My favorite day at GigPark

…is new feature release day. It’s always the toughest, busiest day but there is nothing more satisfying than watching people use a feature you’ve just worked hard to create.

Today we launched a big one: You can now ask friends for a recommendation and post messages to friends to help them find what they’re looking for.

This came from an insight we had a few weeks back, that recommendations aren’t often volunteered, they ‘happen’ as part of a conversation between friends. It sounds obvious now, but it took this little realization for us understand that if we really want to make sharing recommendations easier for people we need to facilitate the conversation.

So far our wonderful beta users are telling us they like being able to ask and respond to questions and are sending through some great ideas for improvement – just the way we like it.

I’m already looking forward to my next favorite day at GigPark.

Shawn and Richard sell Quotiki

Quotiki, a great social quotes site started by Toronto locals Shawn and Richard, announced their sale today to Utora of Yaphank, New York.

I’m a big fan of what Richard and Shawn have done with Quotiki. They chose an interesting little niche to focus on, quotes, and went about creating the best site on the web for quote lovers. I think their pragmatic approach of deliberately focusing on a smaller, under served category for their first major project together was a clever strategy. I’m looking forward to seeing what they do next!

Congratulations Shawn and Richard!

BTW – Does anyone know who Utora is? And why they’re based in Yaphank?

Wings worth traveling for

Rosalynn is shooting a TV commercial in Buffalo next week and I’m trying (desperately) to convince her to same day courier me some Buffalo wings from the Anchor Bar.

If you live in Toronto and haven’t made the trip south yet for these wings… What are you waiting for!

While you’re in Buffalo make sure you visit the three Frank Lloyd Wright houses there, including the spectacular, recently renovated Darwin Martin House Complex.

Still a happy Apple owner

After owning Macs for almost 10 years I had my first real experience with Apple after sales service on the weekend. I guess I was expecting a lot and they didn’t disappoint.

I had managed to cleverly drop a screwdriver (don’t ask) on my keyboard a few weeks back and it had smashed the number 3 key out of place. The back of the key was busted so I definitely needed to make a trip to the Apple store.

The whole process was so simple:
1. Booked a time to see a “genius” ?!
2. Handed over my laptop to Trellawny.
3. Got it back in 5 minutes with a new key. No charge.
4. Left with a big smile on my face.

People will argue with me, but I still think Apple do the little things so well. Being able to book a time to see someone for example. Or the fact that they didn’t bother charging for a small repair. So, although I’d never admit to being a fanboy, I’m still a fan.

My adventure in book publishing ;)

Rosalynn’s Grandmother turns 80 this year and as a present Rosalynn has put together a great little family cookbook. Aunties, uncles and cousins all sent in their favourite recipes and on Nana’s birthday everyone will be getting a rather professional looking cookbook in the mail.

We published it on Lulu.com.

Lulu’s simple little tools and step-by-step instructions made it incredibly quick and easy. Format a Word document, upload a front and back cover and your done. And the price was fantastic.

For me this was a really powerful example of what the web has made available for everyday folk. We just published a simple book! 10 years ago that would have taken us a few months and cost thousands of dollars.

Skype’s goodwill gesture not likely to generate much goodwill

Last week Skype, the massively popular VOIP company, stopped working for a couple of days.

This morning I got my first email from Skype about the outage:

You may or may not know but last week Skype wasn’t available for a couple of days. There were a number of reasons for this and I am delighted to say that the problem is now well and truly sorted and everything is back to normal…As a goodwill gesture to all you faithful Skype Pro, Skype Unlimited, SkypeIn or Skype Voicemail customers, we’re adding an additional seven days to your current subscription, free of charge.

7 days of free service!?

A product that millions of people pay for and use everyday stops working for 2 days. Do they really think 7 days of free service will generate any goodwill? Keep in mind some of Skype’s customers use a Skype-in number as their main phone line.

My cynical conclusion (based on no facts at all!) is that eBay, Skype’s owners, might have applied the pressure. I can imagine a tense boardroom scene with a Skype exec wanting to do something for their customers and someone from eBay pointing to the revenue targets and frowning.

Photo: iloveacomputer

“Ted Rogers… Hello… Are you out there?”

The iPhone ads are annoying enough when I’m reading the New York Times (iPhone coming to Canada anytime soon Ted?) but this week it was even worse… T-Mobile had a full page promotion for their new HotSpot @ Home product.

Here’s the gist: Buy a HotSpot phone ($49) and a wireless router and, while you’re at home, T-Mobile will route all of your calls through the internet without you doing a thing. This means unlimited nationwide calling while you’re at home (or any of the T-Mobile HotSpot locations) for only $10 per month. Now that sounds pretty darn good to me.

So Ted, when do you think we can expect to see this in Canada?… Ted?

Toronto gets a new building by Will Alsop

I’m late to this, but if you haven’t heard already Toronto is getting a new design by the British architect Will Alsop. The building will be the flagship for the mammoth new film studio development being installed in the portlands – Filmport.

Most people in Toronto will know Alsop by his incredible (and incredibly controversial) Sharp Centre for Design at the Ontario College of Art and Design.

Although I’m by no means a raving Will Alsop fan I do really appreciate the amount of high profile commissioning going on in Toronto right now. Buildings like this pave the way for more innovative design in this city – something that benefits Toronto in many ways. There are the obvious pluses like increased tourism of course, but beyond that I think beautiful, challenging architecture creates a much more inspiring urban climate for citizens. When we are surrounded by buildings that challenge us I believe it becomes easier for us all to have thoughts and ideas beyond the ordinary and mediocre.

How to build a successful Facebook application – insights from FacebookCamp Toronto

Last night the GigPark crew, a handful of my friends and what seemed like most of the Toronto tech community descended on the MaRS building for FacebookCamp Toronto.

FacebookCamp was part of the Facebook Developer Garage series and focused on strategies and tips for developing a successful application on the Facebook platform.

The highlight of the night for me was a presentation by Meagan Marks, a platform manager from Facebook. She offered some great insight into user behaviour on the site, clearly laid out all of the ways you can integrate with Facebook and offered some strategies for making sure your application benefits from “the Facebook effect“.

I was going to write up my notes but Joey deVilla has already done a much better job than I would have over on the Global Nerdy blog (thanks Joey!).

The key points I took away from the event were very simple:

1. Successful applications offer self promotion for users (on my profile as well as other areas of Facebook) and social comparisons based on actions (am I smarter, hotter, better travelled… than my friends?)

2. Successful applications often integrate very deeply into Facebook (apparently some developers have found up to 14 different ways to integrate: messages, profile actions, the wall, share buttons…)

Happy Facebook developing everyone!

Facebook (not so) temporarily unavailable

When you create a platform as pervasive as Facebook (which I love by the way) I think you need to do 3 things very well:

1. Be open
This means letting other people/companies develop features that exist within or have access to your site. Facebook gets top marks for this.

2. Be secure
Goes without saying really. Unfortunately after the last week Facebook probably gets a 7 out of 10. From The Register: “Office workers logging into Facebook on Tuesday morning were shocked to discover they were being served up other user’s private pages.”

3. Be reliable
When people integrate a platform into their lives they get really upset when it disappears offline, even for a little while. 6 out of 10 and dropping…

Facebook’s growth over the last year has been completely insane. Any other site would have disintegrated by now and you have to give them kudos for that. But when a site that you rely on so much is “temporarily unavailable” so often it starts to hurt. This is especially frustrating for me this week because I’m trying to organize an event on Facebook.

So come on Mark – let’s get it sorted!