It was great to have the COVE Conference in Huntington Beach. One of the highlights was hosting a party at W+R Studios office. We turned it in to the “W+R Studios Speakeasy”. We made a short video of the event, please enjoy.
My thanks to Diane Ruggiero for letting us tag along with her event.
I was on Zillow today with a colleague and we noticed that a bunch of listings with their new agent generated “walkthrough videos” were at the top of the search results. I was skeptical when I saw this announced because I felt the quality of these videos would vary.
Anyway we started to watch one of them. After about 10 seconds my colleague said, “Doesn’t this seem a bit spooky, like a slasher film? You know the kind when a serial killer cases the house?”
I thought, oh my god she’s totally right! So you can guess what I did next. The Zillow Agent Video Walkthrough REMIX!
Oh, and just wait to you see what happens at the end!!!
(Keep in mind, this is an actual Zillow Walkthrough video, I just added the music)
I’m not sure how new this site is, I just ran across it in my Twitter feed this morning. It looks like Art Carter and his team at CRMLS are starting to ramp up the California Statewide MLS initiative again. The new site, dubbed, ItsMyBusiness.me leverages a lot of videos and their twitter banner is a hoot.
The first attempt at a California statewide MLS , calREDD, was a disaster. CalREDD was full of C.A.R.’s hubris, arrogance, and most of all, incompetence at running an MLS (at any size.) But Art seems to be taking a more nuanced and pragmatic approach. Plus Art’s already proven he can be successful running the largest MLS in the country, CRMLS. Here’s one of the videos from the site titled, “Why This Campaign?”
Message from Art Carter from August Partners on Vimeo.
Case in point is at 1:55 of this video, where Art states…
“I think there are some compelling reasons why the 50 or some odd MLSs in the state of California should come together as one, but if that doesn’t occur, the data needs to come together as one.”
Sounds like a reasonable person, not at all crazy.
I gotta say this is a pretty ballsy move by Art. There’s a lot of baggage left over from calREDD, and lets face it, the odds of putting together a statewide MLS in California is pretty slim. But, this type of thinking represents a change in attitudes in many MLS executives. These kind of MLS execs are not afraid of asking the “whys”, not afraid to mess with the status quo, almost looking for a big fight/challenge.
I know a lot of MLS providers will be looking at what happens in California with great interest, and so will a lot of vendors.
FBS has been busy. At NAR in New Orleans they debuted what they call their “Flexmls Mobile Suite”. When I first heard Mike talk about their plans a few months back I thought it was super ambitious. Most MLS vendors had been out-sourcing their mobile development to third party companies. From the beginning FBS wanted full control, and with there Spark API infrastructure they were a unique position actually make that happen. This video does a great job of what showing off that vision.
I happen to think CoreLogic’s acquisition of DoApp and their 17 employees was a direct result of what FBS is implementing.
Yesterday FBS announced their new Flexmls for Android. Below is a quick video.
Based on what I see in this video, and the introduction of what they call “map clusters”, FBS now has the best Android app for MLS systems, period. And I think this is going to be huge. I’m an iPhone guy myself but you can’t argue the fact of what a huge install base Android has.
You can read more about this on their website:
I had a chance to sit down with Joel Macintosh, CEO of WolfNet, at ARMLS‘ Technopalooza conference last week (which was great BTW).
We had a great conversation covering such topics as the history of IDX, VOWs, owning vs. leasing your website and keeping a business going for 16 years.
Joel Fun Fact: He recently got married. So be sure to congratulate him next time you see him. : )
Enjoy.
At the NAR EXPO 2011 in Anaheim I had a chance to get a demo from Bill Fowler, from Solid Earth, of their new “Spring“, MLS system. Hope you enjoy.
