10th October 2006 - New Media Nonsense
The world wide web was invented 16 years ago.
Its seen boom and bust – been heralded as both a new dawn and a load of hype.
Today a site run by two 20somethings that’s less than two years old and has yet to make money has been sold for $1.6bn.
Funny old thing the internet.
This week, a mixture of sites. Some with no aspiration to sell for millions – their aim to just look lovely, make people smile, or meet the needs of a small discreet audience. Others whose ambition is large and whose creators are no doubt dreaming of their own Yahoo/Google/Microsoft acquisition.
So first, the beautifully designed, entertaining, surprising or just silly
Etsy is a way to shop online: by colour. All products on Etsy are scanned for the colours they contain and an average colour is found. When you click on their beautiful colour interface, you’ll see images of products available in your chosen colour. Sounds complicated, but as with all good web things, it isn’t, and its worth trying it out. Try throwing the item thumbnails around, or chuck them off the interface altogether. The design of this site is its genius rather than its business model. Try spinning images or dragging them, change the background to black, there’s something amazingly addictive about playing with Etsy.
Etsy
Next a site for Jackson’s of Piccadilly who sell tea. This just shows how surprising some of the innovators in new media are. At the AOP awards this week, the best use of a new media platform went to Nature.com a serious science site for something called Avian Flu mashup which mixed Google maps with outbreaks of Avian Flu. Here a traditional retailer has a stunning site. Try navigating by hovvering over the flower heads. Simply lovely
Jacksons of Picadilly
Some sites aren’t even using design to sell something, they are simply a pleasing way to spend a couple of minutes. Try moving your mouse and clicking on this site inspired by the artist.
Jackson Pollock
But as usual, not everyone is being creative in a highbrow way. Someone spotted that Paris Hilton always uses the same pose in front of the paps. Here on a loop is endlessly entertaining proof (more fun with sound)
Paris
And almost as good, her nemesis Lindsay Lohan
Lindsay
Next, a group of sites that are all about web 2 type stuff – user generated content, social networking and collaboration – these are the guys who are no doubt hoping to catch the eye of the big boys.
Firstly, Blogger is big, but can be a pretty clunky application. Why not try the new kids on the block. Vox allows you to pull in feeds from Flickr, Amazon and others, you can publish audio, video, images, and entries from your mobile, and it has many more lovely templates than plain old Blogger. You’ll need an invite to sign up as its in beta and they’re using that clever “exclusive club” Gmail tactic but if you’re about to start a blog it’s a very nice and friendly place to do it.
Take a look at my blog on Vox to see what yours could look like
My Blog
If you want to start your own, here is the place to get yourself invited
Vox Invites
And here’s the link to their homepage
Vox
You know those sites that you hear about from about 5 different people in a short space of time? Writely is one of those for me. It’s a place where you can create documents on your PC, upload them to Writely, keep them online and edit them from anywhere, allow other people to edit them, and then download easily back to your PC. Highly likely that this kind of functionality will be built into the new Microsoft operating system Vista if it ever launches.
Writely
Chatsum is a way to chat with all other Chatsum users who are looking at the same website at the same time as you. Take a look at this page which shows how it might work on a news site.
Chatsum
Twitter combines a blogging concept with SMS. You send texts to a number from your phone. Your text can appear in a number of ways: it can appear on the public web pages if you want everyone on the site to see, you can ensure its just seen by your friends, you can upload to your own Twitter page or you can take the feeds to insert on your MySpace profile or other Blog. Basically its blogging by sms.
Twitter
Want easy video editing software but don’t have a mac and not convinced you want to buy some pricey piece of software? Try Eyespot. Easy editing, easy sharing (even to mobile) and another nice interface.
Eyespot
If you’ve already got a video you want to share with the world (and its all legal with no copyright issues) then think about a world beyond YouTube. Revver allows you to make some cash back from the ads put around your content. Nice idea and something we can expect to see a whole lot more of as people try to commercialise their creativity
Revver
As we know, text isn’t dead, and the internet isn’t just about video. Reviews remain a pre-eminent resource online, and as the repositories grow, restaurants, hotels and other companies just aren’t able to seed positive reviews that that outweigh negative ones. Trip Advisor is huge now and had thousands of hotels listed, but there are masses of other great sites growing just as vast.
Yelp is a US site that got a really great interface. You can read what "real people" are saying about restaurants, hotels, nightclubs, etc… in New York, Seattle, Phoenix and 21 other US cities. The site is yet another example of mixing up brilliant tools like Google Maps with user generated content. Try searching for a restaurant in New York (if you don’t know any try Balthazar). Scroll down the results page and see how the map follows you down. Hovver over pins in it to see pictures and contact details for results. Click through to the top result for reviews, other places you might like, nearby nightlife, shopping etc.. and new restaurants. Lets hope they come to the UK soon.
Yelp
If its TV you want to know about rather than eating, go to Television Without Pity for incredibly acerbic in depth reviews on all US shows.
Television Without Pity
And if you’ve got your own site, or blog and want to know just how its doing (did you know the average blog has one reader – the author!) once again good old bloody Google has the solution. Track how people came to your site, Geotargeting (where in the world your traffic came from), effectiveness of ad campaigns and performance of Google AdSense. From very very simple pages, to complex ecommerce sites, Google claims this can tell you all you need to know.
Google Analytics
So that covers the small, lovely, artistic sites, and the big 2.0 sites that are hankering after acquisition. Finally, however, one of the opportunities bubbling up with broadband penetration and video, centres around video education. Sounds dull. It isn’t. Imagine how-to guides for everything from cookery to treating injuries; or from hooking up your PC to your TV, to how to fix your car - basically its on demand video instructions for everything you’ve ever wanted to do.
The first is Videojug who’s tagline is “Life explained. On film.” Search for instructions on something specific, or browse by category. There’s no doubt room for improvement on the execution of some of the videos, but I have to say, cookery books with instructions on how to poach an egg perfectly have frustrated me endlessly as they never really explain exactly what they mean – here on videojug you can sit and watch.
Videojug
But if you still really like printed instructions, there’s a wiki that you can check or contribute to which is the ultimate “how to” manual
Wikihow
Finally CNet have set up a section of video tutorials to teach teach non-geeks how to do all sorts of technical things from upgrade to high-definition TV, set up a wireless home network or stream digital music from a computer to another room in the house. The "convince me" pages offer reasons why you should take on a particular job in the first place-which comes in handy if you’re sceptical. Visitors are invited to vote on which projects CNET's experts should tackle next.
Digital Home
But despite all of this wonderfulness, it seems only right to end with the type of site that makes you ask “don’t these people have anything better to do??”
Songs For My Funeral
Funny old thing the internet…
Its seen boom and bust – been heralded as both a new dawn and a load of hype.
Today a site run by two 20somethings that’s less than two years old and has yet to make money has been sold for $1.6bn.
Funny old thing the internet.
This week, a mixture of sites. Some with no aspiration to sell for millions – their aim to just look lovely, make people smile, or meet the needs of a small discreet audience. Others whose ambition is large and whose creators are no doubt dreaming of their own Yahoo/Google/Microsoft acquisition.
So first, the beautifully designed, entertaining, surprising or just silly
Etsy is a way to shop online: by colour. All products on Etsy are scanned for the colours they contain and an average colour is found. When you click on their beautiful colour interface, you’ll see images of products available in your chosen colour. Sounds complicated, but as with all good web things, it isn’t, and its worth trying it out. Try throwing the item thumbnails around, or chuck them off the interface altogether. The design of this site is its genius rather than its business model. Try spinning images or dragging them, change the background to black, there’s something amazingly addictive about playing with Etsy.
Etsy
Next a site for Jackson’s of Piccadilly who sell tea. This just shows how surprising some of the innovators in new media are. At the AOP awards this week, the best use of a new media platform went to Nature.com a serious science site for something called Avian Flu mashup which mixed Google maps with outbreaks of Avian Flu. Here a traditional retailer has a stunning site. Try navigating by hovvering over the flower heads. Simply lovely
Jacksons of Picadilly
Some sites aren’t even using design to sell something, they are simply a pleasing way to spend a couple of minutes. Try moving your mouse and clicking on this site inspired by the artist.
Jackson Pollock
But as usual, not everyone is being creative in a highbrow way. Someone spotted that Paris Hilton always uses the same pose in front of the paps. Here on a loop is endlessly entertaining proof (more fun with sound)
Paris
And almost as good, her nemesis Lindsay Lohan
Lindsay
Next, a group of sites that are all about web 2 type stuff – user generated content, social networking and collaboration – these are the guys who are no doubt hoping to catch the eye of the big boys.
Firstly, Blogger is big, but can be a pretty clunky application. Why not try the new kids on the block. Vox allows you to pull in feeds from Flickr, Amazon and others, you can publish audio, video, images, and entries from your mobile, and it has many more lovely templates than plain old Blogger. You’ll need an invite to sign up as its in beta and they’re using that clever “exclusive club” Gmail tactic but if you’re about to start a blog it’s a very nice and friendly place to do it.
Take a look at my blog on Vox to see what yours could look like
My Blog
If you want to start your own, here is the place to get yourself invited
Vox Invites
And here’s the link to their homepage
Vox
You know those sites that you hear about from about 5 different people in a short space of time? Writely is one of those for me. It’s a place where you can create documents on your PC, upload them to Writely, keep them online and edit them from anywhere, allow other people to edit them, and then download easily back to your PC. Highly likely that this kind of functionality will be built into the new Microsoft operating system Vista if it ever launches.
Writely
Chatsum is a way to chat with all other Chatsum users who are looking at the same website at the same time as you. Take a look at this page which shows how it might work on a news site.
Chatsum
Twitter combines a blogging concept with SMS. You send texts to a number from your phone. Your text can appear in a number of ways: it can appear on the public web pages if you want everyone on the site to see, you can ensure its just seen by your friends, you can upload to your own Twitter page or you can take the feeds to insert on your MySpace profile or other Blog. Basically its blogging by sms.
Want easy video editing software but don’t have a mac and not convinced you want to buy some pricey piece of software? Try Eyespot. Easy editing, easy sharing (even to mobile) and another nice interface.
Eyespot
If you’ve already got a video you want to share with the world (and its all legal with no copyright issues) then think about a world beyond YouTube. Revver allows you to make some cash back from the ads put around your content. Nice idea and something we can expect to see a whole lot more of as people try to commercialise their creativity
Revver
As we know, text isn’t dead, and the internet isn’t just about video. Reviews remain a pre-eminent resource online, and as the repositories grow, restaurants, hotels and other companies just aren’t able to seed positive reviews that that outweigh negative ones. Trip Advisor is huge now and had thousands of hotels listed, but there are masses of other great sites growing just as vast.
Yelp is a US site that got a really great interface. You can read what "real people" are saying about restaurants, hotels, nightclubs, etc… in New York, Seattle, Phoenix and 21 other US cities. The site is yet another example of mixing up brilliant tools like Google Maps with user generated content. Try searching for a restaurant in New York (if you don’t know any try Balthazar). Scroll down the results page and see how the map follows you down. Hovver over pins in it to see pictures and contact details for results. Click through to the top result for reviews, other places you might like, nearby nightlife, shopping etc.. and new restaurants. Lets hope they come to the UK soon.
Yelp
If its TV you want to know about rather than eating, go to Television Without Pity for incredibly acerbic in depth reviews on all US shows.
Television Without Pity
And if you’ve got your own site, or blog and want to know just how its doing (did you know the average blog has one reader – the author!) once again good old bloody Google has the solution. Track how people came to your site, Geotargeting (where in the world your traffic came from), effectiveness of ad campaigns and performance of Google AdSense. From very very simple pages, to complex ecommerce sites, Google claims this can tell you all you need to know.
Google Analytics
So that covers the small, lovely, artistic sites, and the big 2.0 sites that are hankering after acquisition. Finally, however, one of the opportunities bubbling up with broadband penetration and video, centres around video education. Sounds dull. It isn’t. Imagine how-to guides for everything from cookery to treating injuries; or from hooking up your PC to your TV, to how to fix your car - basically its on demand video instructions for everything you’ve ever wanted to do.
The first is Videojug who’s tagline is “Life explained. On film.” Search for instructions on something specific, or browse by category. There’s no doubt room for improvement on the execution of some of the videos, but I have to say, cookery books with instructions on how to poach an egg perfectly have frustrated me endlessly as they never really explain exactly what they mean – here on videojug you can sit and watch.
Videojug
But if you still really like printed instructions, there’s a wiki that you can check or contribute to which is the ultimate “how to” manual
Wikihow
Finally CNet have set up a section of video tutorials to teach teach non-geeks how to do all sorts of technical things from upgrade to high-definition TV, set up a wireless home network or stream digital music from a computer to another room in the house. The "convince me" pages offer reasons why you should take on a particular job in the first place-which comes in handy if you’re sceptical. Visitors are invited to vote on which projects CNET's experts should tackle next.
Digital Home
But despite all of this wonderfulness, it seems only right to end with the type of site that makes you ask “don’t these people have anything better to do??”
Songs For My Funeral
Funny old thing the internet…
posted by Blach at 5:40 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home