It’s a little bit later than expected but at last I’m happy to announce the creation of  CloudAve. Along with a great team of writers and researchers, Zoli Erdos as editor in chief and myself as editor will be creating what we hope will become the pre-eminent location for cloud computing and SaaS analysis and commentary. We will be specifically focusing on SaaS tools for business.
Originally slated to launch during the recent Office 2.0 conference, lots of busy-ness, a few technical issues and a general high degree of chatter at that time made us decide to delay until next Monday. We’re posting about it now to allow people to subscribe to our feed, all ready for our content to come floating over the pipes.
Our vision with CloudAve (in fact it’s part of our manifesto) is that it should start and remain ad free – in order to pay its way then Zoho has come on board and is sponsoring the site. Have no fear though – their sponsorship is completely hands-off when it comes to editorial independence – we’ll tell it like we see it – no matter who we catch in the crossfire!
So where to for Diversity? I’ll be posting a little less often here, and my posts will probably be more around the themes of New Zealand business, economic development, manufacturing, broadband issues and the like (in fact similar themes to where my blogging started) – my co-contributors to Diversity will continue to post here as and when they see fit.
I’ve also got a few interesting projects coming up in the next few months around the New Zealand telecommunications industry, small business development in New Zealand and the like. So stay tuned – there’ll still be stuff of interest.
But also head over to CloudAve, with the talent we have on board we’ll begin to amass a pretty compelling resource.
Cheers!
Congratulations! I was wondering if I’d missed the announcement while being crushed by the crowd.
Nice one!I am sure you will generate heaps of traffic!
I am interested in a couple of things
1. Why do you consider sponsorship to not be an ad? Isn’t it pretty much an exclusive ad?
2. Why is being ad-free important to you and your customer base. This is a genuine questions
3. Will you publish your manifesto so we can get a handle on what your purpose is
Looking forward to Monday!
@Miki
Thanks for the comments
1) An ad generally has a pretty overt message alongside it. In this case it is more about engaging in dialogue with a community which has piqued Zoho’s interest. The other thing is that it’s my contention that we’re less likely to criticise the product of an advertiser than we are of a silent sponsor – just my view though
2) Because we’re sick to death of being harrangued by blogs with advertising, popups, banners etc. We believe that we are creating a much more high-brow offering that isn’t tainted by advertising. We feel there is a credibility that comes with being independent
3) Absolutely – it’ll be up on Monday (PST – so Tuesday NZST)
Good stuff! Look forward to Monday
Ah, this is what you mentioned the other day. Congrats, sounds awesome, looking forward to it.