6 posts tagged “twitter”

I have to admit I've been blogging more often at Life is a Thrill and my Twitter account, and that my Vox blog has been suffering as a result. But these things are cyclical. I'm not considering abandoning this blog or anything. Vox has the best mix of features and good looks for the price (it's FREE) and I still recommend it if you're thinking about starting your own blog.

Another reason for my light posting schedule is that I've been studying for the bar exam and attending Bar/Bri review classes. It's actually a lot more work than law school was. Probably a lot more helpful, too. 

Virb is finally letting you put the Twitter flash widget on your Virb home page. You could already post the badge on your Myspace or blog, but Virb wasn't cooperating. Well, now you can add it. This handy widget displays your posts on Twitter (from either your Gmail chat/AIM, cell phone, or the Web) on another site (e.g., Myspace, Virb, Blogger). Add a post in one place, it shows up everywhere else.

You probably already know how to do add custom widgets to Virb, but if you don't click here for some pics that take you through it.

This post attacking Virb raises a number of stinging, and I think legitimate, criticisms of the nascent, would-be Myspace killer. In his post titled "10 Reasons virb sucks big time," Michael Kamleitner gives voice to a number of misgivings I've had myself:

• virb is not open - in fact it’s way more sealed up than Myspace ever was. virb currently supports external flash-content from YouTube, Google and a few other approved popular service only. compare that to the widget-ecosystem which has emerged around Myspace for the past 2 years. bidirectional content syndication from and to social networks might turn out crucial. it will be exciting to see Myspace’ anticipated/dreaded policy shifts in 2007.
• virb is hard to syndicate - I haven’t found a single RSS-feed yet. not even on my personal blog (c’Mon, even myspace offers RSS-feeds, though without full content)
• virb ain’t valid - agreed, virb’s code is lightyears ahead of Myspace’s, but does it validate against current web-standards? not really.
• virb is poorly communicating itself - I was suprised that virb isn’t using the merits of blogging to communicate with its userbase.
• virb is a silo - there is currently no way (i.e. API) to get data out of a virb-account (except of course by content-scraping). since social networking is almost commoditized (check People Aggregator or Ning) by now, and most users have realized they want to be part of numerous networks instead of one monolithic, this is probably a bad move.
• but most of all: virb is a lonely place (currently only 35 users based in Austria). sure, it’s kinda unfair to compare a service just started with Myspace’ community of +100mio users. but in the end, size-of-community is exactly the key-feature of any closed down, centralized social network as is virb or Myspace.

        (ok, that was only 7 issues, sorry for cheating on the headline )

Excepting the ridiculous criticism of Virb's small size, I think some of these criticisms are dead on, and I love Virb. The two biggies for me are the lack of support for additional "approved" flash services & the lack of communication with users. Yes, Flash widgets have their security issues, but Virb has been less than proactive about approving additional sources, and most widgets in wide use on Myspace (e.g., Twitter, Slide) are safe as milk. A cynical user might wonder whether Virb is just worried about cannibalizing their own offerings. For example, how likely are they to approve Last.fm widgets, when Virb offers their own competing feature. Their reluctance is not entirely unsurprising, but Virb isn't going to compete with Myspace by offering less flexibility.

Much of the skepticism might be alleviated if Virb had a conventional beta blog that addressed user questions regarding upcoming functionality. There is a group on Virb that solicits user feedback, but I've seen nary on official Virbster writing in response. Communication with users of a new service is paramount if you want to retain their tenuous loyalty. As big a Virb fan as I am, I still think Facebook is better, offering more useful features and excellent communication with readers.

Okay, but does Virb really suck? Nah. This list of features literally counts the ways in which the site is better than Myspace. And Virb is still new enough that users are willing to give them a pass while they roll out additional features and functionality. But they need to be careful not to spoil the honeymoon.

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EDIT: Turns out Virb does have a group for its developers. But they're not really using it to talk about what's happening at Virb. Actually, they're not using it at all.

My pal Jac asked me to put together a list of my 25 favorite/most useful Web sites.* Of course, I agreed, being the Internet dork that I am. I had planned to put together a list of each site along with a short blurb describing the sites and explaining why I liked each one. Very quickly, I realized my planned post was quite a chore and would take me much longer than I anticipated.

In the interest of time, I've posted a quick reference list below. The sites aren't in any particular order, but I have grouped them together in a few rough categories.  In the future, I'll write about each of these sites in more detail. These posts will be tagged top sites on my Vox blog (and the sites below are tagged on Del.icio.us), so you can find them easily. Some of these services I've already written about, and I'll update the tags accordingly. I've written little or nothing about most of these, but I encourage you to check them out anyway.

Please, if you have a question, or you think there's a site better than the one I've listed, let me know. I'm interested to see what you think.

1. Google Reader
2. Netvibes
3. Yahoo! Pipes
4. Flickr
5. Snipshot
6. Meebo
7. Twitter
8. Del.icio.us
9. Scrapbook
10. Google Docs and Spreadsheets
11. Scribd
12. Digg
13. Metafilter
14. Google Calendar
15. Remember The Milk
16. Virb
17. Facebook
18. Vox
19. MeeVee
20. Emusic
21. Allmusic & Allmovie
22. Metacritic
23. Pandora
24. Last.fm
25. MediaFire

Coming Soon

These sites aren't open to the public yet, but both are pretty compelling. To see why, click on the links and view the demo videos.

• Zoho Notebook
• iScrybe

Duh

These are Web sites you should already know about. If you're smart, you're already using them.

• Gmail. The most storage, POP3 access (for both Gmail and other accounts), integrated chat, lightning fast search, filters and labels that are easy to set up. It's the best e-mail you can buy. Only it's free, even the "premium features" Yahoo! and Hotmail make you pay extra for.
• Netflix. There is no other way to rent movies. True, my account is on pause, but that's only because I don't have time to watch movies. If I did, I'd be using Netflix.
• Craigslist. Before I'd buy or sell anything on Ebay, I'd look here. I check the musical instruments listings EVERY. SINGLE. DAY.
• YouTube. They're getting attacked from all sides, but this is still the best place to find online videos. Viewers who want a reliable place to find Comedy Central & VH1 clips are better served by using iFilm (Be aware that the site may soon be rebranded as the online home of Spike TV).
• Wikipedia. Andrew Morgan alerted me to the a swell Wikipedia feature the other day. Set your homepage to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random, then every time you open your browser, you'll be treated to a randomly generated entry on Wikipedia.

Remember my last post on this service? Well, I've got a few updates. First, the IM function appears to be working again, which means you can now post to your micro-blog from within AIM or YIM or Gmail chat. If you've got Twitter on your IM, you also receive updates on your IM.

My second item is a bit more interesting. Suppose you're surfing around on the net, and you find a Web site (or photo or video) you want yr pals to look at. A new service called TwitThis allows you to instantly create a Tiny URL and post the link to Twitter. Here's an example.  Your friends would receive the update on their IM service, or on their phone (if they so elect). You know how some people post links on Gchat? Well, this works in much the same way, except that it reaches other people who are on AIM or using their other service. You can read more here.

So why am I bothering you with this? Well, I think Twitter is interesting, because in the next few years, our phones are going to become a lot more useful. For some people, getting a link on their current phone might not make much sense. But if you've got a Sidekick or a SmartPhone (or an Apple iPhone), a tiny link can open a full-featured Web page. Twitter is awfully good for people with cutting edge phones. But Twitter works pretty well even if you never use it on your phone. That's because you can send messages to your pals without leaving your Gmail chat or AIM or whatever. Some of us already do this with our status updates on Gmail. Twitter does the same thing, but with more functionality and more reach.

Okay. That's it. You can find me here. Launchabomb, Brownlee, and Carrie, are on there too, but aren't too active.

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UPDATE: Courtesy of Lifehacker, here's a link to a simple Twitter "HowTo."

As you know, I'm your pal that tries out all the new Web sites. Some are too boring or too useless or too buggy to mention. But sometimes I find a site that's worth mentioning. That's when I share them with you. If I'm your pal on Gmail chat, you probably noticed the link to Twitter. So here's what's up with that.

In a nutshell, Twitter wants to be your micro-livejournal; a second tiny blog that you can update from your IM, phone, or the Web. Instead of boring people with long entries, you just put in one or two sentences (up to 140 characters) that tell your pals where you are or what you're up to. You can send (and receive) updates from your instant messenger, including, AIM, Yahoo, and even Google/Gmail Chat. If you want, you can also send and receive messages from your phone. Thankfully, this can be easily switched off. Basically, it's like Dodgeball with more features and fewer annoyances. A few Twitter features stand out for me:

• First, like Livejournal, you can view your own blog, or you can see all your friends' updates on one page. Yours are also mixed in there. Here's mine "with friends." As you can see, I have a scant few friends. I managed to get Carrie to sign up, but she was too hung over to figure out how the IM worked.
  
• Second, you can create a "badge" that you can put on your Myspace page or your blog. This actually replicates the instant update feature that Facebook has and Myspace doesn't. You can see my badge at the right. Note that this badge uses Flash, not Javascript, so that it can work on Myspace. A more feature-rich Javascript badge is also available.
  

The core reason to have Twitter is the ability to just dash off updates by typing into Gmail chat or AIM. If you've got this enabled, all your pals will see your update instantly as long as they're online OR they've got their phone. Naturally, you might want to avoid flooding your pal's phone with updates about your cat. Also, you can direct messages to only one of your pals. For example, I can type "I'm stuck at school" using my laptop, and my girlfriend (an no one else) will see it on her phone.

Recommended internet! A++++++. Would post again.

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UPDATE: Twitter's still a bit flooded with traffic after all the SXSW hype it received. So it's a bit slow, and the IM feature isn't working right now. I expect them to fix those problems shortly. I should also note that the service has received some criticism for being a one trick pony.

Personally, I think I like the fact that it does only a few useful things, and doesn't clutter the interface with ads or crap that I don't need. What it does well is let you keep in touch with people without having to surf the Internet or even be near a computer. And I think the following observation might be true for a lot of people:

What’s interesting to me about Twitter, though, is that it actually reduces my craving to surf the web, ping people via IM, and cruise Facebook. I can keep a Twitter IM window open in the background, and check it occasionally just to see what people are up to. There’s no obligation to respond, which I typically feel when updates come from individuals via IM or email. Or I can just check my text messages or the web site when I feel like getting a big picture of what my friends are up to.

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Another update: This article compares Dodgeball to Twitter. Like me, he also compares Twitter to Facebook.