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May 1, 2006

A New Look at Personalized News

Michael Arrington

64 comments »

Israeli startup Spotback, which I’ve been tracking for a while, will launch tonight (Monday) at 10 PM PST. Spotback is a personalized news portal that learns from user behavior over time to deliver the news that’s just right for them.

Web 2.0 news sites usually fall into one of two categories. Sites like Digg and Newsvine take user feedback and actions to affect what the entire community sees. Personalized sites like Findory change what they present to a single user based on his or her actions over time. Spotback falls into the latter category - a personalized news site that changes for each user over time based on what they like and don’t like (although they also have a Top Stories tab with the most highly rated news from all users).

Each news item on Spotback can be rated by a user, saved, and/or emailed to others (click on image to right for larger view). Users may comment on any story. The source of the news item can also be marked, to tell Spotback to include more news like this, or to block items like it (or from that source). Finally, users can also customize the page to include whatever news categories they like (business, sports, etc.) or an RSS reader widget, which allows a user to add any news source that may not already be included in the Spotback index.

Here’s what I like best about Spotback - there is no requirement to set up a user account, you can simply access the site (personalized via cookie) if you choose to. If you do create a user account, you can rate other users and receive personalized news based on what they like and dislike, too.

  • Sphere It

This entry was posted on Monday, May 1st, 2006 at 6:08 pm and is filed under Company & Product Profiles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

Trackbacks/Pings (Trackback URL)

  1. NCN BetaZone » Spotback

    May 1st, 2006 at 6:19 pm

  2. Library clips

    May 2nd, 2006 at 12:32 am

  3. Ellis Web » Spotback Review

    May 2nd, 2006 at 1:03 am

  4. Ellis Web » Items of Interest: 2006.05.02

    May 2nd, 2006 at 1:51 am

  5. Anonymous

    May 2nd, 2006 at 8:23 am

  6. The American Moderate Blog » Blog Archive » Spotback Personalized News

    May 2nd, 2006 at 8:28 am

  7. » Spotback - A New Look at Personalized news

    May 2nd, 2006 at 9:13 am

  8. Behavior-based News at Nerve Endings Firing Away

    May 2nd, 2006 at 10:00 am

  9. Customization in the Internet economy » Blog Archive » Spotback, a new place to personalize news

    May 2nd, 2006 at 10:14 am

  10. Spotback: A New Look At Personalized News at SynaptiX

    May 2nd, 2006 at 12:00 pm

  11. Mashable*

    May 2nd, 2006 at 1:43 pm

  12. Personalized info from Spotback - Fosfor

    May 2nd, 2006 at 2:19 pm

  13. El Ruso » Spotback, a learning news aggregator

    May 2nd, 2006 at 5:45 pm

  14. WXM » Spotback - A New Look at Personalized news

    May 5th, 2006 at 12:02 pm

  15. Spotback offers personalized news | Gadgetell - The Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things Blog

    June 20th, 2006 at 6:01 am

  16. TechCrunch » Blog Archive » Zlango’s Icon-based Language for SMS

    June 28th, 2006 at 3:01 am

  17. Techcrunch » Blog Archive » Spotback startpage gets even better

    August 28th, 2006 at 7:06 pm

  18. TechCrunch Japanese アーカイブ » Spotback、パーソナルニュースサイトさらに充実

    August 28th, 2006 at 10:48 pm

  19. accelzone techie weblog » Spotback news site gets even better

    August 29th, 2006 at 7:26 am

  20. The American Moderate Blog » Blog Archive » Spotback and Newsvine Personalized News

    September 7th, 2006 at 6:56 am

  21. Tech Industry » Spotback - A New Look at Personalized news

    September 10th, 2006 at 3:26 am

  22. Techcrunch » Blog Archive » Web Swamii Provides Online Guidance

    December 1st, 2006 at 11:51 am

  23. Web Swamii Provides Online Guidance at Swiss Podcast Directory and Blog

    December 1st, 2006 at 12:31 pm

  24. Web Swamii Provides Online Guidance » JenIT

    December 8th, 2006 at 1:18 am

  25. Web Swamii Provides Online Guidance

    January 8th, 2007 at 10:29 am

  26. Spotback Launches Their “Rate Everything” Widget

    March 23rd, 2007 at 7:41 pm

  27. Just a random blog !

    June 15th, 2007 at 9:18 pm

  28. Revver Founder Launches Thoof: Personalized News Service

    June 15th, 2007 at 9:57 pm

  29. Revver Founder Launches Thoof: Personalized News Service : Forecast-Blog

    June 16th, 2007 at 4:07 am

Comments

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  1. Wannabeleader

    May 1st, 2006 at 6:26 pm

    Ugh, it has no name recognition. If you want to build a name within the news industry, ya need a name.

  2. Russell Limprecht

    May 1st, 2006 at 6:29 pm

    I want to try this. I loved the way SearchFox learned my reading habits then put those articles at the top of my list.

  3. Kevin Burton

    May 1st, 2006 at 6:30 pm

    Pretty UI for sure……

    Super web 2.0 :)

    I think the jury is still out on whether this implicit (and hidden) tuning is right for all users.

    My *gut* say isn’t right for the mainstream user.

    Products like Tailrank allow the user to have more control over their personalization while at the same time supporting implicit tuning.

    I could enable this in Tailrank if I wanted but I just don’t see it as a big win.

    Of course I’ve been wrong before… :)

    Thoughts?

  4. Calvin

    May 1st, 2006 at 7:01 pm

    Didn’t Claria announce something similar a couple of weeks ago? http://www.personalweb.com.

    You download, it spies, it learns, you get personalized content.

    I like this approach much better.

  5. Saul Weiner

    May 1st, 2006 at 7:08 pm

    Man, this is a a great site. Only problem is that the space is tough. Getting mindshare will be difficult where the services don’t provide a lot of differentiated value from one another.

  6. Don Wilson

    May 1st, 2006 at 7:18 pm

    Don’t care for the UI, lots of features I wouldn’t need.

    The only thing that’s cool with that is the little baloon thing at the top.

  7. Pete Cashmore

    May 1st, 2006 at 7:18 pm

    I can’t help noticing that the top story on that screenshot is titled: “what do you think about the vagina?”. Amusingly, you seem to have clicked it! :)

  8. Ted

    May 1st, 2006 at 7:41 pm

    I like this because it passes the “mom” test (as in, could my mom use it), which I think is very important when it comes to news sites. If you get a chance, Mike, you ought to do some research on people who consume their news online, where they go, and what they like.

    And Pete, who wouldn’t click that?

  9. Decipho

    May 1st, 2006 at 7:51 pm

    I like the fact that you don’t need to sign up for an account to use the site. Interested in using this site.

  10. Vaibhav Domkundwar

    May 1st, 2006 at 10:01 pm

    Cool UI, indeed. If they reduced the numbers of small icons under each item, it will be cleaner. I like the one column view much better.

    The personalization part will be more evident with more usage and I’ll be looking forward to the results. It will be awesome if they allow me to prefine a few topics so I don’t have to wait until the system learns.

  11. Paul

    May 1st, 2006 at 10:11 pm

    This is pretty incredible. It has tonnes of features…and doesn’t appear in the slightest buggy.

    So many new services come along, that just do not arouse my interest — but this I’ll actually look into a bit more.

  12. Yaakov

    May 2nd, 2006 at 12:18 am

    You cite Newsvine as a site that takes user feedback to affect the entire community. Although this is true on a general level (ie: pushing posts and seeds “up the vine” to main topic pages) they have also introduced a feature called Recommended Articles. This feature takes the articles that you have approved, and displays a list of articles that you have not yet seen that were approved by other Newsvine users who have similar taste to you. So they do offer something in the realm of personal recommendations.

  13. Paul

    May 2nd, 2006 at 12:41 am

    OK, I have a verdict: I love the site. I’ve discovered a lot of news.

    There’s just one drawback: lack of a community, as of yet.

  14. Entertainer

    May 2nd, 2006 at 12:48 am

    I have been one of the beta testers for a while. These guys create great service. very intutitive and are very responsive to user feedback. I am thinking of making this my homepage instead of my.yahoo.com

  15. charbar

    May 2nd, 2006 at 1:26 am

    This is really great! Seems that the more users are joining the system, there more interesting it gets. I’ve also been beta testing it, but now it’s really become relevant.

  16. elwir

    May 2nd, 2006 at 2:30 am

    well site is ok, good job with asp but you said that it works with cookies so one does not have to register to personalize the hopepage, let me tell you my story. i did remove the stuff i`m not itnerested in, like woman, children, etc. and added more news on webdevelopment, business IT etc. then deciced to sort news in one columnt instead of two columns which comes default. one you set one column page it becomes two one-columned pages. and when u switch from one page to another you see that all your changes are gone and it has applied its default settings. in my case all news about woman, children, etc. were back on my pages and none of my additions like web development were there anymore.
    so my israeli friends, work harder…

  17. charbar

    May 2nd, 2006 at 3:58 am

    Why whould you want to get rid of the women section elwir :-D

  18. Eric Cogan

    May 2nd, 2006 at 8:19 am

    I really like the way registration is handled. Might try that on my site.

  19. Bob

    May 2nd, 2006 at 8:30 am

    It looks very nice, but the personalization doesn’t seem to work right. Oh well.

  20. giffo

    May 2nd, 2006 at 9:40 am

    damn they beat my little ass to release, i can’t give up been working on the algorithms for the past flipping year

  21. Seth

    May 2nd, 2006 at 10:21 am

    Another great installment by the Israeli fellows.

  22. Matt

    May 2nd, 2006 at 2:23 pm

    Pretty nice little site. Not good enough to make me want to switch from NetVibes though.

  23. Luke

    May 2nd, 2006 at 2:37 pm

    Like a dumb bonde, pretty on the outside but really quite shallow inside.

    Not to be fooled and give them Two thumbs down…

  24. Web two point oh

    May 2nd, 2006 at 2:41 pm

    Kevin Burton - please don’t try and steal spotbacks ’spotlight’ by whoring tailrank again, it’s getting a bit much!

    Good job anyway, Spotback has blew my stereotype away of ugly and ropey development often associated with Asian type developers

  25. Steve

    May 2nd, 2006 at 3:02 pm

    180n.com does this personalization without having to log in, but goes the social aspect of what people think is important news.

  26. Luke

    May 2nd, 2006 at 3:08 pm

    Ya, I got suckered to try it, I saw, It sucked…

  27. Paul

    May 2nd, 2006 at 10:13 pm

    Steve, you do not have to log in…

  28. sainathkm

    May 2nd, 2006 at 11:45 pm

    TAAZZA is comming.. Will be launched within this month !! HOpe that give Spotback a BANG !!

  29. Steve

    May 3rd, 2006 at 4:15 am

    Paul, sorry, I knew that… I meant to write a ‘too’ in my post. LOL

  30. Jonny

    May 3rd, 2006 at 8:32 am

    Doesn’t work in Opera…the loading icon spins endlessly.

  31. Micha

    May 4th, 2006 at 1:50 am

    Opera is now supported (make sure your Opera browser does not identify as another type of browser). Thanks.

  32. elwir

    May 4th, 2006 at 2:44 am

    charbar, i just wanted to personalize it :) dont think ii dont like women:) well i’m a college student, i can say i like girls instead of woman:)

  33. Anon

    May 4th, 2006 at 11:38 pm

    awful interface - too much colour. Mutton dressed up as lamb…

  34. Rachel

    May 11th, 2006 at 1:11 am

    You should also check out ifbyphone at http://ifbyphone.com, a personalized voice portal that offers news in addition to weather, sports, blogs, chat, a social network called Voplace, stocks, wake-up and reminder calls, notepad, games etc. On ifbyphone you can personalize your news search based on keywords, select different new feeds from a predefined list, or add your own feeds.

  35. Plugg music blog

    December 24th, 2006 at 10:24 am

    Spotback rules.
    I don’t understand why everyone in the world is a member, it’s my only news source and has been for quite a while now.

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