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Notemesh is a perfect example of what has gone horribly wrong with the surface of Web 2.0. Underneath, Web 2.0 is still a thriving pool of innovation where creative developers and designers alike are trying to squeeze the most power and usability out of the Web and web-connected products as humanly possible. However, on the surface, there are those people who simply don't "get it". Everyone has seen the success of MySpace, they have seen how much money eBay rakes in, they know how much money Google makes, they know how many hits YouTube gets and everyone wants a piece of the pie.
Unfortunately, in their race to get a piece of the pie, people seem to be forgetting some really solid principals of software development and design:
Apparently no one told Notemesh that these were some really good questions to ask. Firstly, Notemesh is essentially a Wiki that is customized for educational use, where the "starter kit" for each Wiki page revolves around a class, rather than a generic "page" concept. You can invite other people and share access to your class notes (Wiki pages) with a set list of people who can then collaborate on the wiki pages with the intent of creating a merged knowledgebase of notes for a given class.
The first problem I have with this is that there's absolutely no way of guaranteeing a match for a class... Student A and Student B can both go to Notemesh, both create new classes if they don't find an existing one, and both be taking cylo'd notes for the same class without knowing it. Secondly, this is a classic example of someone trying to get in on the land rush without actually providing a product.
Why? Because I can go to pbwiki.com and create my own domain, my own custom wiki, and accomplish the same thing with a little bit more flexibility. I certainly don't intend to insult Notemesh or its efforts, it certainly looks nice (although it looks so "Web 2.0" its almost cliche). I just think that the average internet users are being abused by a glut of new products and they will eventually get so frustrated by trying new stuff that they don't like, that they will eventually stop trying new things - ruining the innovation efforts of great thinkers to come.
If people want to get their feet wet in the Web 2.0 space, I think the least they should do is take a couple of deep breaths and do some thinking about their product before releasing it. Does your product provide something above and beyond what's out there? Is there incentive for people to use your product? Does your product look just like every other product out there with no unique branding of its own? These questions and more can not only save the developers wasted effort but it can save consumers the wasted effort of trying out something that falls under the "been there, done that, got the t-shirt" category.
