We are going legit and putting our blog under our domain name, finally.
Check out our new blog at www.upnext.com/blog
(Bookmark it because our new content will be awesome)
While your are there check out our new iPhone App --> www.upnext.com/iphone
or go straight to iTunes and download it --> www.itunes.com/app/upnextnyc
Come see us present our new iPhone App, UpNext 3D NYC on Tuesday, June 2nd at the New York Tech Meetup.
Details:
Where: Haft Auditorium at FIT (27th btw 7th Ave and 8th Ave)
When: 6/2/2009 at 7:00pm
Who: UpNext, Aviary, Livestream, MakerBot, NYSenate.gov, Mahalo 2.0, Centrl and 1 more.
Also, come by the NY Tech Meetup Showcase from 3:00pm - 6:30pm at the FIT Great Hall where we will have a table set up demoing the app.
To see other events for Internet Week NYC click here.
UpNext NYC is an interactive 3D map to explore Manhattan. With UpNext you can fly and zoom through the city fluidly, in its full 3D glory, without network hiccups or download times.
Along the way we’ll show you restaurants, nightlife, shops, and all the places that are local favorites or highly rated. Tap a building to see all the businesses inside, or tap a subway station to see all the trains passing through. Search for bars, hair salons, sushi, or any of our other 50+ categories and we’ll light up all the results in your area. It’s not just a map, it’s Manhattan in your pocket.
Whether you are a local or just visiting for the weekend, UpNext will make your NYC experience better.
Visit our iphone page for more info.
We got added to the Tumblr Goodies section today under Third Party Apps.
That's us at the bottom of the middle column. Check it out and let us know what you think.
For more information, instructions, help, on the new feature, read, "UpNext Map Permalinks..."
On a more personal note, Tumblr is a dead simple service that is one of the most elegant web services I have used/seen. I have met founder David Karp a couple times and he is a fantastic entrepreneur. He and his team are building a great product. Also, check out lead developer Marco Arment's site for some interesting insights into Iphone apps, web development and at times, beer.
Lastly, if you want to check out my personal site, DaMoon. It is in its nacent stages, but I think I will be using it more and more.
There has been a lot of data portability news lately with both Facebook Connect and Google Friend Connect launching within days of each other.
We have been utilizing some version of Facebook Connect for a while on UpNext. It is easy to use your Facebook ID to create an account on UpNext. It will also automatically bring together your friend connections if they have also logged into UpNext.
I personally don't have much to add to the data portability conversation because I really think what has been offered to date only scratches the surface. Until there is true data portability this is filed under nice feature rather than killer feature.
It is understandable that Facebook, Google and others are slowly sharing data in phases. Making sure things are set up correctly. There is also the question of what data should be shared. Afterall, part of Facebooks value proposition is that they were the ones that were able to get users to share so much data.
We will continue to dabble in the data portability solutions and create ways for people to better interact with UpNext and their social circles. Looking forward to seeing what comes next from this movement.
Because of forthcoming traveling and holiday merriment, we wanted to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving a little early.
Hope you all have a safe and happy Thanksgiving holiday.
Also, for those of you braving Black Friday in New York City, don't forget to use UpNext to figure out where all the stores are located to plan your shopping strategies.
At UpNext, we try to make it easy for you to explore and discover this great city of New York. Users love how they can intuitively find places to eat, drink, shop, sleep, and more. We recently added a feature so you can share your finds with others.
You can now create a map permalink and share it with your friends. Here is an easy step by step tutorial.
1) Find the Place you want to share
Navigate the map and use the search bar, category medallions or activity buttons to find the business, landmark, intersection, or address you want to share.
2) Map Permalink
Click on "Map Permalink" button on the top right corner of the map
or
the "Send it to" button on the right side bar.
3) Customize the snapshot
- Select the size of your desired snapshot. A red box will appear which are the borders for the image size.
- Move the map to center your selection and to include any landmarks or streets you think are appropriate.
- Click "Create Snapshot" to capture.
(The example above shows the new Shake Shack on the Upper West Side. We have included the street names as well as the Natural History Museum on the right for context.)
4) Share the map permalink
- Copy the URL and send it in an email
- Copy the embed URL and post it to your blog
- Send the image along with a message directly to your Tumblr
- Post a Twitter message with the map url included
These permalinks are great for adding visual locations to messages. Here are some example of the permalinks in use. Twitter Example, Tumblr Example
If you come up with or see any other creative uses for UpNext permalinks, please let us know in the comments.
By now you have read about the CEO's of the Big 3 automakers flying to Washington in private jets to request taxpayer bailout money. Here's the link in case you missed it.
If Congress does indeed bailout the automakers, then perhaps we should all consider pitching investors the Big 3 Way rather than cutting costs and being lean.
Here is how I would do it.
- Show up to the meeting in an Audi R8 and park it next to the VC's BMW. Make sure he notices it from his office window by honking loudly when you pull up. (Even better, if you get there before him, make sure to park in his space if he has one.)
- Bring at least 6 people to the meeting. Make sure they all have VP or Director titles. That way the VC's knows that they get paid a lot of money, but there are still people above them getting paid even more.
- Bring along the consulting firm you hired to put your pitch deck together. McKinsey or the B's (Bain, BCG, Booz) would be best.
- During the getting to know you part of the discussion, make sure to invite the VC to the company holiday party at Per Se (or French Laundry) so that he can meet the rest of the team.
- When talking about the issues with your product, make the analogy that a product has to be tailored to each user like the custom suit you are wearing.
- When asked about possible exits, get your bankers and lawyers on the phone (both on retainer) and have them talk about the IPO window opening in 2009.
- When the receptionist/assistant/intern brings in some bottled water, make sure to tip him a benjamin.
- If he ever dares to question your spending, imply that he does not care about employee safety. If he looks confused, start rambling about standard procedures.
Let me know if you have other suggestions in the comments.
Last night a group of hyperlocal/LBS web companies got together for food and drinks at Pop Burger Midtown. It was a great evening and I hope that there are more events to come.
Here are some of the companies represented:
Medallions (or category) search has now been moved into the map area. This makes it easier to search and navigate by keeping everything in the map.
Also the medallions are now clearly labeled below and the on/off functionality is easily recognizable. Try them out yourself. We have...
Use these 3 buttons to discover places through your friends and the UpNext community.
There is nothing better than having a passionate user base. We love our UpNext community members and all the feedback they give us.
So when given the opportunity to leverage another great group of users, we jumped at the chance.
The Yelp API allows us to bring more content into UpNext, helping you better understand and evaluate businesses in NYC.
Once a venue is selected. Click on "More Info" in the venue window to open the expanded sidebar. Here you will see up to 3 reviews from Yelp related to that business.
The screenshot above is a great example of how UpNext combined with Yelp content can be a very useful tool. Mr. Jones is a Japanese restaurant that opened this month. You can tell it is a new restaurant by the glowing red dot hovering over the location (UpNext Hotspots). When you click on "More Info", 2 Yelp reviews appear.
For a place that has been open less than a month, these Yelp reviews provide you with some immediate feedback on the location. Pretty impressive stuff from the Yelp community.
So take a look around when exploring New York City. Let us know how you like the Yelp integration and any feedback you might have.
So the team has been working overtime on this new version of UpNext. Honestly, I am blown away by the improvements and want to share them with everyone.
Even before you read this post, go to the new site (www.upnext.com) and check it out.
Here is a list of the new stuff we want to point out. (We will be writing expanded follow up posts on some of these features.)
The last couple weeks have been pretty good for us in terms of press. We did an interview with Maureen Farrell at Forbes.com. Check out it out to see some new stuff that we are working on.
UpNext on Forbes
(Sorry, no embed option again)
It has been a while since our last post. We have been in a black hole of sorts getting the new and improved UpNext ready. It should be coming soon so keep an eye out.
In the meantime, enjoy this segment that aired on the CW11 morning news a couple days ago.
Raj and Vik both did an awesome job and are naturals in front of the camera.
UpNext on CW11
(Sorry no embed option on this video.)
I recently read a post on Peter Krasilovsky's blog, The Local Onliner, about Citysquares and the progress they have made. Here are some of the numbers Peter mentions...
Boston-based CitySquares, which just celebrated its second anniversary, is getting about 70,000 unique visitors per month and now has a base of 700 advertisers, averaging $1,200 per year, reports CEO Ben Saren. He believes they have even more potential via upsells such as video, sponsored/display ads, etc.
The recent news of the Washington Post's struggles to establish their local property LoudonExtra.com has sparked some conversation around hyperlocal and how to make it work?
Fred Wilson, a NYC venture capitalist, has written many times on hyperlocal and has made an investment in Outside.in which focuses on created newspapers for every zip code. He recently wrote a post entitled, "Hyperlocal Has To Be Peer Produced".
I have been interested in "hyperlocal" for years and have blogged about this topic quite a bit. From day one, I've been convinced that hyperlocal must be "peer produced". That means we together will document what is going on in our streets, our schools, our churches, our parks, and our communities. No "newsroom centric" model is going to work. That's how I see it.
Some exciting news for the LBS industry today. Pelago, parent company of Whrrl, raised $15M in a Series B round from some heavy hitters including T-Mobile. When I first read the story I thought 2 things:
1) Great to see geo-related, "where 2.0" companies raising serious cash. The phrase, a rising tide lifts all ships, comes to mind.
2) What are they going to do with all that money? This is $15M on top of the $7.4M already raised.
According to the press release and blog posts, the money will be used to quickly grow into new markets in the US and abroad. This is a smart team (ex Amazon veterans) backed by smart money (Kleiner Perkins, Jeff Bezos), but $22M+ seems like a lot of money for what is now a service built on top of Google Maps. It is an interesting service with some nice twists on LBS, but not one that on the surface seems to need that sort of cash to expand.
My guess, and this is not based on anything but pure speculation on my part, is that Pelago/Whrrl will be building out their own location based advertising platform which will require time, resources and therefore cash.
Geotargeted ads are the holy grail (or Crystal Skull) for location based services. A lot of people are focused on the building of services (Brightkite and Loopt come to mind), but fewer are focused on the advertising portion. The idea that a relevant ad can be delivered to me on my phone in a non-obtrusive manner has yet to be mastered.
Whrrl can combine both your past actions (place's you've been, reviews you wrote) plus your current location to deliver targeted ads. This is demographic/ psychographic/ geographic/ "fill in the blank" graphic, gold for advertisers.
Perhaps Whrrl will become the AdSense for location based services. (Blogger Greg Sterling has written some excellent posts related to this topic.) If not, I would like to know what they plan to do with all that cash.
(Note: I do not know what kind of relationship they have with carriers and how much having access to those companies might cost.)
There are plenty of great live blogging posts and recaps of Where 2.0 on the web. I just wanted to post some of my own thoughts about the conference.
Data and Open Data
This seemed to be a big theme this year. Google, Yahoo, ESRI and others announced greater access to data through API's. This is a positive move forward for the geo community as access to better data will leader to greater innovation.
Geotagging is hard (from Flickr)
I really enjoyed the Flickr presentation on geotagging photos and the difficulty associated with it. This was not the primary message they were trying to share, but that is what I took away from it. Getting down to the neighborhood level is hard enough but real value comes when geotagging occurs at the address or street level.
Monetizing Geo
Greg Sterling led an excellent panel on the challenges of monetizing the geoweb. It seemed like no one had truly figured out the Map Adsense model yet but plenty of people are trying. I liked the honesty of the panel in stating that no true model has emerged yet. I spoke briefly with Greg after the panel about the challenges we are seeing and discussed the idea of a Local Adsense from an IYP led group. Whether this happens or not, there are many newer players in the marketplace who are aiming to take over this large, very large market. Let me know if you are in the space, we would be happy to speak with you.
Streetviews and Geobrowsers
In the exhibitors room, I was surprised at the number of streetview and geobrowser companies. All the demos they had on display were very impressive and it just speaks to how far the geoweb has come.
Google, Everyscape and Mapjack were some of the companies showing off a streetview technology. And it looked like there were 4 geobrowser companies showing off impressive globes.
As we see geo data becoming more open and shared, will next year's conference have an annoucement that someone is opening up streetlevel pictures and 3D models to the community. Probably not, but we will see.
The Inside (from Mok Oh of Everyscape)
A very interesting presentation from Mok Oh, CTO of Everyscape. He talked about how Everyscape is emphasizing the inside as much as, if not more, than the outside. And with their ambassador program, they are looking for users to help them achieve this.
His demo of the Boston bar Cheers, from the TV show, was a great example of why the inside should be given more weight.
If Everyscape is able to "map" a large percentage of the inside for certain markets, this will give them a great advantage over others and the ability to license this content.
While I don't think this will happen, imagine the scene in Ocean's 11 where George Clooney and Brad Pitt are looking at the floor plans for the Bellagio. Perhaps in Ocean's 14, they will be looking at an Everyscape layout while using the tagging feature to plan their next caper.
Best Presentation - History's Best Geo-Hacks (Part Deux)
Chris Spurgeon had the most enjoyable presentation of the conference. Being an avid reader of history, this one really appealed to me, personally. Hopefully there is a video of his presentation as simply seeing the slides do not do it justice.
It was announced today that UpNext won a Duke's Choice Award under the category, Java Everywhere. The awards will be handed out tonight at the JavaOne conference.Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ: JAVA) today announced the winners of the sixth annual Duke's Choice Awards. The Duke's Choice Awards program recognizes the year's most influential Java technology-based applications submitted by developers and companies around the world. The winners are chosen by Vice President and Sun Fellow James Gosling, along with a panel of Java technology experts at Sun. (Sun Press Release)
We are very honored to receive this award. This really highlights the work that Raj and Vik have put into UpNext. Working with these guys has been an amazing experience and it is great to see their accomplishments recognized by Sun and the Java community.
Stop by our booth in the Java Playground if you are around and say hi to Raj and Vik, who are having a blast at the conference. Also, we are demo-ing some cool new things at JavaOne the we have not shown before. So stop by, check it out and let us know what you think.