A New Twist on Online IM

If you want to IM, but you don’t have any IM software available on your PC, it used to be that you were out of luck. These days, services like Meebo and Mabber can help you out. At these websites, you have the ability to log into your instant messenging accounts online. Now, in addition to the current offerings, there is a new IM site that does things a little differently. Like the others, Snimmer lets you chat with MSN, Yahoo, AIM, and GoogleTalk users. However, at Snimmer you don’t have to put in your password to establish a connection. Snimmer is designed to enable two users to talk to each other privately, without having to log in to the IM network in the usual way. Even better, at Snimmer, you can log in to one IM network while your friend is on another IM network. The Snimmer site itself is still a little rough around the edges, especially when compared to the beauty that is Meebo, but the concept is great. Flag this as one to watch.

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Today, Walmart announced the launch of a new service: video downloads. This isn’t an online video download store like their current music download service, though. Rather, the video download service is a feature that allow shoppers who purchase a particular DVD to have the option to also download the video to their computer for a small additional fee. The first DVD that has a digital download available is Superman Returns. Even better, the download service offers users three pricing options: $1.97 for portable devices, $2.97 for PCs/laptops, and $3.97 for both portable players and PC/laptops.

I almost hate it when Walmart does something right, but I have to admit, this is a great concept. I often purchase DVDs so I can enjoy them on our widescreen TV, my laptop, and of course, because they have all the nifty special features. However, to download a movie for a portable device, you end up paying for the movie all over again. Offering a bundle is convenient and forward-thinking. Although both iTunes and Amazon have had extensive movie download libraries for months now, they are not selling DVD/download bundles. I doubt iTunes ever will - that’s not their thing - but I can see Amazon copy-catting this idea very soon, especially if this drives some of their customers over to the competition. Just hope their website stays up.

This weekend, I tried out the online website creation service, Weebly. With Weebly’s AJAX interface, creating websites is as easy as drag-ang-drop. With a click of a button, you can add pages to your website and drag elements like a text block or an image block onto the page you are creating. If you mess up, you just drag the element over to the the trash can, which is off to the side of the page. With Weebly, you can even add video to your site. There are several different, attractive themes to choose from that can be easily applied to your site; however, they cannot be customized. I appreciated that the service allowed me to not only change my password, but my username as well.

My one complaint is that I emailed the Weebly team and asked if I could have a domain name point to my Weebly website without having to do a redirect. TypePad offers this service so that your blog can have a URL like sarahintampa.com, as opposed to something.typepad.com. I didn’t see this feature anywhere in Weebly’s settings, and I was curious as to what they would say — perhaps this was something they would offer in the future? I never received an email response back, which a little disappointing. It seems strange that they would ignore emails considering that there is a big "Contact" button on the Weebly homepage linking you to a "Contact Us" page, where it seems they are encouraging you to write them with feedback and questions. I began to think — what if I used this site for something "real", like a website for a small business? It would not be good if there was no support available for when things went wrong.

So overall, a good service, but if you need reliable customer support, you would be best using a paid webhost. Oh, right — did I forget to mention? — you don’t have to pay to use Weebly — it’s free. A good price, and it excuses the lack of support. Bottom line, if you would rather have a more static personal homepage instead of a blog, and don’t need any support, this is the tool for you.

This week, Google launched an online web book reader integrated with their Google Book Search. When searching for books, users have the option of using Adobe Reader or the new web reader instead. The online reader offers many features, including zooming, a fullscreen mode, the ability to switch to a two-page view that appears like an actual book, easy scrolling through the book using the mouse. Next to the book is a convenient "search this book" box as well as a linked table of contents so you can click into different sections of the book. Above the search box near the bottom are links to buy the book at several different online retailers. Who needs Adobe?

"Cyber Monday" is the Monday after Thanksgiving, and, like "Black Friday," it’s a big day for shopping, except that this shopping isn’t done at brick-and-mortar stores - it’s done online. At work! Last year, 77% of online retailers reported a substantial increase in sales on the Monday after Thanksgiving, and this year should be no different. In anticipation, Google has opened a special website at Google Checkout: http://checkout.google.com/holiday. The holiday site will feature items along with details on special promotions. Some of those promotions include the following: through Tuesday, December 26, Checkout users can take $10 off purchases of $30 or more or $20 off purchases of $50 or more, (depending on the merchant). These promotions are reusable & no special registration is necessary. Nice! Google Checkout claims to eliminate an average of 15 steps from the online checkout process, often making the process as quick as entering a single login. Currently, the website is just a landing page asking you to check back Monday. You know I will!

Another online storage site, myfabrik, is offering beta users an account with 2 GB of online storage. It’s not exactly new (see TechCrunch’s August review), but if you’re signing up for all the free accounts you can find, add this one to your list. myfabrik is different, you can tell its trying to stand out from the other storage services out there. The interface is attractive — if this was an art project, I’d be impressed — but its usability ranks low for me. myfabrik is not simple and not entirely intuitive, either. For one thing, I found the font to be hard to read in many areas. Dark gray text on a gray background isn’t easy on the eyes. And the size! Squint, squint. Or am I just getting old? Buttons are tiny, too. I drag and drop a file to the recycle bin…"You are dropping 1 item to the trash," it tells me. (Yes, I know; at least in Windows, I can shut the prompting off.) The "OK" button offered is a half-a-Skittle big in a bright shade of blue. Maybe on a large monitor, the sizes are okay, but c’mon, we’re all on laptops these days aren’t we?

Mysterious icons that require mouse-hovering for explanations abound. For example, something resembling an asterisk will "generate a micro-link" when clicked. A micro-link? I’m pretty hip to the web 2.0 lingo, but this was a new one for me. Clicking a stick-figure man means "share" and on the complete opposite side of the screen is the button to tag (a luggage tag looking icon). An icon that reminds me of the MSN messenger guy takes you to "my account," but it’s not at the top of the screen, it’s off to the right, next to the scroll up/down buttons. I try to use the "move" option under the  "Organize" button (the folder icon beneath the stick figure), but I get lost. You don’t even "upload" and "download" files at myfabrik - you "import" and "export."  Hmmm. I’m not into long experimentation, so it’s time for the pink button with the black "X." (Log out).

There were some nice touches to myfabrik - pictures had rounded corners; there were lots of different views available - like a timeline view, a list, thumbnails; drag-and-dropping of files was easy; the ability to create folders to organize, instead of just tagging; and, of course, the pop-up "experiences" box at the bottom of the screen that lets you label your files with words & icons like "love",  "friends", "event", etc. That was different. And you have to hand it to them, the price isn’t bad either - 2 free GBs, then $0.49 per extra gig per month.

Me, though? I’m going to wait for GDrive.

Do we really need another online dictionary? Isn’t M-W.com and Dictionary.com enough? Well, maybe…but those pages are rather…errr…busy. Flashing ads, links to thesauruses, etc. What if you just want to quickly know the definition of a word? Personally, I found the simplicity of Ninjawords‘ online dictionary refreshing. It reminds me of the classic Google page. Search box, "look up" button, done. The Ninjawords site says they are "fast like a ninja." Hmmm…not quite. I think they could be faster. It took five whole seconds to look up a word. To me, that’s an eternity. If they could speed it up and delivery what they promise, I would use the service when all I need is a quick definition.

If you’ve ever tried to learn some programming or Photoshop on your own, you know that you’ve spent many an hour googling what it is you’re trying to do. Now comes tutorialicious, an online tutorial aggregator that groups together the best programming, design and Photoshop tutorials on the web. You can isolate just one type of tutorial category (e.g. AJAX) by clicking its link to filter the view or you can view all of them grouped together. There is also a link to submit a tutorial, so if you know of any (or if you have written any!), you can contribute them to the site. Currently, there aren’t a massive amount of tutorials listed, but the ones that are there are very useful. I’m definitely bookmarking this site to see what comes of it later on.

Google Apps for Your Domain is a service that lets you mix-and-match Google services including private-labeled email, IM and calendar accounts. The service is an easy way to get started if you’re a small business since everything is offered for free. A recent addition to Google Apps for Your Domain is the inclusion of a start page where your users can preview their inboxes and calendars, browse content and links of your choosing, as well as search the web. I imagine this is like the Google customized homepage…I wonder if users can add widgets? Still not included in Google Apps for Your Domain is Docs & Spreadsheets, which seems to me an obvious choice for inclusion as it allows you to create, store, and share documents and spreadsheets online. Why leave it out?

I just read this interesting post over at GigaOM: A municipal wi-fi provider, MetroFi of Portland, OR, has partnered with MSN. The partnership will bring MSN content to the citywide network, with MSN providing info such as weather, news, restaurants, nightlife, movies, government services and local search. Lucky Portland.

With Google now established in Mountain View and MSN setting up shop in Portland, are we to expect that someday soon all major American cities will be blanketed by an ad-supported wi-fi network? I can only hope! I have no problem viewing ads in exchange for getting something for free . However, Tampa citizens are totally out of luck: apparently, there is free wi-fi in Tampa already, but it’s only downtown, and that doesn’t help me out much. Still, it’s better than nothing!