Sexy Widget

Thursday Bullets: KickApps, Widgetbox, Twitter Widget, Sproutbuilder, and Outside.in

• KickApps has a new, build your own hosted social network service available, that seems to be very similar to Ning (review).  I played around with it a bit, and true to its promise, I was able to get a social network live with blogging, media upload, WYSIWYG feature configurator, message boards, etc in just a few minutes.  I got a little bit derailed when I couldn't embed a Flash widget into my blog post.
• Widgetbox has raised $8M more in funding.
• Widgetslab has found an amusing Twitter widget.
• SproutBuilder is as fun and as cool as advertised.  Check out my Obama widget.  At first blush, Sproutbuilder seems a bit easier to use than MixerCast (review).
• Outside.In (review) is going after Topix with hyperlocal discussion boards.  I think it's a good call.  Features without community are just that - features.  It's community that protects you against the new, super funded startup that is able to replicate your features.  Yet another argument for Hub and Spoke, versus just Spoke.  Says me:

"As much as I like the idea of a fully distributed, widget powered network that only exists at the edge, I believe that widgets backed by a sturdy home base community have a better chance for success than those that exist solely on a distributed basis."

Barack Obama Widget: Made with SproutBuilder

MySpace Platform

Here comes the MySpace Platform - February 5 is the day it will open for business.  Mashable has the scoop.

Monday Bullets

• Somehow I missed this when it was posted a few days ago, but Jeremiah Owyang has posted a summary of a brainstorming session with Dave McClure, Justin Smith, and Rodney Rumford in which they discuss things like widget segmentation, and the difference between an app and a widget.  Here are my own thoughts on widget segmentation.
• Facebook has released a set of JavaScript APIs that allow Facebook apps to run on any website.  One implication of this is that sites can now set things up so that actions performed on their domains trigger stories in the Facebook news feed, without the site having to get approved for Facebook Beacon.  It's cool, but I am shuddering to think of the performance implications of having to run everything through Facebook.
• My employer, RateItAll, has now made its millions of user opinions available through its Facebook app.  Previously, you could rate stuff and read your friends reviews, but not tap into RateItAll's big database of global reviews.  Now you can.  To try it out, add the app, and search for anything (ipod, obama, kentucky, tecate, etc.).  I have clearly come a long way since my initial skepticism about exposing everything to Facebook.
• Ivan has the scoop on the iPartee event widget.  Such a simple, good idea.
• PC World summarizes and profiles a couple of commerce widgets.

Outside.IN Widget - a Casualty of Performance

I had to pull the Outside.IN widget (review) today because it wasn't loading, perhaps because of heavy traffic from TechCrunch.  And because the widget is in my left sidebar, and SexyWidget's pages load left to right, the widget's failure was preventing my actual blog posts from loading.

Will I get around to adding this widget back once they get performance under control?  Probably, as I really like it.  It's the only widget that I know of that can feed me news stories about my neighborhood.

But most widgets won't be so lucky.  I suspect that most page owners operate from the "out of site, out of mind" principle for all but the most indispensable widgets.  Once a widget is ripped for performance reasons, that may be all she wrote.

The same, of course, holds true for ANY service that is embedded into another site, like analytics and ad networks.  As a case point, RateItAll ripped out AdBrite a while back as the AdBrite code was crippling our pages.  AdBrite hasn't gotten another chance with us.

On the analytics side, Google recently proactively released a new version of its Google Analytics Javascript in an effort to optimize performance.

Facebook App Spam

Dare Obasanjo gives a nice example of the type of app spam that is pissing off users, driving Facebook to take action, and yes, delivering viral growth to the app maker.

Wednesday Bullets

• VC money continues to rain down on widget related companies.  Mixercast (reviewed here) just brought in another $6M in funding bringing its total funding over $11M.  Click through for my original post on the subject of which VCs are funding widgets.
• Box.net - Berkeley startup and the creator of one of my favorite widgets - has raised $6M more in funding.
• Clearspring founder Hooman Radfar has posted a long and well thought out post on a potential revenue model for Facebook.  I have some thoughts on the subject which I will hopefully get to sharing in the next few days.
• Ming Sheu of Stickiwidgets and Demand Media has created a very cool video game rating Facebook app using RateItAll consumer rating widgets.
• Has anybody checked out Quantcast's reach recently?  Pretty impressive.   What's driving it you ask?  Their widget which makes a site's traffic transparent.  Such a simple idea, and so well executed.

Sexy Widget's Guide to Feed.PublishTemplatizedAction

Feed.PublishTemplatizedAction is a tool that allows Facebook App stories to be pushed to the news feeds of people that have added your app AND people that have not added your app.  Currently many apps use feed.publishActionOfUser to push stories to the news feeds of friends of the person performing the action.  This feed only reaches folks that already have the app, so it's not ideal for making the app spread virally. 

Eventually, Facebook plans to deprecate publishActionOfUser completely, so all FB apps should use Feed.PublishTemplatizedAction.

For example:

With feed.publishActionOfUser - a user takes an action using an app. The story is pushed to their Mini Feed on their profile page.  The story also is pushed to the News Feed of friends of the user who have the app, according to FB's feed algorithm.

With Feed.PublishTemplatizedAction - a user takes an action using an app.  The story is pushed to their Mini Feed on their profile page.  The story also is pushed out to the News Feed of every friend of the user, according to the FB's feed algorithm, and whether or not the user has installed app.

Also important to note is that stories that don't require an immediate app install are more likely to show up in more users News Feeds. 

App developers should compile a list of actions that users of their app perform, and register those actions as stories using Feed.PublishTemplatizedAction.

Resources:

Developer Documentation
Wiki page: feed.publishtemplatizedaction
How to register news feed stories
Intro to feed.publishtemplatizedaction
New rule regarding how only actions undertaken by the user can be pushed into the news feed:

Event: The Wadget Revolution

The Bay Area Interactive Group is putting on a widget event on January 24th at the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco.  The event is sponsored by Google.

The panel looks great: Will Price from Hummer WInblad (investor in Widgetbox) is moderating, with panelists from RockYou, the Washington Post Newsweek Interactive, agency Context Optional, and HP.

Sexy Widget's Widget and App Directory

Over the weekend I set up a mini widget and app directory for Sexy Widget.  If you check out my right sidebar, you'll see links to things like Facebook Apps, Video Widgets, Widget Platforms, and more.

These pages were built using RateItAll's Musestorm powered rating list display widgets.

If you are launching a new widget or app that you think might be interesting to Sexy Widget's readers, make sure to add it to our directory using the link on the appropriate page.