It’s not all bad, as I hope is clear by the end of the cover story. Toronto has some amazing Internet innovation. Here are just a few.
i4i’s XML
With its beginnings on Spadina and King, i4i is the creator of the custom XML used to open a range of documents using one program. The innovation never made much money on its own, but netted millions for its Toronto developers when a U.S. court found the technology was pinched by Microsoft.
BumpTop
A desktop organizer that looks like an actual work space, not a bunch of icons against blue background. With the real-world design is intuitive, real-world functions that allow you to stack items on top of each other to make room or put up sticky notes. Drop an MP3 into your email icon – a mail message will open up with the file attached. Use a file more than others and it grows in size. Tons of impressive features, and all came out from University of Toronto’s Anand Agarawala. BumpTop was his Masters Thesis. Check it out here.
Another University of Toronto innovation. Tor allows for the ultimate private browsing experience, which may sound just like a sleazy way to watch porn online. But this is far more important. Tor is for highly confidential business and state security. As the Internet becomes less democratized over time, Tor’s global significance will skyrocket.
Media Analysis Platform (MAP)
For marketers MAP is the product of the Toronto analytics firm Sysomos, and is as definitive a tool to track social media as there is. Associated with U of T’s MaRs BlogScope research project, it’s a full-fledged buzz tracker, gathering information off of Facebook, MySpace and Twitter, on which Symosos wrote the definitive Inside Twitter guide.[rssbreak]
