Today my foundation, The Arch Mission Foundation, announced our mission to land the Wikipedia (and other datasets) on the Moon in 2020 with Astrobotic. This will create a permanent backup of human civilization that will persist on the Moon for billions of years.… Read More “Announcing our Mission to Land the Wikipedia on the Moon!”
Category Archives: Best Articles
Arch Mission Foundation Announces Our Payload On SpaceX Falcon Heavy
Arch Mission Foundation Announces Our Payload On SpaceX Falcon Heavy
I am thrilled to announce the launch of the first Arch™ payload, on board the Falcon Heavy Test Launch, with SpaceX.
Read the full blog post here:
Our goal at the Arch Mission Foundation™ is to permanently archive human knowledge for thousands to billions of years.… Read More “Arch Mission Foundation Announces Our Payload On SpaceX Falcon Heavy”
Magical, My New Startup Studio in LA, Comes Out of Stealth
Today we began to reveal a little more of what we’ve been working on in stealth mode, since last December. It’s a new science and technology startup studio, based in Los Angeles, called Magical.
You might think of Magical as a moonshot factory, except that we’re not just aiming for the moon.… Read More “Magical, My New Startup Studio in LA, Comes Out of Stealth”
Idea: Could a “Basic Cable” Model Solve the Newspaper Industry’s Woes?
Since the advent of the Web, the newspaper industry has struggled with declining subscribers and plummeting revenue.
The failure of the mainstream media, and growing threats from fake news and partisan news outlets, is not only a risk to the newspaper industry (whether paper or completely digital), but is also a threat to the checks and balances that make Democracy work.… Read More “Idea: Could a “Basic Cable” Model Solve the Newspaper Industry’s Woes?”
Announcing the Arch Mission Foundation – Spreading Humanity’s Knowledge in Space
Today we are officially announcing the Arch Mission — a non-profit foundation dedicated to spreading humanity’s knowledge across the distant reaches of space and time. I first wrote about this concept in 2015. We have been working in stealth since then and now I am proud to announce the project has reached a major milestone.
Nerve Center 3.0 Announcement in the Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal’s CIO Journal covered the announcement of Bottlenose’s Nerve Center 3.0 platform today. They did a nice job capturing the big idea here.
AI, BI, and the Necessity of Automating the Analyst
It’s Time to Automate the Analyst
I have been speaking about the need for “automating the analyst” for several years. This need is prompted not only by the data deluge — the Cambrian explosion of data volume, velocity, and variety of data sources — but also by the simple reality that enterprises cannot hire the number of data scientists they need to adapt to this new environment.… Read More “AI, BI, and the Necessity of Automating the Analyst”
I Wrote This Short Story in 10th Grade – 1985 – Ernest Hemingway Assignment
I wrote the attached story, “The Path,” in 1985, for an American Literature class assignment. I was a 10th grade junior high school student at the Beaver Country Day School, in Chestnut Hill, MA.
The assignment was to write a short story in the style of either Hemingway or Faulkner.… Read More “I Wrote This Short Story in 10th Grade – 1985 – Ernest Hemingway Assignment”
Bottlenose Named Gartner Cool Vendor in In-Memory Computing
I’m thrilled to say that my company, Bottlenose, has been selected by Gartner Group as a 2016 Cool Vendor in In-Memory Computing.
I’m very proud of the team and what we built here. Truly the next-generation of business intelligence, powered by AI and streaming analytics.… Read More “Bottlenose Named Gartner Cool Vendor in In-Memory Computing”
How Twitter Could be 10X Bigger, 100X More Profitable, and 1000X More Awesome
Read my new article about how to evolve Twitter, on VentureBeat
… Read More “How Twitter Could be 10X Bigger, 100X More Profitable, and 1000X More Awesome”I’ve spent many years studying, writing about, building, and funding companies (such as Bottlenose, Klout, and The Daily Dot) in Twitter’s ecosystem.
Despite the media chatter, I am still bullish on Twitter – as should be any investor who understands the social network’s fundamentals and true potential.
My Forbes Interview – People May be Brands, but Brands are Not People
I was recently interviewed by Blake Morgan at Forbes, on the subject of “Building Influence in the Digital Age” — listen to the interview here:
… Read More “My Forbes Interview – People May be Brands, but Brands are Not People”Peter Drucker’s grandson Nova Spivack, CEO of Bottlenose, says that Drucker would have felt today that real influencers are not spending a lot of time on social media.
The Rise of the Chief Analytics Officer
My new article on the growing role of the Chief Analytics Officer has gone live on GigaOm. Read it here.
How to Solve Twitter’s Engagement Problem: Add Semantics
The fundamental problem that Twitter has is engagement. If engagement can be corrected, the whole Twitter ecosystem (and their stock price) will improve.
Improving Twitter engagement comes down to fixing the core consumption experience.
First of all what’s wrong with the consumption experience?… Read More “How to Solve Twitter’s Engagement Problem: Add Semantics”
Why Twitter’s Engagement Has Fallen
I have been thinking about Twitter for many years. One of the interesting trends that many of us who share an interest in social networks have been tracking is the decline in engagement on Twitter.
Indeed this decline is not only evident from Twitter’s own metrics and reporting, but also to anyone who has been an active user of Twitter since the early days of the service.
Venturebeat Article on the Venture Production Studio Model
Interesting article in Venturebeat about the emerging Venture Production Studio model, which I wrote about in 2011 here on this blog.
It’s Time for an Open Standard for Cards
Cards are fast becoming the hot new design paradigm for mobile apps, but their importance goes far beyond mobile. Cards are modular, bite-sized content containers designed for easy consumption and interaction on small screens, but they are also a new metaphor for user-interaction that is spreading across all manner of other apps and content.… Read More “It’s Time for an Open Standard for Cards”
The Next Step for Intelligent Virtual Assistants
When we talk about the future of artificial intelligence (AI), the discussion often focuses on the advancements and capabilities of the technology, or even the risks and opportunities inherent in the potential cultural implications. What we frequently overlook, however, is the future of AI as a business.… Read More “The Next Step for Intelligent Virtual Assistants”
Bottlenose Nerve Center 2.0 Released – Milestone for Real-Time Big Data Analytics
I’m happy to announce the release of Bottlenose Nerve Center 2.0 today. Analyzing 3 billion messages an hour (72 billion messages a day), and doing real-time predictive analytics on nearly 300 million data points an hour, it’s a big step in real-time big data analytics. … Read More “Bottlenose Nerve Center 2.0 Released – Milestone for Real-Time Big Data Analytics”
How Bitcoins Could Restructure the World
Read my article in VentureBeat about how Bitcoins may restructure our civilization, and the need for advocacy to support this transition, if it is going to happen. Here’s an excerpt:
… Read More “How Bitcoins Could Restructure the World”Bitcoin is a trend with all the ingredients necessary for changing the world.
Why Cognition-as-a-Service (CaaS) is the Next Operating System Battlefield
Read my article in Gigaom on the coming cognition-as-a-service wars. The next thing after the Semantic Web.
Can Humans Fall in Love With Bots?
I was quoted in this New Yorker article about whether relationships between humans and bots are real, along with some other AI experts. Can bots experience love? Read it and find out.
Is Twitter’s Business Model Going to Work?
Twitter’s business model appears to have shifted from being a network to being a destination. The question I address here, is whether this shift in strategy is going to work, and what the implications are.
Twitter’s Declining User Engagement: Can it be Solved?
… Read More “Is Twitter’s Business Model Going to Work?”Bottlenose Announces Free Live Visualization of Global Social Trends
Bottlenose has just launched something very very cool: A free version of it’s live visualization of trends in the Twitter firehose. Check it out at http://sonar.bottlenose.com and get your own embed for any topic. This is the future of real-time marketing.… Read More “Bottlenose Announces Free Live Visualization of Global Social Trends”
Consolidate This: Quantified Self Edition
Read my article in Gigaom on the Quantified Self market and how it is developing.
There are too many choices available for consumers when it comes to devices and apps that track your steps or daily activities. What needs to happen is consolidation across the industry and a focus on storytelling, not just activity.
The Future of Virtual Assistants
Check out my article in Forbes on the future of Virtual Assistants. What’s after SIRI and IVR?
… Read More “The Future of Virtual Assistants”All of the interesting stuff happens when data collides. A voice-based interface to a single data set is a thing of the past.
The Present IS the Future: Real-Time Marketing In the Era of the Stream – Part Two
In Part I of this article series, we looked at how the real-time Web has precipitated Nowism as a fundamental shift in how we understand and engage with information. Nowism is a cultural shift to a focus on the present, instead of the past or future.… Read More “The Present IS the Future: Real-Time Marketing In the Era of the Stream – Part Two”
Bottlenose Beat Bit.ly to the First Attention Engine – But It’s Going to Get Interesting
Bottlenose (disclosure: my startup) just launched the first attention engine this week.
But it appears that Bit.ly is launching one soon as well.
It’s going to get interesting to watch this category develop. Clearly there is new interest in building a good real-time picture of what’s happening, and what’s trending, and providing search, discovery, and insights around that.… Read More “Bottlenose Beat Bit.ly to the First Attention Engine – But It’s Going to Get Interesting”
How Bottlenose Could Improve the Media and Enable Smarter Collective Intelligence
How Bottlenose Could Improve the Media and Enable Smarter Collective Intelligence
This article is part of a series of articles about the Bottlenose Public Beta launch.
Bottlenose – The Now Engine – The Web’s Collective Consciousness Just Got Smarter
How Bottlenose Could Improve the Media and Enable Smarter Collective Intelligence (you are here)
A New Window Into the Collective Consciousness
Bottlenose offers a new window into what the world is paying attention to right now, globally and locally.… Read More “How Bottlenose Could Improve the Media and Enable Smarter Collective Intelligence”
Bottlenose – The Now Engine – The Web’s Collective Consciousness Just Got Smarter
Recently, one of Twitter’s top search engineers tweeted that Twitter was set to “change search forever.” This proclamation sparked a hearty round of speculation and excitement about what was coming down the pipe for Twitter search.
The actual announcement featured the introduction of autocomplete and the ability to search within the subset of people on Twitter that you follow — both long-anticipated features.… Read More “Bottlenose – The Now Engine – The Web’s Collective Consciousness Just Got Smarter”
How I Got Into College (by Doing the Opposite of What I Should Have Done). An Essay.
Today I had an interesting phone call with an alumnus of my alma mater, Oberlin College. He called me for an informational interview, asking for some career advice. It was a good conversation. At one point, on a tangent, he asked me why I went to Oberlin?… Read More “How I Got Into College (by Doing the Opposite of What I Should Have Done). An Essay.”
I Get 13,000 Messages/Day via Different Streams – Here’s the Analysis
Continuing with the theme I’ve been writing about lately, focused on the growth of the next phase of the Web, what I call “The Stream,” I’ve started to analyze the messages I get on a typical day.
First of all, through all the different channels I use, I now receive approximately 13,000 messages a day.… Read More “I Get 13,000 Messages/Day via Different Streams – Here’s the Analysis”
Keeping Up With the Stream — New Problems and Solutions
This is Part III of a series of articles on the new era of the Stream, a new phase of the Web.
In Part I, The Message is the Medium, I explored the shift in focus on the Web from documents to messages.… Read More “Keeping Up With the Stream — New Problems and Solutions”
Drowning in the Stream — New Challenges for a New Web
This is Part II of a three-part series of articles on how the Stream is changing the Web.
In Part I of this series, The Message is the Medium, I wrote about some of the shifts that are taking place as the center of online attention shifts from documents to messages.… Read More “Drowning in the Stream — New Challenges for a New Web”
The Message is the Medium – Attention is Shifting from the Web to the Stream
Shift Happens
A major shift has taken place on the Web. Web pages and Web search are no longer the center of online activity and attention. Instead, the new center of attention is messaging and streams. We have moved from the era of the Web to the era of the Stream.… Read More “The Message is the Medium – Attention is Shifting from the Web to the Stream”
Consciousness is Not a Computation
In the previous article in this series, Is The Universe a Computer? New Evidence Emerges I wrote about some new evidence that appears to suggest that the universe may be like a computer, or least that it contains computer codes of a sort.… Read More “Consciousness is Not a Computation”
Is the Universe a Computer? New Evidence Emerges.
I haven’t posted in a while, but this is blog-worthy material. I’ve recently become familiar with the thinking of University of Maryland physicist, James Gates Jr. Dr. Gates is working on a branch of physics called supersymmetry. In the process of his work he’s discovered the presence of what appear to resemble a form of computer code, called error correcting codes, embedded within, or resulting from, the equations of supersymmetry that describe fundamental particles.… Read More “Is the Universe a Computer? New Evidence Emerges.”
StreamGlider Launches Today!
Today I’m happy to announce the launch of StreamGlider, a new tablet app (initially on iPad) that provides the first live streaming dashboard for keeping up with your interests.
TechCrunch just broke the story.
The inspiration for StreamGlider was a product that launched in the early 1990’s called Pointcast.… Read More “StreamGlider Launches Today!”
The Problem with Stream 3.0
After my former project, Twine.com, was sold, I began to turn my attention to the Next Big Challenge: How to make sense of the growing real-time Web, or what many call, “the Stream.”
I could see the writing on the wall, and it was less than 140 characters: Social media’s own success was going to be its biggest challenge.… Read More “The Problem with Stream 3.0”
Bottlenose has Launched!
Today, after almost two years of work in stealth, I am proud to announce the launch of Bottlenose.
While I have co-founded and serve on the boards of several other ventures (The Daily Dot, Live Matrix, StreamGlider, and others), Bottlenose is different from all my other projects in that I am also in a full-time day-to-day role as the CEO.… Read More “Bottlenose has Launched!”
The Daily Dot – Our Newest Venture Production – Launches Today!
Today I’m pleased to announce that, The Daily Dot, our newest “venture production,” has launched into public beta.
The Daily Dot is the first of its kind – it’s the Web’s newspaper — the first community newspaper about the Web.… Read More “The Daily Dot – Our Newest Venture Production – Launches Today!”
Sharepocalypse Now
The social media landscape is changing quickly, but this change won’t be immediate, or for that matter, efficient. And that’s going to be a big problem for all of us.
I believe that Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn are fundamentally different, and thus, should not be in competition.… Read More “Sharepocalypse Now”
The New Social Media Landscape: A Roadmap
It may look like Google+ is competing with Facebook and Twitter, but I don’t think that is what will happen in the end. I think Google+ is a very different kind of service and it’s not clear that it can or will, or should, replace these other services.… Read More “The New Social Media Landscape: A Roadmap”
Should Facebook be Worried About Google+?
In previous articles, I’ve written about how Google+ can build a developer ecosystem on Chrome that is different from Twitter’s ecosystem, and how Twitter must change to survive against that. It’s clear that Google+ and Twitter are very different animals.
Now what about Facebook?… Read More “Should Facebook be Worried About Google+?”
Why Twitter’s API Strategy Must Change in a Google+ and Facebook World
As a result of the emergence of Google+, Twitter could soon find itself in a tough spot. A large chunk of their core developer base might migrate to Google+ because there is simply more opportunity there.
Why? Well for starters, it’s really easy to crank out Chrome extensions and you can market and sell them instantly in the Chrome Web Store to a ginormous captive audience that is many multiples of the size of Twitter’s user-base.… Read More “Why Twitter’s API Strategy Must Change in a Google+ and Facebook World”
The Google+ Developer Ecosystem Will Be Different from Twitter
Google+ has seen some good initial uptake from early-adopters in its first few weeks. But how will it leverage developers and partners?
In order to really build value around Google+, of course Google will integrate it with their other products, including Search, Gmail, and more.… Read More “The Google+ Developer Ecosystem Will Be Different from Twitter”
My Best Interview: About Global Brain, Consciousness and AI
I was recently interviewed by Stephen Ibaraki and Alex Lin (CEO of ChinaValue) in what turned out to be the most interesting, far-reaching, and multi-disciplinary (and long) interview I’ve ever given. I was very pleased with the depth of their questions and the topics we covered.… Read More “My Best Interview: About Global Brain, Consciousness and AI”
[Excerpt From My TechCrunch post] Why Twitter Should Adopt a Freemium API Model Immediately
TechCrunch kindly ran my most recent article today — the full version is available here.
Here is an excerpt:
I’ve been puzzling over Twitter’s recent tactical moves around their API, Ubermedia and Tweetdeck, for a few months now, and it just doesn’t add up.… Read More “[Excerpt From My TechCrunch post] Why Twitter Should Adopt a Freemium API Model Immediately”
Announcing my newest production, The Daily Dot
I’m pleased to announce that my newest venture production is beginning to unstealth. It’s called The Daily Dot and it promises to be “the hometown newspaper of the Web ” — the community newspaper for Web.
The story of The Daily Dot began several years ago when I was thinking about where the Web was headed.… Read More “Announcing my newest production, The Daily Dot”
What I’ve Been Up To: The Venture Production Studio Model
UPDATE NOTE: June 8, 2017:
The original post below was written in 2011. In that article I discussed the concept of venture production studios as a model — what are now being called “startup studios.”
I actively produced nearly a dozen ventures starting in 2011, using my venture studio model.… Read More “What I’ve Been Up To: The Venture Production Studio Model”
My Father and Me. A Memoir. For Mayer Spivack (1936 – 2011)
My father, Mayer Spivack, passed away on February 12, 2011, in the Kaplan Family House, a beautiful hospice outside of Boston. He passed away, at the young age of 74, after a difficult year and a half battle with colon cancer.… Read More “My Father and Me. A Memoir. For Mayer Spivack (1936 – 2011)”