Widgety Goodness crammed a lot into a day. All the feedback we’ve had so far has been positive. The speakers were great, the sponsors were great, the participants were great and the venue was great.
We’re already working on next year’s event - and on taking it to the US next summer. More on this and much more widgety feedback in the coming weeks.
Thanks to everyone who made this such an excellent day.
More photos on Flickr

Filed under: conference | No Comments »

He was busy with his wife bringing Jake into the world. I had told him the baby would never come a week early, but what do I know.
Widgety Congratulations to Jon and Jane and Jake

Filed under: conference | No Comments »

social network « Widgety Goodness

Of course one of the key reasons for attending Widgety Goodness is to network - express, connect, learn, create - with like-minded colleagues from across the industry. We’re hooking up with backnetwork to create the Widgety Goodness 07 Social Network.Not only do you get all this on The Day, but we’ll be bringing you, one and all, together in the leadup - and for 12 whole juicy months afterwards. Call it a learning community, call it a network, a bunch of widget fiends cooking up the future. But whatever you do, don’t miss out. This is a dedicated space for widget wonders to emerge.

When you register for the conference, you will be automatically subscribed and welcomed into the Greater Goodness. Infact, you become The Great and The Good of our very own micronation.

Filed under: conference | No Comments »

Platform 4

Platform 4 is keen to discover creative talent wherever it is emerging. And we recognise that some of the most inspiring online work is coming from the bedrooms of passionate hobbyist coders - not always the big name agencies and software giants.To recognise this trend we’re offering £1500 to the most creative mash-up of Channel 4’s Film4 RSS feeds. Two runners up will also get £250. You can find a list of these RSS feeds on the RSS Central page, and also listed below. We’ll create a gallery of all the mash-ups received that meet the judging criteria. The full guidelines of the competition, including how the projects will be judged and the timeframes for getting your entry into Platform 4, are outlined here.

Since we’re not going to be hosting these mash-ups, you’re free to develop them in whatever language you’re most familiar with, and deliver them as bite-size widgets or full-blown apps. If you’d like to pull in other Channel4 content into your app, refer to our RSS Central Page for some of our more popular content feeds. For more on what makes a good mash-up, and a list of hundreds of open APIs with which to mash-up the Film4 data, visit www.programmableweb.com.

As an example of the kind of application that can be created using the film site’s content, check out the Movie Tag Facebook application.

Filed under: conference, sponsors, widgets | No Comments »

So the good folks of Livejournal have been sold on by their owner, Six Apart, to a Russian oberfuherer. No-one seems very concerned and it probably wont’ have any effect on the users - may even be beneficial. Who knows, they may even have a positive attitude to widgets. But it does raise questions about who owns the users.

LiveJournal & SUP

San Francisco, CA - December 3, 2007 - Six Apart, the world’s leading
independent blogging software and services company, today announced
that SUP, an international media company, has acquired LiveJournal
(LJ), the pioneer of social networking communities online used by
millions of people around the world to connect through personal
journals and topic-based communities. SUP has launched an American
company, LiveJournal, Inc., to manage and operate LiveJournal globally.Six Apart acquired LiveJournal in January 2005 from its founder, Brad Fitzpatrick. From its founding, LiveJournal popularized many of the fundamental innovations of social media, such as friends lists and powerful privacy controls.

Filed under: conference | No Comments »

RockYou climbing past Slide, to be number one widget-maker?

RockYou, the company behind popular Facebook applications and Myspace Flash widgets, may soon pass its arch-rival Slide to be the largest widget-maker in the world.Some have accurately called such Facebook applications “mostly silly, useless and time-wasting” — yet this virtual real estate may be worth a lot one day. RockYou claims it is quickly growing revenue through running advertising across applications.

The San Mateo company’s “SuperWall” Facebook application has just passed Slide’s “FunWall” application in number of daily active Facebook users — 3,186,833 versus 2,951,078. Like Facebook’s own Wall feature but with a few bells and whistles, these applications allow users to comment, post videos and share other information on each others Facebook profiles.

Filed under: conference | No Comments »

Widgety Goodness afterparty with Techcrunch and the Brighton posse

Immediately following the event we will be holding a drinks reception in the same elegant building as the conference - a further opportunity for attendees to network, mingle and discuss the content of the day. This is sponsored by NixonMcInnes, Spannerworks, doof and bigmouthmedia in association with TechcrunchUK

 more… 

Filed under: brighton, conference, partners, schedule, social networks, widgety goodness | No Comments »

Marc Canter on fine form! Go read the whole thing, it’s too complex to paraphrase.

Marc’s Voice » Blog Archive » Ads and Widgets: two battlefields, one solution

Ads and Widgets: two battlefields, one solution

There’s a war raging on out there and I ain’t talking ’bout Pakistan, Palestine, Iraq or Darfur. I’m talking ’bout the war over openness - open platforms and access to end-user’s data and social graphs.

Its a war over money, Ads and Widgets. New eco-systems which breed VCs, greed and acquisitions. Little companies are getting bought, VC funds are getting setup and its all over this silly notion of ‘monetizing‘ people.

Technorati Tags: wguk07

Filed under: conference | No Comments »

We wanted our shirts to be classy, eco friendly and above all, wearable. We’re printing on these bamboo based shirts, sponsored by Platform 4. They look and feel wonderful and every participant gets one that will actually fit them.

Naturally sustainable BAMBOO is rapidly emerging into the fashion world. Fabric woven from bamboo yarn is light, almost translucent, and softer than cotton. It has a natural quality that feels like silk, but has the advantage of being machine-washable. This natural fibre is hypoallergenic, absorbent, and fast drying. It is naturally anti-bacterial and will not hold odour. Like other natural fibres, it allows the body to breathe as the fabric absorbs the perspiration away from the body. It also is the most sustainable of the natural fibres. It is fast-growing - the type of bamboo used for making fabric, commonly known as Moso, can reach a mature height of 75 feet in just 45 to 60 days. Because of its natural antibacterial properties, it needs no pesticides. This fabric is cooling in summer, warm in winter, and environmentally friendly all year round. Combined with 30% ORGANIC cotton, our BAMBOO fabric becomes softer than ever, has beautiful drape, and prints perfectly.

Filed under: conference | No Comments »

Widgets make a big splash on the Net - USATODAY.com

Americans, meanwhile, are fast catching on to the joys of the snazzy new mini-programs. Awareness and use of widgets among online users, which was less than 5% in early 2007, has zoomed to more than 39% and 26%, respectively, says JupiterResearch.

Venture capitalists have taken note. Lightspeed Venture Partners, Khosla Ventures and Sequoia Capital are pumping millions of dollars into widget makers. Dave McClure, an angel investor in Silicon Valley, wouldn’t be shocked if iLike, Slide, RockYou and others eventually go public or become prime takeover targets. “Any traditional media company who wants to get serious online could be a suitor,” he says.

Max Levchin, CEO of Slide, the largest widget maker, with 134 million monthly viewers across the major social networks, likens the entrepreneurial climate among widget makers to the early 1980s, when software companies such as Adobe Systems developed applications for PCs. “It’s a really exciting time for software development,” says Levchin, who also co-founded online-payment processor PayPal.

“The possibility of going public has never been better for us,” says Jia Shen, chief technology officer and co-founder of RockYou, makers of a widget that turns anyone’s photos into slide shows. The 2-year-old company boasts 40 million monthly viewers across the major social networks.

Filed under: conference, widgets | No Comments »