A week ago we reported that blogger Robert Scoble is leaving his current job running FastCompany TV. Now he’s going to start talking about his new project – a new content and social networking community called Building 43, which he’s building in partnership with his new employer, Rackspace.
More details will be announced on the Gillmor Gang at 3 p.m. Saturday (today, Pacific Time) live at TWiT Live. Scoble will join Steve Gillmor live via Skype from Rackspace’s offices in Austin, Texas.
Regarding the name Building 43: “The first time I visited Google they gave me a tour of Building 43. I found it to be a fanciful place where not only did the founders have offices, but they had this fun board in the lobby called “Google’s Master Plan.” VC Steve Jurvetson has a picture of that board here – seemed like a good metaphor for a community that’s for people who are fanatical about the Internet. Make Building 43 open to everyone.”
Why Rackspace, a hosting provider? Scoble says he visited the company a year ago and was impressed with their approach to building communities and technologies. It’s also a good fit, he says, because the company has touch points with thousands of other companies (providing hosting and other services). A focus of Building 43 will be visiting and profiling these and other companies, with a look at how they grow over time.
I asked Robert how Building 43 will differ from Channel 9, the Microsoft video channel that he started in 2004 that tries to create discussions between Microsoft, its users and developers. His response:
I was one of five guys who started that and, yes, we broke a lot of
corporate rules. We put customers on the home page who could write
“Microsoft sucks” and we wouldn’t take that down. We didn’t follow the color
guidelines of Microsoft’s branding department. Channel 9 was one of the
first corporate sites to have RSS feeds everywhere. It was also one of the
first to have a wiki.Building 43 will definitely live by that same philosophy, but it will go a
lot further. First, our content will be available via Creative Commons so
you can use our videos or photos or other media on your own sites. You can
cut it up, edit it, or claim it as your own. Second, Building 43 is not a
place. It’s not a website. It’s a distributed community and you’ll engage
with Building 43 on your favorite social network. No need to visit
http://www.building43.com at all. Plus, we’ll have new videos that you can
interact with via technology like that available on 12seconds.tv and
seesmic.com so you can post your own video tips or techniques or demos.Second, on Building 43 you won’t just find information about Rackspace.
We’re going to help the entire cloud computing industry get more adoption,
users, customers. We’ll cover technologies from Rackspace’s competitors like
Amazon, Microsoft, Google, GoGrid, IBM, and others. Our philosophy on
Building 43 is a rising tide lifts all boats, so we’re going to look to get
you the best advice on both how to build your business better on the
Internet as well as have fun, too. We’ll also link to the best ideas,
videos, demos, blogs, on the Internet. I’ve already been practicing that. In
the past year I’ve linked to more than 16,000 things on
http://www.friendfeed.com/scobleizer/likes my likes feed on friendfeed.Third, and this won’t be on Building 43 in the first stage, but in the
future we want to make Building 43 a place where you come to build your own
cloud-based applications or services or try out all sorts of new approaches
that the industry is pitching our way.So, yes, we’ve learned from Channel 9, but we’re going to push it a lot
further and a lot of that depends on how the community evolves on Building
43.
Robert says his personal blog will remain a separate property, but he’ll move it from Wordpress to Rackspace hosting to “make that a showcase for new blogging technology (like the various commenting plugins that let you federate comments to friendfeed, for instance).”
Good Luck to Robert.
Every time I see fast company I think of fucked company and http://f2bbs.com lol
His business acumen is mediocre and couldn’t keep at par with his blogging commentary against a lot of successful business leaders. He shouldn’t have left Microsoft and just blogged for the rest of his life.
He sure is a unique individual… I’ll give you that.
Jon
http://WoodMarvels.com – Create Unique Memories
Good luck from my part too.
(But to be honest, this “Building err what again?” idea probably wouldn’t have made it to TC50. It’s a nice plug for that rack company though. Maybe that’s all it’s about, let’s see.)
Good Luck to Robert. Wish you continue success
Good luck for Robert
so he just got another job doing the same shit. boring.
does he think if he tries it yet again it might work this time?
Best Of luck from Me too.
http://www.smartbloggerz.com
He’s not one of us.
Watch him.
Closely.
Seems the commenting plugin space is heating up, with Google announcing this week their FriendConnect opensource API plugin.
Good luck to Scoble.
But, will this be significantly different than LinkedIn? Maybe a more startup/valley focus?
Looks promising. Hopefully Robert thrives here too.
Still not exactly sure what to expect of the site but I’ll definitely check it out.
Interesting. There are already a lot of places for people fanatical about the internet, so you’ll have to “throw the heat”, Robert.
Interesting project. I look forward to seeing how this develops. Spreading the culture of Google is an invaluable asset.
making the web more social is a great idea, empowering people to come together and share cultures and ideas will make all of us stronger and more aware of the world as a whole. All the best Robert!!!
boring
New startup to show jobs available and also allows people to blog about companies they’ve worked for…. http://www.jobstoblog.com
Excellent – was watching wondering what was next. Whatever Scoble touches will be impacted. I look forward to your work Robert.
Mark at LeapFish.com
Congrats on the new start Robert. I look forward to see the Building grow and flourish.
I had lunch with Robert a few weeks back and we discussed this. I wish him the best of luck, and hopefully it will last more then 1 year!
I’ve worked with people from RackSpace in the past, an absolutely great company. I think that this will be a great fit.
Just keep the content coming, Rob.
How does Scoble’s Building 43 site, when I click on “tweet”, send a Twitter message, from my account, by me, without knowing my password?
Is it tied in with Twitter?
That was creepy. I thought it was going to take me to the Building 43 Twitter page, not generate a tweet from me.
Easy on the paranoia.
It’s just a javascript snippet and it doesn’t twitt it all the way. In any case, you need to have a twitter session open for it to work, so don’t worry.
Congratulations to Mr. Scoble.
See Robert’s post about this on FriendFeed today – http://friendfe...ws-I-m-joining/
I am very happy for Robert Scoble’s new venture at RackSpace “Building43″ idea – very intriguing!!
We’ll be watching as this develops with great curiosity!
@susanbeebe
The difference is that you don’t work for Google.
Scoble will now be a shill that pimps services such as GoDaddy’s website tonight, and other Rackspace tools aimed at everything from Social Networking, to blogging to whatever rackspace craps out that day.
DISCLOSURE: I am a former investor in Rackspace, but in no way favor them because of that. I hate lots of companies I have invested in and have publicly said so.
So with that said, Robert is now Danica Patrick, with no race car, no boobs, and I bet he doesn’t smell like flowers.
Take the money and run Robert. The new CDN I am launching with partners is going to blow everything you knew about hosting out of the water. Including RAX.
I retract my “no boobs” comment after some reflection, but the others are fine.
http://www.flic...sica/101847348/
Well, I don’t “approve this message”,
BUT it was a funny read
… Although I “feel” that this idea is mighty intriguing, I do not approve either. We do thing much better around here… Scoble should have called me before going ahead with this already doomed project.
Anjali Spammersen
From India
@Smart Babes Are Stupid Spammers,
Stop this bullshit, retard spammer. Get lost and hog some pigshitburger.
thanks for asking me
This comment cracked me up!
http://www.goog...:RAX&ntsp=0
RAX is currently rising but operating on credit as opposed to cash:
iii.co.uk/news/?type=afxnews&articleid=7213561&subject=companies&action=article
I divested in RAX a couple months at a loss.
They are on a spending spree.
As much as some of you like Robert, I see this as a symptom. He’s not a celebrity.
Makes sense – a fanatical blogger/tech evangelist working with a fanatical hosting company. Good luck Robert.
Hi reall think scoble should get a hair cut first.
“Robert says his personal blog will remain a separate property”
One word. Origami. You saw the 10+ posts and videos at the behest of Bill Gates.
“X service will be the BIGGEST thing EVAR”
You know it’s coming.
I realize Rob has to pay the bills. So I’ll leave it at that. If you’re going to be a shill be the best shill you can be. Infomercial shills are the best.
Rackspace -> The Borg Singularity In Crap Hosting Companies, Bar None. Their credibility can only go up with Robert on board (until he discovers the truth, and the life-size docking stations by the lavs). Happy for both Rocky and Robert though.
Roberts a genuinely good guy and is reflective of many of us who plug away at our online jobs every day. He’s much appreciated. I hope he doesn’t get uprooted by the ‘in crowd’ of dot commers and venture guys and continues to get the attention he deserves. It’s obvious he’s a tough worker!
Robert, please do a building 43 article about this
http://www.inte...12Month+Low.htm
Microsoft bought powerset about a year ago for 100M+ and you can still only search wikipedia with it. In otherwords they did nothing with the brand and they didn’t incorporate the R&D into live either.
They wasted 100M of MSFT investor money. Nail them. Turn on your former masters!
hell yeah it pissed me off i am using a supposedly natural language search engine but the results are wikipedia links wtf
Ever since Channel 9 started Microsoft and their products started to become a joke. I haven’t bought a MSFT product since 2004 aside from MSDN Professional and I haven’t renewed that since 2006. I just let it run out.
At least it let people find out about other technologies, which is good for consumers, but it didn’t do any good for their company.
RAX made a lot of cap during the IPO and now that the soft stocks are starting to turn around they expect a sudden inflow of cash from that.
Just because you have a lot of money doesn’t mean that if you spend it you will get it back.
About the RAX IPO, you should take a look at this.
http://www.bobp...yIPOPulled.html
It’s not directly related, but it’s one reason I reconsidered a hosting IPO vs. software/hardware.
Does this comment mean I can now start comparing Kia to Lexus when talking about the auto industry?
While I agree that hosting is hosting when it comes to turning a profit (upfront capex and long term roi), the way in which these two companies acquire and retain customers is entirely different.
Go daddy is a street vendor hocking commodities. Rackspace sells service. Customers know the difference and I’m betting on long term success, as proven by their long term track record.
What controversy happened today on The Gillmor Gang that is causing it to be pulled from rebroadcast on TWiT? Something to do with Scoble and RackSpace?
The controversy? Bad audio maybe. I’m sure it’ll be back once they fix that. There wasn’t anything controversial on this week’s show. If you want controversy, you should listen to the show two weeks ago. Wow.
acompute – it was a Canter “visual” apparently, perhaps oregano. I didn’t see it. Certainly not exciting like the episode Robert mentions
…and I care because…?
another year of poorly planned, terribly produced flip videos from rackspace clients. sell or short rax. clearly a sign of poor judgment on their part.
RAX may continue to rise with NYSE/NASDAQ
If you read the Godaddy article I linked to you would have read where Bob Parsons wrote that all hosting and coloc sales paid on a monthly basis have to be accounted for full at the time of the contract or sale for public companies.
When all that deferred income gets accounted for, the sh1t may hit the fan. Look at what happened to MSFT and the deferred Vista sales. Now they are spending big time. 15-30k a month just here at TechCrunch in ads.
http://www.tech....com/advertise/
They are not on the bleeding edge of cloud computing and their tech is going to be superseded by new virtual image services. I’m not saying that because it’s what we will be selling next month. It’s just the way things are headed right now.
seems like a misfit, scoble and a hosting company? like trying to mate water buffalo with a herd of hippos
and the fact that techcrunch is calling this ‘news’ is a reminder that michael arrington is a shill for his friends
How about a disclosure statement on how many shares RAX shares Mr. Scoble received from Rackspace upon signing?
Were they common or preferred?
When Mr. Scoble took a job at Microsoft Corporation he was given several thousand dollars worth of MSFT shares and he had disclosed that.
How much interest does Mr. Scoble have @ RAX ?
It would help us meter the trust worthiness of the articles he is publishing for sure.
Of course he does not have to answer at all, since share holdings are normally private for *most* investors.
But he did tell us about Microsoft giving him holdings in MSFT, and that did *seem* to influence his articles, so why would he withhold that information now with RAX?
typo, should say
“How about a disclosure statement on how many RAX shares Mr. Scoble received from Rackspace upon signing?”
http://scobleiz...ancial-results/
“I only own stock in one company. Contrary to popular opinion I’m not rich, and don’t have a large 401k plan or stuff like that. I’m working on changing that, but for now I only have my Microsoft shares. I kept them waiting for yesterday. I knew Office and Vista — even if they were failures — would bring truckloads of cash into Microsoft.”
Microsoft gave you those shares when you started there.
So why are you silent now about RAX ??
As an A-list blogger one could think that you may be able influence the share price with one of your stories. With MSFT’s volume you hardly matter, but with a little public company like Rackspace with such small market cap and such small volume, a little bit of news could change prices ???? <– That’s a bunch of question marks.
So please share if you are inclined to do so?
Just to be clear, anybody working for a company has a right to say whatever to influence share price as long as it’s true.
But they can not personally act to profit from their knowledge or statements.
Robert waited until he left Microsoft to sell.
I am still curious and would like him to disclose that since he has in the past. Michael Arrington always disclosed his private investments on this website.
Hm, I’m pretty doubtful this will be very successful…
well i think we should wait and see what he can do , if he success as i hope for him, it will be great thing for all bloggers
Congrats Scoble
Congrats Scoble. I like their recent purchase of slicehost. Thats one cool service out there.
All the best to Robert for this new venture. Seems interesting, lets see how it turns out to be!
I would like to see more of entrepreneurial videos and the struggle they face to get the word out. Good luck Robert!
Shameless self promotion to drum up customers for Rackspace.
The tech flacks need to take a walk in the real world sometime instead of the promotional world where everything is the next big thing.
When this fails, I’m sure it will be spun as a success wh
Shameless self promotion to drum up customers for Rackspace.
The tech flacks need to take a walk in the real world sometime instead of the promotional world where everything is the next big thing.
When this fails, I’m sure it will be spun as a success wh
Cool post I like it.
Amal
Top 100 Celebrities
(Vote your favorite celebrity)
http://apps.fac...op_celebrities/
Scoble. Seesmic. Bldg43. Sounds like a plan. Best of luck to you Robert. Kick butt!!!
all the best Scoble on Building43..will sure check it out..
I think this is a great move by Rackspace , go and get one of the most prolific and outspoken bloggers and let him loose… It can only be good – especially as the pace at which new start-ups and sites rise – we will all need somewhere to host, manage and run – and with Rackspace up there, this will be at the forefront of our mind. Best of luck.
I was guessing he is in partnership with NEC, it seems he is with Rackspace rather
Great news!
hhhmmmm interesting news
Best of Luck
Interesting, keep us posted regarding its development.
sounds like an interesting project, but really, there needs to be ALOT of work put in to make this anywhere near successful
Is there something left to add?! LOL Best of luck Robert and never forget, the higher you climb the more little critters will turn up to try and bite your backside so it’s all good
Well…I was about to write “good luck Robert” , but soon realized that Robert does need not luck I its pure sense: luck would mean wining on the lottery and that does not happen that often by chance. So Robert has new a great idea – innovative – , he is a hard worker, passionate about what he does, he now has corporate backing whom share the same vision and I quite sure many of his followers like me feel the same. Joao/TechFuga
Sounds gimmicky and like a veiled attempt to advertise Rackspace services to me, but maybe i’m cynical (I would be if I didn’t read 20 other comments here just like mine).