Well, not exactly now, but sometimes this fall. I know one of my client who’s gonna freak out.

PS: Illustration above not super accurate since it’s just a Photoshopped screenshot of a Facebook Fan page Fullsix US realized for L’Oréal Professionnel, that I roughly pasted into an iPhone. Just an excuse for a bit of self-promotion: we’re pretty good at developing Facebook applications so if you need one or if you want to develop an advanced Fan page but don’t really know how to, drop us a line!

Created by Carlos Ulloa Matesanz, Ralph Hauwert, and John Grden. Papervision3D is a open-source 3D engine for flash, that allows developers to change the position, size and rotation of a sprite on its X, Y and Z coordinates.

The results and possibilities for this technology are truly amazing, a website is no-longer a flat canvas but can be transformed in to a rich 3d environment. Recent updates to the engine allows developers to uses triangle tessellation to distort textures and render complex objects in real 3D.

The most exciting area to Papervision3D is the ability to embed video into a 3D environment. Could this open-source technology transform the way established traditional medias allow consumers to view their content. Combing Papervision3D and a 360 degree camera can already achieve amazing immersive video allowing us to take control of the camera and become a character in the environment.

Mattel has teamed up with Hasbro to sue the creators of Scrabulous, one of Facebook’s most popular applications.

The two companies, which between them own the rights to the board game, claim that the online version developed by brothers Rajat and Jayant Agarwalla infringes their copyright. Hasbro asked Facebook to take down Scrabulous – which attracts over 600,000 daily users and gives the brothers $25,000 of advertising a month.

Why would you want to turn your fans into enemies? Why not just buy the company? Why not advertise the Scrabble board game on the Scrabulous pages?

The rush from the toy makers has definitely not helped, they’ve seemed to have forgotten a number of things:

1. There is such a thing as bad publicity.
2. Facebook Scrabulous users love the game, and they are angry for losing it. It is not likely that these people will buy Mattel/Habro toys for friends and relatives.
3. There already are more than 55,000 members in a Save Scrabulous Facebook Group and talk of boycott of Mattel and Hasbro
4. Realize that Scrabulous turns people on to Scrabble and other word games and creates opportunity for Mattel/Hasbro.

The SlingBox, a low-cost video placeshifting device that allows users to stream what they’re watching at home to a computer or smart phone anywhere in the world. It sends the signal from your cable box, satellite receiver or digital video recorder to any computer.

The SlingPlayer serves as your interface and features a variety of components, including a favorites bar and customizable remote controls that help bring your living room experience to your computer.

If you’ve been paying attention to what is going on online, the new keyword is “OpenSocial“. Recently announced by Google, OpenSocial opened its doors to developers on November 1st, and believe me, it does deserve the websphere hype it has been generating.

Essentially, what Google did was provide a common set of APIs for social applications across multiple websites by tapping into 3 distinct sets – member profiles, social graph and member activities. Unlike the Facebook case, that uses FBML (Facebook Markup Language) in it’s APIs, requiring every developer to invest yet again in learning a language to develop a Brand presence in another Social Network, OpenSocial allows developers to use JavaScript and HTML to create apps for Social Networks. Of course, at this stage, the participants are “scarce” – but by no means unimportant! With names such as MySpace, Hi5 or LinkedIn for Hosts (the place where the Apps can be used) and ILike, Slide or Flixter for Developers (the companies that develop APIs for the OpenSocial library and key Facebook App developers), there is definitely an alarm ringing for Brands to check it out. During the initial release of OpenSocial, several examples were presented.

Of course, some noticeable names are missing, Facebook on top of them all. But I believe this is expected – this idea derived from the success of Facebook opening up API development to third parties, and let’s face it, there is little love between Google and Facebook. OpenSocial represents Google’s Trojan Horse into the private information gladly given away by users in Social Networks – the trump card Facebook held high. And with this comes the potential to extent AdSense’s lifespan. A smart move indeed.

On the other hand, while being a good concept, OpenSocial is still standing on shaky foundations. The inherent characteristics of each Social Network – simple friend aggregation, relationship between users, etc… - makes it difficult to develop an API in which the actual experience the user gets out of it makes sense on every Host. Also, since Social Graphs still aren’t intertwining, how to create APIs that are set upon the User’s social graph if this is fragmented in the various hosts? Doesn’t it ruin most of the desired effect this project would have? 

For this beginning stage, Google opened up a sandbox in Orkut for developers to test their API creation skills. What are the next steps for you, thinking about what should you suggest your Brand to do? Test, try, observe, read and let the experts deal with it in this first stage. If you have resources, get someone watching and reporting on this subject. As soon as you see a break, try to create something worthwhile for the Brand - an app that takes in consideration the possible limitations and possibilities of OpenSocial’s System. But, in my opinion, do not disregard it – if Google manages to attract the big fish into this, we could be witnessing the birth of something big – a possibility for Brands to, in a “simple” way, engage with consumers in an environment otherwise closed to them.

Definitely worth reading.

Browsing through the Internet demanded originally some previous knowledge when you wanted to find something. Sites were scarce and they were too oriented towards information depots – you knew that there was a clear distinction between real life and the virtual web, as contents you’d find in one were different and required specific search logic to find it. I’m talking about the time of the Web 1.0, of course, where you could find some static non-interactive information regarding your traveling needs, for example.

The evolution in the Web was so amazing that searching for information on any given search engine is a natural input of keywords – users no longer have to devise careful anagrams and keyword combinations to find the page they needed. Essentially, they have to think what they need, type it in and find it. This shows how the fusion of the virtual and real world has evolved – you know you’ll find those tickets you need, the hotel you want to book and information regarding what other users thought about the services you are using.

This leaves a lot of room open for the transition of offline services to the online world – that’s what people are expecting to find – but, of course, taking in account the whole sociological and societal evolution that is occurring online. In this logic, a great amount of services online are appearing in a daily basis, taking advantage of the tools and spirit the users are immersed.

This entire introduction serves as a basis to explain a type of website that is a perfect example of real world meets virtual world in web 2.0 logic – Social Lending Sites or Microlenders. I’m not talking about lending services for objects or services – I’ll approach those on another post. The Peer-to-peer lending focuses on two axis – people who have money to lend and people who want to borrow money. Each user is a bank on its own and can gain interest off a loan while users who want “small” amounts and that wouldn’t be eligible for a loan in a real bank have an opportunity to get that investment cash!

There aren’t many P2P Lending Websites existing yet – mainly we have four big sites:

- Zopa – Having already gathered three web awards since 2006, Zopa works by giving credit scores to borrowers for lenders information. The Lenders make offers with a certain amount and time period oriented towards on credit score (A+ to C). The Borrowers can then choose from the various offers they have towards their credit score. Since no bank is involved, Zopa does all the mediating – paperwork, checking legal the identity of the users and cases of missed payments. Another concept introduced by Zopa was the split lending – one user who needed 1000 € can get it from 50 different users until that amount is gathered. Of course, Zopa receives money through transition fees from both parties.

- Kiva – Kiva is the “benefactor” of the P2P Lending Sites, as it focuses on loans to low-income entrepreneurs in developing countries. The Lenders can find what country, region, business and risks associated to their loan via the website and present a loan to the struggling business-man. Borrowers don’t apply for loans – they post their needs and the Lenders browse them, searching in their hearts for the best business opportunity while helping someone. Like Zopa, users can join together to raise the money needed – but while in Zopa it’s a Borrowers initiative, in Kiva it’s the Lender’s who contribute with what they can to each business. Field wise, each country has its own MFI (Micro Finance Institutions) who track the loans, their use and payments. Since it is a non-profit website, PayPal allowed Kiva to transfer the money without transaction fees – partially due to the fact that Kiva’s Presidente, Premal Shah, was Principal Product Manager at PayPal. This website has gained high visibility at Oprah’s, after which a lot of the struggling businesses found a happy ending to their financial needs;

- The Lending Club – What differentiates this site is the lender-user match up service it consists upon and the use of the Facebook application platform to connect lenders and borrowers. It’s a use of the Social Graph and connection trust as security for the users. The Lending Club has high credit standards – they turn away borrowers who are too risky and do a rigorous checking before any transition, claiming to be the safest P2P Lending Site available. They focus on one-time event loans and credit card debt consolidation loans;

- Prosper – Not wanting to repeat myself, Prosper uses the same principle as the other contenders, differentiating in one main characteristic – borrower group affiliations. This group functionality allows borrowers to group together and gain reputation according to their collective repayment records. The better the reputation, the lower the rates the users will get of future loans. Using a auction platform, lenders set their interest rate and bid in increments on the loan listings they’re interested in. After an auction is over, Prosper gathers the bids with the lowest rates and combines them together into a single loan – handling all the administrative tasks from here on.

To what point has the Internet evolved that allows for users to directly lend money to each other, having only a small company (when compared to a Bank) managing these transactions? This shows that some of the “new media fear” surrounding the Internet and financial transactions associated to it is beginning its decline. Of course, I didn’t approach the natural dangers and gaps that can rise in these sites – but they’re just taking our first steps in this area, so some things need to be fine tuned. Besides, the online social network structure and work ethics have shown us that there is definitely space for growth in services that depend on user-user interaction and trust.

Besides being an important learning for most marketers, these websites show us two things:

- The power behind the social networking in any aspect of the online life – trust is rising on the web. People trust peers and causes – Kiva hopes for a better future and The Lending Club helps people who already know each other to share money – these sites aren’t loan sharks but intermediaries of a natural loan flow that should happen in the online world;

- The fusion of real life and virtual web – when thinking on your next campaign, try not to think only about the online – that’s old and it doesn’t work anymore. The online and offline worlds are becoming one, like steps in the same staircase. Don’t consider the online experience always as an alternative experience to the offline – sometimes it’s just better to think “What are people doing offline that the online would simplify and help?” – you might just find that winning edge for your Brand.

You are no longer advertising on the New and Old Media – we are talking about the version 2.0 of New Media, where you have to go beyond the 360º approach and into the virtual X + Y + Z axis approach. A whole new dimension in the making!

You might know Orbitz from its ridiculously huge pop-up ads on CNN selling discounted airline tickets. I’m guilty of simultaneously disliking their ads and giving them business. Previously one could buy a plane ticket through their site and opt for text messages with flight status information. Flying out of any of New York City’s airports always seem to result in several text messages.

Now the company introduces their UGAA (user generated airport advice). Patrons can choose to contribute both while logged into the site or anonymously — airport conditions. (This has the potential of being bugged like Wikipedia, but we’ll give it time.) Updates include wait times, weather info, traffic (via Google Maps), wifi, and a host of other pertinent travel details. It just launched Sept. 3 and already passengers in Chicago have been “generating” away. The service serves two purposes, really:

a.) To share with others and
b.) Fight boredom

Oops. Perhaps those not already on Facebook will be more inclined to use the service on their fancy Dell’s from those overpriced airport hotspots.

The question I have is how many more text messages will be sent?

Regardless I’m willing to give it a try, and like any other new technology it will either pass, fail, or progress but either way our lives are getting easier!