Big trend coming out of TechCrunch40: data normalization services like Mint, Cake, TripIt, and Clickable.
DMS is a new category (I think I just named it) in which companies pull in data from 3rd parties, normalize (clean) it, and then leverage it. In Cake's case they suck in people's trading activity to share investment wisdom. TripIt normalizes desparite travel prodiders to provide clean trip itenearies. Mint, which one the TechCrunch40 event's $50,000 prize ($25,000 of which was technically my money!!!), sucks down your credit card and banking information to create a dashboard of your spending AND to save you money.
These services are creating a layer on top of existing services in order to do something that those services typically don't want done. In the case of Mint they might show you how your bank is ripping you off and get you better rates for your credit card or savings account. In Clickable's case they reveal the fact that you might be wasting money on a certain competitive keyword on Google AdSense and advise you to spend that money on the same keyword on Yahoo or Microsoft's search services.
Even mEgo, and avatar service, is normalizing data by pulling in your MySpace preferences and syndicating those out--via a syndicated, Flash-based avatar--to Facebook, your blog, and... wait for it... MySpace. In some ways these service are aggressive reactions to the lack of open standards. FOAF never took off? No problem, we'll login and suck down your data. That's what Flock's doing with their impressive social browsing features, which were also launched at TechCrunch40.
Of course, this is layering on top of layers. And, I'm sure at the TechCrunch40 conference in 2008 we'll be seeing a sertvice called Icing that pulls in your Mint and Cake information into one dashboard. :-)
Comments are open for 24 hours... be nice.
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Big trend coming out of TechCrunch40: data normalization services
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Reader Comments
(Page 1 of 2)3. I suppose in some cases data normalization services are doing what primary services don't want done, but I think in more cases they're simply doing something that each service isn't capable of doing on its own.
For example, Mint can tell you more about your spending habits than your bank because they have access to your bank's records AND each of your credit and debit cards.
4. I have a hard time trusting my social networking account passwords ... let alone my _banking_ login information ... to a bunch of startup kids who hardly have a business model, let alone a security strategy to protect that information.
Before I'd use a service like Mint, I'd want to know how many hundreds of millions of dollars worth of general liability insurance their policy covers. Because the first time their servers get pwned, everyone's going to be HUGELY screwed.
Posted at 2:25PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Dossy Shiobara
5. Jason-
Thanks for the mention and for your takeaway from the conference. I happen to agree with you that accessing, normalizing, and then doing something interesting with data, especially personal data, is an area that should continue to grow.
What I like in particular about data normalization is the opportunity it provides to create real businesses that people find valuable and might even be willing to pay for. And, from a business perspective and defensibility, normalization-based businesses are not easy to replicate. At a time when companies are easier and cheaper to build, it is good to have barriers to entry.
Posted at 2:37PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Steven A. Carpenter
6. I am assuming Mint's business model is getting you to switch to lower rate CCs and then they get an affiliate commission? In just guessing what the service provides (I signed up but it did not properly suck in my CC data for some reason, servers getting hammered?) it is a service I would pay for. But it is great that they have a business model that allows it to be free. I have been waiting for an app like this for a while. And I think the "kids" are coming up with better ideas, business models, and contingencies that anyone who is 45+ who has been in the banking biz for years.
Posted at 2:51PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Nick Dynice
7. Can somebody please create a DNS for all of the disparate vendor relationships we all have in our lives. We all have a couple hundred (at least) relationships with "vendors" (think of every product you have ever bought, or service you have used) with whom we have ongoing interactions.
My regular old address book is inadequate. The standard dat fields would need to be customized too much. For Cole Haan I would need shoe size but for jetBlue I would need meal, seat, and airport preferences.
Instead of us, the individuals, maintaining that information, why not create a DNS which would "pull" that information from all the dozens/hundreds of user accounts we have with all the vendors.
The "secret sauce" in this service would be that each vendor would make available a web widget which contains all of our individual data. Since the vendor would be creating a unique type of data record for their particular product/service we wouldn't have to do any customization.
Then since it's a web widget this hypothetical DNS could simply create an online account comprised of HTML boxes where each web widget could be pasted and hosted. When any data changed in any of our individual relationships (e.g. we took a trip or made a purchase or a warranty expired) the VENDOR could make the update and since the web widget is pulling from their database our widgets would automatically be updated.
This hypothetical DNS could wrap a tag layer on top of the HTML boxes and create categories (e.g. travel) where widgets of a certain type could be grouped.
Each user could have private widgets and public widgets. The public widgets could be voyeured by others as a sort of recommendation engine. Want to know where to go to each Italian in Brooklyn? Go to Jason's public category for NYC restaurants and check-out which ones he maintains a relationship with.
The iPhone would be the perfect platform and form factor for displaying these web widgets. Think about that jetBlue widget. Would it not be very cool if you could pull-up the jetBlue widget (it might look very similar to the actual plastic card you use at the check-in counter) and have the gate attendant scan a barcode on your iPhone screen.
Let's call this DNS a "Widget Wallet" for the sake of discussion. As I mentioned above, would somebody please create this DNS because I need it badly.
Posted at 3:10PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Timothy Post
8. Can somebody please create a DNS for all of the disparate vendor relationships we all have in our lives. We all have a couple hundred (at least) relationships with "vendors" (think of every product you have ever bought, or service you have used) with whom we have ongoing interactions.
My regular old address book is inadequate. The standard dat fields would need to be customized too much. For Cole Haan I would need shoe size but for jetBlue I would need meal, seat, and airport preferences.
Instead of us, the individuals, maintaining that information, why not create a DNS which would "pull" that information from all the dozens/hundreds of user accounts we have with all the vendors.
The "secret sauce" in this service would be that each vendor would make available a web widget which contains all of our individual data. Since the vendor would be creating a unique type of data record for their particular product/service we wouldn't have to do any customization.
Then since it's a web widget this hypothetical DNS could simply create an online account comprised of HTML boxes where each web widget could be pasted and hosted. When any data changed in any of our individual relationships (e.g. we took a trip or made a purchase or a warranty expired) the VENDOR could make the update and since the web widget is pulling from their database our widgets would automatically be updated.
This hypothetical DNS could wrap a tag layer on top of the HTML boxes and create categories (e.g. travel) where widgets of a certain type could be grouped.
Each user could have private widgets and public widgets. The public widgets could be voyeured by others as a sort of recommendation engine. Want to know where to go to each Italian in Brooklyn? Go to Jason's public category for NYC restaurants and check-out which ones he maintains a relationship with.
The iPhone would be the perfect platform and form factor for displaying these web widgets. Think about that jetBlue widget. Would it not be very cool if you could pull-up the jetBlue widget (it might look very similar to the actual plastic card you use at the check-in counter) and have the gate attendant scan a barcode on your iPhone screen.
Let's call this DNS a "Widget Wallet" for the sake of discussion. As I mentioned above, would somebody please create this DNS because I need it badly.
Posted at 3:12PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Timothy Post
9. This is an astute observation.
IMHO there are three things going on here.
First, a "marketplace of user interfaces". That is, most of the sites that these "data normalization services" aggregate from have really, really bad user interfaces (banks, credit cards, travel sites, seriously), which thus presented the opportunity for a service to come in with a *good* UI and aggregate them all. As far as I can tell, we are now seeing the market "correct" for so many bad interfaces with a few better ones at least.
Second, we are seeing a "marketplace of interoperability". You mention "aggressive reactions to the lack of open standards." which is overall an accurate statement. For most of these applications, there are insufficient open standards to build something that is open and interoperable. Where there have been open standards, they've been more often than not been too complex, presented too high a barrier (time investment to understand and implement) for too little return. As you said: "FOAF never took off", and for many good reasons. In the past couple of years, we've made some progress with microformats (especially recently in the area of social network portability), and presented simple, low barrier to entry solutions to *a few* of the problems mentioned. But certainly not all. The smart "data normalization services" will recognize that they are not competing with open standards, but rather, can become even more useful/powerful by themselves implementing them and becoming open "hubs" for you to manage your data. Plaxo has started doing this with their support of hCard, and from having chatted with the mEgo founders, I'm quite optimistic about them as well. It's a competition as to who can build better interoperability between all the services you depend on, and it is good to see a variety of approaches competing to best solve the interoperability problems.
Third, perhaps the biggest challenge for these data aggregators is *trust* (as has been pointed out by a few other commenters). You said: "No problem, we'll login and suck down your data." Problem is, that's what every phishing site does too.
Thus any site that asks me for my username and password for *another* site raises my suspicions. From spamming your address book (Quechup), to emptying your bank account (phishing sites), many have already experienced the problems with this approach. The one exception is perhaps Flock, which because it is a clientside application (and presumably keeps your passwords locally, not on someone else's server), users can feel like they have a bit more control.
Posted at 3:13PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Tantek Çelik
10. Timothy Post, take a look at http://projectvrm.org
Posted at 3:15PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Nick Dynice
11. I agree Jason, regardless of whether people like Mint or not, being able to pull in disparate data sets into a cohesive whole is key. Like summarized RSS feeds drawn from all your feeds or banking records ... there are so many places where data are getting stuck into silos, getting it out is key.
BTW: http://digg.com/tech_news/Big_trend_coming_out_of_TechCrunch40_data_normalization_services/
;-).
Posted at 3:17PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Tris Hussey
12. I have a big concern with giving a start up such as Mint my bank login information because if there is fraud on my account -- even if it isn't a result of using Mint, my bank isn't going to cover it. I can appreciate what these companies are doing, but there is a huge security concern from the consumers on this one. An example is the outcry on TechCrunch in the post about Mint winning the $50,000 price at TC40. Data is exceptionally valuable and these companies are taking advantage of the consumer's general trust to collect it for their own purposes. I don't see why I should give Mint my login information and take that value away from my bank. My data is vulnerable no matter where it is, and I prefer to leave it up to the long-standing institution to fight for me, than the new hot startup.
Honestly, I am having a hard time grasping the general web philosophy that our data should be open so that we can manipulate it the way we see fit. IMHO, it is just shifting the control from one institution to another, not necessarily doing anything new. Perhaps this is my conservative business approach, but I see a bigger picture that I think is missed by many of the technology companies. There are closed doors in this world for a reason because for every honest and trusting consumer, you have three waiting to take advantage of an arbitrage situation.
I am waiting for a savvy business person to pwn the "open" web. It's closer than you may think.
Posted at 3:30PM on Sep 19th 2007 by David Litsky
13. Nick:
Bingo! I heard Doc Searls (I believe it was him) speaking about VRM and it greatly clarified my thoughts on this topic. I think a combo of VRM and DNS, plus web widgets would be fabulous.
Posted at 3:31PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Timothy Post
15. I think both Cake and Mint were brilliant and the ideas themselves make such great sense that if the early adopters rave eventually people will take the risk on the security. I can remember when people wouldn't use an ATM card because they thought people would steal them and get all their money. All it will take is a reasonable amount of time without a major security breach and a bunch of early adopters making and saving money.
Posted at 9:09PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Steven Kempton
18. I love the idea of providing value by aggregating data that would otherwise live in silo's. I am sick of my personal data and attention being spread out among all the vendors and web sites that I use on a daily basis. It's just inefficient.
I haven't looked at Mint yet but I have been using quicken for over 10 years and it is bloatware at it's worst. Last time I did a budget with my wife we were wondering how much other people like us spent on groceries, dining and other expenses. I'd love to be able to get some rules of thumb and advice.
But, would I trust my financial data to a startup? NO WAY. I took a quick look at their website and they barely mention security. (Well you can find the link to a detailed page if you look in the footer). I would only feel comfortable if these guys offered me cash money insurance against theft or fraud. Of course, that is unlikely.
Posted at 11:34PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Pete Mauro
19. Hi Pete-
Steve Carpenter here, CEO of Cake Financial. We do have an insurance plan in place that will pay you for your financial loss in the unlikely instance of a breach. We talk about security alot and are built like a bank. Not sure if you have investments or are interested in managing them better, but if you are, you should feel confident trying Cake.
Posted at 1:31AM on Sep 20th 2007 by Steven A. Carpenter
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1. I don't understand what the big deal about Mint is. Isn't it just like MS Money, or Quicken? Is it just the fact that it's a web-based MS Money that's giving it all the focus? Maybe I have to play around with it to see where the real value is.
Posted at 1:59PM on Sep 19th 2007 by Nathaniel PAyne