OracleCommunity.net Arrives

By Jake • February 6th, 2008 • View Comments

Lost in the frenzy of last week’s travel to the Bay Area and the Marketing 2.0 Leader Summit, I neglected to mention Eddie’s brand-spanking new OracleCommunity.net, a “social network for Oracle people” hosted on Ning. I know I’m late to the party, since OraNA tells me it’s been covered here, here, here, here sort of by accident, and here.

eddietwee_smt.png

The community already has 127 members, which represents good viral spreading, since Eddie did very little promotion aside from blogging and tweeting. There seems to be a lot of activity with brisk uptake of the blogging feature and the forum.

So, why another community? The prevailing opinion lately is summed up nicely by Andrew Clarke, all expect for the bits about Mix :) If APC still used Mix, he would have seen this idea, “Web 2.0 Fatigue” and this one, asking for integration of all the communities run by Oracle.

Although I can sympathize with the fatigue of registering and reentering details, I think choice is a good thing. Try out a few communities, pick a couple that add value and use those until you get bored.

At some point I guess OpenSocial and DataPortability will melt away the frustration, but until then, I guess we’ll have to suffer with too much choice. I firmly believe that overexposure and the plethora of information will drive aggregation as the theme for 2008. The best way to aggregate all the content, with the appropriate controls and throttles will win.

Incidentally, one frustration I have with Ning is combining my networks under a single email address. Eddie invited me via my Oracle addie, and I already belong to Ning using my GMail addie, the one I use for the Working Group. So, without thinking (a recurring theme for me), I joined using Eddie’s invite, and now I have two disparate identities on Ning and no way to combine them. There’s still a long way to go with aggregation.

What do you think? Do we have too many communities? Do you care? How will you deal with Oracle over-stimulation?


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  • Jake
    @APC: Your approach is the same for most of us. I'm not lobbying you to come back to Mix for exactly that reason, i.e. there is only so much bandwidth for networks.

    If at a later date, you find value in Mix or the UKOUG decides to use it for some activities, then I'd be happy to hear your feedback.

    It's not like we're selling ads or trying to drive traffic to Mix. It's an ongoing experiment. As I said in my last comment, we're thin on resources, so bugs take longer than is ideal to get fixed.
  • APC
    @David H

    I know what you're saying and I acknowledge that you may be correct: maybe I should give Mix a second chance.

    However, I already write a blog, answer questions in the OTN forums, chair the UKOUG Development SIG, have a family and do my job. So I haven't got a lot of spare time. I've decided to run with OracleCommunity.net for a while. If that doesn't work out perhaps I'll come back to Oracle Mix with my tail between my legs.

    Cheers, APC
  • @APC

    I have several cases of trying something writing it off and then being persuaded to go back and try it and loving it. Maybe the software stabelized, maybe there was something going on there, or more friends there. A good example is twitter I hated it, then gave it a second change nad found interesting people to follow and hang out there a lot. Second Life on the other hand has had two chances and now I realize if is a big waste of my time - must blog on that sometime
  • Jake
    Agreed, Ning is a much more stable platform than Mix. When we have 40-odd employees, 3+ years of development and millions in VC, I think we'll be comparable.

    BTW, we fixed the navigation issues about a month ago, not fast enough, but again, it's an issue of scale.

    I'll see you on OracleCommunity.
  • APC
    >> If APC still used Mix

    You don't get a second chance to make a first impression ;)

    If the initial software had worked better then I probably would have stuck with Mix longer to figure out what it could be used for. If it had had a focused use then maybe I would have put up with the poor navigation. But as it was, the site was deluged with curious people doing all sorts of things but the software made it hard for me at least to get a handle on it.

    This is where Oracle Community wins. The basic software works, so that means we can focus on what we can do and what others are doing.

    Cheer, APC
  • Jake
    I agree with a laissez-faire attitude and the "bloat" of Facebook. One thing I like about Twitter is its light feature set, but I couldn't stand Twitter inside Facebook.

    Networks will come and go, but I guess it's dependent on who is active where. As long as someone with content or insight that I want uses a particular network, I'll probably stick around to consume.
  • Over time some networks will die, some will remain popular, some will be integrated into other networks. While a network adds value it will remain. When it ceases to add value people will cease to visit and it will die.

    In some ways I would like to see integration, but on the other hand I like the separation. I don't want the bloat of Facebook if all I want to do is twitter.

    The biggest problem with integration for me is the lack of fine control over what gets seen. I don't want my friends mixing up with my workmates or my Oracle network. Each network of people would be innundated with information that is meaningless to them.

    Instead, the big social networks should allow a finer grouping control of connections, so you can keep your personal life separate from your work life etc.

    Until this sort of control is introduced, I'm happy to use Facebook for friends, LinkedIn for work and Mix for Oracle etc.

    Cheers

    Tim...
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