Kreeo : Knowledge Networking Platform for Enterprise and Individuals

September 1, 2008

By sinha

Kreeo is a knowledge management platform that harnesses the power of collective/social learning and helps users in organizing/sharing/discovering information around their area of interest (is meant for enterprise as well as consumer usages..

Leaving the jargon aside, Kreeo essentially gives you tools to capture and organize contextual data around a topic.

Termed BoK (i.e. Body of Knowledge), Kreeo provides a framework to capture data in few specific type of information, related to the concept and inherently builds a network of users who are interested in similar topics.

For example, if you a Javascript definition page will have:

Introduction
Best Practices
Quick Reference
Tips & Tricks
News Items
Blogs
Book reviews
Trivia etc.

Overall, Kreeo seems a very promising product – they can do wonders if they can mine the data semantically.
But here is a candid feedback - the entire user experience is way too overwhelming for a normal user to understand/use the product. It’s just not clear why would one use this and not directly go to the plain-and-simple Wikipedia?

Of course, too much of AJAX might hurt them in SEO, but am sure the team has thought about this.

Do give Kreeo a spin – it’s currently in closed alpha, but if you are interested in trying it out, do leave a comment.

Update: We have 1000 invites to give away. Please leave your email id in the comment section and I’ll send you an invite.

Competition in this space: twine, mahalo

tags: kreeo

Tags: Indian Startups, profiled

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Sumeet on September 1, 2008 at 6:11 pm

Ashish thanks for an encouraging review. I’ll try to answer a few points you have raised.

- Why Kreeo and not Wikipedia: Kreeo is not an encyclopedia, rather we provide a link to wiki article next to a BOK item, we call Kapsule. BOK provides a way to collaboratively create a comprehensive Body Of Knowledge (BOK) around concepts(wikipedia doesnt intend to do this), where people can even share a drop of their knowledge (micro level contributions). we all have some knowledge but may be not masters to write a full article.
Moreover BOK is a set of items that represents a dimension of knowledge, that we use to share or seek it. Like I may not be a master but I know of a good story related to a concept like “Leadership”. You can BOK it as a story BOK item in the concept “Leadership”. Moreover on Kreeo, people can contribute BOK items as Links to good pages/bookmarks by putting them into a concept as a relevant BOK item type, they can even share their knowledge/experience as original contribution(wikipedia doesnt allow this).

Idea is to create holistic BOKs by combining drops of knowledge (tips, best practices, stories, examples, resarch & stats etc.)

A drop from all can create an ocean for all.

SEO: We choose to create a AJAX heavy site to provide a multitasking interface (no back button required, all content opens in muti tab interface, user can write a blog, post a BOK item, send a message all in parallel). Most people compromise on usability for SEO. We are working on a separate version of Kreeo which will be only for crawlers/BOTs.

Whats the benefit: If people share the kreeo way, they can learn from each other, save time spent on web research, save time spent on solving day to day work related problems, market themselves better as recruiters can see value added profiles(Kreeo updates each Users’s profile with a summary of their online contribution and activities, that can not be fudged)

Kreeo provides a new way of sharing and doing meaningful, knowledge related networking on web. The biggest challenge we face is how to educate the users on the benefits and usage, I welcome suggestions from all. Leave your email id and name (what is kreeo? section in Home Tab) and we will send you an invite.

Gaurav on September 1, 2008 at 7:50 pm

KM or shall I say KM2.0 is cetainly a hot topic behind firewall. Many of big companies have implemented internal facebooks to web2.0 like systems. With social computing gaining ground, the traditional KM is dead. KM2.0 systems need to be people centric and not document centric. They also need to have more DIY tools and features. Wikis are one of best tools for enterprise collaboration which along with community based asset management system can do what most enterprises need for managing thier knowledge.

BTW, I dont think if Mahalo really falls in this space. But the market segment is already too crowded. SocialText, clearspace and many other players have pretty matured products. I would like to give Kreeo a try though…..

Sumeet on September 1, 2008 at 8:34 pm

I agree Gaurav, mahalo/wikia.search is not a direct competition, twine is the closest. Lead by Nova Spivack, who happens to be the grandson of Peter Drucker the key proponent of Knowledge economy and increasing the productivity of knowledge.

In kreeo we have a totally different approach than clearspace etc. They are just a bunch of tools like wiki, blog etc put together. Very difficult to overcome the change challenge in an enterprise with such tools, BTW 90% KM initiatives fail becasue of change barriers.
In Kreeo our focus is on organizing knowledge content based on how normal people relate to it and on usability. Our enterprise model combines the benefits of open web and secure enterprise implementations (cant reveal more than this as we are in a nascent stage)
Research shows that > 80% of learning that happens is Informal in nature, we wish to enable Informal learning through Kreeo and let users manage knowledge themselves.

Prashant on September 1, 2008 at 8:02 pm

The site looks a bit overcrowded..Too many things on a single page…But the concept is gud

Sumeet on September 1, 2008 at 8:45 pm

Prashant,
The page never reloads in Kreeo, its 100% ajax. Idea is to enable multitasking interface (desktop like). Our UI motto is “Variety with simplicity”, its a big challenge and as you know UI is always a work in progress.

We used a lot of feedback from initial alpha users and completely changed the UI 3 times (current ver is the 3rd one). We wish to keep evolving based on user feedback. Its a platform driven by user contribution and feedback, users suggest and we make changes to the technology.

Please have a look and share your thoughts on how we can further improve it. There is a Poll also on Kreeo about the new UI

venkata giridhar on September 1, 2008 at 10:08 pm

venkatagiridharch@gmail.com

Pratham on September 2, 2008 at 1:58 am

Sumeet,
It doesn’t work on my system (FF3 / proxy+).

I get an HTTP 411 error (content length required) on the 2 POST requests.

Sumeet on September 2, 2008 at 9:54 am

We are working on it. People accessing from certain offices are facing the problem. We have not been able to identify the exact cause, most probably its because of the proxy server, which is detecting certain keywords in the content and blocking the xmlhttp request. Will appreciate any tips that can help us locate and fix the cause.