MyKaroo: an independent blog next to every website in the world

Challenges Entered:

MyKaroo is a mashup in perhaps a broader sense than other projects, but it is indeed a mashup. It combines the contents of each website in the world, with the input of the community that surrounds that website. MyKaroo supports text, audio, video, and other typical web communication modes. It provides a separate, independent community space next to every website in the world.MyKaroo is a mashup in another sense as well - the combination of traditional media with the net. We have partnered with San Francisco radio station KKGN (the local Air America outlet) to present The MyKaroo Web Review as a combined radio/net production. We see great promise in this, well, mashup :)

What else have you done in this area of work?

Project Details

Project url:

http://mykaroo.com

Project video:

Supporting organization:

http://mykaroo.com

Project Assessment

Financial support:

Project has financial support

Project goals:

Over ten years ago when the internet was new to most of us, it promised to "level the playing field" to allow other voices to be heard. And, some of this has certainly happened. But today there is again a "de-leveling" in process, in an effort by certain parties to regain influence and re-control the discussion. MyKaroo is a "level the playing field" tool. It puts an independent blog next to every website in the world. For each website, the blog is next to it - but not under its control. Every website already has a community of interest. They just have no way of contacting each other. Having a separate independent discussion space next to every website in the world will allow those communities to discuss issues of common interest regarding that website, that company, that organization, that issue. Yet, even though the discussion is right next to that website, it is not under the control of that website. This creates a common channel for these communities to come together.MyKaroo is working today. You can try it at mykaroo.com. It is free (of course!) and does not request or require any personal information. It is active today next to every website in the world. (And yes, we have done our legal and intellectual property research to ensure that these are not barriers to proceeding with this project.) I am convinced that MyKaroo plus a critical mass of users can do great good in this world.

Identified Obstacles:

Like any Web 2.0 project (yeah I know, it's a dumb term) MyKaroo is composed of two parts: the technology platform, and the community. Of these, the community is the more important. The technology platform is merely a way to empower the community. MyKaroo's technology is feature-complete and available today at mykaroo.com as a free tool. There is already, today, a MyKaroo blog next to every website in the world. But any such project must also have "critical mass" to create a self-sustaining body of users. We are doing what we can, for example we have partnered with San Francisco radio station KKGN (the local Air America outlet) to present The MyKaroo Web Review. See our video for more on this. We need help with the viralization of MyKaroo. The support of the NetSquared community would be very helpful in getting the word out about this tool. We would be grateful for this.

Location

San Francisco Bay Area, CA

United States

See map: Google Maps

Submitted by bsmiler on February 19, 2008 - 5:28pm

I get my say

Submitted by manxkity on March 5, 2008 - 4:55pm.

I love being able to talk about a site - wheather I like it or not, if I find helpful or if its hard to read or if it's the best thing since buttered bread AND the site doesn't have control over it. Very cool indeed

It is great

Submitted by AA on March 6, 2008 - 1:50pm.

yeah i tried mykaroo and it is great. so many places these days they censor what you say, like myspace is awful for this or facebook where they track what you do and sell it to advertisers. mykaroo is like hands off my life, I can say what I want and I knowe the people I am talking to can too. i love that.

cool

Submitted by karky on March 5, 2008 - 4:15pm.

This is cool, I love blogging and I have opinions :) But how can we be sure the comments are legit and not just a barrage of praise or knocking something down?

Re: COOL

Submitted by bsmiler on March 5, 2008 - 5:13pm.

Glad you like MyKaroo, and thanks for the questions.

MyKaroo is free speech for the internet. It really does put an independent blog next to every website in the world. Anybody can post. So how can you be sure comments are legit? It's a fair question. Here is what we have.

There are a few levels of automated protection in MyKaroo.

First, it is spam-proofed by a built in CAPTCHA system, same kind lots of websites use, where you see an image with letters and numbers, and have to type them in.

Second, MyKaroo has a community based comment rating system. The MyKaroo page next to a website is a community, and the members of that community can rate any post up or down. If a post is downrated enough it goes away. We rely on the wisdom of the page's own community to decide how any particular post should be handled.

So between these two systems e think the comments are about as 'legit' as a free speech system can be.

Of course, the final judge of any blog post you read, is YOU. Like everything else you read on the internet, it's important to consider any MyKaroo post on its own merits. Does it make sense to you? Is it consistent with what you have seen elsewhere, and what you know of reality? As with other parts of MyKaroo, we want to empower you, the user, to be in control of this part too.

Re: COOL

Submitted by bsmiler on March 5, 2008 - 5:04pm.

Glad you like MyKaroo, and thanks for the questions.

There are a few levels of automated protection in MyKaroo.

First, it is spam-proofed by a built in CAPTCHA system, same kind lots of websites use, where you see an image with letters and numbers, and have to type them in.

So between these two systems e think the comments are about as 'legit' as a free speech system can be.

Cool

Submitted by pandacat on March 5, 2008 - 5:02pm.

Good question. I like MyKaroo but how DO you know? I have posted a few times and I like the responses and the dialog I have been getting in return. Also the MyKarooWebReview.com is very cool too!

cool

Submitted by karky on March 5, 2008 - 4:00pm.

I love blogging and giving my opinion :) This could get some good exchanges of ideas going. How can I know it won't get coensored?

Censorship

Submitted by bsmiler on March 5, 2008 - 5:12pm.

MyKaroo is not about censorship, it is about community. There are a hundred and twenty five million websites on the net, and each one has its own MyKaroo page. More actually, since some sites have more than one MyKaroo page, for example every MySpace page, every YouTube video, every Facebook entry has its own separate MyKaroo page. That's a lot of MyKaroo pages! We couldn't monitor or censor them all even if we wanted to. And we don't want to. But we recognize the issue. Here is what we do about it.

Each of those MyKaroo pages has its own community, and we have provided tools that empower that community to manage its own MyKaroo page. Posts can be rated up or down by community members, and if a post is downrated enough it vanishes. That way the community around that particular page can handle its own situation, using its own community standards, in the way most appropriate for them.

Good question! Thanks for asking.