I'm really greatful to have been a part of these passionate communities of user advocates over the past year or so. In both cases, my involvement started when someone personally reached out to me to say "hey, Plaxo should get involved with these emerging standards". In the case of OpenID, it was Kaliya Hamlin, who has done wonders to catalyze and organize the various user-centric identity efforts out there. In the case of microformats, it was Chris Messina, who of his own accord took the train down to Plaxo from SF to explain what microformats were and why we should care.
To both of you, and the countless others that I've talked to since then, let me say thank you. You reached me. I completely share the vision of an open social web in which users are in control of their data and they can use it on any web site they come to or from. Plaxo gets it too, and our mission is clear: to knock down every wall we find and free your data until nobody owns who you know except you. Our weapons of choice are continued and expanded support of open standards like these, as well as the know-how and resources to get at your data in and out of tight spots that might otherwise be closed to you. We've already done it for Outlook, Mac, Thunderbird, AOL, Yahoo, Google, LinkedIn, mobile phones, and probably a few more, but you ain't seen nothing yet.
And to our users: tell us how we can do more. What sites and tools and services do you use where being able to keep your updated contact info and contact list would make your lives better? Where are your friends and colleagues generating cool content online that you want to keep up with? We can help. That's what we do. And we'd like to do it a whole lot more.
Speaking of which, while I was implementing OpenID support for Plaxo, I took copious notes and wrote them up in a step-by-step recipe guide so any other existing web site with users would have an easy way to do the same. Now you have no excuse not to OpenID-enable your site--it's quick and straightforward, and a sign of respect and trust to your users. So get to it, and let me know how I can help!
--Joseph Smarr, Chief Platform Architect
Hi, I'm Joseph Smarr. I've been at Plaxo since the very beginning, so as you can imagine I've worn a lot of hats over the years (including most recently the architect of Plaxo Online 3.0, which we just released). I want to tell you about my newest roll as Plaxo's Chief Platform Architect. I'm now focused on helping Plaxo wire up the social web, and we're doing it with open standards. Here's why:
Plaxo's core mission is to help you stay connected to the people you care about. Doing this properly means integrating with the applications and services that you and your contacts already use, since that's where daily digital interactions take place. When we started Plaxo in 2002, this basically meant plugging into Desktop PIMs like Outlook. But since then, we've seen a remarkable flourishing of socially-enabled web services: photo sharing, blogging, social networks, social news, social bookmarking, and the list goes on. These days, "staying connected" to your family, friends, and colleagues means more than having their up-to-date contact info. It also means staying current with the digital lives we're all increasingly living.
Plaxo's vision has always been to integrate with all the tools and services that benefit from knowing who you know. We've built quite a few plug-ins and sync points ourselves (Outlook, Mac, Thunderbird, AIM, Google, Yahoo, Hotmail, LinkedIn, etc.), and a number of partners and developers have built additional integration points using our APIs. Lots of sites also use our widget to let their users access their address books across the web. But there's always more to do and we certainly can't do it on our own.
We believe that people will continue to create and consume content across a wide variety of services, and that no one site will ever be the de facto destination for everyone in the world. Thus we see the task of keeping who you know and what they're doing in sync across different sites and tools as core to Plaxo's mission, and an important challenge that our experience makes us well-suited to meet.
We also believe the best way to help wire up the social web is to continue embracing open standards and providing users with transparent access to their data across all the sites and services they use. Plaxo 3.0's sync engine is built on top of SyncML, vCard, and iCal; Plaxo Pulse is powered by RSS; and this is just the beginning for us. We envision a world in which users can easily find out who they know on any service and stay on top of what they're sharing. This can only happen if sites are open and let their users stay in control.
I'm incredibly excited about Plaxo's opportunity to help contribute to the open social web! Doing it right is a full-time job, and in fact it's now my full-time job in my new role as Chief Platform Architect. It's always been a personal passion, and my new title and focus reflects the importance that Plaxo is placing on it. So expect to see more support for open standards, more and better APIs, more widgets, and more developer tools to help empower our comrades.
If you believe in the Open Social Web, please tell me how you think Plaxo can best help out. You can always get my latest contact info at joseph.myplaxo.com. Or come find me at MashupCamp, OSCON, or similar events in the future.
--Joseph Smarr, Chief Platform Architect
Well, as crazy as it sounds, we decided to move our office the same week we were launching Plaxo 3.0!
The new office is really great. It's bigger, with lots of room to for now and for future growth. It's all ours, not just a floor of a shared multi-story complex. And it's not next door to Google, so we don't have to fret about when they will buy the building!
There's a lot of excitement at Plaxo these days, with a totally new version of the service, rave reviews from the press, a very interesting jump in user growth, and a new office. Why, it practically feels like a new company.
Of course, if you know people here, and you use Plaxo, you already know that our new address if 203 Ravendale, Mountain View, because your smart address book would have already been updated -- automatically and quietly. (Now, if only I can figure out how to get the address and logo updated on this blog!)
Here are a few shots I took on Friday...
The space has lots of natural light pouring in from the sides.
There's plenty of room for everyone -- and lots of unused space, ready for future growth -- or parties!
There are plenty of seating options, ranging from the zebra bench, to the big blue ball (that's Cam's choice), to the more conventional office chairs.
And what Web 2.0 office would be complete without an electric scooter to accelerate the pace of collaboration? I'm sure it will lead to a hilarious mashup in meat-space at some point!