Flag me

All the buzz these days is about Web 2.0. The term applies to the idea of an internet built for much greater user participation in what is on the web. It also applies evidently to a lot of hype around the Bay Area from people who miss the dot-com bubble of the late ’90s and want another shot at it. There are reportedly bumper-stickers in the Silicon Valley saying "Just Give Me One More Bubble." I guess they hope to get a lot of loose money flowing, grab a pot-full, and get out of Dodge fast.

But there are also web services emerging that enable people to combine their own information with bigger programs to get something uniquely useful to them. Google Maps is an example. The interface to Google Maps is "open" meaning if you know some programming you can get information of use to you and your cronies displayed on a Google map. There’s even a site called Frapper! that alows you to enter information on their site and create a custom map with the information geographically displayed, all without programming.

To show how this works I created a map called ACS Offices. I entered the addresses of a few offices in California and added addresses and phone numbers in the balloon or "shoutout" fields of the map. Then I thought, "What about Discovery Shops and events like Relay or MSABC?" You’ll see it’s very sketchy, but you get the idea of what could be done.