Folks, I am not talking about the technological problems. There are many people around, who can handle them.
I am talking about how to make this a success!

There are facebook apps, flickr has this function and I already featured geshout.com - and there must be thousands of other concepts for that around - but none of them is successful when it comes to creating a hype. The internet community just does not react on them.
I am sure people would like this service, but it is yet too complicated.

Let’s look at twitter and facebook:

• They are easy too use. You have a box on top and there you post. That’s it.
• They have a clear timeline: Most recent on top, you scroll down - you go to the past. That’s it.
• They focus on people. That’s it.

Hence the formula is: Easiness + Timeline + People = Success

Compare that with those geo-things:

• You need to tell your location before posting, either by typing it or zooming in. That’s complicated.
• You see all posts on the map at the same time. You can’t go through them step by step. That’s confusing.
• They focus on the location, not on the people. That’s not so interesting.

So their formula is: Complicated + Confusing + Wrong information = No success

I am sorry guys, it is that simple!

But - here comes the solution:

Easiness + Timeline + People + Geo info = (Possible) Success

Never, I say NEVER, put geographical information in front!

Add it to what is successful:

• Keep it simple. Posting has to be as easy as on twitter. Read the GPS-data from the mobile, get location info from the ISP, or use the saved home location of that person. And only if they want to, they add it themselves.
• Have a clear timeline. And next to it a map or google earth. When you mouse-over a post, the map shows the location.
• You still see your friends at once. Mouse-over shows locations, or you can show all your friends as network on the map.
• Pure geo-info is boring. You need helpful features. E.g. I go on vacation to Hong Kong. I wanna know: a) who of my friends is there or was there already;  b) does any of my friends’ friends live there; etc.

Always think about the users and if something is useful for them.

So the final formula is: Useful = Successful

We have created quizes on facebook.
Take them because:
1. they are fun
2. we want to see how far they spread
3. people are invited to visit letscreateastorm.org

Go to the quizes

What storm are you?

The dumbest quiz

What is your Internet Quotient?

What happens if you combine the features of Twitter with Google Earth?

You get GeShout.com !

The website is in its alpha phase and I say:

Let’s create a SHOUT !

The next Mesa Systema will cover the topic: Viral Marketing

Learn more about the Mesa Systema, our dialogue forum (face to face every 13th of the month and online, in german) here

Visit Mesa Systema

Stooorm.com is a partner of letscreateastorm.org

It delivers these features:

• stooorm.com gives startups a free platform to present themselves
• stooorm.com gives you a free widget (ideally installed as header) for developing and promoting your site
• stooorm.com gives you a free domain: yourwebsite.stooorm.com
• stooorm.com connects you with the letscreateastorm.org community

Featured websites will be presented with a screenshot and a short description. These sites can either be spinoffs of letscreateastorm.org, or independently created websites.

The widget includes useful links with standardized features: comments, bug reports (especially for sites in alpha or beta stages), promoting on digg, delicious, etc. It also includes a backlink to stooorm.org and is required if you want to be listed there.

You can become even closer connected by using our subdomain service yourwebsite.stooorm.com

The letscreateastorm.org community can help you in further developing your website (programming, design, marketing, terms of use - especially the latter two are often forgotten by startups!).

(Check the vision to see what stooorm.com can turn into in the long run.)

Seth Godin lists 5 pillars of social media site success:

• Who likes me?
• Is everything okay?
• How can I become more popular?
• What’s new?
• I’m bored, let’s make some noise

How do we perform with respect to that?

In terms of website development we deliver:

• Who likes my idea? (Idea rating)
• Is everything ok with my project? (Follow contributions online)
• How can my know how/creativity become more popular? (User profile and friends/coworkers)
• What’s new? (New ideas and developments constantly posted)
• I’m bored, let’s contribute something (LET’S CREATE A STORM !)

If Seth Godin is right, then we are on a good way to success!

How about storing websites on multiple PCs instead of one server?
With a good distribution on several computers around the globe, we could make sure that the website is constantly accessible.
No need to pay for webspace anymore.
We all use websites, we all create websites - so we all store them too!
And again the letscreateastorm community would kick companies in their …..

Hussein Nasser started a very vibrant discussion in his blog (link) on new ways to compress files. I take part in the brainstorming that covers IT, maths, biology, physics and chemistry.

Letscreateastorm is not about new websites only. It also covers the technology needed to get them going. This could be one of them.

From an article in futurezone.orf.at (in German):

Web Science Research Initiative (WSRI)-cofounder Wendy Hall, Professor for Computerscience in Southampton: “…cause the Web is not just a technology, it is formed by the people.”

All Web3.0 approaches I have heard of focus on technology: Semantic web etc.

Only letscreateastorm.org focuses on the social - on the people - part.

Of course technology is an important part, and we will be developing great new technologies here - but it is always the people who create them - and this is the platform for them to meet.

Furthermore we not only need new technologies, we more than ever need new organizational structures. So far the web knows two: The guy who develops something in his garage and the big company that develops something typically in hierachical structures.
Here we will (all together) develop a non-hierarchical, cooperative structure, that works via the internet - and will be copied for offline ventures around the globe too.

I am afraid we lost our Unique Selling Proposition.
Version 1 was so simple (almost ugly) that it attracted people to see, what this was all about.
And it very well reflected that this project needed support.
Now with this nice, state of the art website (many thanks to Dietmar Hafner for creating it!), it might not be so obvious for people to join the project.

Version 1 showed what it was about - but had no communication tools.
Version 2 has all the tools - but shows not, what it is about.

How can we get this together? How do we get our USP back?