SocialVibe Review

I recommend this application to people looking to help raise money without really having to do too much work and you don't even have to pay for it. 

Quick Summary
According to SocialVibe's website they describe themselves as:

SocialVibe is the leading social media utility connecting people with brands to earn charitable donations using their social media properties.  Members complete and share branded activities to earn points, which translate into positive social impact via micro-donations for the member’s cause of choice.

Essentially SocialVibe lets you choose from a list about 40 "causes" that you can help support. The way you support these causes is by having people fill out survey type interactions that show them advertisements. The advertisements then donate to the cause. Pretty simple.
All you have to do is sign-up for an account or sign-in through your FB account. Then you can share your cause through FB, Myspace, Twitter, Blogger, Wordpress. You name it, and you can figure out a way to share your cause and help raise money for it.

Things I Like

• Easy to sign-up and pick a cause. 
• Lots of causes to pick from. 
• You can track your progress for how much difference you are making for your cause. 
• As you get more support, you become eligible for receiving prizes and other goodies. Plus you feel better about yourself because you are making a difference.

Things I Don't Like

• You don't get to see exactly what your cause will be doing with your donation, but that's pretty standard across most donation type situations. 

Honestly, for what the site does, they do it really well. I'm having a hard time thinking of any serious things I don't like. After using the service for a while maybe I'll find something, but as of now I can't see anything major to complain about. 

iPad Impressions

Today I am bringing you a special edition on the newly announced iPad from Apple. If you didn't realize Apple did this, then I'm just not sure....

I cannot offer a recommendation about this product, because I haven't had the chance to play with one. If you want to buy one and send it to me I am completely okay with that. I will provide a recommendation at that point :-)

**Update - Some useful information I have found about the iPad
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31322_3-10443887-256.html
http://lm.macworld.com/t/865500/7003017/50415/0/
http://lm.macworld.com/t/865500/7003017/50417/0/
http://lm.macworld.com/t/865500/7003017/50430/0/
http://lm.macworld.com/t/865500/7003017/50431/0/

Quick Summary
So Apple released a new device today called the iPad. Its a large iPhone with more power. It's got a 9.7" LED display that runs at 1024X768. Comes in a 16, 32, or 64GB model. It has a specially designed Apple A4 chip that runs at 1GHz. It does Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and 3G (which will cost 30$ a month). Its got a 10 hour battery (wow). It does multitouch and its only about 1.5lbs. Those are the tech specs.
It runs apps from the App Store. You can also get books from their new book store. Read newspapers and magazines. Watch movies and listen to music. Most of the applications have been redesigned and remade for the iPad. What this means is the Mail, Photos, iPod, and most of the other main apps are all more streamlined and specially designed for the touch interface. The result is the iPad is fast, fast, fast.
The iPad is targeted at current iPhone/iTouch users. The idea is you can pick it up and use it perfectly without any hiccups. As far as whether I think I would use one, I don't think so. Essentially its a big iPhone without the phone feature. And while browsing the web with my fingers is cool, I think that for most of what I do the iPad is just not the right tool. I think that due to the price point (499$, come on just make it 500$), lots of people will buy it just to play with it. I saw sales projections for somewhere between 1M-5M.

Things I Like

• Looks cool 
• Super fast
• Newly designed chip (that's the EE dork in me)
• Weight is low
• 10 hour battery

Things I Don't Like

*so I have to say that as much as I think this is a cool product, I have a few major complaints.  

• No multitasking. Seriously WTF, a brand new processor and everything and still you can't listen to pandora while browsing the web. I can do this with my android phone right now!
• No camera. Once again, WTF?!
• No HDMI out. In fact no out period, you have to buy an adapter, for E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G. Even a USB. Even a HDMI. WTF?!
• Go to this site for a longer list of complaints.

MOG Review

I recommend this application for music lovers that are looking for a service that combines their desire to specify songs and get a great internet radio.

Quick Summary
MOG is another internet music listening service, however they have combined some features that have been lacking in others. MOG allows you to search for specific songs, artists, or albums and play them instantly. So imagine this is the service you log onto youtube to do when you are hanging out with friends trying to find a specific song. You can then play the song using their internet player. You can play only that artist, or mix up the station by adjusting a slider to play similar music (this is adjustable which is nice, so you can play more or less of a mix).
MOG is a subscription only service that allows unlimited listening, but you can give their service a test for an hour. As far as music goes I would say the service is very similar to Pandora, but offers many more options for picking and fine-tuning (pardon the pun) the music you want to hear. The price for a subscription is 5$mth or 25$ for 6mths. Pandora charges .99$ for a month of ad-supported unlimited listening or 36$ for a year of high-quality, ad-free radio. Last.fm is a similar service (although free), but their radio service pales in comparison to either of these services and their main focus is on community building and artist discovery.
MOG is much closer to having your itunes collection online, but with the added ability that you can access any song anywhere. Their service is definitely better than Pandora or Last.fm, but lacks the mobile application I desire (for my android phone) and a free option that would entice me to leave Pandora and Last.fm.

Things I Like

• Extremely customizable. I can find music exactly as I want it. Play only one artist, mix it up, and essentially do anything I can with iTunes except that I have an unlimited library.
• Great player with awesome user interface for building playlists, sharing music, seeing lyrics, and finding new music. 
• Awesome site for finding music according to a variety of options and filters. Their site kills Pandora and Last.fm (except last.fm has a better community building feature set).

Things I Don't Like

• Comparably more expensive than Pandora or Last.fm (which although is has ads, is free up to 40 hours, and since I'm a student, any money saved is a good thing)
• No mobile application, which is something both Pandora and Last.fm offer.

Groupon Review

**Really cool service for those that love deals!**

I recommend this service for people looking to get cheap deals to various restaurants, stores, and services located in their city.

Quick Summary
Groupon self describes themselves as "Collective Buying Power". Essentially Groupon = Group + Coupon. The way it works is Groupon promises a business to get a them a certain number of customers by advertising a coupon, that will only get used if enough people buy it. For instance, a cupcake store gives out a coupon for 25$ worth of cupcakes for 12$, but this coupon will only work if at least 15 people buy the coupon. You only get charged if the deal gets enough people to purchase it. You could also purchase coupons for a friend if you think the service is something they will like.

The service works in up to 30 cities, but I'm sure they will be adding more all the time. You can have them email you the deal daily, or follow them on facebook, twitter, or as an RSS feed. Deals are typically at least 50% off and for cool things/services.

For instance today's (Jan 26) is for 50$ worth of 100$ spa services at a spa in SF. Save 50$, not too shabby.

Things I Like

• Saves you money!
• You can log in via facebook to save yourself having to make an account. 
• Super simple and easy to use. Coupons are printed from your computer with a map to the place. You can also read reviews of the service right on the home page without having to search for information about the service. 
• Businesses can use the service as a way to get customers in a cool advertising way. 

Things I Don't Like

• Not always services or things that I would like to purchase. 
• Need more cities! (Only have about 30 right now, but at least SF and SD are on there :-P)

Delicious Review (Social Bookmarking)

**In an effort to make this a more useful blog, I am paring posts down to the essentials. What this means is that I am going to focus more on providing a recommendation, quick summary, and things I like/dislike**

I recommend this service for finding out new trends and keeping your bookmarks backed up online, but not as a bookmark replacement system.

Quick Summary

"Delicious bookmarks is a social bookmarking service, which means you can save all your bookmarks online, share them with other people, and see what other people are bookmarking." - Delicious Site

In addition, Delicious can show you bookmark trends by displaying the most popular bookmarks in many areas of interest. They also have a search and tagging tool that helps you keep track of your entire bookmark collection.
My understanding of the service is that beyond its basic online backup, delicious is essentially providing a social search function. What I mean by this is that it is search intelligence created by humans. Google uses an algorithm to create its index, delicious uses humans. This means that delicious is creating a contextual search service that has the potential to be more accurate than google can be, providing you with more relevant information.
This service is owned by Yahoo, so you have to use a yahoo ID to join/sign in

Things I Like

• Cloud bookmarks.
• Find websites that are applicable to your needs using their social search.
• Search your bookmarks fast. Find similar bookmarks on their site that have been added by others.
• Way to backup bookmarks online (but not sync).
• Easy to find things you are looking for. 

Things I Don't Like

• You cannot sync bookmarks between computers, only access them through Delicious's website. It requires you to be completely tied to their web interface. You can import bookmarks that already exist in your browser, but they will not be synced if you change anything. 
• It's not an entire replacement for the way that you have your bookmarks on your browser, but rather is more of a discovery tool for finding similar sites to ones that you have bookmarked. 

Out of Contact

Sorry for no blog post on Fri-Sun. I was too busy and then went snowboarding (which was awesome).

BackBlaze Review

I recommend this service for those looking to get a online backup system for their computer. Is 5$mth or 50$yr worth knowing that you can restore your computer if it gets a virus?

Quick Summary
Backblaze is an online backup tool which allows you to backup all data on your computer. It costs 5$/mth per computer for an unlimited amount of space (to test the service you can download a free trial that lasts for 15 days), you can also pay 50$ for a year and save a total of 10$. It backups ALL your data on your computer. You can restore your data from the web or order a USB or DVD to be sent to you via FedEx.

Things I Like

• 5$ a mth for UNLIMITED backup space. I mean you could have terabytes all backed up. That's awesome. 
• The various options for restoring your information.
• Installing the program and starting the backup took about 2 minutes, pretty quick. All I had to provide was an email and password and I had an account.
• You can plug in your external HD, and back that up to. 
• Reports: it's a breakdown of what type of files are backed up (i.e. music, movies, documents, etc...)

Things I Don't Like

• As with most backup systems, the first backup takes forever! You can adjust the speed at which it happens, but it still takes a while.
• How much they charge to order a 4gb DVD (99$).

Using the System

• Once you download and use the automatic install, it immediately asks you to create an account, and then backup commences. That's it. The program lives in the Systems Preferences area, so you never actually have an icon pop-up in your dock, it does have a configurable icon for the menu bar.
• You can adjust a bunch of settings that include: 
• Online name for the computer.
• Throttle - adjust the speed with which the backup is performed.
• Warnings for when you have not backed up within a certain time period
• Show backblaze icon in menu bar
• Select Hard-Drives to backup
• Schedule for backups: continuously, once a day, or when you click
• Exclusions: folders you don't want backed up
• Security: you can add an additional private encryption key
• Reports: a breakdown of the type of files backed up
• Logs
• You also have the option of "Restore Options", where you can go to their online repository or pay to have a USB or DVD sent to you. The DVD costs 99$ and the USB cost 189$. I prefer the download zip option for free. 
• You can pause the backup at any time, or resume at any time. 
• They use "military-grade" encryption to secure data. Essentially its some super complicated algorithms that I won't go into detail over. You can read more about that on their encryption blog post.

That's it. This program is super simple. My "first backup" is still in progress, because its a little slow I will update this post once it has finished. However the program is working great at the moment.

atebit's Tweetie Client Review

**Quick Disclaimer: This application is only available for MAC's or the iPhone. However, I will be illuminating features that you should look for when downloading a twitter client for your PC.

I recommend this client if you don't already have a Twitter client, but it does not possess huge advantages over any other twitter client out there (although it does have some).

Quick Summary
Twitter has made it possible to access their service through a variety of methods. These include clients for your computer, mobile phone, website, text (the list keeps going). The twitter space is crowded with a considerable amount of clients and finding one that works for you is the most important thing.

Tweetie is good because it is very clean and basic. It allows you to quickly shorten urls (see my bit.ly post for more information on url shortening), add photos, and add videos to your posts. It is a clean program that allows you to see your tweets in more of a IM type fashion, rather than just a timeline. Its appearance looks like it was almost built by Apple. This program is also available for the iPhone.

Things I Like

• Clean interface. Functionalities allow you to do everything you want with Twitter. 
• Allows you to see your @ replies, messages, and to search. That's it, nothing else clutters the program. 
• You can add multiple Twitter accounts. 
• By double clicking a user's image, it shows you all the person's tweets. By double clicking a user's tweet it shows you the conversation surrounding that tweet. 

Things I Don't Like

• When I want to send a new Tweet, instead of just giving me a small text box at the bottom of the program, it gives me a pop-up window. While this isn't a huge complaint, it might be cleaner to just have the entry part be part of the main window. 
• As far as functionality goes, it offers pretty much the same use as many other clients out there.

Using the System

You can download a free version from their website, or pay 20 dollars for a copy that doesn't have ads appear. This seems a bit steep for a twitter client, considering how many options there are. So if you don't mind seeing an ad every now and again, going with their free version (which you can use as long as you like) is not a bad route at all.

You don't have to create an account on their website in order to download Tweetie, which is awesome. You just download the program, start it up, it asks you for your twitter name and password, and voila you are using the program. This is a very streamlined process and makes the time required to get the program up and running very small.

The things that you should have in a Twitter client (no matter what platform you use) include timeline, @ replies, messages, and search. It should be able to shorten urls, include photos, and include videos. Most importantly, it should make these things easy to do.

Overall Tweetie stands at the forefront of twitter clients. It does what it needs to and does it well.

**My preferred client for my android phone is Seesmic. If you have one you prefer add it in the comments so people can see what are good clients to try using.

bit.ly Review

I highly recommend using this service.

Quick Summary

Many of you may know about bit.ly already. It is most commonly used as a url shortener for Twitter or to make urls more manageable for emails. However, bit.ly provides more services than simply url shortening. The most important service that is worth mentioning is the ability to track a link's usage (this is explained in detail below), and therefore provide valuable statistics to the person that created the link. This can be very handy if you are trying to gauge the effectiveness of a link. 

Things I Like

• Shortens url to something that does not take up multiple lines in an email or something other form of communication.
• Gives back usage statistics about how much the link is being clicked (details below). 
• Super easy to use and share through various social services.

Things I Don't Like

• While bit.ly has gone out of their way to think of ingenious ways to make it possible to shorten your link, it still takes a little bit of time to actually do the manual shortening. 
• Can't necessarily tell where the link is going depending on how you are viewing the link. In your browser you are supposed to be able to mouse over the link and get a quick preview, but this is browser dependent. 

Using the System

Usage Statistics: bit.ly provides usage statistics for every url that you create. These statistics include number of clicks, traffic broken down by date, referrers (how the person found the link i.e. twitter, facebook, ...), location from where the link was accessed, and various metadata. You are also able to see a total amount of global link usage for bit.ly user that has created a bit.ly link to your long link (so for instance if I create a bit.ly url to google.com, anyone else that made a bit.ly link to google.com will have their clicks included in my global account).

Using bit.ly: To actually use bit.ly it is very simple. You simply paste your long link into a text field, click Shorten, customize the link a bit, and voila you are done.

Tools: In order to make accessing bit.ly as easy as possible, bit.ly has built a number of tools that you can use to access their url shortening service. Most of these tools just provide a different interface for accessing their service, so it really depends on your personal preference. I have listed them here so that you can get a quick idea about the various options 

• Sidebar Bookmarklet: this is a flyout that provides shortening.
• Standard Bookmarklet: this is a link that allows for quickly shortening a url. 
• Browser Extensions: preview links...
• Access through twitter clients
• Access through mobile: m.bit.ly
• Gmail Gadget
• Track click on amazon affiliates

Sign Up Process

The sign-up is very easy. All you provide is a username, email, and password. You can also provide a twitter account at time of signup, if you have one.

** sorry about the formatting, the cat sat on the mouse and keyboard at the same time, i tried to clean it up as best as i could.

Dropbox

I highly recommend this application. The write-up for this is fairly short because the service is extremely easy to understand and use.

Quick Summary
Dropbox is a program that you install on your computer (platform independent) and creates a folder (called dropbox) that is synced across any of your computers that have dropbox installed on it. You can also access your dropbox folder via their website. You can put anything you want in the way of files into this folder.

The amount of space you have in your folder is determined by the type of user you are. You get 2gigs of free storage and any more than that you have to pay for it. The payment options are okay, you get  50gigs for 9.99mth or 100gigs for 19.99mth.

It has completely replaced my USB thumb drives that I used to use to move files around.

Things I Like

• Great way to keep files easily accessible between different computers and get the files from their website. 
• Good amount of free space for storage. By performing certain things (referring friends, etc...) you can increase your storage in 250mb increments.
• You can share folders with friends, which is a great solution for group projects and files that are larger than email will allow you to send. 
• Recent Events: this is a tab on their website that is a feed of all the actions that you have done. Kind of a cool way to see your activity and easily find files. 

Things I Don't Like

• Trying to create an account without downloading their program is not easy to do. They intentionally make it hard to just sign-up for an account without downloading their program. 
• To adjust certain settings (like sharing) you have to use their website interface. 

Sign-up Process

• To sign-up for an account all you need to provide is a first name, last name, email, and password. 
• You can do this by signing up on their website (which isn't all that easy to do because they want you to download their program). 
• You can also sign-up for an account once you have downloaded their program and are installing it. 

Overview of the Service and its Features

• The program creates a folder on your computer called Dropbox (original right?). You can put files into and out of this folder and then it remains synced with all your computers and their website. You can right click on the folders and files to adjust their settings. 
• Their website interface is somewhat like the google docs interface if you are familiar with that. 

This service is extremely simple to use and understand.

Animoto

I recommend trying this application just to see what it does (or watch my video below), but expect some issues because the service isn't too polished just yet. I think using the facebook app could be more appropriate if you have a lot of photos on your facebook. This will allow your friends to see the video you create easier too.

Quick Summary
Animoto is a website that allows you to upload a series of pictures, video, and music, from which animoto's service makes a video from them, automatically. It makes a music video that is completely customized to the soundtrack using a technology that fits the images to the music.  It also allows you to make greeting cards.

To use their free version you can only create videos up to 30 seconds long. To create full-length videos you can buy a all-access pass for 36$yr or 3$ a video. To get videos that are commercially licensed you can pay 249$yr. So as long as you are only making small videos you can use their free service happily, but anything longer than that and you will be left wanting.

Things I Like

• Making a video is very easy and works well. I couldn't make a greeting card without having to pay. You can see the one I made here: 
• Cool idea. Makes videos fast that also look cool. 
• Sign-up process is unique. 
• Facebook app allows an easy way to share with your friends. 

Things I Don't Like

• The website, FB app, and iPhone app are connected very well and almost exist separate of one another. 
• The websites app doesn't allow an easy way to find friends or network with the community. 
• The site needs some serious tweaking to be better in way of workflow, but the actual service that is used to create a video works great.
• Kind of nit-picky, but the color scheme of the website is somewhat hard to read because it is so dark. 

Sign-up Process

• Their sign up screen uses a really cool system that highlights blocks. The different blocks are Email, Password, and About You. The highlighting really helps to read parts of the screen because the color scheme is so dark. It is also fairly original, even if the sign-up information that is being provided is fairly standard.
• What I really like about their sign-up screen is that they provide an explanation for the information they are collecting. 
• After signing up you are taken to a Dashboard type interface.

Overview of the Service and its Features

• You can narrate your videos with text. 
• The service can be used on the iPhone and on Facebook.
• The facebook application uses the animoto's website tool, but pulls in your FB videos and pictures. However, trying to use animoto's website does not pull information from your FB. At least, after spending a few minutes trying to figure out a way to link my two accounts I gave up (I mean if I can't do it quickly, why should I keep trying?)
• The Dashboard allows you to see My Videos (the videos you have made), Friends (I talk more about this below), and iPhone (more below).
• Friends: The only way you can see friends is by having a video shared with you. So there isn't really an easy way to find friends videos unless you are using the FB app (which does let you find friends).
• iPhone: You are able to view your videos from the website and create videos on your iPhone, but you cannot view videos from created on your iPhone on their website. 
• There is also a Music Lounge that lets you browse the built in music the site has, but I don't see myself really using that. 

Creating a Video Process

• You create a video or greeting card by doing a series of things in this order: choose your images/videos, choose your music, and then finalize options for the video. 
• Choosing your images/videos: you can upload images from your computer, select from photos that animoto has on their website, or retrieve photos from another site. Those sites are flickr, facebook, smugmug, picasa, and photobucket. 
• Choosing your music: select from animoto's collection or upload your own music. 
• Finalize: allows you to adjust video length (upgrade your acct to make it longer), the image pacing (1/2 speed, normal speed, or double speed), and the video cover screen. 

Aardvark

I recommend trying this service. If you have an iphone give their mobile app a try if you are interested.


Quick Summary
The main idea behind Aardvark is a search engine with answers provided by humans. You can "ask" a question by typing it into their website or using your iphone application. The questions are then answered by people with relevant experience or knowledge. By creating an account you can start asking and answering questions. The website provides a good way to get appropriate answers to questions that can't be easily searched for. This is a great way of creating community crowd-sourcing.

Things I Like

• Great way to get crowd-sourced, appropriate answers to a question. 
• Easy to use interface. 
• Easy to configure how you want to interact with the site, how you want it to contact you, and your profile. 
• Easy integration with facebook.

Things I Don't Like

• IM Commands page is wayyyy to complicated for me to even considering trying to memorize and use. I'd rather interact with the site through their website or my phone.
• No Android application, only iPhone. (Where's the love?)
• No way to easily browsed asked questions to see if your question has already been answered. 

Sign Up Process
To initially ask a question on their website you need to have an account.
If you want to sign up for an account and join their site you can do so by either creating an account with the site or you can do it by joining using fbConnect.
I tried the fbConnect method and it seemed to work fine. The site pulled in information from my profile to help diagnose my "expertise" on certain topics. You can then fine tune that information to help make it more appropriate.
Once logged in, you have a dashboard type system.

Using the System
When you are logged in you can see along the top of the screen the following options: Home, Profile, History, Network, Share Aardvark!, Help, and Sign Out.

• Under Profile you can adjust your topics (things you know a lot about), settings (how much you want to be contacted, when to contact you, etc...), Nametag and Photo, IM & Email & Twitter addresses, and iPhone (if you have one you can download their application).
• Under History you can see Questions You've Asked, Answers You've Given, Referrals You've Sent. Pretty straight forward. 
• Under Network you can access Entire Network, Friends, and Friends-of-friends. Essentially it took my facebook networks (like berkeley, san diego) and ported them over. My friends were made of FB friends.
• When you click on Share Aardvark it brings up a page that allows you to send messages to friend through your email, twitter, facebook. This is pretty standard. 
• Under Help you see FAQ, Enabling IM, IM Commands, Tips and Etiquette, and Community. Under the FAQ you can be told how the site got its name, how it works, so on and so on. IM Commands gives you a page of commands you can use to interact with the site. Tips and etiquette are a good way to get an explanation on how to interact with the community.

Along the bottom of the website is a menu that allows access to all the items in the top menu, except that it is expanded at all times.

That is a breakdown of the features of the site.