DLAs, mashups and canapes
TV Chefs and blogs have had it — networking evenings and portals are back
Last Thursday I went to and event titled Digital Lifestyle Aggregators at the ever so posh BT Centre and learnt three things about this latest web 2.0 trend
- Digital Content Aggregation is when you present a load of different content sources in a single interface (yes, what used to be called a Portal, but is now, like most consumer marketing things, a lifestyle)
- A Mashup is when you put this stuff together (integrating RSS feeds and using stuff like the Google Earth or other web2-style API)
- If you want to get funded, do a DCA Mashup - although it’s probably already too late, as pretty much everyone at the event seemed to have found VCs recently. Even BT themselves sounded committed to it. Their director of strategy suggested they would be embracing the new internet economy by promoting Skype, amongst other things, within their own portal.
Having been integrating feeds and services from other sites for years it’s strange to see businesses so conceptually and technically simple seeing significant funding. It has to be said that there are some great interface designs in some of these companies sites - Netvibes for example is probably the best of the crop. We have yet to see whether they have the marketing muscle to see it through.
Oh yes, I almost forgot, BT do great canapés.
1 comment September 25th, 2006 mike