Splore Blog

Splore powering discussions for the California Women's Conference

Sun, 16 Sep 2012 10:11:14 -0700

Splore powering discussions for the California Women's Conference:

Splore is proud to be partnering with the California Women’s Conference - the world’s largest annual event for women - to extend this phenomenal community to continue engaging 365 days a year through its new online community, Touchpointe, powered by Splore. Visit http://cwc.splore.com/home to join in!

Splore for iPhone is here!

Sat, 03 Mar 2012 10:30:53 -0800

Splore for iPhone is here!:

That’s right, we’ve launched our first version of a native iPhone app for Splore! Follow the link to head out to the App Store and download the app for Free, and take it for a spin. Now you can take Splore with you wherever you go - access your favorite splores, splore sites, and take advantage of mobile features unique to the iPhone, like posting photos directly from your phone, finding other users and splores nearby, and integrated mobile notifications!

Communication is the Most Important Medical Instrument

Thu, 16 Feb 2012 18:05:52 -0800

Communication is the Most Important Medical Instrument:

A very insightful article from someone closely aligned with the future innovation and direction of healthcare technology. As we continue to see growing interest around the use of Splore Sites for what we refer to as a ‘collaborative medical communications platform’, we are seeing increasing evidence of this phenomena every day. To extract a quote from the article, “The future of medicine in the U.S. is clear…highly effective communication will separate the winners from the losers.”

-Shawn

A Case for Pseudonyms

Tue, 03 Jan 2012 06:40:29 -0800

A Case for Pseudonyms

One Country, Two Revolutions

Tue, 08 Nov 2011 04:39:13 -0800

One Country, Two Revolutions:

While Wall Street is being rattled, Silicon Valley is being superempowered as the I.T. revolution takes a leap forward.

Disable social sharing?

Thu, 27 Oct 2011 18:08:24 -0700

Yes, you read that right. For you Splore Site administrators out there, we know there are entirely valid times when it simply doesn’t make sense to allow your users to post content from your site to their varied social networks - Facebook, Twitter, etc. Whether constrained by regulations such as HIPAA, or just protecting the privacy of your site’s users, Splore has now enabled the ability for you to simply turn OFF all social sharing on your custom Splore site with the click of a button. You’ll find this simple, yet powerful, feature by accessing the ‘Admin’ menu on your Splore site. Click to disable, unclick to enable. Voila!

-Shawn

Did I just say that out loud?

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 15:57:45 -0700

For those of you who missed the growing fury from users following a string of major announcements at the Facebook f8 Conference the past several days, you may want to tune in for just a quick minute. So what’s the big uproar about this time, and why is it that every time Facebook makes a new product announcement, millions of people seem to get very angry (yet strangely that total user count keeps rising)? Well, if you were concerned about online privacy before, well…things just got a lot more interesting.

I know - you hear talk about new Profiles, something called a Timeline, and that headline about some new Facebook Open Graph - and your eyes begin to glaze over as you head back to the couch to catch the rest of the game. But, honestly, there is actually some really BIG news behind those obscure headlines. Zuck called it “frictionless sharing”. For the rest of us, the premise is that it’s an awful lot of work to click that “Like” or “+1” button as we wander around the web, and it just shouldn’t be so hard. Well, with the new FB Open Graph, it just got easier. App developers will now be able to effectively track your activity even when you’re logged out - where you’re eating, what you’re watching on tv, the music you’re listening to, that website you accidentally landed on… Yep, it all becomes part of the digital story of your life (“Timeline” starting to make more sense?). And if you’re not careful, all of it may just be posted far more publicly than you intended, if you intended any sharing at all.

We’ve all seen the Facebook application permissions prompts before, many of us so frequently that we don’t really look too closely at what we’re being asked to allow.

With these new changes, when you register with a new application you’ll only get ONE prompt asking if you want to share your activity, and from then on, no more explicit requests to share. No more friction. What you do online is shared automatically for you. The line between social media and privacy is getting quite blurry.

At Splore we’ve been quite open about our stance that user privacy should be protected by default - what some have referred to as an opt-in policy. In simple terms, that just means that instead of having to turn privacy settings off, you decide when to turn them on. We recognize that each of us live multi-dimensional lives, and while opening the kimono to some, under certain circumstances, is a good thing - many times we want and even NEED to protect elements of who we are. If I’m researching a health condition that I’ve just been diagnosed with, I have a strong desire to find information, and people, and engage contextually around that topic so I can gain understanding, empathy, and potentially even form new personal relationships that may prove very meaningful over time. But if you’re like me, I would rather remain ignorant and scared, than risk exposing an intimate part of my life with complete strangers, or even my “friends”, which could include a boss, or a family member who I’d prefer to communicate with in a slightly less public forum.

While I’m intrigued by the idea of “real-time serendipity” that these changes would suggest, do those rare moments justify the very real downside of this continued erosion of privacy? Some argue that we - the users - simply need to become more responsible and accountable for “what we say”. The privacy controls are all there, after all…at least, I’m pretty sure they are, last I checked. I would argue that for a vast majority of us out there, though, you’ll glance at the confusing headline about Timelines and Graphs, then go back to worrying about the economy, jobs, and the price of gas. But make no mistake - these continued changes will profoundly impact each of us. You may not notice it for a while, but it won’t be long before you realize that your life is on display for all your friends to see. And I, for one, am not convinced that the benefit is worth the cost.

- Shawn

Lots of Splore enhancements!

Wed, 14 Sep 2011 10:39:00 -0700

In case you hadn’t noticed, we’ve introduced several new features recently, too many in fact to cover each in detail here. But here are a few teasers…

More Calendar Improvements. We’ve extended the use of calendars such that now all splore participants can create and edit their own events. What’s more, you can also enable event alerts and reminders - new options in your Account Settings. Find out automatically every time a new event is added or changed, and be reminded a day in advance so you don’t forget.

More Email Support. Similar to your ability to reply directly to an email notification of a new contribution in Splore - and have your reply automatically posted as a Comment - we’ve also added the ability for you to reply to email notifications of private messages. So now you can conduct an entire private message thread via email if you’d rather not go back to the Splore site and manage replies there. Even more, each splore participant now has a private email address that you can use to automatically post contributions directly via email (displayed under the splore toolbar).

New Multi File and Image Upload. We now support multiple images per contribution, and both image and file upload sports a new multi-select capability, and even drag-and-drop support. Try it out! Grab a file(s) from a folder and drag them onto the file or image upload control in Splore. Cool, right?

Video Upload Support. Thought we were done? Not even close. You can now upload your own videos directly into Splore - that in addition to the still supported ability to simply embed/link existing YouTube (and other) videos.

Google Forms Support. For you forms aficionados, you can now embed a Google Form directly into a splore contribution. This is one of those “hidden” gems - we’ll be adding some inline instructions and FAQs soon, but meanwhile just remember that you’ll want to use the iFrame embed code that Google Forms provides. Cut and past that code directly into your text contribution, and voila, instant forms support!

Category Bar on Dashboard. Many of you told us you really liked the category bar on the home page, so we decided to add that to your dashboard as well. Now you can navigate splores via category and never have to go back to the home page to do it!

Splore Highlighted Content. Splore creators, you’ll be happy to know that you can now “pin” content from throughout all your splore contributions and have it highlighted at the top of your splore page. What’s more, you can not only pin individual contributions, but comments, images, and file attachments as well! Make sure your splore participants can quickly find the most important content by keeping it front and center.

Splore Sites Integration. Many of you may not be aware, but we’ve been actively implementing support for custom private and public splore sites. For those of you who are using a site (or three), you’ll now see additional capability to access and interact with those sites. That includes one-click site lists on the dashboard and next to your user image on each page, the ability to filter your “My Splores” page based on one or all sites, and more is on the way. For those interested in learning more about Splore Sites, let us know!

Many New Design Enhancements. We’ve been regularly working to apply improved styling to many of the Splore pages. You’ll see improved UI on each splore details page - including a new “toolbar” with quick access to things like participant lists, the file cabinet, the Calendar, and yes, a new RSS feed capability (for those of you who just love to stay updated using your favorite RSS reader). The new splore contribution form has also been improved, and the whole page now sports an updated design that we’re applying to other pages as well (splash page, dashboard, etc.).

Thanks again for helping to make Splore a better product each and every week. Keep the feedback coming, and good Sploring!

- Shawn

Let Patients Help! When Dave deBronkart learned he had a rare...

Tue, 06 Sep 2011 10:49:33 -0700

Let Patients Help! When Dave deBronkart learned he had a rare and terminal cancer, he turned to a group of fellow patients online — and found the medical treatment that saved his life. Now he calls on all patients to talk with one another, know their own health data, and make health care better one e-Patient at a time.

"Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be..."

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 06:08:48 -0700

““Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. Most important have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. I have always wished that for myself. And now, I wish that for you.””

- Steven P. Jobs (Commencement speech at Stanford University, June 12, 2005)

Splore named a top-10 finalist at Vator Splash LA!

Tue, 31 May 2011 05:33:15 -0700

Splore named a top-10 finalist at Vator Splash LA!:

We are very excited to share that Splore has been selected as a top-10 finalist out of 150 technology start-up companies in the Vator Splash LA contest!

The 90-9-1 Rule of Social Networking

Sat, 07 May 2011 18:05:39 -0700

During a discussion with a group of enterprise CIO’s I participated in this week, the topic of how to increase user engagement in social media was raised. Some of you may have heard reference of the 90-9-1 Rule of Social Networking, or as Don Dodge refers to it, the Community Pyramid.

Anyone who’s ever tried to organically build a new social network can likely attest to the difficulty with getting your average user to not just visit your site with any regularity, but do something more than just casually read a bit and then leave! We’ve seen evidence of this phenomenon in the early release of our Splore beta. This has led me to contemplate if there are some psychological laws at play here that maintain strict boundaries around this model, or whether - more likely - we just haven’t yet figured out a more effective way of encouraging / facilitating the 100 consumers to take a more proactive role in initiating discussions unique to their interests and passions.

You see, I get it with Facebook. We all know who that small percentage of friends are that dominate the posts on our wall (ok, excluding the growing number of commercial posts looking for ways to better engage with their customers). And if my conversations with many over the past few months are any indication, I don’t expect to see much change on that front anytime soon - most seem to be inching (or sprinting?) further and further away from that type of very public exchange of “ideas” (I’m making air quotes with my fingers right now). In fact, we’ve seen a significant uptick in our Splore users creating private Family Splores to provide a more protected, safe, environment in which to share some of the more intimate parts of our lives with close loved ones.

But I, for one, believe strongly that the social media movement is only gaining significant steam, and that includes the much discussed “power to the people” enabling the common user to take a much more active role in the things that matter to them, appropriately leveraging social technologies and channels. And, as such, I expect to see the Community Pyramid begin to reshape itself, subtly at first, but dramatically over time. Given the proper channels to express yourself, protecting appropriate privacy and even anonymity where necessary, provides even the most socially reclusive to find a comfortable way to find and engage with those who are like them, who share their interests, and find common ground to safely collaborate. The virtual voyeurs will always have a place - reminds me of the cultural people watching spectator sport that I enjoyed so much when living in Spain many years ago - but true positive social change will only come through increased individual engagement. And we at Splore feel compelled to help encourage that process along.

How about you? Are you a Creator, a Synthesizer, or a Consumer in this new social web? Why?

"Never before in history has innovation offered promise of so much to so many in so short a time."

Sat, 07 May 2011 17:16:22 -0700

“Never before in history has innovation offered promise of so much to so many in so short a time.”

- Bill Gates

As soon as I saw this Ted session, I knew I had to share it....

Mon, 25 Apr 2011 05:55:47 -0700

As soon as I saw this Ted session, I knew I had to share it. Granted, I’ve been around music for as long as I can remember, and very little touches me quite like music can. But the message behind this particular experience captures better than any words I could likely come up with, the powerful motivation behind Splore. How technology and social media is enabling those with shared passions around the world - often people who have never met and may never meet in person - to come together to accomplish things never before possible…well, it’s staggering. Whether it’s forming a virtual choir, sharing the joys of unicycling, or banding together to improve the lives of those struggling with chronic disease, our ability to form meaningful relationships is boundless.

I hope you enjoy the video as much as I did.

- Shawn

A Focus on the Family...

Fri, 15 Apr 2011 09:06:47 -0700

It’s always fun to watch how users take a new technology and find creative ways to use it for their benefit. One of the use cases for Splore that we admittedly didn’t expect would become so popular is a very simple one - creating private Splores to safely stay in touch with close family members. I ran across a quote last night while waiting for my dinner party - “It’s not that I don’t have problems. I’m just not putting them on Facebook.” This seems to fairly capture the sentiment I’m hearing from our Family Splore users. The types of interactions you have with your immediate loved ones are typically not conversations you’d share with your co-workers and buddies from high school.

So if you haven’t taken the chance to create your own private Family Splore, I’d encourage you to try it out! It’s an amazingly quick and simple way to re-connect with your loved ones, particularly those of us who are geographically distributed around the globe! And stay tuned…we have some new functionality coming very soon that will allow you to create your own “Splore Domains”, where you can manage groups of Splores as a single unit. We think you’re going to like it! http://www.splore.com

- Shawn

Barry Diller and SxSW Energy

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 15:02:52 -0700

As I bounce around meeting with lots of different folks these days, I seem to get a common question from people curious to know what the general “atmosphere” is like in Silicon Valley these days, or more broadly, the global technology community. Considering the current state of the economy, the housing market, job outlook, etc., I can relate to the desire (desperation?) to find a ray of hope somewhere.

So as I sat listening to Barry Diller speak at the SxSW (South by Southwest) conference this week in Austin, I was happy to hear him respond to a question about one thing he’d learned from the attendees at SxSW this year:

“The environment here is great because it is an environment that is dominated by nobody. And the result of that is you really get a lot of cooking and that is pretty good.”

And, while I’ve been accused of being a bit biased towards optimism from time to time, I have to say that the last several (grueling) months trying to get a software startup off the ground have been surprisingly refreshing. When answering the inevitable questions about the outlook for tech in the near future, I can’t help but consistently respond that I honestly can’t think of a better place to be, nor better goals to be pursuing.

Whether it’s the fact that we just don’t have time to focus much on anything else, or the culture where we tend to surround ourselves with others equally passionate about driving innovation to improve the state of the world we live in - there’s a contagious excitement, or energy - buzzing around here. And sure, we’re all biased, but I remain convinced that innovation is the engine that will drive long term economic stability across the globe. And that’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it.

Happily, Barry seems to agree. Taking into account his other comments about another potential tech bubble, and mathematically insane valuations bouncing around, he was clear about what does matter to him:

“What interests me is starting businesses on our own, finding ideas that we can support, and simply investing in invention or ideas, and not in chasing crowds.”

So, back to Splore…I’ve got some really intriguing new prototypes to put together tonight!

Our first Splore video! Don’t forget - we’re in...

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 14:52:01 -0800

Our first Splore video! Don’t forget - we’re in public beta, so come check out the site at http://www.splore.com. Any and all feedback welcome…

Tweet and Change the World

Thu, 17 Feb 2011 08:02:00 -0800

I’ve talked about the social media revolution taking place across the globe, though I know there are some who feel that such a bold claim - a REVOLUTION - is unwarranted, maybe just a bit sensationalistic? So maybe a quick case in point…

I’m going to go out on a limb here, and assume that you’ve heard about that small uprising over in Egypt these last few weeks? I read a very interesting article about the impact that social media has played in these events. It is fascinating to consider the amazing influence that was wielded by the younger generation there in rallying support for fundamental political and social change - predominantly through the now popular social networking technologies like Twitter and Facebook. No public speeches, no organized protests (in the historical sense), just lots and lots of people communicating their common frustrations and calls for action through social media, sufficient to upend an entire government.

If you’re more of a visual kind of person, take a look at the video below which demonstrates a simple example of how individuals using Twitter in real time banded together to enact change.

So I stand behind my claim that there is indeed a social media revolution underway. At Splore, we’re committed to build even better social technologies to support the common individual to pursue the things that matter most. The question is, what will you do to change your world for better?

- Shawn
www.splore.com

Are you wearing your thinking hat?

Fri, 28 Jan 2011 06:59:07 -0800

I had lunch with a good friend this week in our favorite basement cafeteria at the Chicago Board of Trade (Thursday is chicken taco day!). As an entrepreneur, I find it enormously helpful to brainstorm with others, particularly those outside of this hi-tech start-up bubble I spend so much time in. While chatting about Splore and the process of product discovery and customer development, Craig shared some insights about the concept of “lateral thinking”, as described by bestselling author Edward de Bono in his book Six Thinking Hats. For those like me, who may not share quite the elevated IQ of someone like de Bono, this can sometimes be more crudely referred to as thinking outside the box.

While I certainly wouldn’t venture to do any deep analysis of lateral thinking, I admit I’m intrigued by the idea of emerging technology supporting - even encouraging - people’s ability to tap into that more creative side of how we explore (dare I say ‘splore’?) the world in search of not only information and knowledge, but inspiration. I’ve previously made mention of the current social revolution underway, and I believe it’s inevitable that technology is starting to provide common individuals like you and I the ability to approach life with a new set of tools to enrich our every day experiences. Google search, Yahoo Answers, discussion forums, etc., have served us well over the past decade, yet are concrete examples of the limitations of logical or linear thinking - ask a discrete question, get a direct answer(s). Have you ever considered, though, that in many cases it is the search for inspiration - those times when you frankly don’t even know what questions to ask - that leads to the most rewarding learning?

I walked to lunch yesterday thinking of the specific questions that I felt Craig could help me answer. I walked away with a whole new perspective that otherwise I would never have gained on my own. De Bono argues that we, as a people, need to learn how to deliberately tap into the value of creative or lateral thinking. Can technology of the future help us to facilitate that process? I believe that Splore holds the potential to become more than just another place to ask questions and get answers. I envision a future where products like Splore can enable the act of discovery, of inspiration, where we as a people can deeply enrich our own lives as well as those of others around us, where increased creative thought leads to innovative change.

Which thinking hat are you wearing today?

Facebook, Privacy, and Robert De Niro

Wed, 19 Jan 2011 10:54:00 -0800

In case you’ve been hiding in a cave the past few days, you may have missed that Facebook is back in the news with a renewed furor over yet another change impacting users’ privacy. What now, you ask? They announced on Friday that they had decided to add address and mobile number to the private user information made available to 3rd party developers. Granted, Splore is one of those 3rd party developers, and I can certainly understand the proposed benefits - in this case, justified to improve an end-user’s shopping experience through a seamless buying process that starts with a Facebook advert (no need to enter your personal information twice). And while Facebook continues to emphasize that users can always tighten their privacy settings to control sharing options, they’ve still decided to freeze plans on this change while a more thorough review of privacy controls is underway.

That said, it’s clear that issues of online privacy will continue to drive debate for quite some time. At Splore, we’ve tried to listen closely to our early beta customers and advisors, and one message continues to ring loudly and consistently…that users should have their privacy protected by default, with the option to choose when and with whom to share. This is the opposite of the typical “opt-out” approach taken by Facebook and other social technologies today.

With that in mind, we will soon be releasing a new feature in Splore called “Circles of Trust”. Inspired in part by the memorable Robert De Niro performance in Meet the Parents, this feature will allow Splore users to identify other users with whom they’ve gained a level of trust and familiarity. This may be with people known to you in real life, or more likely people you’ve only virtually interacted with in previous splores. In either case, these are individuals who you feel have proven their integrity and worth and, as such, are people you can now maintain a contextual relationship with (family, friends, common interests, etc.). Create as many circles of trust as you want, and organize based on how you interact with these folks in your life. Best of all, you maintain the benefit of default privacy, with the option of “opening the kimono”, so to speak, with those targeted individuals/groups you feel comfortable with.

We’re excited about these new features, and we encourage you to try them out and tell us what you think at splore.com!

- Shawn

“All right. Now look, Focker, I’m a patient man. That’s what 13 months in a Vietnamese prison camp will do to you. But I will be watching you, studying your every move. And if I find that you are trying to corrupt my firstborn child, I will bring you down, baby. I will bring you down to Chinatown.”