A New Player in Online Editors' Team - Aviary.com

Undoubtedly, I’ve already written about a great number of sites and services related to social networking sphere, and to be honest, I’ve been fed up with this theme a bit.

Though, when the time came to decide upon the topic, I’ve chosen to take a closer look at the content we are likely to share most – photos & music, and the tools and engines we use to create a masterpiece out of the ordinary.

In this respect, in addition to well-known Photoshop (which frequently turns out to be a bit “heavy” or “bulky”), and the basic image editors, inserted into the apps for different mobile platforms, a range of online image editors have also gained considerable popularity. Here, the first service that comes into thought is surely Picnic, which has become of the widely-applied tools not only for editing pics and photos, but for their instant sharing as well.

To be honest, the popularity of Picnic has really reached the global scale at a certain point: it’s currently used by millions of people all over the world, and is even connected to one of the file-sharing giants 4shared, which offers the users to edit their photos directly from their accounts.

Nevertheless, I’d like to dwell upon another market player, namely Aviary.com, which has managed to combine the photo-editors (including effects editor, vector editor and image markup, etc.) and the music-creator+ editor at one place.

Having tested versatile available features I have pointed out a number of essential benefits of Aviary.com, like its simplicity of usage, especially as far as photo-editing is considered. The whole range of available features is simply to access, apply and undo, in case you have made a sort of a mistake.

As for the music creator and editor, these aspects are more complicated to grasp, though the smart service authors have also placed the intelligible tutorials at the site, so their usage gets much simpler.

One more important advantage of Aviary is the provided user-friendly Web and Mobile API, aimed at fast insertion of photo and music editing tools into both web and mobile applications of various kinds.

At the same time, I wouldn’t be me if I couldn’t find a flaw in powerful Aviary.com services, though in this very case it’s not really a flaw, but rather an amusing aspect. This is related to Aviary-friendly site, Worth1000.com, designed to launch the contests for photographers with different skill levels and experience.

I’m not saying that Worth1000.com is bad, or, has little chances to become incredibly famous among the users. On the contrary, all contests are structured in a logical way, and the whole idea of the site appeals to human natural desire to boast a bit.

Yet, the prmised awards aren’t that valuable, so that I’d try very hard to win in the site’s contests. In fact, their majority is nothing, but a presented digital badge, whereas the number of sponsored contests with worthy prizes is still insufficient from my point of view.

Basically, you can satisfy your ego, but you can’t fill your wallet with Worth1000.com.

Looking forward to hearing more?

Stay tuned)
Andy

Unexpected Pinteresting Innovations

Honestly, the number of photo-sharing sites we’ve got today is totally stunning. I’m not even speaking of more general file-sharing sites, like 4shared or RapidShare, where users can share not only photos, but any other files, as well. I mean, the specific services, offering people to exhange their “photographic” emotions, photo-events, etc.

On the market, where you sometimes get lost, what service to choose for this or that photo to share, having got Flickr, Tumblr, yFrog, or even Twit-connected TwitPic at your disposal, it’s hard to imagine some innovation to be encountered, as all sites of such kind are more, or less similar in their entity.

Yet, I have lately found a brand-new service, Pinteresting, which presents its users at least with one unique core feature that have brought this “youngster” to the top of popularity. I’m talking of one’s opportunity to share the image, pic, or photo he/she finds worthy of viewing without copying/pasting it from one site to another, or saving it on one’s PC.

The essence of Pinterest, as its founders explain, lies in its “drag’n’drop” simplicity – you only need to add the special “Pin It” plugin to your browser and feel free to drag’n’drop any image from the Web to your Pinteresting profile to share it.

Other options also include the keyword-search option, “Like” and “Repin” buttons that work in pretty the same way, as FB “Like” and “Share” buttons.

Sounds awesome? I’d say it does.

At the same time, as with absolutely every available service, there can’t but be found some flaws in Pinterest:

1) You’ve got to be invited to become a part of Pinterest family. I’ve been already speaking about the fresh services, acting like G+, forcing you to search for invitations of such kind, but with Pinterest, the case is somewhat different.

The thing is that you have to apply to the site’s owners for membership. In this respect, I’ve been already waiting for more, than a week, and still haven’t been allowed to start “pinning” photos I like. A) The site is so popular, that the authors haven’t read my e-mail yet. B) They tend to neglect new users.

Guess, the first variant is more credible, but I feel a bit offended, really.

2) Copyright protection. Pinterest founders claim, that the initial site link, where you take a particular pic from is always stored, so you don’t violate any copyright, but what if I’ve taken any copyright-protected photo from my blog, where I had formerly put it without caring about violating copyright laws. How will Pinterest check it?


Anyway, as soon as I’m accepted in Pinterest community I’ll be able to tell you more. For now, let’s just wait a bit.

Stay cool)
Andy

To Say Sorry, To Conratulate and To Observe ShopCade

I’ve been busy, guys; I’ve really been busy, though I know that any justification of my absense for some time isn’t suitable enough.

For now, I can only say I’m sorry and one more thing: now I’m married, officially, so looking forward to getting some congrats from your side, both live and online!))

If talking seriously, there have passed a number of serious events while I was gone, like The Europas 2011 Winner Announcement, for instance, by the way, for those who haven’t heard of it yet, the startup that has won Grand Prix is PeerIndex (the sort of analogue of GroSocial or somewhat like this), and this fact can easily be used as one more confirmation of various social services having now become insanely popular…and profitable.

Yet, I would now like to speak of another new site that has also much in common with social media networks and is aimed at your earning due to being more active and “persistent” – that is ShopCade.

To start with, let me explain the actual idea, how ShopCade platform works: you check the relative online store app on Facebook, purchase the goods, and also share/recommend what you’ve bought with your friends, of course, in case, you wish to earn some money.

That’s basically it, the more your recommended goods are purchased, the more you can earn, as in every affiliate program.

Is ShopCade useful?

Well, as with every affiliate program, like the ones, you’ve all perhaps participated in (namely, AdSense, or, mm some of them from file-sharing sites, like RapidShare or FileTram Affiliate Program, etc.), it’s not really hard to make some cash.

Is ShopCade the good source of income?

I wouldn’t be so sure, really. I mean, if you were given the rewards for clicks, it could become a good way to make money, but you need your friends to buy, and this turns out to be not as frequent, as it may seem. So, it can only serve as a bonus, not the main salary.

Is ShopCade annoying?

Oh, yes, yes, it is. I’ve already spent hours speaking of how disturbing it is to be spammed by your friends. On the one hand, you realize that they wouldn’t spam you in vain; they just don’t have another choice.

On the other hand, you simply start loathing the services, which make the good people spammers.

Such irritation would prevent me from using the services of such kind. So, even if Dropbox ovecome 4Sync or SugarSync one day (though I doubt that))), for example, I wouldn’t use it anyway. The service which shows no respect to its users, deserve no respect.


Ok, I’m heading to have lunch with my wife now. C ya soon, guys, I’ve missed you.

Stay cool)
Andy

The Europas 2011 - European Technology Startups Awards

It’s true that the ecomomic crises happen majorly on a cyclic basis, and it’s almost impossible to prevent another cycle.

Yet, the the recent economical crisis which has touched upon the whole world has proven the fact that virtually nothing can prevent the technological progress and the invention of numerous useful products or the lauch of ingenious, still already highly-profitable start-ups.

Here, it hasn’t been the surprise for me to encounter the exciting news about the upcoming “European Tech Awards (The Europas 2011)” taking place on November, 17, 2011 in London, aimed at defining the best technology startups in 2011, although the experts are now predicting the 2nd wave of economic crisis that will affect the EU countries most of all.

Despite of the fact that The European Technology Startups Awards is rather young (started in 2009), it has good chances to become one of the hottest awards in European software industry.

The thing is that unlike slower European tech startups development, the new business in the US have already become countless and I have written about many of them already, the tendencies show that the major part of them is connected either to a fun, yet partially useless apps, or the marketing and social media marketing services (let’s recall Visual.ly, Epom or Fliptop, for instance).

There’s, of course, other niches, mostly related to internet security and created to prevent the customers’ loss of money (I have tested both the oldies like McAfee and have also learnt about ITM Secure, if to give the names).

How about the nominees in The Europas 2011? I promise to present you some of my favorites tomorrow)


Stay tuned)
Andy

Dropbox Updates Make You Laugh

As a prologue to this post, I’d like to say that I can’t stop laughing at the whole “11.11.11” fever and still can’t really get, why people worldwide go crazy about all this number-stuff. Are really such dates memorable? Perhaps, they are, but only if something memorable happens during the day, am I right? What if you’ve got your 1st child born on November, 10, 2011? Would you even pay attention to 11.11.11? Guess, not.

Conclusion: it’s not the date or time, which matters, it’s rather about the events or people who make you value this or that day.

Well, that was just a laughing user’s remark.

Now let’s get to more serious things, which yet can make you laugh even more. In particular, I’m talking about the recently watched interview of Dropbox CEO Mr. Houston, who was talking of completely useless things with the most serious face ever.

For the record, I’m not aiming to insult anyone, especially Mr. Houston, I’m sure that he’s a smart man and a highly-qualified specialist in his field. Though, his above-mentioned interview can evoke nothing, but laughing from my side, really.

The thing is that Mr. Houston was speaking about the upcoming Dropbox updates and dared to state that the service is not about the files in the first place anymore, as it gonna become much more in the nearest future.

I certainly agree with the fact that the upgrades are more, than necessary in every service, if the company’s interested in maintaining its reputation and revenue. Nevertheless, in the case with Dropbox updates, they should be really useful.

And saying that the backup service shouldn’t be a folder also sounds a bit confusing. I’ve always been a sort of a naiive person believing that the most important things in syncing and backing up your files (see, I still use the word “files”))) are the simplicity and security. The way you use your sync folder should be as effortless as it’s only possible. In this respect, the more side features are being added, the more the syncing process gets complicated. Consequently, the user appears to be offered too much, when only the core essence is needed.

As an example, ok, Dropbox promises adding your FB friends’ tagging in the synced photos, but do I really need them? Hell no, synchronization is all about getting access to your data whenever your need the files, no matter which computer you’re using. What does FB tagging have to do with it?

May be if I were a lazy teen, and was bored enough to check what my friends are syncing at THIS VERY MOMENT, or where some of my pals has taken a certain synced pic, I’d care about such an update, but Thanks God, being an adult you have more serious and essential things to do.

As P.S. Dear Mr. Houston, I get that you’ve probably got no idea about this blog, but if you find this post somehow, please, oh, please, take a look around. Some of your rivals, like the authors of 4Sync, for instance, have done their homework, and the updates of their new version are much more valuable. They have made their service work better, faster and in a more secure way without adding some unnecessary functions. There should come the time, when others’ experience, like the one from 4Sync, should be taken into account, don’t you think?

United Ad Serving Platforms vs. Individual Players

I’ll tell it at the very beginning, this post won’t be long, though it certainly touches upon one of the vitally essntial aspects of promoting any product (e.g. IT product) and incresing its sales rate.

I’m now talking about the recent news about AOL’s, Microsoft’s and Yahoo’s Ad platforms being united together.

What does it mean?

Technically, this is rather a very brave move in the fight against Facebook and Google, which now hold the larger sergements of ad serving market.

On the other hand, this is also the very smart move from the side of the companies. Whereas the amount of money in ad serving niche is more, than impressive, the Yahoo’s chances to win over Google, for instance, are totally minute.

The principle saying “Together we are stronger” seems to be working perfectly in this very situation.

Of course, the experts, as usual, remain skeptical and offer to wait and check, whether the cooperation of three players on the market will be as effective and profitable, as it is now claimed to be, and, they’re probably right in such suggestions.

Meanwhile, what is also essential, the ad serving & exchange “playing field” has recently been added numerous “fresh” players, many of which have already received critical acclaim from the side of users.

The software forums start talking of the new Epom.com service, which possesses a few advantages over its elder competitors, like Doubleclick, for example.

I would now describe all that I’ve read, but I promise to get back to both services as soon as possible, right after I get a chance to test them.

For now, the only decent conclusion we all can make is that the more diversified the ad serving market becomes, the more opportunities for development, it will, naturally, receive.


As I’ve promised, the post is short enough))


Stay cool)
Andy)

Milk.Inc Gets Unexpected Google Support

For what it takes, Google seems to be the very first potential King in the software world, at least the company’s, obviously, got such ambitions. One more actual proof of this statement is the recent invenstment into one of the freshmen on the current software development market- Milk.Inc.

To be honest, I’ve never heard of Milk before, and it has become an interesting matter to find out what innovations they have got at their disposal to attract such giant as Google and receive the huge investment.

Well, the Milk.Inc site is fun to observe, mainly because there’s actually nothing to observe within its interface. On the beige background (a bit girlish and hell knows, what it has in common with the notion of Milk)))) you can’t, somehow, even find the About Us section, though there’s a short phrase at the Home page, saying that the company is involved in software development. Thank you, guys, or better to say, Captains Obvious.

The vacancies section isn’t exactly the section, but at least it’s noticeable, likewise as the offered subscribtion options for everyone who is interested in Milk’s achievements.

These options are, in fact, the only sources of information that enabled me to learn that there’re some apps, already created by Milk.Inc developers, namely one – Oink app.

Being launched on the basis of truly creative idea, Oink app is yet more frustrating, than encouraging now, much because of the fact that the users need to wait for being invited and their application to be accepted. The explanations from the app authors are seemingly reasonable saying that the servers are still being tested. On the other hand, why not test them either quicker, or before the app starts being distributed at iTunes.

Anyway, what I should say is that my scepticism makes me not believe in the cloudless future of Oink app, if Milk doesn’t introduce some essential upgrades.

So, why has Milk attracted Google, after all? I have several versions here:

1) Milk has got many talented software developers “in the sleeve”.
2) Google tries to control all new software development companies on the market and involve them in the company’s projects.
3) Google headquarters just love Milk.

P.S. The whole situation with Google investing in Milk.Inc made me wonder, how much such investments are rewarding in the long run. Guess, they really are. The outsourced specialists can do some extra job, certainly, but their involvement is rather more effective in API Programs, like Facebook or 4shared API Program, for instance, than on a permanent basis. At the same time, the more creative developers you hire, the more chances to succeed you have.

Stay cool)
Andy)

To Unthink or Not to Unthink – that is the Question!

As I’ve already numerously mentioned, the modern paste of life as much as the widened, if not the eliminated international borders, at least as far as web-technologies are concerned can’t but make the social intercation and networking almost vital.

In this respect, large and developed companies, of course, tend to focus on social media marketing opportunities, whereas the average users happen to spend much time just socializing and sharing any info they find worthwhile, at least to laugh at.

Within the whole bunch of old and new social media networks, the well-known ones, like Facebook, for instance, are still holding the winning torch, but the young rivals are strengthening up now.

Among these, whereas some players like FlipTop happen to attract and reach more business-oriented target audience, some of the brand-new services, like UnThink are more about individual users, who aren’t interested in promoting their company within the social network in the first place.

Being presented as the so-called “Anti-Facebook” service, the founders of Unthink.com have focused on establishing high security levels that can be manually defined by each very user towards different sectors of their audience (that is followers, friends and connections).

Of course, I have also tested Unthink.com that is, btw, yet in its beta version to check if it’s working well and whether there’re some peculiar innovative features in it, which would allow UnThink get to the Top of the social networking rating.

Well, let’s see what we’ve got:

1) UnThink.com is working and the registration is quite simple (not as simple at 4shared, for instance, but likewise plain as in FB).

Here, I’ve noticed 1 small note in the account-verification pop-up stating that as long as the site is still available in its beta version, there’s a chance that I won’t be able to sign up for now. I suddenly recalled the similar situation when the initial Google+ was presented,. And it was actually worthy of waiting for registration. Would people put up with the same thing on UnThink? I highly doubt it.

2) The introductory wizard. It was fun to check the video with the friendly Tree (that doen’t work yet ((((), but it’s a bit too long and boring to check all 5 offered steps of the wizard.

2) The interface seems pleasantly-colored, though I kinda noticed that a great number of sites use white&green palette in their designs, like FlipTop that I wrote about yesterday, and many others. Guess, it proves the lack of creativity, but who knows…

One more thing about the interface, it seems to bulky, as from my point of view, as there’re at once numerous options, sections, buttons, and you turn out really confused in terms of which one of them should be opened/clicked, etc.

3) Now about the whole idea of UnThink. The claimed ultimate goal of the service is to provide the users with the highest levels of their data security, which they, moreover, change and define manually. It seems very similar to what you have at 4shared (namely various access levels you can select for your files). Meanwhile, it seems way too different from Facebook or Twitter, where it’s more complicated to point out all privacy settings for your profile.


In a whole, the only possible conclusion we can make regarding UnThink is that the service deserves “A” for the concept and so far “D” for its realization.

Stay cool)
Andy)

FlipTop.com – More About Social Intelligence & Media Influence

I’ve been for long confident of the fact that the social presence of a separate individual has already become equally critical for small, medium and large companies, no matter what niche they happen to occupy on the market.

Hence, it’s obviously justified that the social media networking PR-strategies have become more, than common in the recent times, and you can hardly find a world-popular brand that hasn’t yet acquired its official Facebook or Twitter Page, for instance. It seems like every reputable company, starting with the software grandees, like Apple Inc., Google, Microsoft, 4shared, and others, to more casual Coca-Cola, Pizza Hut or Starbucks (the list is immeasurable, you know that), have got their official and, what is more, unofficial FB and Twitter fan pages at least.

But the importance of social intelligence in networking media isn’t now only curtailed by official fan pages and the posts with company updates; these have already converted into the platforms to increase the brand’s popularity, audience reach and, consequently, the number of sales. In this respect, it also seems logical that numerous services, analysing your enterprise activity and influence have become much more famous among the users.

I have already spoken about Klout.com with its vaguely useful Klout scores and much more convenient GroSocial and for now, let’s check one more interesting service, Fliptop, which is, apparently, innovative in its essence, despite having been created on the similar basis with Klout.

The thing is that, the majority of services, offering you the analysis of you social intelligence and media presence and sometimes the range of options, how this very presence can be improved are developed on the basis of “connecting” your social network accounts with the specifically created account on the site of the service. Fliptop.com, here, isn’t an exception, but what is new about it, that you are displayed the number of clicks on each and every post (text, photo, or whatever), that is you can check, how much attention this or that information attracts.

Moreover, the Fliptop is also the web-based platform to purchase profiles and increase social media influence and, in such a way - your sales rating in such a way.

In a whole, I wouldn’t dare say that Fliptop is useless, or that the service can’t have an impact on the rating of company’s popularity, yet it can’t probably become the key factor in earning and maintaining the brand’s reputation.

As a P.S. I say that whereas large companies should definitely engage in various social intelligence and media marketing activities, we, the average users, can play with other beautiful and exciting toys to present ourselves to the social media world. In addtion to customizing my Twitter and 4shared account, I’ve also adored using Flavors.me, like this:

Stay cool)
Andy