---
Maybe I am behind on the latest in Internet technology or there have been huge changes in recent months due to further popularity of Web 2.0.
The latest trend is to collect your Internet activity into one common place. For anyone that enjoys social networking through familiar sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Plaxo or commonly uses sites such as Flickr, Digg, Picasa, Last.fm will have come across how separate your work on the Internet can become. On top of this you might have your blog and RSS subscriptions. It is a full time job to keep any one of these updated or fun for visitors.
When you meet new people you end up having to choose which sites you are going to share with them and if you start one more website, you need to invite all your friends. Another fact is that, like in my case, I have many friends that don't like social networking that much - and never want to subscribe to any one of these. My work on the Internet therefore is only for the selected few tech savvy, attention hungry friends that I have (oh, wait, I actually have rather many friends that fit into that category).
Now all of a sudden there is multitude of websites that offer you to combine all your services into one location. Sort of "your life on the Internet". You get your own web address, or can even in some cases tweak your own web address to display that page. Once registered you link all your current social network sites and from that point forward it will display everything there.
In the past few weeks I have been trying some of these to see how useful this is.
Chi.
mp - "Own your identity with chi.mp"
The first site I heard about and tried was the Chi.mp. They call themselves Content Hub and Identity Management Platform. You register for a free domain name and few seconds later you are in. As usual I stuck to my SamRag name, so my website with Chi.mp is now samrag.mp
The main reason I originally started with Chi.mp was to find an alternative to Plaxo. I have over 2000 contacts and Plaxo is becoming behind in functionality - and constantly want be to pay subscription even though there is nothing really to be gained with it (beside getting rid of the constant request for the subscription). Chi.mp seemed to offer a whole contact category, where you could both import, maintain and add contacts as you liked.
My disappointment were great when I saw the awfully simple interface, with only the absolute basic information for my contacts. Even Facebook with their horrid friends listing looks better.
What Chi.mp offer also is different level of access right - fancily named Persona, for Public, Work and Friends. In some sense I don't really get why they are offering this. If you don't want to share your stuff with the world, why would you get a website like Chi.mp anyway. And the set up is confusing, or at least it was to me. The idea though is similar as what Facebook is doing with their privacy settings and just as easily misunderstood.
Oh, and they are compatible with the vCards.
The service connection Chi.mp offers are:
Yahoo, RSS Feed, Flickr, Hotmail, Twitter, Facebook, Gmail. (Through the RSS Feed you can of course add several other services)
They also allow you to put all your online identities nicely on your profile.
Once you have set this all up the person visiting your site can filter the content by the services you have connected to it.
Verdict:
Neither the look or functionality will make you want to show your friends to this site.
+ Quick and easy to set up, with your own short brand homepage
- Address book is a mess. No functionality after initial installation. No archives
storytlr - "Your life online"
The next one I tried was storytlr.com, and already I saw that here was something much more interesting. Beside all the functionalities of Chi.mp (excluding the address book and what comes with that), storytlr has a function called "stories".
I have so far not tried the story function, so I will not comment about that just now. However, I signed up and made the connection: samrag.storytlr.com. There is much more to choose from regarding layout and connections. You can also use the setup on your own website in an easy manner.
When this was all done and set up and I went to my newly created homepage it looked much nicer than the Chi.mp one. The greatest functionality though was the archives. I can go back to a set month in the past - and see my "Life Online". That made a whole lot a sense to me and I look forward to trying out the 'stories' functionality.
In the preference page you are also given a lot of different function (most of which I haven't tried yet). They seem easy to do though and presented in a organized way. Some of these 'extra' features are:
- Pre-designed pages
- Ability to change the whole look of the page
- Add extra tabs (videos, pictures, external page, free html page)
The service connection storytlr offers are:
Delicious, Digg, Facebook, Flickr, Google Reader, Identi.ca, Lastfm, Picasa, Qik, RSS, Seesmic, StumbleUpon, Tumblr, Twitter, Vimeo and Youtube
Verdict:
In a totally different league then Chi.mp. In every way much more fun and packed of functionality. It also gives you stuff to do after you have set this up (stories, pictures, video etc.)
+ The look,functionality and archive functions
- Flickr pictures come up as a single entry, often taking up many pages (Chi.mp was the same). There is no address book or connection to friends (but is that a minus??). Also privacy settings are either for all or no one.
Lifeblob - "Your life on a timeline"
The last one I have tried so far is lifeblob. It is the fanciest one yet, though if anything overly so! After registering and receiving the longest URL yet in this unofficial test of mine (lifeblob.com/user/samrag)I connected the few services they offer so far. What created me was a timeline, with blobs for each day where I had posted something. Behind each blob was a related blob from someone else posting similar stuff that day.
I must admit that I got totally lost with this one. This site didn't seem to be about collecting your online life into one place, but more to find other similar creatures out there, and possibly to connect your timeline with your friends timeline. There is no link to find your friends on other services (though you get a change to send out invitation to them). The available services to connect are also very few.
The service connection lifeblob offers are:
YouTube, Picasa, Flickr, Smugmug, Blog, Twitter
Verdict
It might be too quick for me to judge this, but in the realm of what I'm looking for (record my online life...) this seemed to be an overkill in the look, and didn't really show my online life as much as showing it in relation to the rest of the world.
+ Fancy, and lots of activities after initial set up
- The purpose of the website is a bit lost to me... confusing, though after some usage might come very clear.
Kakuteru - "Your life. Shaken, not stirred""
I was going to check Kakuteru.com out - but it is in Beta Stage, and only available by invitation. Hopefully I receive one soon so I can add some comments.
Conclusion
Of the above websites I will most likely stick to storytlr, unless a better ones comes along. I might keep the others up - just for the fun of it.
However, I look forward to further development in this field...
Leave comments, opinions, and if there are other sites out there worth checking out - let me know
Maybe I am behind on the latest in Internet technology or there have been huge changes in recent months due to further popularity of Web 2.0.
The latest trend is to collect your Internet activity into one common place. For anyone that enjoys social networking through familiar sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Plaxo or commonly uses sites such as Flickr, Digg, Picasa, Last.fm will have come across how separate your work on the Internet can become. On top of this you might have your blog and RSS subscriptions. It is a full time job to keep any one of these updated or fun for visitors.
When you meet new people you end up having to choose which sites you are going to share with them and if you start one more website, you need to invite all your friends. Another fact is that, like in my case, I have many friends that don't like social networking that much - and never want to subscribe to any one of these. My work on the Internet therefore is only for the selected few tech savvy, attention hungry friends that I have (oh, wait, I actually have rather many friends that fit into that category).
Now all of a sudden there is multitude of websites that offer you to combine all your services into one location. Sort of "your life on the Internet". You get your own web address, or can even in some cases tweak your own web address to display that page. Once registered you link all your current social network sites and from that point forward it will display everything there.
In the past few weeks I have been trying some of these to see how useful this is.
Chi.
mp - "Own your identity with chi.mp"The first site I heard about and tried was the Chi.mp. They call themselves Content Hub and Identity Management Platform. You register for a free domain name and few seconds later you are in. As usual I stuck to my SamRag name, so my website with Chi.mp is now samrag.mp
The main reason I originally started with Chi.mp was to find an alternative to Plaxo. I have over 2000 contacts and Plaxo is becoming behind in functionality - and constantly want be to pay subscription even though there is nothing really to be gained with it (beside getting rid of the constant request for the subscription). Chi.mp seemed to offer a whole contact category, where you could both import, maintain and add contacts as you liked.
My disappointment were great when I saw the awfully simple interface, with only the absolute basic information for my contacts. Even Facebook with their horrid friends listing looks better.
What Chi.mp offer also is different level of access right - fancily named Persona, for Public, Work and Friends. In some sense I don't really get why they are offering this. If you don't want to share your stuff with the world, why would you get a website like Chi.mp anyway. And the set up is confusing, or at least it was to me. The idea though is similar as what Facebook is doing with their privacy settings and just as easily misunderstood.
Oh, and they are compatible with the vCards.
The service connection Chi.mp offers are:
Yahoo, RSS Feed, Flickr, Hotmail, Twitter, Facebook, Gmail. (Through the RSS Feed you can of course add several other services)
They also allow you to put all your online identities nicely on your profile.
Once you have set this all up the person visiting your site can filter the content by the services you have connected to it.
Verdict:
Neither the look or functionality will make you want to show your friends to this site.
+ Quick and easy to set up, with your own short brand homepage
- Address book is a mess. No functionality after initial installation. No archives
storytlr - "Your life online"
The next one I tried was storytlr.com, and already I saw that here was something much more interesting. Beside all the functionalities of Chi.mp (excluding the address book and what comes with that), storytlr has a function called "stories".I have so far not tried the story function, so I will not comment about that just now. However, I signed up and made the connection: samrag.storytlr.com. There is much more to choose from regarding layout and connections. You can also use the setup on your own website in an easy manner.
When this was all done and set up and I went to my newly created homepage it looked much nicer than the Chi.mp one. The greatest functionality though was the archives. I can go back to a set month in the past - and see my "Life Online". That made a whole lot a sense to me and I look forward to trying out the 'stories' functionality.
In the preference page you are also given a lot of different function (most of which I haven't tried yet). They seem easy to do though and presented in a organized way. Some of these 'extra' features are:
- Pre-designed pages
- Ability to change the whole look of the page
- Add extra tabs (videos, pictures, external page, free html page)
The service connection storytlr offers are:
Delicious, Digg, Facebook, Flickr, Google Reader, Identi.ca, Lastfm, Picasa, Qik, RSS, Seesmic, StumbleUpon, Tumblr, Twitter, Vimeo and Youtube
Verdict:
In a totally different league then Chi.mp. In every way much more fun and packed of functionality. It also gives you stuff to do after you have set this up (stories, pictures, video etc.)
+ The look,functionality and archive functions
- Flickr pictures come up as a single entry, often taking up many pages (Chi.mp was the same). There is no address book or connection to friends (but is that a minus??). Also privacy settings are either for all or no one.
Lifeblob - "Your life on a timeline"
The last one I have tried so far is lifeblob. It is the fanciest one yet, though if anything overly so! After registering and receiving the longest URL yet in this unofficial test of mine (lifeblob.com/user/samrag)I connected the few services they offer so far. What created me was a timeline, with blobs for each day where I had posted something. Behind each blob was a related blob from someone else posting similar stuff that day.I must admit that I got totally lost with this one. This site didn't seem to be about collecting your online life into one place, but more to find other similar creatures out there, and possibly to connect your timeline with your friends timeline. There is no link to find your friends on other services (though you get a change to send out invitation to them). The available services to connect are also very few.
The service connection lifeblob offers are:
YouTube, Picasa, Flickr, Smugmug, Blog, Twitter
Verdict
It might be too quick for me to judge this, but in the realm of what I'm looking for (record my online life...) this seemed to be an overkill in the look, and didn't really show my online life as much as showing it in relation to the rest of the world.
+ Fancy, and lots of activities after initial set up
- The purpose of the website is a bit lost to me... confusing, though after some usage might come very clear.
Kakuteru - "Your life. Shaken, not stirred""
I was going to check Kakuteru.com out - but it is in Beta Stage, and only available by invitation. Hopefully I receive one soon so I can add some comments.Conclusion
Of the above websites I will most likely stick to storytlr, unless a better ones comes along. I might keep the others up - just for the fun of it.
However, I look forward to further development in this field...
Leave comments, opinions, and if there are other sites out there worth checking out - let me know
5 comments:
I got a chi.mp page in part because I liked the idea of being able to have different personas. I would like to present professional information online without having to share with business contacts that fact that I am a fan of the TV show Lost, for example.
However, I have been completely unsuccessful in making any personas other than my public persona available to anyone. A friend was unable to find my Friend persona even after she signed up for her own chi.mp page and assigned me to her Friend persona. There was nothing that even indicated that the different personas existed.
Chi.mp has no help section to speak of so at this point I can only describe it as a frustrating service.
Hi Sam, thanks for the review of Storytlr ! Great to see that you liked our service the best :-) Don't hesitate to send us any feedback or issues you may have, we always try to improve.
Thanks Eschnou, I'll be sure to do that :)
Hey Sam,
Excellent feedback - thanks for taking the time to review lifeblob. Look forward to hearing more from you as you use it.
There is one thing that I wanted to explain about the blobs and the timeline design to understand if it is valuable to you:
Every blob has relations that could be other people, place or tags ( proxy for your interests ) and it is these relations show up behind the blobs that you see on the timeline. The idea behind this concept is that as you scroll the timeline, you get to see how your relationships changed over a period of time, which is something I find very interesting to watch.
You can also click on a relationship to explore it further. If it is a person, you go to that person's timeline at that point in time and get to see what he/she did around that time. And if it is a tag, you get to see blobs by others with the same tag - the idea is to help people with similar interests find each other easily.
I think we need to explain this better on the site, but would love to first hear if you find these concepts valuable after reading this explanation.
Cheers,
Pranav
If you wish for to get much from this post then you
have to apply such methods to your won blog.
My web blog - Fake Louis Vuitton Bags
Post a Comment