The original genesis of the idea for Touchstone came about when I was working on Web-Based Enterprise software back in the day (you know… Those Web 1.0 days?). The issue very quickly became apparent to me that if you wanted to display an alert like Outlook routinely does from a web-based CRM or CMS system, you were in trouble. There was no convenient way to do it.

So the question arose in my mind… “How can you alert the user to stuff”. Then other questions followed… “how do you build a unified alerting tool that worked for all applications - not just the ones I was making” and then “how do you keep the user in control of all this alerting without overburdening them with a rules engine”.

The result is Touchstone. It’s scope has expanded to handle news and content discovery and all sorts of other things, but at its heart, it is still a way to get messages from the web, to the user - on their own terms.

Enter Peepel (Disclosure: Peepel and Faraday share an investor). At its surface Peepel looks like the newest player in the Web office suite marketplace. What it actually is, is a realization that online environments need to be platforms. Just like Windows is a platform for other software on the client-side.

In the diverse coverage that it’s getting today and over the next few weeks most blogs will probably focus on the office stuff. But I actually think the most interesting part is the environment that is being built out to support the applications themselves. Windowing, File Handling, Task Manager etc.

One of the pieces of that environment will be Notification. And notification is what Touchstone is all about.

“A document in your workspace has just been updated…”

“A spreedsheet you are monitoring has been updated…”

“Chris Saad has logged onto Peepel…”

Etc..

So I look forward to see Peepel grow into its own and establish a viable platform inside which a whole range of applications can live - and notify - for the user.

Check out Peepel!

Want a huge glimpse at Touchstone? Check out some screencasts I just posted… let us know what you think.

Touchstone Screencasts

Make sure you have your speakers on - some nice tunes in the background.

Imagine getting alerted instantly when your LinkedIn contacts have a job on offer or when they add a new contact you might want to know.

The latest build of Touchstone does just that. If you have your copy check it out in the Subscription Helper.

Now imagine doing it for MySpace, Facebook, Hi5 etc. The latest build of Touchstone also makes that possible!

Paul has added a feature called ‘Subscription Plugins’ that allows developers to quickly and easily write little XML files that add Touchstone subscription support to all sorts of services.

Combined with Dapper.net this sort of functionality can be taken to a whole new level - making it easy for users to get alerts from all your favorite web apps - even those that don’t support RSS (without the need to write dedicated Input Adapters).

We have included support for LinkedIn already - we look forward to see what the community can come up with. Be sure to email us your plugins.

If you are developer: Read more about it here

Also, since this type of extensibility is a first in the Feed Reading space (as far as we know) we would be interested in collaborating with other feed readers out there to add universal support and working with app developers to build their own plugins for the Subscription Helper. Drop me a line.

Don’t have an invite yet? Maybe you should pay more attention.

Touchstone and APML have been mentioned in quite a few places in the last week or so. Here are some of the highlights….

From TechZoogle

“this is an invaluable tool that simplifies the process of research for academics and professionals alike. It is not meant to replace the RSS Reader in anyway, but it does improve workflow/ productivity by acting as an intelligent personalized “tipster” right on your desktop and one that gives you up to date persistent information. Being a heavy RSS reader/ user, I found it filtered a good amount of news based on my keywords and preferences. Touchstone is a powerful app that is going to be a permanent addition to my desktop tools and daily research setup.”

From Daniela Barbosa

Last night i hit the jackpot via my personal filtered Touchstone tool that i am using during their BETA period (see below note). In the post titled “Web 2.0 applied in an Enterprise – a huge business opportunity” Peter Reiser lays out beautifully how a company like Sun Microsystems is looking to take advantage of the social dynamics of Web 2.0 and turn it into a business value and business advantage.

[...]

Note: Here is a perfect example of the way a tool like Touchstone has helped me be alerted to something that i might have missed- based on the feeds i have inputted via my OPML file (i have had the complete SUN Blogroll on my GoogleReader for ever but there is just so much on a daily basis i find it very hard to find what is personally important unless i subscribe to Sun individual blogs). With Touchstone and key terms i might be looking for- in this case client names and key words like ‘enterprise 2.0′ the information was delivered to me via a news ticker of things that are important to me. Without it, i wouldn’t know that Peter Reiser was blogging on a subject that is dear to me. Touchstone is in Private Beta- i still have a couple of guest invitation and if you are interested please do drop me a line (danielavbarbosa[at]gmail.com).

From TwoPointTouch

Rose confirmed that digg is actively mining users’ attention data in order to implement these changes. He professed ignorance of APML, but “there are a couple of engineers deeply into this stuff” back at digg HQ.

Thanks to everyone who takes the time to blog about Touchstone - you are instrumental in spreading the word about our baby! It is very much appreciated.

SOBCon 07 is happening in Chicago in May so if you’re in the area check it out.

Overview
An evening and a day of community, strategy, and information about the art, technology, and science of relationship blogging for 250 experienced bloggers.

Purpose
We will demonstrate to 250 bloggers how to take their existing blogs to the next level through interactive presentations on publishing, design and branding, tools, analytics, social networking, marketing, and coaching, from the perspectives of the blogger and the audience.

Sounds right up Touchstone’s ally!

If you are in Chicago and would like to go represent Touchstone please drop me a line at chris@touchstonelive.com.

Cheers!

Via: Logic+Emotion

Thanks to Toby for pointing this out to me!

Over on our Development blog Paul has made a great discovery - here’s a quote:

Unfortunately, due to the complexities of the Gmail authentication system, attempting to subscribe to http://gmail.google.com gets you nowhere. All is not lost however! Subscribe to https://mail.google.com/mail/feed/atom, enter your username and password, and Touchstone will check gmail for you. Nifty.

That’s cool!

Thanks Paul.

Everyone is talking about the new service from Yahoo - Pipes.

Pipes is cool. It does a lot of stuff. Mainly it lets you take RSS (Ray Ozzie has referred to RSS as the “Unix pipe of the web“) and literally pipe it. Through what? A series of services and transformations until it comes out look just like you want it.

Think of it as a super FeedRinse.

Unfortunately though, it’s not exactly useful ‘out-of-the-box’. But that’s ok - because it is more a piece of Internet plumbing than it is a consumer facing service. Which is strange considering it’s coming from Yahoo!

My friend Ian Forrester loves pipes. He has been talking about them for a long time. In fact he correctly noted that Touchstone is a sort of pipeline. Data comes in from a set of Input Adapters, is processed by our engine for Personal Relevancy, Cache and Routing, and is then passed on to one or more Output adapters for presentation to the user.

Of course our pipe is not as flexible or configurable, but it is immediately useful for consumers. It’s interesting in fact that the first example that Yahoo provides (and O’reilly catches on to) is the idea of using pipes to aggregate and filter news alerts. But filtering is so 5 years ago.

According to the LATimes website (unbiased reporting on this issue I’m sure) the new editor is helping the paper focus on the internet as the main news distribution platform.

Los Angeles Times Editor James E. O’Shea unveiled a major initiative this morning designed to expand the audience and revenue generated by the newspaper’s website, saying the newspaper is in “a fight to recoup threatened revenue that finances our news gathering.” [...]

[...] “At this rate, those double-digit profit margins everyone cites will be in single digits and then be gone,” O’Shea said, adding later: “If we don’t help reverse these revenue trends, we will not be able to cost-effectively provide the news — the daily bread of democracy. The stakes are high.”

I think that’s great. No one is quite sure what a newspaper’s role in Media 2.0 will be, but online will certainly be the most important part of their business.

Check out the full article for a breakdown of some of the planned changes.

Imagine if they had a way to keep the user coming back for more content by sending them desktop alerts and displacing headlines on a news ticker.

I love the new Touchstone Beta + FlickrBabes.com

Update: I just realized this is the first public glimpse of the new Beta user interface. But you aint seen nothing yet

One of our fantastic alpha testers made a theme song for Touchstone. Get it while it’s hot.

Thanks for that Marcello! Make way Brett Lee…