turn around.

The net.art list

Vuk Cosic. One of the artists of the Ljubljana digital media lab. I really enjoy his stuff. Some of them are very ‘avant-garde’ but certainly worth your time.

Super Bad. If you like cats, kittys, Lolcats or whatever this might be a sight for you! I warn you though, it’s not THAT conventional.

etoy. This is probably my favourite. Just read what their new project is all about

an ultra long term project that allows pioneers of the information age to travel space and time forever…

One of their coolest projects was the digital hijack in 1996.

Brandon. That’s cool. You have to solve small puzzles to carry on. I really like it.

0100101110101101. Cyberpsace in its purest form. These two artists mostly devise hoaxes. They even spread a virus as a work of art. Thanks!

War.

borderXing guide. It took me some time to decode this site’s structure, form and principle, but it finally got me thinking.

Netzliteratur. I’m sorry to say, that this site is in german. It is full of net art projects and essays. start learning german?

This is certainly not a large list. But these sites contain so much information, that can keep you surfing, reading and browsing for hours. Handle with care.

Trent Reznor gave an interview yesterday, where he states his thoughts on music in the digital age and his Saul Williams experiment. Here are some points he made, which I found very interesting. (A full version of the inteview can be found at news Blog.)

On his disappointment over the sales

I’m not disappointed with the numbers with Saul at all. I think, particularly looking at what he’s done historically and in the climate of today’s music scene, that’s something to be proud of….here’s the record in as great a quality as you could ever want, it’s available now and it’s offered for an insulting low price, which I consider $5 to be, I thought that it would appeal to more people than it did. That’s where my sense of disappointment is in general, that the idea was wrong in my head and for once I’ve given people too much credit.

On the future of music

• In my mind, I think if there was an ISP tax of some sort, we can say to the consumer, “All music is now available and able to be downloaded and put in your car and put in your iPod and put up you’re a** if you want, and it’s $5 on your cable bill or ISP bill.

• If I could redo everything and start again, I think having a physical product is a good thing. I think that having some more coordination on our part–and I’ll take the blame on that because there was an urgency to get this done and get it out that I was the ringleader for–I think if we could wave a magic wand and do it again I think being able to offer an inexpensive version in addition to a premium physical product that could be shipped out afterward.

On the Radiohead Project

I’ll name check Radiohead on this–they’ve done a pretty suave marketing plan on this new record. I think generally it’s been a pretty cool thing, but what they’ve done is used those (sales) numbers in a way that they can spin them anyway they want cause you don’t know what they are.

Two points drew my attention at most:

• “…in my head and for once I’ve given people too much credit.” The sales percentage seems to agree with that point, but is it really so or is it just the public that Saul Williams adresses to?

• “All music is now available and able to be downloaded and put in your car and put in your iPod and put up you’re a** if you want, and it’s $5 on your cable bill or ISP bill.” So many questions emerge from this thought: Would you be willing to pay such a tax? How much would you be willing to pay? Would you think that such a tax, would be the beginning of an internet tax in general?

The tax issue

• On the one hand it seems unfair to tax the whole internet community for something (downloading music) that just a percentage of the users does.

It also seems hard to imagine all the participants (artists, industries, government) trying to share the income of this tax. How would be the percentage divided?

• On the other hand it could be just a tax on subscribed downloaders. Only users who download the music, would pay a certain amount. But it is something we have already witnessed (Napster, Rhapsody) and it doesn’t work. But Reznor also talks about the physical product. I would gladly pay 5$ tax or registration to get the original cd shipped to me, instead of just the digital version.

An interesting discussion on the subject goes on at Matthew Ingram’s post “Hey Trent - a music tax is a dumb idea“. I wouldn’t go that far, to say it’s a dump idea, but surely there are many-many parameters we should take account, in order for such a proposal to be successful and fair.

It would be dumb, if it were to start an avalanche of internet taxes in general (in youtube videos, online books, radio stations etc).

After reading the post “15 questions for an early facebook reader” in ReadWriteWeb, two (actually similar) things got my attention:

What do you think of the Facebook user interface?

I prefer the older version. This one is way too cluttered. The newsfeed is distracting/addicting/useless. I really don’t care what Joe wrote on Jane’s wall or which event Alison is attending next week.

What is the social impact of Facebook? How did it change the way you keep in touch with your friends?

When they started to add new features like the wall, photo albums, video capabilities, and groups, people became more interested. But then Facebook took it too far. Now I find Facebook to be a suffocating bombardment of useless applications and features. I prefer an older version of just the basics - messaging, walls, photos and groups.

Now I’m getting invitations to be join Zombies and Vampires, while attending Happy Hour (online). As great as it sounds to accumulate drinks from friends on Facebook, it’s not still as good as having them [offline]! The latest upgrades on Facebook seem to be geared to a younger audience, which doesn’t make sense to me, since nearly 71% of its users are 25 or older.

Kaioo is a relatively new social network located in Hamburg Germany has emerged, offering services, which could compete the ones of Facebook. As Markus Spath noted, Kaioo is basically a stripped down version of Facebook. Members get a profile, can add photo albums, join groups and communicate or flirt with other members. That’s about it, nothing we haven’t seen thousands of times.

So what makes it so special?

• Non-profit – All advertising money goes to charity!

The key difference is that kaioo donates all advertising revenues to charity, while the operating costs are covered by sponsors. kaioo places only a limited amount of advertising on the site, so there is no disadvantage to using kaioo compared to any other social networking site.

• Democratic – The users decide where the money goes!

kaioo is the Social Community of its users. Users can suggest charity projects and decide by voting which projects should be supported by kaioo.

• Independent – User data will not be given to or shared with third parties!

kaioo is and will remain independent from any political, religious, commercial or other organizations. This independence enables kaioo to guarantee its users that all user data will be treated confidentially and will not be passed on to any third parties. For kaioo, the protection of the user’s privacy and data have the highest priority. As a Germany-based and federally accredited non-profit organization, kaioo is subject to Germany’s data protection rules, which are among the most restrictive in the world.

Before I rush to any conclusions, lets take a deeper look at the pros and cons of the platform.

Pros.

• The platform is made available by kaioo for private use only. Commercial use is not permitted.

• And charity for the topping.

• The upload of pictures and videos without the consent of the photographer or the persons depicted therein.

• Privacy is of utmost importance. See also Doreen Carvajal’s post on the subject.

• It is a stripped out version of Facebook. No more useless applications about vampires and secret crushes.

Cons

• From the Terms of Use:

There is no claim on membership at kaioo’s. Membership can be cancelled by both parties without stating the reasons therefore and without notice. Kaioo may terminate a membership in particular in the case of suspicion that the member has given wrong statements during registration, has breached these terms and conditions of use, has published unlawful contents about kaioo or where kaioo has another legitimate interest in termination.
Termination may be undertaken by both parties by deactivating the appropriate account.

The “without stating the reasons and without notice” part is kind of harsh. We all saw, how the Scoble-Facebook story went. A bit discussion may solve the differences.

• “Users will be able to develop new features and applications for the platform in the future.” Lets hope it won’t develop like the application-avalanche of Facebook.
• It is still in beta, so be patient.

Maybe the pros outnumber the cons, but the cons have great weight. What worth is a social network, without a network? And the terms of use have some sharp points. In the end its a personal decision. (I deleted my account in Facebook and started with Kaioo; you can find me there)

Conclusion

After the Facebook debate, maybe we should start considering alternatives. Facebook starts getting too cluttered (so many applications) and too dangerous (malware, spyware) (not to mention too commercial; especially after the update they are planning: blast messages to large groups).

But is it possible for such a huge network to loose its prestige and followers?
It seems very difficult to move your network from Facebook to another social service (plaxo, kaioo). Not only because its a fuss for the user, but because Facebook doesn’t allow it. data portability may change that.

But maybe the fuss is worth it, don’t you think?

During my surfing time I have discovered several books about the web, that - i think - are very influential. I make a list here, with the ones I found most intriguing and accurate. They discuss a wide range of topics, some of them really up-to-date.

1. The Cluetrain Manifesto. [C. Locke, D. Weinberger, R. Levine, D. Searls] A classic. Describes the changes the internet age is bringing to our lives. May sound utopic sometimes, but makes you see the web under another perspective.
2. Code 2.0. [Lawrence Lessig] That’s a must for anyone interested in the freedom of cyberspace and code. A great resource, especially after the latest stories on privacy and censorship. How data (and consequently code) constitute the law of the web.
3. We the media. [Dan Gillmor] How the blogosphere revlutionizes journalism and interaction in general. Although it describes services most of us are familiar with (RSS, Wiki, Blogs, etc), it stands as an advocate of an open society and the wisdom of crowds.
4. We think. Innovation by the masses for the masses. [Charles Leadbeater] A study on the collective intelligence, with numerous examples from BMX bikes to wikipedia. Discusses the motivation of the participators and the reason their innovations succeed.
5. Cascading Style Sheets. [Hakon Wium Lie] That is actually a PhD thesis. It poses an interesting analysis on a very popular web language.

If you have any addtional resources please let me know.

• The Davos Question. This time the Davos Question goes online. As the Google blog posted on the 18th of December:
  

  Every year, many of the world’s top leaders from politics, business and the global community — including some of our own — attend the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, to discuss how to make the world a better place. This year, we wanted to give people around the world the chance to join them, and help them, by submitting their own answers to “the Davos Question,” which is: “What one thing do you think that countries, companies or individuals must do to make the world a better place in 2008?”

  Until now the official Davos Question YouTube blog, has only one post, but I’m expecting more movement after the holidays. I have already expressed my skepticism, but nonetheless I am looking forward to observe reactions; reactions of the public, of the Davos ‘leaders’, reactions in general. I’ll keep you posted. [Did I say that I find it cool, that popular bloggers are also taking part in the Davos Meeting?]

• Google Knol. Shortly before Christmas Google surprised us again. It announced the plans of a new platform of knowledge, where authoritative figures will write articles about their specification. Since then a great debate has risen, discussing the project; [indeed it was one of the posts that "...elicited more reactions in terms of views and linkbacks"] its competition with wikipedia, its authoritative model and its potential in general. To be honest, I’m dying to see where this thing goes (if it actually goes anywhere).
• Hyder’s challenge. My personal favorite this one. On the 18th of December Hyder (Everybody GoTo) opened a poll, where everybody could vote a challenge for him (beginning a new blog or getting 100 RSS subscribers in a week among others). Well results are out, and his challenge is to launch a new blog and get 100 subscribers in a month. Will he make it? I don’t really care if he does or not. Its all about the process. And if the process is well documented, then every blogger will have lots to study. Cool, eh?

What’s your virtual self waiting for?

Happy New Year