Uh. Two people whose opinions I deeply respect, Niko Nyman and Joel Spolsky, say that 2D barcodes don't work.

In 2006, in my earlier job, I tried to push the concept inside Nokia, publicly manisested by the the pompous blog posts 2D barcodes will rule the earth and 2D Barcode Manifesto. Taking a honest look at the current state, hovever, I realize that things have not proceeded as quickly as I assumed. Yes, we (=Nokia) have put a free barcode generator available. Yes, we have put a pre-installed barcode reader in the hands of millions. Yes, we have promoted open standards, and the consensus in the industry seems to be that this is the only sane way foward. And lots of other companies and individuals are doing similar stuff.

But still, I don't see barcodes around me. I don't use them in real life. I haven't seen anyone (Japan being an exception) using them in real life, except for technical curiosity. Still, I am planning to add barcodes-linking-to-application-downloads under Beta Labs website, due to numerous requiests from Beta Labs users. I still very much want to give 2D barcodes a fighting chance.

As Joel concludes:

Sometimes when the elders say to the youngsters, "don't do that, we tried that, it failed," it's just because they're failing to notice that the world has changed. But sometimes the elders are right, and the youngsters really are too young to know the history of the idea they think that they've just invented.

I guess we'll get to watch to see whether the oldsters or the youngsters will win this one.

Pick your side:

A remarkably great opportunity for a Master’s Thesis worker in Helsinki Finland? (not 100% confirmed yet)

Would you happen to know a great candidate?

Note: this was just a heads-up: please don't clog my email inbox, I will let you know if / when it becomes available

As I watched this video clip of how Techmeme homepage changes over time, revolving around a limited number of hot topics, I couldn't help but wonder: isn't this a textbook example of herding phenomenon? (via Herd)

To give you some context, let me introduce you to the artificial life simulation called Boids, created by Craig Reynolds in 1986. In the simulation, boids are individual agents programmed to move around according to a set of simple rules. The fascinating part, as nowadays seen in movies and computer games, is the marvellously complex movement that emerges from the simple rules, almost as if the whole was a creature of its own.

Craig explains in his website:

The basic flocking model consists of three simple steering behaviors which describe how an individual boid maneuvers based on the positions and velocities its nearby flockmates:

1. Separation: steer to avoid crowding local flockmates
2. Alignment: steer towards the average heading of local flockmates
3. Cohesion: steer to move toward the average position of local flockmates

Hmm... Don't these points sound frightenly similar to how the blogosphere and social media works? Bloggers, including myself, while trying to be different from each other (= separation), are heavily influenced by their blog commenters, RSS subscription list, and aggregation services such as Techmeme (= alignment and cohesion with local flockmates).

Let's look what happens in practice. Here's an example Boids simulation that has added a simple goal-seeking rule, symbolized by the green dots:

Doesn't this look exactly like what keeps happening in social media, including the blogosphere and aggregation services like Techmeme or Digg? To me, it sure looks so. A "hot topic" gets born, like Scoble's episode with Facebook, and everyone and his uncle contribute to the debate. But also, a truckload of other equally important/interesting hot topics get ignored, due to the herd phenomenon.

But what if you don't like the herd thing? What if you want to avoid it?

Looking at the problem from another perspective, James Surowiecki convincingly argued in his book that for "wise crowds" to emerge, you need (1) diversity of opinion; (2) independence of members from one another; (3) decentralization; and (4) a good method for aggregating opinions.

Guess which one of these criteria is missing from the public debate in social media?

Independence. Bingo.

At this point, you might wonder why the heck I'm writing about this mumbo-jumbo here, in this blog. The thing is, we would want to take the Nokia Beta Labs feedback system to the next level, and I'm struggling with the problem how much of it we should make public, and how much private. Making the feedback system public inspires people to send insightful feedback, and to expand others people's ideas. But then again, it throws fuel on the herd phenomenon.

At the end of the day, I think we need to have both: a public feedback system (with all the latest web buzzwords) for debating the hot topics, and a private feedback system for collecting systematically feedback about the rest.

Any thoughts?

If I had to make a single new year resolution, that would be to kick in the nuts everybody who mentions the term Web 2.0. Nothing personal. It's just something that a zen master should do as a favor, when somebody limits his thinking so harshly by clinging to such labels, and doesn't try to see the real world as it is.

Sure, the box that Tim O'Reilly defined in 2004-05 was truly a thought-provoking one; and sure, it facilitated the emergence of great new stuff in the latest wave of web innovation. But as Janne Jalkanen wisely wrote last April:

"Web 2.0" is becoming now a constraint, a convenient catchphrase, the box in which people think. And I'm not interested in boxes.

So let's all stop talking about "Web 2.0". I'm sure people understand your point if you call it plainly "the Web".

I'm not suggesting, however, that we should stop making definitions and boundaries, and just think and talk out-of-the-box or without the box. On the contrary. Here's the wisest thought I saw today, from HBR Article Breakthrough Thinking from Inside the Box (walled garden, sorry) recommended by Rita Gunther Mcgrath:

In our quest for breakthrough ideas, we didn't ask you to think outside the box. Nor did we ask you to think more intently inside your usual box. We gave you a new box and asked you to think inside that.

Constraints are the thing that let us function, and eventually create beauty (or innovation, or a great football game, whatever). We all need constraints, some ground rules for the game.

So off you go, and define yourself a new box.

Just do me a favor: whatever you do, please don't call it Web 3.0.

Reminder: check out Nokia Beta Labs blog and subscribe to the new RSS feed. Lots of goodies coming.

I guess it takes time before everybody finds the new blog. For example, I just received a comment to the official Beta Labs feedback channel:

Perhaps you could link this beta site to your homepage? I checked your website several times for apps and software since buying my N95 a couple of months ago and only found this by chance just now.

I'm not sure if I'm playing with fire, but I just dropped a comment to the newly-born Official Google Mobile Blog:

Brilliant. Great work!!

And sure as hell, subscribed to your blog. Of course, if you are interested in your humble collaborators/competitors, do visit my humble playground at http://betalabs.nokia.com/blog someday too.

Hmm... I wonder whether we Nokia bloggers are allowed to have direct public discussions with Google guys in the blog world, and whether it would be beneficial for both Google and Nokia (and for our beloved users)?

Forum Nokia just released Nokia Energy Profiler, intended to help 3rd party developers to test and monitor (and improve) their application’s power consumption in real time in the target device. I proposed last month, inside Nokia, that we should release this under Beta Labs too. We decided not to go for it, however, because the app is clearly developer-focused, while Beta Labs is consumer-focused.

Yet, I wonder: are 3rd party application developers really motivated to measure and improve their power consumption? After all, if the battery runs out quickly, Nokia gets the blame - not the developer. But what if power users and loud-voiced bloggers started using this app, increasingly giving public pressure for the developers of applications that prove to be the worst power-hogs?

I wonder.

Update: I'm not talking about 3rd party apps only, but also about apps by Nokia and our partners.

Update: you can contact the Energy Profiler team directly by sending email to energyprofiler (at) nokia (dot) com. The team is interested in how to improve usability, fixing possible bugs, and your unexpected observations about power consumption in different circumstances.

Note: for Nokia Beta Labs specific discussions, visit Nokia Beta Labs blog.

Folks, Nokia Beta Labs blog has been moved from here to http://betalabs.nokia.com/blog.

I already copied all our Nokia Beta Labs related discussions to the new domain. Next, I will close the related comment threads from here, in order to avoid two different branches of comments. Finally, I will rebrand this "Tommi's ... blog" to something completely different.

Subscribe to the new Nokia Beta Labs blog: (RSS feeds)
Nokia Beta Labs blog posts
Nokia Beta Labs blog comments

Hope to see you all at the new site!!

Darn, I missed the scoop, as Eseries.org and All About Symbian broke the news already. Yeah, it's true: significantly improved Nokia Sports Tracker beta is out. And it's good.

You can try it at http://sportstracker.nokia.com/.

We haven't updated the Beta Labs page for Sports Tracker yet, I'll try to get it done tomorrow. However, feel free to start sending us feedback already now!! It's still in beta, and the team is actively improving everything based on your feedback.

In the meanwhile, check out the presentation by Jussi Kaasinen, one of the main guys from the Sports Tracker team: (starts from 5:42)

Update: comments thread closed. Nokia Beta Labs blog and all related discussions have been moved to http://betalabs.nokia.com/blog.

We just got the (first beta version of) Advertising powered Download! client for S60 ready. So now, my UK friends, please give us feedback, and win a Nokia E65!!

Compatibility: Available in United Kingdom only. Nokia 5700, 6110, 6120, 6121, 6290, E51, N76, N81, N95.

Download here.

Update: comments thread closed. Nokia Beta Labs blog and all related discussions have been moved to http://betalabs.nokia.com/blog.