Octavianworld

Missed Connections

Last night I checked out TripConnect.com   In theory, a useful service: travel recommendations are a popular thing to share, as other folks like Tripadvisor have demonstrated.  Presumably, they would be even more popular to share within groups of folks you know and whose opinions you trust, which is TripConnect's premise.

Problem is, as far as I can tell, you have to manually enter / invite the network of folks you'd like to share trip reviews with.  No thanks.  Within the circle of folks whose names I'd have the patience to  put into the system manually, I'm better off calling or emailing them.

TripConnect's UI looked eerily like LinkedIn's (the usual Web-two-oh pastels and rounded buttons).  So I thought, "TripConnect is a useful focus for collaboration in search of pre-existing networks of folks to use it.  LinkedIn is a network of folks looking for useful things people could share.  Why don't they partner?"  I'm sure someone has thought of this of course. 

I'm more interested in the general case -- what other networks and other service ideas, existing or envisioned, should get together like this?  Where's the LinkedIn API so folks like TripConnect could build mutually beneficial services onto it?

Referrals to stuff like this appreciated!

I Like Peanut Butter

Recently many of us read with interest Yahoo! exec Brad Garlinghouse's leaked "Peanut Butter" memo on what the venerable portal needed to do to revitalize itself.  In sum, Garlinghouse argues that Yahoo! needs to narrow the set of businesses and initiatives it's pursuing, and clarify/simplify/shrink the organization around the surviving priorities.  "I hate peanut butter.  We all should," says Garlinghouse.