Dot Boston » social network http://adamp.com Apple, Bicycles, Boston, Dot and Web Media Mon, 25 Oct 2010 02:57:58 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 Entrecard turns on the faucet to pour comments into your blog http://adamp.com/blog/entrecard-turns-on-the-faucet-to-pour-comments-into-your-blog/ http://adamp.com/blog/entrecard-turns-on-the-faucet-to-pour-comments-into-your-blog/#comments Wed, 16 Jul 2008 16:55:09 +0000 Adam http://adamp.wp42.com/blog/entrecard-turns-on-the-faucet-to-pour-comments-into-your-blog/ Yesterday Entrecard founder Graham Langdon published a blog post to announce a big new partnership between Entrecard and Sezwho, the comment rating system. As you can see below [in the comments section of this post], this blog now features the Sezwho system. By no means is this a permanent addition to the blog here. For the next week, we’ll have a test run so if you have any issues with the new rating system, let me know! If there are no bugs and you all find it to be a good addition to the site then it will remain.

Also, while evaluating Sezwho, I’ve also decided to keep the Entrecard system up for now. Entrecard will now be rewarding users for thoughtful comments (based on the comments’ rating) with Entrecard credits, which I think is a much better system than clicking drop on other people’s cards. If you’re subscribed via the RSS feed [and if you're not subscribed, sign up today!] then the new comment rating system should not affect your feed viewing. Remember, using the Sezwho ratings is completely voluntary but if you have any issues with it, please let me know!

]]> http://adamp.com/blog/entrecard-turns-on-the-faucet-to-pour-comments-into-your-blog/feed/ 6 Social Coupon Savings http://adamp.com/technology/social-coupon-savings/ http://adamp.com/technology/social-coupon-savings/#comments Mon, 14 Apr 2008 01:50:05 +0000 Adam http://adamp.wp42.com/technology/social-coupon-savings/ All over the internet we’re seeing the rise and enduring popularity of social network sites. Digg, myspace, facebook and other social networks are among the most trafficked sites on the web today. Yet, with most social networks you contribute content but receive little to no compensation for your time and effort. Not so with a site I stumbled upon a few days ago; Savings.com is a social network revolving around sharing the latest and greatest coupons, promo codes, and discounts.

The way the site works is a user submits any online coupons or promotional codes they find to the site. Then, the coupon is voted on by the community and the top discounts get put on the front page. You can also browse for savings by company or site name and check out existing deals and their vote rating. For instance, a few days ago I was buying up a ton of domain names (for reasons I’ll reveal sometime soon) and went looking for GoDaddy promotional codes. Thanks to the voting system on savings.com, I was able to quickly find codes that actually worked.

There are tons and tons of coupons on the site for all sorts of stores so if you’re doing any shopping check out savings.com. I’m now slightly wealthier thanks to savings.com, which I can’t say for facebook, digg, reddit, myspace, pownce, or any other social network site. If you liked this post, there’s good news for you as I’ll be launching a site revolving around money in the coming weeks. The site will publicize saving opportunities, saving tips, and historical information about money. I’ll post to this site when it’s live, but subscribe to my feed to ensure you’re up to date.

Score: 4/5

]]> http://adamp.com/technology/social-coupon-savings/feed/ 0 Hulu Adds Full-Length Movies http://adamp.com/video/hulu-adds-full-length-movies/ http://adamp.com/video/hulu-adds-full-length-movies/#comments Thu, 13 Mar 2008 05:28:58 +0000 Adam http://adamp.wp42.com/video/hulu-adds-full-length-movies/ I just logged into Hulu today for the first time since the site went public and noticed they’ve add full-length movies to their video collection. This addition is great news, but from my very limited time checking out the movie section, it seems advertisements still pop up during the movie. I understand that advertisements fuel this site, but there must be a less intrusive way of advertising than to halt a movie and thus ruin the effect of being drawn into the story. For now, this new feature does not alter my original review score of Hulu but does make the site more attractive.

]]> http://adamp.com/video/hulu-adds-full-length-movies/feed/ 0 Hulu Goes Public Today! http://adamp.com/video/hulu-goes-public-today/ http://adamp.com/video/hulu-goes-public-today/#comments Wed, 12 Mar 2008 04:01:16 +0000 Adam http://adamp.wp42.com/video/hulu-goes-public-today/ Just two days after I (finally) reviewed Hulu.com they (finally) decide to open to the public after four and a half months of being in beta. I approved of Hulu then and I still approve of them now. Hopefully, now that they’re open to the public, a larger diversity of advertisements will flow in thus alleviating the annoying repetition currently present. Anyway, it’ll be very interesting to see how their servers hold up tomorrow and if the site remains lightning fast as it is now.

]]> http://adamp.com/video/hulu-goes-public-today/feed/ 0 Hulu Review http://adamp.com/video/hulu-review/ http://adamp.com/video/hulu-review/#comments Mon, 10 Mar 2008 05:00:14 +0000 Adam http://adamp.wp42.com/video/hulu-review/ A while back I got into the Hulu beta program (note: I still have 5 invites, send me an e-mail if you want an invite) but did not really use the site too much at the time. Recently, however, I moved my television out of my room and into the basement. Since then I’ve barely watched any TV but on occasion fire up Hulu.com for a quick 20 minute fix. So far, the site is awesome. Shows stream quickly with a very nice quality with a bare minimum of commercials interruptions. Oh and when commercials do run, they have a timer at the top counting down until the episode comes back, letting you know exactly how much time you have.

Another nice feature is the ability to edit clips right on Hulu and embed the trimmed down clips on a site. When you click the embed clip button, a screen comes up with a scroll bar at the bottom that lets you decide where the embedded clip should start and where it should end. Already I wish youtube had this feature, as it’s very handy when you just want to show someone a part of a clip, not the whole video. Here’s how the editing screen looks:

The Hulu.com clip editing screen

Pretty cool eh?

The same editing feature is available under the share button, where you can e-mail your friends a link to either the full original video or an trimmed down clip. It all works smoothly and quickly. Quite impressive.

Check out this clip from the end of the Family Guy episode, Play it Again Brian:

Hulu would be better if the advertisements just scrolled at the bottom of the screen or played in a sidebar while browsing the Hulu site, but as is they’re about as un-intrusive as can be. One very irritating part of the advertisements is that many times the same ad gets played over and over again through the course of an episode. While it’s not too annoying while watching a short 20 minute episode of The Simpsons or Family Guy because there’s only two or three ads, it becomes very annoying over the course of a 40 minute episode of The Office. Hulu needs to figure out someway to rotate ads around or require advertisers to submit more than one ad. In either case, seeing the same ad five or six, or even more times over the span of 40 minutes quickly destroys any urge to buy the advertised product.

There is also a HD Gallery on the site which streams high-definition videos. Right now this collection of high-def videos is limited to ten movie trailers but the quality and speed of the streaming is very, very impressive. If they’re able to upload full-length HD movies and shows Hulu is going to receive tons and tons of traffic from people like me who have a nice big monitor with a limited amount of HD content to view online. Though, if movies were to get interrupted every twenty minutes by an ad it might not be such a big hit.

It’s still early but my experience with Hulu has been great so far. Over time I hope Hulu alternates advertisements so it’s not the same ads over and over again. Another big concern is whether they’re able to stay afloat financially without increasing advertisements. Have you had a chance to explore Hulu? What did you think?If not, want to?

Score: 3.5/5

]]> http://adamp.com/video/hulu-review/feed/ 0