Kevin: “Features, I’ve recently come to realize, can be obstacles. Problems. … Determine a basic need -> Create a service that satisfies it in the simplest way possible -> Open it up.”

In the manner of Facebook and Digg, the social-news application lets people see which stories their friends are commenting on and recommending. Read this blog post by Caroline McCarthy on The Social.

Kevin: Thoughtful post about the New Yorks Times’ Times People social media tool. He likes the focused nature of the tool as opposed to baking in social networking features into the site.

Kevin: Interesting post and stats about ad spend and trends in the US and India. Mukund Mohan says that advertisers may go straight from print to mobile.

Could the BBC be funded by a tax on web and mobile? In France President Sarkozy has just announced such a plan.

Kevin: Adam Tinworth writes a must bookmark post on why media gets community wrong. To quote one of the comments, ‘brilliant clarity’. Goes to the heart of why mass media doesn’t take advantage of social media.

Kevin: My colleague Roy Greenslade has a great post on the benefits that journalists can realise by learning the values of the blogging revolution.

Suw: To paraphrase: Social media has to be 9x better than the technologies it replaces in order to be accepted by users. Wonder how a proper adoption strategy changes that equation

Suw: Joel Spolsky on how hard it is to reach a state of flow, and now an interruption of merely a few seconds can result in a 15 minute loss of productivity for the person who has been interrupted.

Kevin: Jeff Jarvis from an internal conference at the Guardian about the Future of Journalism. Lots to think about. I like in helping find quality or interesting content, “it becomes an editorial job and knowing who people are and creating “circles of tru

Kevin: Is Fred Wilson getting bored with Web 2.0? Yes and no. He is just curious about having a more positive social and political impact, which is why he’s travelling to Europe.

Kevin: Ari Melber says: “Web entrepreneur Arianna Huffington slammed old media at a political conference in New York today, assailing reporters for abandoning the pursuit of truth in favor of a “fake neutrality” and quailing in the face of government inti

Kevin: USA Today’s Chuck Raasch wonders if journalists are painting a grimmer economic picture than actually exists because of the woes of the newspaper industry

The Personal Democracy Forum collects essays from lots of big thinkers including Esther Dyson, Yochai Benkler, Jeff Jarvis, Micah Sifry and many more on how to re-energise, reorganise and reorient US democracy for the internet age.

Suw: Amazon use their power to bully small publishers by removing one click buy buttons from the titles of those publishers who are not submitting to Amazon’s demands. Disgraceful.

Kevin: Craig draws lessons from Iain Dale’s advertising model and makes some suggestions on why Google AdSense didn’t work for him. Craig suggests improvements on ad placement and the value of an ‘online presence’.

Kevin: Robin Hamman makes it official. He’s leaving the BBC to join Headshift and head up a team of social media consultants. Congrats and good luck Robin.

Kevin: Adam Tinworth collects a couple of sage points of community wisdom: Must enjoy technology and Participate. Good conversation in the comments.

Kevin: Very rich map mashup of donations and other campaign contributions on Huffington Post. Excellent use of data but also great presentation.

Kevin: Journalist and programmer Adrian Holovaty talks about how reporters can make better use of data from his recent talk at the Guardian internal Future of Journalism conference.

Kevin: More on the AP’s ‘new aggressiveness toward bloggers’ over the Drudge Retort. “(T)he train left the station years ago.” Read the comments for more analogies. ‘Unfan the shit?’

Kevin: Fred Wilson makes a compelling argument for a post-widget web. Javascript slows page load and they are distracting. He says we need a model where the content is “all in the same flow”.

Kevin: More about the AP/bloggers flap. “Posting a link to copyright material and enough of an excerpt to encourage a click-through is a Good Thing. It drives traffic, raises visibility and weaves the source material into an ongoing conversation. Getting

Kevin: Jeff Jarvis tells the AP “protection is no strategy for the future” as they go after Drudge Retort with a DMCA takedown notice.

Kevin: A great post on ways that news organisations should be using location-based technology to enhance their content. Must read post with lots of practical tips.

Kevin: Newspaper circulation is growing in Asia and South America, not North America or Europe. Free dailies are also surging. Growth, but maybe not where you live and work.