folkmann.ca » interweb

Pics Oh….

jfolkmann — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 18:21:06 +0000

Another useful on the road type tool is Pixoh, which allows you to edit your pictures online. They’ve got the basics of resizing and croping etc and plans to add a bunch more. This would make a great addition to the Flickr toolset.

Meebo. Unsung hero.

jfolkmann — Mon, 20 Feb 2006 14:00:06 +0000

Techcrunch posted another update on the web based IM client Meebo, and it reminded me of my meebo experience last week. Stuck in New York JFK airport for the better part of 48hours (due to the snow storm), without a laptop and no access to IM, meebo saved the day. Thank you Meebo…you’re a travellers dream.

Note to Microsoft:
I tried using web messenger, and it just didn’t work on the Business Lounge computers, not to mention all of the problems with pop-ups etc. Sort it out.

World of Warcraft maps

jfolkmann — Mon, 30 Jan 2006 02:20:07 +0000

This is an interesting use of the google maps. MapWoW. Fantastic for game play, not sure if it counts as cheating. I guess knowing where all of the locations for things might be considered a cheat. Although it seems like they’re running into a bit of digg trouble.

Sorry; herb, ore, treasure, and location label viewing has been disabled for now. Our tiny shared host can’t handle the load of digg.

Have to say i’m tempted. Ok, last WoW post…but don’t they say that the first step to dealing with addiction is talking about it?

Webby bits.

jfolkmann — Sat, 14 Jan 2006 06:11:07 +0000

Some interesting stuff from the week…

Odopod (A design agency in SanFran) redesigns. They say they’re a two headed monster. “We’re a design studio of two minds: story and logic. When they get together, good things happen.”
They’ve done some nice work, including a great flash/html hybrid.

Make your own custom ice cream. I’m thinking my Liquorish cheesecake will be a hit!

“DateBox is a pure JavaScript library using DHTML and advanced Date parsing to generate the date based on the grammar passed. The purpose of DateBox is to simplify the date entering process using grammatical terms we are all familiar with.” If you didn’t understand what that said, it’s like predictive text.

Clockr. Now this is clever. Using flickr number photos to tell time.

Canon EOS beginners FAQ

Space is cool.

I wish I’d thought of that

jfolkmann — Thu, 12 Jan 2006 04:13:58 +0000

http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/
http://1000tags.com/
http://www.themilewall.com/

Outstandingly simple, stupid ideas all of them. It’s been mentioned on just about every blog, but i’m just as impressed (or dumbfounded) as everyone else. It’s like we’ve gone back to 1995. Perhaps i’ll make a big green button that doesn’t do anything but refresh ads.

Feeling under the weather

jfolkmann — Sun, 08 Jan 2006 12:11:57 +0000

Since I returned from China I haven’t really been feeling myself. In trying to figure out what’s wrong with me (I’m pretty sure it’s not bird flu), i’ve been using the trusty interweb and have discovered that health websites are generally shit. This whole whole sector could use with one big redevelopment.

4 tips to making a better health site.

1. Please make a search that works. There is no excuse now that google makes their search available for you to use. If you have other methods of searching (Faceted), even better!

2. Please provide access to other sources that have either more information or different information if relevant.

3. Include comments and group type features on the same page as the symptom information. When I’m reading about my symptoms I want to hear how other people have handled it…invite doctors perhaps!

4. Let me know if the medical advice is sound by providing a reference that i can check. See the BBC for an example. (Although it would be nice to know who Bob is.)

Corporate boringness

jfolkmann — Fri, 06 Jan 2006 02:32:18 +0000

Intel launches their new site, yet another corporate site with a big header image and some news below. Isn’t there anything more interesting that designers can do? I’m rather disapointed with the state of corporate web design. Common’ people!

Yahoo. Web 2.0 employer.

jfolkmann — Sun, 11 Dec 2005 12:44:08 +0000

Everyday we get another press release about another product being absorbed into the Yahoo machine. Del.icio.us was bought yesterday, Flickr before that and probably many smaller properties I don’t have a clue about. Not too mention bloggers such as Tom Coates (former BBC) etc. It’s amazing how the hiring of real talent affects a business, Yahoo has been launching product like crazy lately and i’ve mentioned i’m impressed before. I wish the agency world (that I live in) would learn a thing or two about hiring like this. Hire smart people, they’ll make your business better. Give them room to grow and they’ll make you the best. Yahoo! has got this.

See you in a few. Off to NY.

Ask questions, find answers.

jfolkmann — Fri, 09 Dec 2005 19:44:00 +0000

Yahoo Answers was launched this morning. This is a very interesting service, as they’ve taken a community driven approach rather than the paid expert approach that a number of other similar services offer. The answers to questions are rated and then the community picks the best answer. Genius. As mentioned at Techcrunch, they need to figure out how to incorporate tagging. The navigational structure they have at the moment will break eventually.

I’m constantly impressed with the products that are coming out of Yahoo at the moment. They “get it”.

Poetry

jfolkmann — Tue, 29 Nov 2005 03:31:08 +0000

A project i’ve been working on for the last 4 months is finally ready to go live. The Poetry Archive will launch on the 30th of November (hopefully to much fanfare and applause), allowing access to recordings of poets reading their own work. This includes a historic archive of many hard to find recordings from the past.

Update: It’s now live! We had a great launch party at the British Library and recieved coverage on the BBC, the NYTimes and many more local language news papers around the world. Well done all!