The Mozilla Manifesto

I came across the Mozilla Manifesto, a statement of what the organisation stands for, and initially it inspired me to make one for Zenbu. But then I read theirs and thought, why bother – I could just use theirs! Sums it all up pretty nicely for me.

Principles

1. The Internet is an integral part of modern life – a key component in education, communication, collaboration, business, entertainment and society as a whole.
2. The Internet is a global public resource that must remain open and accessible.
3. The Internet should enrich the lives of individual human beings.
4. Individuals’ security on the Internet is fundamental and cannot be treated as optional.
5. Individuals must have the ability to shape their own experiences on the Internet.
6. The effectiveness of the Internet as a public resource depends upon interoperability (protocols, data formats, content), innovation and decentralized participation worldwide.
7. Free and open source software promotes the development of the Internet as a public resource.
8. Transparent community-based processes promote participation, accountability, and trust.
9. Commercial involvement in the development of the Internet brings many benefits; a balance between commercial goals and public benefit is critical.
10. Magnifying the public benefit aspects of the Internet is an important goal, worthy of time, attention and commitment.

Yellow Pages Sold

Telecom New Zealand has sold the Yellow Pages and associated directories to the private investment arm of the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan for NZD$2.24 billion. A smart move by Telecom, I’m not so sure for those Canadian teachers…

Yellow Pages is looking to turn over $250 million this year and is viewed by many as a cash cow. However there are a number of small and big players looking to shrink that market.

Full story – http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10430928

Find Everything (in Parnell)

The Zenbu motto of ‘Find Everything’ is more of a goal than a reality at this infant stage – we’ve still got a long way to go to collect all that information. But today Zenbu just took one small but significant step forward.

Parnell Mainstreet Inc, the business association representing and promoting Parnell businesses, has uploaded 400 plus Parnell businesses, heritage sites, and even bus stops into Zenbu.
I think it’s fair to say that you truly can ‘Find Everything’ in Parnell now!

Feel the Freeze

Today we launched the ‘Freeze’. (No, not some miniature movie villain that comes with a happy meal)

Listings on Zenbu can be edited by any registered user. Some business owners may prefer the security of knowing that no third party can edit their listing. They can choose to ‘Freeze’ their listing, so that only they can edit the listing, at a cost of $1 per month.

Zenbu provides free tools like RSS feeds on your listing data so that you could monitor a listing for any change. The ‘Freeze’ gives you the opportunity to not have to worry about it (and support Zenbu!). A frozen listing will also have certain bonus features available, but still under development…, like document upload – think brochures or menus.

It would be great if we didn’t have to worry about hooligans defacing our real world or virtual property. The beauty of virtual worlds like Zenbu and Wikipedia is that the community will largely look after the site themselves. I truly believe this and trust that people only freeze their listings for the bonus added features it also gives them!