What is the Real-time Web?

If you’re not quite sure what the ‘real-time’ web is, maybe you’ve heard it called life-streaming, micro-blogging, or tweeting.  It really doesn’t matter what you call it.  The ‘real time’ web (RTW) is all about one thing: the fast transfer of knowledge.  It’s really as simple as that.  How fast can I notify, update, and/or interact with a community of like-minded individuals?  It’s a direct extension of the blogging format, with far less barriers, a constant stream of information, searchability, a much larger audience…and we are just at the BEGINNING of this phenomenon.

We are just at the beginning…

At the forefront of this RTW revolution is Twitter.  What this once modest, still barebones service was able to do in such a short time is truly astounding.  It has surpassed that “trend” phase and is slowly creeping into a [dare I say it?] mainstream service.  You may think to yourself – “So what, who cares if people use Twitter?”

What’s the point?

I guess the point that I want to hit home the most is that this really is the future of our web interactions.  It took us a few years, but we are finally leveraging this technology and connecting with other human beings instead of relying on computers, algorithms, and search results to deliver our online data (hmm…Google).  The RTW has enabled us to connect with individuals who we would never of been able to connect with otherwise.  People, for the most part are pretty amazing and you’ll be surprised how much people will give back.  Perfect example: After following theCRICKETtoy on Twitter (accidentally, I must admit),  I receive an instant direct message from the company’s owner asking if I would like one of their CRICKETtoy™ products for FREE.  Not really expecting anything out of it, I direct messaged my address back, and received the little guy in the mail in just days! (Thanks Jeff)  Point is, people want to connect with people, and the RTW finally allows us to do just that.  It doesn’t matter if your promoting a company, a service, a blog, or a product; what the RTW forces you to do is promote yourself first.  People do this by helping others, giving advice, offering their services, whatever it may be, people want to be part of this amazing ‘real-time’ exchange of ideas and information.

What does this mean?

I made a slight cut at Google before…kind of joking, but kind of serious at the same time.  Google searches are great for historical and static pages on the net, but when it comes to current and news-breaking events, nothing comes close to the RTW.  I find myself gravitating towards Twitter Search for various information now.  There is so much power that lies in the RTW and its huge community of people that conventional search engines tend to seem “old school”.  Before pages are indexed in search engines, and even before a blogger can create a post, someone from the Twitter community has already wrote a 140-character gem that will be retweeted, discussed, and spread virally throughout the internet instantly.  So powerful.

What should I do?

Get on Twitter if you haven’t already.  Create an account and start connecting with people that interest you.  Guy Kawasaki has some great articles on how to get started on Twitter.  Read both, here and here.

Once you have built up a solid community of twitterites, I recommend utilizing the power of FriendFeed.  Check out the RTW jedi himself, Robert Scoble, on how to get started with Friendfeed.

Most importantly…

I want to hear from you guys who are part of the RTW.  I want to get your feedback and your opinions.  I would like to do a more comprehensive follow-up and would love to hear back from the community

• What are you thoughts about the future of the RTW?
• More useful: Friendfeed or Twitter?
• How should companies embrace the power of the RTW?
• How many third party Twitter applications do you use?
• How do you get your news?

I figure I’d compile a list of websites / services that have caught my attention recently.  These are sites that cover a variety of topics and uses.  Hopefully I can introduce you to something of interest…

…and don’t worry…there is nothing in here that starts with the letters “T-W-I-T”

Screentoaster | www.screentoaster.com
record your screen activity

Have you ever wanted to record your screen activity?  Well, even if you haven’t, take a look at Screentoaster and you might just find a reason.  With a super-simple, virtually download-free setup, you will be producing online screencasts in no time.  You can even make a quick vid for your mom showing her how to check her email.  Screentoaster is still in beta, so go fetch yourself an invite, and start “toasting”.

Favtape | www.favtape.com
create online “mix tapes”

Straight outta San Diego comes an online mecca for creating online “mix tapes”.  A perfect place to listen to your own unique brand of music.  Favtape even gives you the option of importing your Last.fm and/or Pandora playlists, putting you in charge of your virtual turntable (aka mouse and keyboard).  With the ability to “tweet-out” what you’re listening to over your social networks, it adds a nice touch of sociability to your tuneage consumption.  Highly recommend checking out.

Grader.com | www.grader.com
what is your internet grade?

The guys at Hubspot have developed an extremely useful marketing tool for your website, press releases, and twitter profile.  Most famous for its Twitter Grader (www.twitter.grader.com), Hubspot allows you to explore your Twitter ranking, those with similar interests, and who’s who in your neck of the woods.  Using their website grader (www.website.grader.com) is extremely useful for those of us who are looking to increase its traffic and effectiveness to our website(s) (and who isn’t?).  Check it out, these guys are out to help you.

Posterous | www.posterous.com
post blogs/tweets through email

A must for all bloggers.  Posterous is a clever service that allows you to blog from anywhere that you have email access.  Simply email post@posterous.com and it will instantly create a blog post, where the email’s subject becomes the post’s title and the body of the email becomes the body of the blog post.  Set it up to your Twitter account and your smartphone becomes a tweet machine.  Very cool and I guarantee you will use it from time to time.

Dropbox | www.getdropbox.com
sync files, stay ‘live’

Receiving a bunch of press and recently nominated for the 2008 ‘Crunchies’, comes Dropbox,  a tool for syncing files across multiple computers.  Dropbox wants to ensure that your files remain syced up despite any editing or mistaken deletions.  Very cool and seamless product.  Check out the their video, and you will realize why something like this is so useful.  “It just works.”

Animoto | www.animoto.com
create sweet slideshows

Do you have a bunch of photos?  Do you want to do something cool with them?  Enter Animoto.  A pain free way to produce a cool slideshow of your digital memories.  Created by tv and film producers, Animoto gives you the professional and stylish look that you wouldn’t be able to achieve by yourself.  Leave it to the pros, upload your images, and create a masterpiece.

“there is no reason in 2008, to do shit you hate…NONE!”

I found a great video on Fred Wilson’s blog of Gary Vaynerchuk speaking at the Web 2.0 Expo in NYC. He speaks about building brand equity and constantly hustling while doing it. He advises us to do what we love, saying, “there is no reason in 2008, to do shit you hate…NONE!” No truer words were spoken Gary. I am clapping it up, ‘cause that is the real shit.