We decided to spend the last week building our own simple but useful web application. HowSociable provides an easy way for you to begin measuring your brand’s visibility on the social web.

You can try it right now here: http://howsociable.com

We took the same development approach that we take with our Inuda Engineering client work, with just a couple of exceptions:

1. We don’t ever recommend that our clients take the risk of making an application public after just one iteration

2. We don’t usually do design work

We’ll be sharing more about the approach we’ve taken over the next couple of weeks.

We’ve got loads of ideas about how we can improve HowSociable, but we think the best way to shape a web app into something really useful is through user feedback. You can share your ideas here: http://feedback.howsociable.com and vote on suggestions made by other users.

Over the coming weeks we’ll be adding more information so you can drill right down into the things we do.

Check it out now:

We’ll also be bringing this blog’s style up to date to match and hopefully providing you with a little more content too.

OpenCoffeeSussex

Continuing to run 9am every other Thursday at the Sussex Innovation Centre. Don’t miss the next opportunity for a casual business meets technology conversation on the 14th February.

More information here:
OpenCoffeeSussex

Enterprising Engineers

Thursday 21st February, 17:30 for 18:00 start at the University of Sussex’s Medical School Lecture Theatre

We’re bringing together engineering interest from the IET in Sussex with the entrepreneurial inspiration of the University of Sussex’s Enterprise Thursdays.

A panel discussion between four technologists that have taken differing approaches to creating enterprising ventures from their
software, electronic and mechanical engineering skills. Each of them has found a way to make money while doing what they enjoy.
They provide people around the world with useful devices and web services and get to work with a rich mix of exciting technologies.

Ian Ozsvald - ShowMeDo - Online Video Tutotials

Lincoln Smith - iolab - Response Time Measurement
Devices

Neil Purssey - FireCo - Fire Safety Equipment

Raj Anand - Kwiqq - Social Networking Services

A selection of FOOD and BEER will be provided from Harvey’s Brewery and Forfars Bakery

Booking:

Please register to attend this event using the following form:
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/business/1-3-1-1-3.html

BarCampBrighton2

Weekend of the 15th and 16th March at the University of Sussex

Last year’s 100 tickets sold out in just 22 minutes. This year’s gathering of 150 technologists is already set to be a huge success, hosted at the University of Sussex with sponsorship from businesses including Amazon and Yahoo!. BarCamp is very different from your average conference. It’s known as an ‘unconference’ because the attendees set the agenda when they arrive and everyone must participate in some way.

Keep an eye out for ticket releases on the BarCampBrighton2 blog

If you’ve never visited a BarCamp before email me for a first-timer ticket

For us, the best thing about 2007 has been being in Brighton. The technology community here has really flourished over the last 12 months and it has been an incredible thing to be a part of. The range of events we’ve been involved in on a weekly basis are too numerous to do justice to here, but you can find out about most of them at SussexDigital.com.

The following are just some of our highlights of the year:

January

“ESRC Enterprisers”:http://www.enterprisers.org.uk

We worked with the University of Cambridge to deliver entrepreneurship training to Economic and Social Research Council funded PhD students and employees from Microsoft Research and American Express Technologies.

“Entrepreneurs for Tomorrow”:http://www.sussex.ac.uk/enterprise

We worked with the Univeristy of Sussex to support the entrepreneurial development of secondary school students from around the Sussex area by supporting a team in the Entrepreneurs for Tomorrow programme.

February

“BarCampLondon2″:http://barcamp.org/BarCampLondon2

We attended our first ‘unconference’ at BT’s London headquarters and were blown away by how much we learnt and how many great connections we made over one weekend.

“Shell Step Interns”:http://www.shellstep.org.uk

We took on two University of Sussex informatics students through the Shell Step programme to work as web developer interns.

“Future of Web Apps”:http://www.futureofwebapps.com

We attended the Future of Web Apps, which among other insightful presentations included a high profile panel discussion entitled “European start-up culture: playing catch-up to the US”.

“OpenCoffeeClub”:www.opencoffeeclub.org

Saul Klein started the movement that continues to create excellent opportunities for start-ups, helping them grow from casual conversations between business people and technology people.

March

“Sussex Innovation Centre”:http://www.sinc.co.uk

We moved into offices at the Sussex Innovation Centre, joining over 70 other start-up businesses working alongside the University of Sussex on their wonderful campus in the South Downs.

Art Exhibitions 2.0

We started working with a bootstrapped start-up, developing a web application that will provide a more social experience to people visiting art exhibitions and museums.

“IET Egg Race”:http://www.ietsussex.org

We supported the annual IET Egg Race, challenging A Level students to build an electro-mechanical device in just a few hours that could safely deliver an egg into a particular position.

April

“Royal Pharmaceutical Society”:http://www.rpsgb.org

We delivered our first large-scale project, a web-based collaboration system used by the Royal Pharmaceutical Society to edit an electronic version of the British National Formulary - a publication used by every doctor in the UK and many more around the world.

Healthcare 2.0

We began working with an angel funded start-up, developing a social networking system exclusively for doctors.

“Future of Web Design”:http://www.futureofwebdesign.com

We attended Carsonified’s first web design focused event and brought back a host of new ideas and techniques

May

“Enterprise Thursday”:http://www.sussex.ac.uk/enterprise

We spoke at the University of Sussex’s Enterprise Thursday Celebration Evening 2006/2007 and shared our experience of starting a business after University.

“The Inuda Network”:http://www.inuda.net

We launched The Inuda Network as a community of people with a passion for making a difference through technology innovation. The aim of the community is to create an environment which helps more people explore, deliver and enjoy while working in technology development.

“Facebook Platform Launch”:http://developers.facebook.com

Facebook launched their internet changing platform; recognising the opportunity we immediately made it a focus area for us to become proficient in developing applications for.

“Microsoft Enterprisers”:http://www.enterprisers.org.uk

We worked again with the University of Cambridge to deliver entrepreneurship training, this time exclusively to 32 Microsoft employees.

June

“Open Coffee Sussex”:http://www.opencoffeesussex.com

We launched a Sussex version of the Open Coffee Club which continues to run every fortnight on Thursday mornings in the Café at the Sussex Innovation Centre.

“Higher Education Entrepreneurship Group”:http://www.heeg.co.uk

We spoke at this conference held at the University of Reading, which was backed by the South East England Development Agency, sharing our perspective on enterprise and entrepreneurship training with educators.

“iPhone Released”:http://www.apple.com/webapps/whatarewebapps.html

Apple released the iPhone with web applications as the primary way by which to develop 3rd party tools and services.

“SeedCamp Announced”:http://www.seedcamp.com

SeedCamp was announced, inspired by the excellent Y Combinator, as a way for web start ups to get early stage funding and high profile support.

July

1 Year of Inuda

We celebrated one year of Inuda by buying a Nabaztag Rabbit, giving us a fun and physical web presence in our office.

Employee #4

Rob Watson joined us as an employee after completing his Shell Step internship with us.

“Shell Step Midterm”:http://www.shellstep.org.uk

We spoke at the midterm event for the Shell Step summer programme, sharing with participants how our ideas for going into business had started with a Shell Step placement.

August

SeedCamp

We applied to SeedCamp with a rather radical idea; too radical for us to get funding this time around, but we continue to work on it between client projects.

Enjoyed the Sun

We enjoyed another summer in Brighton, even doing a little work on the beach with the free Pier-to-Pier WiFi.

September

“BarCampBrighton”:http://www.barcampbrighton.org

We sponsored and participated in Brighton’s first BarCamp, which brought together over 100 people interested in technology from around Europe.

Employee #5

Kevin Edwards joined the team as a full-time developer, enabling us to expand the number of client projects we take on.

“d.Construct”:http://2007.dconstruct.org

We attended d.Construct, the original grass roots event for web developers in the UK - in Brighton, of course.

“Argus”:http://www.theargus.co.uk

We were covered in Brighton and Hove’s local paper, The Argus, giving insight into our approach to business.

October

“Make Your Mark”:http://apps.facebook.com/makeyourmark/

We developed a Facebook application to support the Make Your Mark campaign and Enterprise Week 2007. It quickly gained momentum, helping hundreds of people makes their ideas happen.

The Online Opportunity

We were invited by the National Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship to attend this event at Microsoft’s London headquarters. We took the opportunity to ask CEO, Steve Ballmer, if some of their powerful new web development tools would be coming to other platforms. Despite at least 60% of the developers at conferences we’ve been to this year having Macs rather than PCs, Steve made it clear that Microsoft are not yet ready to stop locking people into Windows.

“Apple Released Leopard”:http://www.apple.com/macosx/

With a great deal more success than Microsoft’s launch of Vista, Apple launched a fantastic new version of OS X and it’s purred along nicely for us.

“Future of Web Apps Expo”:http://www.futureofwebapps.com

We popped along to to the Future of Web Apps Expo and said hello to number of exciting new web start-ups.

November

“Rails 2.0 Released”:http://www.rubyonrails.org

Version numbers aren’t everything, but our development platform of choice, Ruby on Rails, reached version 2.0, bringing in features that instantly made us more productive.

“Digital Festival”:http://www.brightondigitalfestival.co.uk/

Brighton enjoyed its annual Digital Festival, and we particularly enjoyed sharing our thoughts on the latest developments in social media at the Five Pound App Day event.

“Facebook Social Ads”:http://www.facebook.com/ads

Facebook launched Social Ads, creating a new way for advertisers to precisely target their messages. Some people found aspects of this a little creepy, causing Facebook to back-peddle on certain features.

“OpenSocial Launch”:http://code.google.com/apis/opensocial/

Google released Open Social as a way for to social networks to compete directly against Facebook’s highly successful applications platform. Unfortunately, it still has a long way to go before it will be as useful and usable as Facebook’s.

“IET Careers”:http://www.ietsussex.org

We shared our approach to a career in technology with Brighton and Sussex University students.

“BarCamp London 3″:http://barcamp.org/BarCampLondon3

We spent the weekend at Google’s London HQ to participate in BarCampLondon3. Among many other things, we found out first hand how amazingly well Googlers are fed by their employer.

December

“Oxfam Unwrapped”:http://apps.facebook.com/unwrapped/

We worked with Oxfam to launch a Facebook application that would tie into their high profile campaign against rubbish presents. The application helped hundreds of people tell their friends they wanted decent presents for Christmas while raising money to support the campaign against against poverty around the world.

“The Werks”:http://www.werkshop.org.uk/

We were the first company to take a place at The Werks, Brighton & Hove’s newest co-working environment for creative businesses.

“Widgety Goodness”:http://www.widgetygoodness.com

We attended Europe’s first conference dedicated to exploring the Widgetisation of the web and heard a wide range of approaches being taken by agencies and platform providers.

“Amazon Simple DB”:http://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=342335011

We got early access to Amazon’s exciting new web service for safely storing structured information across their world class infrastructure at low cost.

Many Christmas Celebrations

We got involved in a host of Brighton’s ‘geek’ community Christmas celebrations, bringing an excellent end to a fantastic year.

For a refresh on our Explore-Deliver-Enjoy approach to technology development, take a look at our web site: www.inuda.net

Over the past 4 months we have:

Grown to over 120 members!
With a good selection of techies and non-techies alike, some on entrepreneurial ventures of their own, others creating great
things within existing organisations.

Supported BarCampBrighton!
We supplied 500 pieces of fruit along with snacks and drinks to 100 geeks participating in wide range of geeky activities at
Sussex’s ‘unconference’ of the year - BarCampBrighton

Launched OpenCoffeeSussex!
We’ve run 7 bi-weekly coffee mornings at the Sussex Innovation Centre, open to anyone that wants to have a casual Thursday morning chat about business and technology.
Click here to find out more and come along

Get involved

We’ve got some great events and activities coming up in the months ahead and we know that many of you are working on some fantastic projects.

If you would like to share something with the network please email inudanetwork@inuda.com or post it to the Facebook group, we’ll pick it up and include it in our next mailout.

NEW: LinkedIn Group
Click here to join

We think this is going to be particularly useful for connecting with new people, in a professional context. You might be surprised at just how closely connected you are to some of the world’s top entrepreneurs and engineers.

Facebook Group
Click here to join

This group continues to grow. It’s a more casual environment than LinkedIn, please feel free to post anything you think is relevant to the group’s wall or discussion boards.

Who are Inuda Innovations

The Inuda Network’s primary sponsor is Inuda Innovations Ltd. Inuda Innovations is a technology business with the Explore-Deliver-Enjoy philosophy at its heart. We founded the Inuda Network because we knew we couldn’t build everything ourselves. Instead we decided invest a little of our time and money in helping others that want to have loads of fun whilst making new discoveries and creating all sorts of useful things.

KEEP EXPLORING! KEEP DELIVERING! KEEP ENJOYING!

• Sociable with people - Software that’s easy to use, providing a good user experience.
  • Customers that have a good user experience will associate it with your products and services.
  • Staff that have a good user experience will get more enjoyment from their work.

• Sociable between people -Software that connects people, helping them collaborate.
  • Customers that can connect with each other and your staff will trust you more.
  • Staff that have tools to efficiently work together will get more done.

• Sociable with other software - Software that plays well with other tools and services.
  • Customers that can find new ways to use your software will invest more time in your brand.
  • Staff that can think differently about your software will identify and share simple solutions for saving time and money.

 

Find out about the specific Widgets, Mashups, Facebook Applications, Social Networks and Collaboration Tools that we have expertise in: Some of the things we do

Widgets - Simple tools for sharing content across web sites

• Sociable with people - People can add widgets to their websites with little or no technical knowledge
• Sociable between people - People can use them to share information from around the web with users of their own site
• Sociable between software - Widgets can be displayed on a consumer’s website because a provider has made their website capable of providing them
• Example - Amazon provides a Wishlist widget that lets people show visitors to their site a list of things they’d like bought for them
  • Makes the process of buying someone a birthday present easier
  • Drives sales at Amazon, sites with the widget earn 10% referral fees
  • widgets.amazon.co.uk

Mashups - Systems for combining content from multiple websites

• Sociable with people - Users see a tailored view on the information they are interested in, rather than combining data from different sources manually
• Sociable between people - People can use them to bring together information about a collection of their friends and colleagues in one place
• Sociable between software - Mashups work because they are able to plug into a number of ’sociable’ information sources
• Example - Querty Cars independently brings together Google Maps and cars for sale on eBay
  • Makes it easier to find cars for sale near you
  • Drives sales at eBay and provides the creator with advertising revenue
  • www.quertycars.co.uk

Social Networks - Online communities that connect people around common interests

• Sociable with people - People can get a simple interface built around people and tailored to specific subject matters
• Sociable between people - People can use them to find out about and communicate with people in a trusted environment
• Sociable between software - Social Networks can be built to integrate with new and existing web sites and services
• Example - Campbell’s Community site creates an environment in which customers can share recipes and learn about new products
  • Makes it easier for the company to understand the needs of their most loyal customers
  • Drives sales through a direct marketing channel which already has users’ attention
  • kitchentable-campbells.forums.liveworld.com

Facebook Applications - A part of the fastest growing online community

• Sociable with people - People can use tools and services relevant to them within an environment they are familar with
• Sociable between people - People can share and discover information within the context of things they have already shared on Facebook
• Sociable between software - Facebook applications are advanced Widgets and Mashups that know how to talk to Facebook
• Example - The “Where I’ve Been” Facebook Application allows users to add a map to their profile
  • Makes it easier for people to share the places they’ve been and want to go
  • Drives sales through highly targeted marketing from travel companies
  • apps.facebook.com/whereivebeen

Collaboration Tools - Systems for managing information and workflow in specialised domains

• Sociable with people - People can do the things they are good at leaving the software to handle the boring and repetitive tasks
• Sociable between people - People can work together while avoiding the problems created by groups of people editing one complex spreadsheet
• Sociable between software - Collaboration systems can be built to interact with new and existing sources and consumers of information
• Example - Basecamp provides a simple alternative to Microsoft Project for project management
  • Makes communication between project team members and clients more effective
  • Drive sales by facilitating richer, more transparent communication with clients
  • www.basecamphq.com

From £100 per month we can help you use the best of these kinds of tools in your business.

Find out about Inuda Signals by clicking here.

From £1000 we can help you build these kinds of tools, tailored to your business.

Find out about Inuda Engineering by clicking here.

We found loads of great businesses but none that demonstrated a good understanding of the benefits of using social software, while remaining affordable. This was a real disappointment, but we saw a challenge. When we founded Inuda Innovations we had the intention of making technology development more affordable, opening up the benefits to more people. Since the first piece of technology most businesses develop is a web site we realised it was our duty to find a solution to this problem.

We wanted to add much more value than traditional web designers, not just creating a web site for our customers but engineering a complete online presence. We also wanted to ensure their presence wouldn’t quickly become dated and buried in the ever evolving web. Finding a way to do all this in such a way that was sustainable for us and affordable for our customers wasn’t easy. We explored a number of models and found businesses selling web sites in all shapes and sizes from FREE to &pund;100,000, with time scales ranging from now to next year.

One model we couldn’t find was the one we and many other businesses enjoy having with our more progressive accountants. Getting all the financial advice and support we need for a predictable monthly fee gives us peace of mind and makes budgeting much easier. Just like bookkeeping, getting an online presence right is an ongoing job so we decided this model would be a near perfect fit. Our customers could buy into the peace of mind that we would always be there to provide social software advice and support they need as their business grows. We could reduce our rates to an affordable level with the knowledge that we would have a regular, predictable income.

Our Inuda Signals service starts from just £100 per month.

Visit our web site to apply, by clicking here.

Inuda Innovations aims to make tailor made technology development more accessible to a wider audience. We’ve been observing, working with and developing social software since before many of today’s most popular applications were publicly launched. Over the past year we’ve developed a set of tools and a highly flexible approach to development that can meet the technology needs of growing businesses that want to gain their own competitive advantage from social software. As a result, our Inuda Engineering service can build custom made Widgets, Mashups, Facebook Applications, Social Networks and Collaboration Tools that need to stick to tight development budgets of between £1,000 and £10,000.

Visit our web site to apply, by clicking here.

SMiDGN - The simplest way to manage tiny bits of information.

SMiDGNs are like post-it notes but:

• they don’t get lost
• they don’t clutter your desktop
• you can access them from anywhere
• you can share them with your colleagues

We’re really enjoying using SMiDGN ourselves and can’t wait to share it with you. If you are interested in helping us test it please visit www.smidgn.com and leave your email address.