The NewsGator team has been working hard over the weekend on a re-launch which we'll announce first thing this morning. All the work on cool new features and functions has had me thinking about innovation. I'm a little too wired to reflect, so will instead note a few innovations that have recently struck me (all of which came to my attention via RSS feeds read through NewsGator ... bien sur!)
Text-to-speech enabled Powerpoint. My previuos company, NetSage, designed text-to-speech interaction models, and produced live text-to-speech systems for some big name companies. So I know something about how difficult it is to create speech interactions with any sort of social intelligence.
Powerpoint's such a font (sic) of hackery generally that I cringe at the thought of authors' voices generated from them...
Podcasting. I don't know enough, but it sure seems that folks like Winer and Curry who have figured out how to use RSS enclosures for audio are finding an audience. Real hallmark of fat media demand, or just something to keep sleepless developers' headphones always engaged? But services companies are sprouting...
And update;
You've just learned about blogs and wikis. Now you need to know the latest buzzword - podcasting, the process of sending audio content directly to an iPod or other MP3 player. Googling "podcasting" got 15-20 hits a month ago. On October 8 it gave you 13,000 hits. Today, one week later you get 66,000 hits. Now that's what I call a buzzword. Steve Rubel has a good roundup for PR people. Wired
Danger Sidekick (I think it's hiptop, now). I'm not there, but I'm dangerously close.
RSS. Scoble says his work patterns have reversed so that he's now 90% outside of IE -- working largely through and with his 900 RSS feeds. And companies are going RSS-wild; cheaper communication and collaboration both internally and externally.
Bush vs. Kerry. Let's see, Dark Ages anti-Renaissance force for evil, or an enlightened internationalist?
