Mathew's comments - Latest Comments in Ankle-deep in the Newspond

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

antje wilsch — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 05:41:53 -0000

right, i am mixing up my oddly-named start-ups now! :)

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

mathewi — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 17:05:02 -0000

As far as I can tell, Antje, the site doesn't have any user input
other than comments -- no ability to submit or vote on a story or
link. That definitely solves the issue you're talking about, but it
makes it difficult to see it as anything other than a news aggregator
with comments -- i.e., not really a community of any kind (of course,
neither is Techmeme).

On Wed, Feb 20, 2008 at 11:57 AM, Disqus

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

antje wilsch — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 16:56:41 -0000

well, I tried to use Digg exactly 3 times. WIthin minutes, my two images and my one story all "disappeared" or buried or whatever they say. If there was any reason, I was unable to figure out how to see it. I just couldn't find my stuff. So I never tried again. I wonder how many other people are like me, who get irritated by getting buried for unknown reasons and just leave, thus diminishing the aggregrate component of the site? Maybe a new one without those users will attract others. [Maybe the users who have a lot of the control of Digg and Wikipedia's fanatical editors are the same.] I'll try it as a welcome alternative if I am able to actually get somewhere with it.

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

mathewi — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 16:48:01 -0000

I agree, James.

On Wed, Feb 20, 2008 at 11:41 AM, Disqus

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

James Lewin — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 16:40:26 -0000

The second thought I had was "Techmeme, with a third the amount of information, in Pligg format, without RSS."

That wasn't as catchy, though.

I'm with you - not sure what people are wowed about on this. The bubbled up items aren't that impressive.

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

James Lewin — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 16:36:25 -0000

Matthew -

The first thought I had when I saw this was Pligg without RSS.

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

mathewi — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 14:32:01 -0000

Good one, Nav :-)

On Wed, Feb 20, 2008 at 9:23 AM, Disqus

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

scrawledinwax — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 14:22:43 -0000

While I'm a sucker for a pretty site, unless I'm missing something, I don't see an RSS feed. Perhaps it's unfair, but to me that suggests a prioritisation of aesthetics over usability.

So Newspond is basically perfect for use on a MacBook Air ;)

Re: Ankle-deep in the Newspond

Michael — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 14:22:18 -0000

Their rhetoric and design sure got them a lot of attention for launch.