In our ongoing search to find fun online tools, we found Jing. It’s a great tool to annotate screenshots and includes a really easy upload component so that sharing is easy. You can also create a video of user interaction on a site and share that. However, the best thing we found on the site is the refreshingly lo-fi demo video. It’s a simple and fun use of Swift3D.

We’re trying Stixy as an internal collaborative work space for projects. As long term Basecamp users, we’re used to a digital project management solution and Basecamp works well as a tool to share with clients. However, it always seems too structured as a workspace. Stixy, however, is a free form desktop that can be used to share notes, to dos, photos, calendars and is much more intuitive for our designer minds (i.e., it allows you to be messy as well as make things pretty)!

TechCrunch provides a nice overview of Stixy, as well as calls out future enhancements that include chat/messaging as well as drag-and-drop functionality. TechCrunch also points out negatives like lack of Stixyboard ownership and file versioning. For now, we’re fine with the lack of these features as long as we can color theme our projects.

Who thinks micro is the new black?  Hello Twitter!

MediaBuyerPlanner says:

- Small banner ads on mobile phones produce the same brand recall as 30s TV spots

OYGYRT says: but are MUCH cheaper to produce

MediaBuyerPlanner says:

- Mobile banner ads produce higher clickthroughs than online banner ads.

OYGYRT says: Capture mobiles now because wouldn’t you guess that a lot of this bounce is due to the relative novelty of mobile banners? Soon, don’t we expect the clickthroughs to be comparable to online banner ads, as people start to tune them out like they do banners on sites?

MediaBuyerPlanner says:

Minorities are more likely to use new media (mobiles, text, ipods, etc.) than whites (see chart).  

OYGYRT says:

PLEASE hire a designer to lay out your marketing charts, we can barely stand to look at them!

Despite being informed recently that Flock is “so three weeks ago”, I’m just starting to use it.  The most interesting feature of Flock, for me, is the blogging functionality…which I have yet to use.  I’ve been finding it a pain to log into the WP admin site to post.  So, I set this blog up in my sidebar and started my post. However, there’s something about the interface I don’t like.  I can’t quite put my finger on the issue, but I started a post and saved it, and opened it and saved it again.  And…then went into WP admin and am posting…  In trying to sort out the cause of my reluctance, I only get to the inability to preview the post (or have I missed that?) and not being sure the post will display in my posts list in the WP admin area (surely, yes?).  I feel like a TESTING123 post may be needed. So instead of blogging, I’ve spent all my time setting up my Facebook, and looking at my friends in the sidebar.

MODx is cooler than the other side of the pillow.

A CMS (Content Management System) like MODx only comes around once every 76 years. Or maybe that’s Halley’s Comet. Anyway, MODx is an alternative to Joomla that is new to the scene, but has some very nice features.
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If I took SocialSpark up on their opportunity, I could be paid $5.50 for this post.  That would buy my tall iced mocha at Aurora Coffee. The pay for posts thing is confusing, because on one hand don’t I want a bit of journalistic integrity? Or is that an old-fashioned notion?  I can’t decide. I didn’t, by the way, get paid $5.50.  

I got a Twitter account a long time ago.  I did nothing with it and thought nothing of it. Really, I just liked the logo and site graphics (I love vector graphics), as I am a sucker for those things…  But recently, Twitter is everywhere.  I’ve been notified that people are following my feed (that will be a serious snoozefest!), Twitter is a GREAT way to market your brand (hmmm…I’d have to be convinced…), some big guys are leaving Twitter (that doesn’t bode well) and finally, SXSW real-time event coverage. Ah…real-time journalism. That makes sense. So what’s the Twitter deal?  Am I missing something?

Coolspotters is the social network for celebrities, brands and fans. At first glance, it seems like a default celebrity endorsement site (I saw blah blah coming out of Starbucks - sort of in the GawkerStalker mode).  But, if you look a bit more, it’s also ranking brands. Very crafty.  Are marketers going to start submitting to move their brand rank up?  Or is it really just about seeing if your new bag is cool because blah blah has it?

The websters at the Souvenir Shop have gotten the drag and drop shop right! Plus the site has cool Canadian things.