SXSW: Here We Come…

Author: janequigley
Filed under: Events, clients, crayon

Tuesday
Mar 10,2009

…and by “we”, I mean me and my fellow-crayonista, (and social media Boy-Toy) Greg Verdino. Not only are we going to hang with the TechSet, maybe hit some Karaoke, and be social in a way that, well, isn’t me, but we have actual WORK to be done!

Two of crayon’s clients, ooVoo and Panasonic, will each be participating at SXSW.

I’ll be one of the people staffing the booth (#231!) for ooVoo, where they’ve announced the official debut of its open API - so they’ll be lots of demos and question-answering. And all you developers? Ask about the App Store that ooVoo’s putting together to showcase your applications - oh, and also make some money. Another sneak peak? Contests for the best application (and there are multiple categories) - if you ask, I bet someone will even suggest some apps to start. BTW - I’ll be looking for an iPhone app, once Apple opens the camera to video.

Also - another crayon client, Panasonic’s Living in HD Community, is one of the sponsors of the live Diggnation event on Saturday Night at Stubbs (see Event info/RSVP here and here). I’m really enjoying working with the Revision3 guys (Hi, Ryan!) and am really excited to show off the community (and announce some cool contests!) to this audience.

So - if you’re going to SXSW, let me know, it would be great to say Hi!

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The Big Picture - iPhone Photo Apps

Author: janequigley
Filed under: Photos, Social Networking, What Excites Me

Sunday
Jan 18,2009

I’ve had a Flickr Pro account for over 2 years. There’s been this fantasy that I’m going to buy one of those amazing cameras, take a class and carry it with me everywhere (like CC Chapman and Brian Solis). So far, not so much.

Then I bought a Diana Camera this year - a quirky, plastic, “toy camera” that’s been a lot of fun and taught me a lot about patience in my instant-gratification life. But still, not so much my everyday companion.

I love my iPhone - and I’m an AppStore addict - so I constantly download, add (and subtract) applications, and was so excited to find an app called “ToyCamera”.

ToyCamera takes the kind of quirky, light-leaks filled pictures that I get with my Diana, without the wait for photo development. I think the developer, Takayuki Fukatsu, is an amazing talent, and has created an app that surprises you with every shot. The filters included in this app include:

Vintage Green effect
Vintage Yellow effect
Vintage Warm effect
Low Saturation
High Saturation
Toning Sepia
Black and White
HiCon Black and White

It also has an uploader to the BigCanvas Photoshare - which I don’t use - as well as a Flickr group.

This month I’ve made a commitment to take 5 pictures of wherever I am each morning and post them to Flickr, no matter how I feel they turn out. You can follow my progress here (and this one is my favorite so far). Takayuki Fukatsu has also made a couple of other fantastic apps, OldCamera (Black and White pictures), SepiaCamera (just as it sounds) and QuadCamera, a really neat effect that takes 4 quick pics and puts them in a number of different ways, stacked, side-by-side, etc. All of them are just as addictive as ToyCamera.

To upload to Flickr, I’ve been using the application by XK72, Mobile Fotos. Mobile Fotos allows you to view photostreams, favorites, tags, sets and groups, as well as search for photos, read and make comments, or see other Flickr members photos.And of course the easy uploader - I can upload to groups as well as my photostream.

Since this is a relatively new passion, I’ll see if this sticks beyond my alloted commitment. But it feels like it will. And I’m looking forward to seeing it in action at the next conferences I’m at.

Are there other apps I should check out? Any tutorials? Let me know.

Update 1.24: Just released - an online companion to QuadCamera, QuadAnimator, which takes your QC pictures and saves it as an animated GIF file.Â Fun!

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My favorite Video of 2008

Author: janequigley
Filed under: Best2008

Sunday
Dec 28,2008

I’m going to be highlighting some of my favorite things of 2008 this week, and I thought I’d start out with this video. What could be better than Christopher Walken cooking?

Man Makes Chicken with Pears

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Greg Verdino: The Book Of Twitter Follows

Author: janequigley
Filed under: Microblogging

Wednesday
Dec 3,2008

From the Not column in the Dead or Not game, my crayonista collegue Greg Verdino brings you Genesis (the ProgRock group, Not Bible chapter):

Oh Phil Collins, you balding seer of online social networking.Â How could you have possibly known that thirty years after Genesis released …And Then There Were Three… a band of raging Twitterati would be anguishing over who to twit and who to qwit? OK — technically speaking, Mike Rutherford wrote the lyrics to “Follow You Follow Me” and I’m pretty sure he wasn’t thinking of Twitter, but I’ve got a soft spot for bald guys (or a bald spot for soft guys) so I hope you’ll let me off easy…Greg Verdino: Marketing, Media & Trends, Dec 2008

You should read the whole article. He goes on to talk about who he follows on Twitter and why. I’m always interested in people’s “Twitter Philosophies” (for lack of a more pretentious term) and I love seeing the rational behind who gets follow’d back - so how do YOU decide?

I don’t have a set criteria - I look at people’s profiles and tweets and try to see why they wanted to connect with me. Or if they bring the funny.

And as for Greg, well - was Genesis REALLY Genesis after Peter Gabriel left??

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Pownce No More…

Author: janequigley
Filed under: Microblogging, Micromedia, crayon, news

Monday
Dec 1,2008

Today on the Pownce Blog, Leah Culver announced that the service would be closing in a few weeks and that the team would be moving to SixApart, makers of MovableType, TypePad and Vox blogging software. I was really excited about Pownce when it began because it seemed to take the next logical step from where Twitter was and enabled actual sharing of files and media. Perfect for my team and making a more social-enabled workflow. Immediately, I signed up for a Pro Account, to show support (although when it came time to renew, it was difficult and I quickly gave up) and distributed most of my invites. At the time it was the “New Shiny Thing” so a lot of Twitter conversations ported to Pownce. Unfortunately, even before coming out of beta, most ported back.

Acccording to the SixApart announcement, the incredible Leah Culver and Mike Malone are joining the SA engineering team (I see that as hugely important as the annoucement last week that Rael Dornfest is joining the Twitter team). Huge coup for 6A. Many people are taking that to mean that Pownce will be absorbed into the SixApart universe in some fashion, but I don’t think so. Too many microblogging platforms exist, all of which can be imported into any platform - why have another? Especially when there are so many features that I can see this team producing, adding immediate value to 6A - especially to TypePad!

It seems that Pownce Pro users will get their own free TypePad account for a year and that Powncers are able to export their posts and can then import them to other blogging services such as Vox, TypePad, or WordPress.

Thanks to the Pownce Team for all of their work and a platform that I think might have been slightly aheaad of its time - I’m looking forward to seeing where SixApart goes from here.

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Event: Network Solutions - Solutions Stars Video Conference

Author: jquig99
Filed under: Events, crayon

Monday
Oct 27,2008

Disclosure: I’ve been working - in a small way - on this wonderful event with Livingston Communications for Network Solutions. ooVoo (a crayon client) is the video platform of choice for this event.

The Solutions Stars Video Conference is happening October 29th at 1pm. A number of social media luminaries (listed below) - the kind that you usually pay a couple thousand to see - have participated in this incredible event.

The format: Videos will be uploaded one at a time, one after the other and will focus on the following nine areas:

Building Web Presence
The Social Opportunity
Start with Listening
Strategy Drives Outreach
You Need Social Networks
To Blog or Not to Blog
Visibility Through Search
Rising Above the Noise
Time Demands

And when Network Solutions says “stars” they mean it. Take a quick look of the participants:

One of the things I love about this event is that it’s such a cool format - with budgets getting cut and time at a premium, you’re able to experience the best part of an A-level conference without the headache of air travel and seeing all of those people you don’t like anyway.

(Not you. I totally can’t wait to see you again.)

The other cool thing - you can participate! There’s a live chat room, where you can talk amongst yourselves, as well as the ability to ask real-time questions of Now is Gone’s Geoff Livingston and Network Solutions Shashi Bellamkonda.

And of course you have the option to share what’s going on to your social networks and also track this event on Twitter by the #solutionsstars hashtag (What’s a hashtag?).

Also - Please visit the “Solutions Stars Video Conference” event pages on Facebook and Upcoming:

So - please come, experience (and participate in!) this event on October 29th at 1pm - I’ll see you there!

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Sweetcron - Noise Pollution? Host your own FriendFeed!

Author: jquig99
Filed under: Lifestreaming

Sunday
Sep 7,2008

I’ve been following Yongfook since I wrote about 8apps on Setting Contexts. Unfortunately, 8apps is gone (would be GREAT to see someone buy that and run with it…) and Yongfook has moved on - he’s the guy behind Sweetcron, a self-hosted Lifestreaming solution.

Sweetcron is a simple (10 minutes install) solution with an already active community - it’s Google Group is very active, with members helping each other and discussions about developing themes, plug-ins and more.

I initially had an issue installing on one of my other hosts (it seems that a database prefix was the issue) and my subsequent install on a new DreamHost account went smoothly. It really did take only a couple of minutes to do and I like the results (www.nycjane.com).

Self-hosted Lifestreaming solution

There have been a few issues with feeds (Brightkite) and someone else’s avatar is showing on my Twitter feed - but I’m confident that’s just tweaking. I also installed Disqus for comments and a WuFoo contact form (as recommended). Both of these last 2 additions were made easy by searching through the Sweetcron Google Group. They had really specific instructions - and all seem really helpful!

Sweetcron (along with some new Open Source microblog platforms) is something to keep an eye on - especially as we inch one step closer to Enterprise adoption of these conversational marketing tools.

Other examples of Sweetcron installations:
* Yongfook
* Sean Percival’s Hurricane Gustav Aggregator
* Mine
* Sean Percival’s TechCrunch50 Aggregator
* Roycifer.com

Please add others in the comments!

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crayon’s panel at Podcamp Boston 3

Author: jquig99
Filed under: Events, PodCamp, crayon

Tuesday
Aug 19,2008

I was going to be on this panel (until I took a certain job...).

The crayon Panel at Podcamp Boston moderated by Greg Verdino, with Doug Haslam, Phillip Robertson and Adam Broitman!

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I Still Love Twitter

Author: jquig99
Filed under: Microblogging, Twitter

Monday
Aug 4,2008

There’s a bit of unrest among the Twitter natives. The service is up and it’s down and…it is what it is.

What it is to me - I’ve been using Twitter for almost 2 years, and as I’ve said I’ve been on long enough to fall in love and out of love and back in love with it. Now 2x over. I also wrote a response to a Brian Solis post about how disappointed I was in their handling of certain seeming violations in their Terms of Service. Then I felt guilt about piling on without knowing both sides of the story.

Twitter was - almost - the first (anyone remember Dodgeball?) and despite scaling issues have done it better than anyone else. Jaiku is pretty much done (Is Google the place where Web 2.0 apps go to die? Jaiku? Delicious? Dodgeball?) with no movement since the acquisition. But now there are new option seemingly every day, Plurk, identi.ca and Posterous among them. FriendFeed is a big favorite among early adopters, with the opportunity to have longer conversations and comments for each of you and your friends items.

There are also push services, like Ping.fm and BlogIt, which can push status updates and blog posts to a number of services at the same time. Personally, I feel weird about that. I have many “friends” across the different services and it feels like I’m spamming them instead of concentrating on delivering unique content. My issues, not yours

Twitter (and Facebook) is where the my conversations are and where I’ve met people who have become personally important to me. There are talented people, who I’ll never meet, who I look at their Twitter pages each day. I’ve had job interviews and opportunities because of Twitter and have met a ton of smart people who I now count as friends (or collegues). I check in to FriendFeed, I look at the other services I’m on - but those are appointment check-ins, not integrated into my daily workflow.

In fact - I still can’t get excited about Plurk - and I know plenty of people who are. I just can’t get past the interface (again, my issue!) and the whole karma point system makes no sense to me. Many of my connections love it and I plan on checking in every once in a while - it’s just not for me. On the other hand, I’m enjoying Posterous and the simplicity of emailing all of my updates, pictures, etc. It’s easy and fast.

Do the Twitter down times disturb me? More of a gentle to general state of annoyance. Do I wish they would set their business model? Uh, yeah (I’m sure they can’t wait to do that too). But I love the service and the team - both of which have changed the daily way I communicate with the world. And have brought me opportunities and people in my life that I would have never had before Twitter.

(And BTW - it’s still FREE!).