DEMOfall: In one era and out the other

Now that Web 2.0 is passe, it's all about Web 3.0 this year at the DEMOfall conference in San Diego. Well, sort of: There's lots of video, lots of social networking, lots of things that don't seem to have lots of potential uses for corporate IT. As usual, DEMO producer Chris Shipley has lined up 69 companies based on how interesting their new products and services are, and that means it's ever more consumery -- but there's still something for us.

For those who've never been to a DEMO conference, it's a seemingly endless series of six-minute pitches for (mostly new) IT products and services. This isn't as bad as it might sound; even the least interesting presentation is blessedly short, and it's rare that they're truly dreadful. (In fact, there were demonstration glitches but no clunkers in the Tuesday morning session at all.)

For those who've never plowed through my not-quite realtime summary of the DEMOfall sessions, I'm boiling each six-minute product blast down to what's essential for corporate IT. Not everything at DEMO is for Computerworld's readers, but there are always interesting items that can have some surprising IT shop uses.

Here's the summary from the Tuesday morning session:

* Digital Fountain showed a video-streaming system called Splash that's designed to get rid of all the pixellation and degradation that causes problems for high-quality video sent over the Internet. Instead of using a batch of edge servers spread out to be as close as possible to users (think Akamai), Splash uses compression software. The result is impressive -- with 20% packet loss (which usually makes video completely unwatchable), video from the other side of the continent was still TV-quality. Launches in January 2008, and we should know pretty early whether it's really a workable alternative for corporate webcasts.

* Global Communications demonstrated a video compression system called VUPT (Video over Unshielded Twisted Pair) for running high-quality live video over copper wire instead of coaxial cable. The idea is to make all those those copper-wired phone jacks capable of carrying two-way video. The company also talked about VUTP Light, which isn't about copper wire at all; it's a laser-based wireless light link for extending Ethernet networks from point to point (think rooftop to rooftop). They say it sets up quickly, doesn't require external power and works better than existing products in bad weather or when animals cross the line-of-sight signal.

* ClipBlast! had a Web video search platform. They seem to want to be the Google of Web videos; they've been crawling the Web building their search index since 2004. Easy-to-use user interface for the desktop widget lets users search, browse, view and store videos.

* MetaRADAR had something...that sounds a lot like ClipBlast. But MetaRADAR's Media Masher focuses on the user interface, giving "rich media" searchers a consistent interface for all sites.

* MotionDSP demoed FixMyMovie.com, a free-for-now website that uses image-enhancement algorithms to clean up video from low-resolution sources such as camera phones. Very nice results, and it looks easy to use -- users upload video files, clip a button and can download the cleaned-up result. This has potential for sharpening up almost any video that corporate IT has to help out with, including security video and presentations.

* Proxure showed Filmaroo, a website for sharing videos among a private group of friends or associates. Easy to use, automatically delivers videos to "friends," designed for consumers but with obvious workgroup applications.

* Your Truman Show described itself as "YouTube meets FaceBook" -- a video blog platform that lets users search for videos according to who is watching them, rather than metadata or content tags. Prediction: Watch for a name change as soon as Paramount Pictures decides to protect its trademark for The Truman Show.

* Diigo showed a system for users to mark up Web pages with virtual hiliting and sticky notes, then store or share those annotations. There's also a social-networking function to search for who else has marked up a particular Web page.

* coComment had a tool for tracking and analyzing "conversations" on the Internet in the form of blogs and comments. Useful for people who have waaaay to much spare time, or who want to research trends.

* Attendi talked about its search engine, which identifies expert individuals rather than websites. The idea is to let users immediately contact the person, not just browse the website, that the search uncovers.

* RelevantMind is yet another special-purpose search site, this one specializing in finding Web conversations about specific products. Just launched its site for bicycles and golf, plans to add more product categories soon.

* Fluid Innovation showed Virtual Ventures, a website in a game format that lets would-be venture capitalists try to decide which technologies should be commercialized. The hook: These are real potential products, and the company is trying to leverage the "wisdom of crowds" effect to pick winners.

* Advanta showed IdeaBlob.com, another kick-around-your-business-ideas website. This time, the hook is that the best ideas, as voted by other users, can win a monthly $10,000 prize along with potentially useful feedback.

* Spigit had Spigit Enterprise, yet another Web-based system for identifying innovative ideas, this one aimed at employees within a large business. It looks more oriented to internal development of a product -- lots of focus on getting expert approvals.

* Glam Media demoed a new version of its Web-based fashion magazine, Glam.com, which adds social networking to its product-search functions.

* Vyro Games showed a set of stress-management games, played on cell phones and using a Bluetooth-enabled fob called a PIP (Personal Input Pod), which detects stress. In each game, the player who has the least stress performs best. Think of it as biofeedback meets Bluetooth. Scheduled for release in the first part of 2008.

* Ncursion is an MMORPG for Facebook that uses gladiators for characters, with the crowd able to save a loser from death with a virtual thumbs-up or thumbs-down. If there's anything you don't understand from that brief description, it's clearly not for you. (And if you understood it all, it's clearly not for your IT shop.)

* Finally, WMS Gaming -- they used to be Williams, the pinball-game maker -- showed its next general of casino slot machine. The applications to corporate IT are left as an exercise for the reader.

More to come...