Here’s another website that uses the Twitter model: it’s called Sprouter - just launched this week!

Check out their video tour.

I don’t use Twitter anymore, but I’m enjoying this neat little startup though. With Twitter, there is too much noise from too broad of  a network. All I see when I log in to my Twitter account are short, barely-descriptive statuses written by bored people. Too often I see the extended version of these statuses on Facebook, so why even bother logging in at all? (More beef on Twitter later in my upcoming blog post)

I think Sprouter (and also Yammer) did exactly what Twitter needed to do, but didn’t: divide and conquer. There is a need for micro-blogging, but it is important for users to sift through the sea of statuses. Twitter could have done that by implementing filters to segment different interest groups, but they decided to invest in the unfamiliar realm of real-time search instead. This is great, but it requires active involvement – the act of ‘searching’ – too bad people are lazy online!

In the near future, there will be more and more startups applying the micro-blogging concept (or Twitter model). And Twitter will be a dead bird – a martyr for micro-blogging – the Youtube comments of the internet.

You can follow me on Sprouter here: http://www.sprouter.com/peterkao

Peter Kao

I was browsing through a fellow UW undergrad’s blog when I stumbled upon his “Endless Google Search”.

The first thing that went through my mind as I was using it was, “Holy shit. This is awesome.” This just comes to prove that opening up API’s is a really good thing for the world. It allows creative programmers such as Paul (his blog here) the tools and resources to building something as ingenious as his “Endless Google Search.”

Basically, Paul used one of Google’s API’s to create his own search tool, one that uses the Google Search Engine but lists the results in such a way that you don’t need to click on any link to see more results. The mod uses AJAX to load search results, which allows you to simply scroll down to view more. This is a great tool if you are doing research!

Check his tool out here

However, as someone mentioned in the comments for the post, the ‘endlessness’ of the page may incur depression in some people…LET THIS BE A WARNING TO THE WEAK-MINDED

- Peter Kao