Mashup Camp - Day 1

MIT hosted Mashup Camp that I attended today and listened to an interesting company Dapper, funded by Accel Partners. The idea is pretty cool: taking any old website and wrapping it into XML structures that can be assembled for content aggregator. I like the fact that the Founders are making a strong attempt to simplify this aggregation so that little-or-no programming skill is required. This gives mass appeal to the technology. I think in the short to medium term, Dapper will have appeal. I have seen plenty of aggregators Yodlee that have sold into the Financial community successfully. However, as an end user, it doesn't do much for me. Dapper will have good success with end-users since it give them control to aggregate information. And I like the fact that they have thought through a proxy model, where users go through their infrastructure, and an SDK-based model where users can deploy their technology.

With a high degree of probability, enterprises will demand that their aggregation is controlled by them for security and SLA reasons. Dapper doesn't store passwords, but will have access to clear text to passwords since they will have to proxy it to the end service.

Also, modern websites/applications will be more AJAX based, hence API driven to begin with, thus diluting the value proposition of companies like Dapper. However, millions non-API pages will continue to exist for a long time and this is where Dapper will shine.

Finally, content ownership/copyrigths will be an issue. Now, I guess this would be the responsibility of the aggregators, but regardless, it is something that will result in an impediment to pervasive content aggregation.

Overall, impressive Team, impressive Backers and an interesting Market. Best of Luck to them.

Riz is on record in saying these guys will be wildly successful. I am a bit more cautious in my prognostications.

Salami: The Accelerating Cultural Divergence

It is becoming apparent that the cultural divergence is widening and that we are more American and Western than we were 20 years ago. Let's consider my brother-in-law's recent engagement where he insisted on returning to Karachi, Pakistan for a traditional ceremony. He was briefed by his buddies in Karachi that he would be getting "Salami." He was amused that such processed meats are a part of traditional Pakistani events. Salami is money that Pakistani elders give their kids on weddings/engagements :-)