myspace flash widgets: August 2008

Monday, August 25, 2008

The best way to get your band's blog on Myspace.

While I was looking through the widget analytics data the other day, I noticed just how many bands are using our RSS reader to deliver news to their fans into social networks like Myspace and Facebook and start pages like iGoogle, Netvibes and Pageflakes.

Get this widget!

Grab this Led Zeppelin widget now.

Of course, I'm going to show my age here, but I had to ask who Timbaland, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony and Rich Boy were, and I had no clue about The Wreckers, Robin Thicke or Faith Hill but when I found out that the official Beastie Boys, Led Zeppelin and Michael Jackson's Thriller profiles were using our widgets I had to spread the word.

Admittedly, Timbaland may get a bit more play these days, but I spent so much time listening to my Zeppelin albums and tapes that I wore them out. And the Beastie boys Licensed to Ill was awesome and played non-stop while cruising in my 66 Mustang in the 80's. (I really am old)

If you have a band, take a look at how some of the other artists I mentioned above implemented the widgets on their Myspace pages and feel free to use our widgets or our platform to promote your own news or events to your fans.

We don't charge for bands to use our RSS reaader, so it's probably the lowest cost investment that you'll make in your popularity. If you are feeling generous, we'll take concert tickets, CD's and backstage passes if you have any to spare ;-)

Get this widget!

If you are a band and add a SpringWidgets express RSS reader to your page to promote your website or blog, please add a comment below and let us know where to find it.

Rock on and build your own RSS express widget today. Read More

TheSpringBox 1.1.5

TheSpringBox 1.1.5
We've got a new build for you today. Most of the additions are for you developers out there. Here are some of the new API features:

Widget.onClose() this event is fired when the Widget is closed

Widget.center() center you widget on the screen

Widget.onMemoryUpdate(isTrigger) now passes a Boolean identifying the instance of the widget that updated the Memory.

We've removed Widget.setVersion() and replaced it with Widget.setMetadata() to allow you to configure an about box for your widget.

We've also updated our SDK to version 1.1.5 so you can view full documentation on the new features; we've also fixed the no-trace issue in the Web Simulator. Online docs will follow in the next few days. If you have any further questions, please post them in the forums.

Feed Compare Feedburner subscriber graphs

A large number of blogs and other sites now use Feedburner as it has a number of great Pro freatures and Feedburner also allows you to transfer feed ownership between users. Whilst you can see your stats in Feedburner the graphs are not that great and you can compare them.

There is a site called Feed Compare that allows you to view the RSS subscriber data for up to 4 feeds on a single graph. This means you could compare your competitors RSS subscriber count with your own feed.

To allow you to get a better idea of subscriber numbers you can also view a graph showing data for the last month, quarter, half year, year or 2 years assuming the feed has been in existence for that long.

The reason this is such a great tool is that you can now find out exactly how a sites RSS feed has grown over time. All you need is the sites Feedburner URL which you can get by right clicking on the sites RSS feed icon and copying the URL than pasting it into Feed Compare.

This post is from the Newsniche website and should not be reproduced elsewhere. Why not subscribe to the RSS feed and get this information delivered straight to your News reader.

Social Trends for July

Social Trends for July
Google stays at the top. Live and Furl are gaining momentum. More trends here. addthis_url = 'http://blog.addthis.com/?p=33'; addthis_title = 'Social Trends for July'; addthis_pub = '';

Google stays at the top. Live and Furl are gaining momentum. More trends here.

SpringWidgets Blog is Here!!!!!

We're using the tools available to speed up our communication process. We'll be using this as our What's Up?, New and Cool, Future "stuff" blog so you don't have to crawl through the Forums if you don't want to (of course, feel free, if you like . . . either's cool).

The "wizards" (as I like to call them), aka our development team will add info here as well . . . so keep checking back. Read More

Dealzmodo: 65-inch 1080p Olevia LCD TV For $2300 [Deals]

Woot's deal of the day is a 65-inch 1080p LCD TV for only $2300. It's Olevia, which isn't the greatest brand—its parent company filed for bankruptcy recently—but it does seem like a decent set for... Read More

Security Center Lite 1.3.9 (Trial)

This security software will monitor network traffic and protect you from potential intruders. Read More

ZylNMEAGenerator 1.52 (Demo)

NMEA Generator Delphi Component that transforms position data into NMEA format Read More

Temporary Server Issues

Temporary Server Issues
We are experiencing issues with some of our servers. We are aware of the problem and working on it. This is not affecting the availability of our widget. It is only affecting our website and the bookmarking and sharing functions. We apologize for the inconvenience. We will update this post as soon as the issues [...]

We are experiencing issues with some of our servers. We are aware of the problem and working on it. This is not affecting the availability of our widget. It is only affecting our website and the bookmarking and sharing functions. We apologize for the inconvenience. We will update this post as soon as the issues are resolved.

Update: Problem solved. Both the website and the bookmarking/sharing functions are working again. Luckily, the downtime was short and the effects minimal. Thank you for your patience.

- the AddThis team

ODBC database plugin 3.2.0.7 (Freeware)

Created for export of data received over serial computer port to compatible ODBC database Read More

ZylNMEAGenerator 1.52 (Demo)

NMEA Generator Delphi Component that transforms position data into NMEA format Read More

New Features - More Customization of the Button

New Features - More Customization of the Button
Well, it’s 2008. Hope you all got a chance to try the new features we added last month to your analytics interface. We already received some great feedback. We’ve been busy preparing to move to our new platform. This new platform will enable AddThis to scale more easily and provide additional powerful capabilities to the service. [...]

Well, it’s 2008. Hope you all got a chance to try the new features we added last month to your analytics interface. We already received some great feedback.

We’ve been busy preparing to move to our new platform. This new platform will enable AddThis to scale more easily and provide additional powerful capabilities to the service. We have now reached the milestone of 100 Million buttons served per day, so it was time to move again. The move will happen next week, the transition will be completely transparent.

We have also been busy coding new features for the button (widget). Many of you have asked us for more ways to customize the button, as well as for an email function. We listened…so here are the latest enhancements. Thank for your continuous feedback!

Button customization - You now have full control over the customization of the the button image, text, and style. We essentially moved the button image and link outside of the javascript, so you can now change the image, text, or style of the button as much as you want, and very easily.

Service options customization - You can now customize the list of service options that appear in the dropdown (e.g. Del.icio.us, Digg, Facebook, etc). You can even remove the “More” choice completely, if you only want to provide access to the most popular services.

Dropdown positioning - We also added the ability to re-position the dropdown vertically or horizontally, if needed.

Email a Friend - We have added a new service option: Email. So when selecting your options for the dropdown, you can now include the keyword ‘email’. When the user clicks on ‘Email’, the dropdown will transform itself into a tiny form to send an email notification to a friend.

>> Here is the documentation for the new features <<

Happy Customizing!

Turn Off Monitor 3.6 (Trial)

Turning off the monitor when not in use saves electricity, which is not the same as running a black screensaver. Read More

Feed Compare Feedburner subscriber graphs

This post is from the Newsniche website and should not be reproduced elsewhere. Why not subscribe to the RSS feed and get this information delivered straight to your News reader.

Arbor day

Get this widget!

Arbor Day is the day when everyone is supposed to go out and plant a tree. To celebrate this day and to help remind everyone that in this digital age we still need to save time to go outdoors and enjoy nature, we have built you an Arbor Day "widget-tree."

Just "plant" the tree on your profile, blog or desktop like you would any of our widgets and watch it grow over time. The longer the tree remains, the bigger it grows.

Our tree has a 30 day growth period before it reaches maturity and occasionally, if you are lucky, you'll see one of the many woodland creatures that like to play on or around trees show up for a visit.

A little bit about Arbor Day:
Arbor Day was suggested on January 4, 1872 so that farmers in Nebraska would have better wind breaks, building material and a more pleasant landscape than the tree-less plains they found when they arrived.

Since that time it has evolved and has spread around the world. Today, planting trees is more important than ever, since they act like a filter and improve the quality of our air, protect our water, save energy, and improve the overall wellbeing of people who live and work nearby.

I remember planting my first real life Arbor Day tree when I was in grade school. That tree still stands today and provides shade for a whole new generation of kids eating lunch and playing games right where I used to. The effects of that one action have brought joy to thousands over the years and is, in hindsight, probably the best thing that I have ever been involved in.

Remember, "planting" our widget is not a substitution for planting a real tree or enjoying nature, so you should still run out to your local arborist and grab a small tree to plant so that you can use this day to give something to the future. Happy Planting!

-Don

A complete history of Arbor Day can be found here.

Tips for planting trees can be found here. Read More

Treadmills Used to Play WoW (Verdict: Even Usain Bolt Couldn't Cut It as a Blood Elf) [Fun Runs]

Most avid World of Warcraft players don't wonder too much about what it would be like to truly run as often and as far as their avatars, because a.) that sounds hard and b.) they're too busy... Read More

Social Trends for August

Here are the trends for August. While Digg, Del.icio.us, and Favorites are loosing some traction and Google is more or less idle at the top, Facebook is gaining ground, and very fast. We took an early peek at the data for September, and as we expected the trend for Facebook is continuing. More later. To [...]

12 Examples of Abandoned Space Technology [Space Junk]

12 Examples of Abandoned Space Technology [Space Junk]
Looking for a space shuttle to convert into a funky dwelling? Believe it or not, there are quite a few pieces of once cutting edge space technology that have been left to rot. For example: there is a...

Redefining the Widget

Redefining the Widget
Last year at Widgets Live, the announcement of the SpringWidgets platform redefined what a widget could be. At the time of our launch there were three categories of widgets: desktop widgets, web widgets and a special subsection of web widgets that would work on social networking profiles.

We changed all that by inventing a widget platform that allowed for the first time, the ability to use a single, updatable and configurable widget file to reach all of these destinations. We took it further by incorporating in the ability to “pop” any SpringWidget you find on the web onto your desktop with just one click.

Since our release, there have been a few companies that have announced a similar product offering - YourMinis and Netvibes are examples we feel are well done.

I'm going to give you a little sneak peak behind the curtain where we are quietly working on redefining the widget once again, and perhaps in the process spur another round of inspiration.

For the most part, online widgets have been exactly what the limited definition has made them out to be …

A web widget is a portable chunk of code that can be installed and executed within any separate HTML-based web page by an end user without requiring additional compilation.

Thanks Wikipedia

Reading this, I’m thinking about the widget landscape and in my head I’m starting to challenge the entire box that we have collectively put widgets into, trying to look past the simple definition and look at the transformative nature of what a portable chunk of code can do.

Is the widget just a visitor on the web page or can it be much more and control and interact with the web page it’s on? If widgets are like parasites, can a parasite define the host?

Can a widget be a portable “experience?”

Envision if you will a Widget that no longer sends the user off to another site to personalize itself. Imagine a widget that is not content to stay within the confines of it’s own little box, but rather can interact with the page it lives on. The “Transformative Widget” would take over the page it’s on; integrating it's content within that page and transforming it based on a click.

If the Widget is not just a chunk of code, but rather a portable experience, imagine the infinite ways we can expand the brand experience within the social network itself. Moving code and embedding Widgets can create a better way to immerse the user in an extreme brand experience. The widget then becomes an ad that is user embedded, user selected and more powerfully engaging and interactive than any traditional advertisement that is available - and just as performance oriented.

If a user allows the widget to brand the entire page, is that a "Widgetview", an "Ad Impression", or a "Pageview"?

So if SpringWidgets is ready to challenge the Widget Landscape it’s safe to say that the launch of THE FANTASTIC FOUR Widget is the next step in redefining the Widget. The transformative nature of TFF Widget is completely apparent once you start using it on your MySpace profile and the brand experience is more immersive than anything possible with a widget prior to the Fantastic Four widget launch.

This is only one of the many transformative widgets that we are engaged in and only represents a small amount of our R&D efforts. Over the weeks and months to come, we'll be rolling out some truly fantastic products that will not only transform the widget, but transform SpringWidgets as well.

We would love to have you on board as we make these transformations, so please feel free to download our API and put your own thoughts to work in redefining what a widget can be.

Install Plugin Manager

Install Plugin Manager
Download the Plugin Manager installation script. Save the file locally as pm-install.cgi. Upload the pm-install.cgi file you just saved via FTP or some other file transfer application into Movable Type?s root/home directory. This is the same directory in which...

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

The best way to get your band's blog on Myspace.

Get this widget!

Grab this Led Zeppelin widget now.

Get this widget!

Police Radio Keeps Disrupting Sprinklers, Local Residents Get FCC Involved [Sprinklers]

The police around Cedar Hill, DeSoto and Duncanville Texas have a fancy new communications system that broadcasts their 10-4s and 187s up to 30 miles, which coincidentally enough is screwing up a... Read More

The Menorah for Hanukkah is also available . . .

The Menorah for Hanukkah is also available . . .
Here's the Menorah for Hanukkah!!!!

A new candle is added and lit for each day of Hanukkah. You can choose from a variety of candles and Menorah colors. I've made this one silver with blue candle, but just click the "Get this widget" to configure in your own way and embed on your page . . .

Thank you Drew and Lani and Michael for creating these great looking holiday treats!

flashvars="file=http://downloads.thespringbox.com/widgets/Menorah.sbw¶m_candleColor=blue¶m_menorahColor=silver&memberId=thespringbox" quality="high" wmode="transparent" width="185" height="280" align="middle" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer">

Get this widget!

M2E Developing Kinetic Cellphone Charger That is Up to 700 Percent More Effective [Kinetic Energy]

M2E Developing Kinetic Cellphone Charger That is Up to 700 Percent More Effective [Kinetic Energy]
This isn't the first time we have seen a cellphone charger that is powered by kinetic energy, but the difference is that M2E is working on a charger that can produce 300 to 700% more juice than...

Exit's Neutron Multiplayer Gaming Platform Coming To iPhone [Iphone Gaming]

Exit's Neutron Multiplayer Gaming Platform Coming To iPhone [Iphone Gaming]
Exit Games has a multiplayer gaming platform, called Neutron, on PCs, mobile devices, game consoles, and BREW phones. It works across devices and hardware, so you can play someone on their PC via...

Convenient Download Bundle

Convenient Download Bundle
For many installing Perl modules is difficult within their environment, and for those people we provide a simple and easy to install bundle of all the necessary perl modules for Plugin Manager. Instructions Download the bundle. Navigate to the MT_HOME/extlib...

�Torrent 1.8.1 Build 11903 Beta (Freeware)

�Torrent 1.8.1 Build 11903 Beta (Freeware)
This is a bittorrent download client that sports RSS auto-downloading, bandwidth prioritization, Mainline DHT and scheduling

Xilisoft Video Converter 5.1.2.0819 (Demo)

Xilisoft Video Converter 5.1.2.0819 (Demo)
Converts video files between various formats and grab audio from video

EVE online Mineral Prices

EVE online Mineral Prices
This gives mineral prices for EVE Online.

Saturday, August 16, 2008

TheSpringBox 1.1.5

TheSpringBox 1.1.5
We've got a new build for you today. Most of the additions are for you developers out there. Here are some of the new API features:

Widget.onClose() this event is fired when the Widget is closed

Widget.center() center you widget on the screen

Widget.onMemoryUpdate(isTrigger) now passes a Boolean identifying the instance of the widget that updated the Memory.

We've removed Widget.setVersion() and replaced it with Widget.setMetadata() to allow you to configure an about box for your widget.

Ikarus Engine Update 71286 / August 16, 2008 (Freeware)

Ikarus Engine Update 71286 / August 16, 2008 (Freeware)
Use this file to manually update Ikarus Virus Utilities and T3 Command Line Scanner

foo uie albumart mka 0.1763 (Freeware)

foo uie albumart mka 0.1763 (Freeware)
Albumart mod to read matroska covers.

SpringWidgets Blog is Here!!!!!

RSS advertising with Bidvertiser

There are already several options for RSS advertising but Bidvertiser has decided to enter the market and offer publishers the opportunity to sell advertising in their RSS feeds. Of course this also means advertisers will also be able to buy ads in RSS feeds.

Advertising with RSS

With the much larger subscriber numbers for RSS feeds it has become more viable for advertising to appear within an RSS feed. An ad in an RSS feed means that the ad will only appear in the feed rather than on the site.

As RSS subscribers tend to be more interested in the content the ads could be more effective if targeted correctly. Bidvertisers feed advertising program is in public beta and offers RSS advertising and allows RSS publishers to sell RSS ads. It will be interesting to see how it progresses compared the Feedvertiser program.

This post is from the Newsniche website and should not be reproduced elsewhere. Why not subscribe to the RSS feed and get this information delivered straight to your News reader.

foo uie albumart mka 0.1763 (Freeware)

foo uie albumart mka 0.1763 (Freeware)
Albumart mod to read matroska covers.

New Features - New Faces - Happy Holidays

Only a few more days and it’s already 2008. How time flies! We hope you are all enjoying the holiday season. Here is a brief message with the latest news about AddThis. More Analytics. To help you start off the new year, we have upgraded our stats interface to give you more analytics about how your [...]

Only a few more days and it’s already 2008. How time flies! We hope you are all enjoying the holiday season. Here is a brief message with the latest news about AddThis.

More Analytics. To help you start off the new year, we have upgraded our stats interface to give you more analytics about how your content is bookmarked and shared by your visitors. Here are the new features:

- bookmarking/sharing trends over time (day, week, month, year)
- enhanced ‘Top Bookmarks’ report
- audience breakdown by country
- export to various formats (e.g. CSV, Tab, Excel)

To try it, just go to your account ! By the way, we will be adding even more analytics soon. So be sure to add our widget now on all your pages, so that the tracking can already begin. Also, be sure to tell your friends about AddThis.

Our Team. Our team is expanding as well. We are excited to announce that Brian Jones has joined AddThis. Brian is a sys/admin/infrastructure guru; he founded Linuxlaboratory.org, created Python Magazine, helped found php|architect magazine, and is the co-author of Linux Server Hacks 2 for Oâ€™Reilly publishing. Brian is already working hard setting up tomorrow’s infrastructure for AddThis, making sure AddThis can continue to deliver its great service reliably as it continues to grow.

We are hiring. We are currently looking for a front-end guru. If you live and breath AJAX, Javascript, and PHP, and are obsessed with creating the best possible tools for users, then we want to hear from you. We offer very good salaries and great benefits, and even the possibility to work from home.

AddThis Trends. As most of you know by now, each month we publish a report of the top most active bookmarking/sharing and feed reader services. Below is the report for the top bookmarking/sharing services for November. You can find more reports here.

Top Bookmarking / Sharing Services - November

Don’t have our widget yet? If you don’t have an AddThis widget on your website or blog, click here and get it now. It will really help your visitors share and remember your pages, and help you gain visibility in the search engines by the same token.

Happy holidays and best wishes for 2008!

Lenovo Unveils ThinkPad X301 With Centrino 2 and 128 GB SSD [Notebooks]

Lenovo Unveils ThinkPad X301 With Centrino 2 and 128 GB SSD [Notebooks]
Lenovo is following up on their solid X300 notebook with the Thinkpad X301, which will have the Centrino 2 chipset and the option for a 64 or 128 GB SSD. Set for official announcement next week, the...

Olympic Medals Dashboard Widget 1.0

Olympic Medals Dashboard Widget 1.0
Keep up to date with the latest live medal counts with this Mac OS X Dashboard widget.

About Olympic Medals Dashboard Widget
Keep up to date with the latest live medal counts with this Mac OS X Dashboard widget.

Haihaisoft Universal Player 1.1.0.5 (Freeware)

This comprehensive software will allow you to watch your video files and listen to music, regardless of the file format. Read More

Shiver Me Timbers!

For the fans of Captain Jack!...

A SpringWidgets Pirates of the Caribbean countdown clock to put on your profile or blog!

Those of you who have seen my MySpace profile and noticed the skull and crossbones that I use as my profile picture, you have probably figured out that I'm a big fan of pirates.

So much so that I figured that we just had to create a countdown to what will probably be, in my opinion, the biggest movie of the year . . . Pirates of the Caribbean!

Being somewhat piratical ourselves, the team can really relate to the need for blue ocean waters, treasure and wearing silly three cornered pointy hats.

By the way . . . take a look at the bottom of the widget...

Fans of our widgets will notice that the "pop" button has moved from the upper right to the lower left of the widget and it now has a couple of friends, an "options" button and a SpringWidgets logo.

Don't worry, the Pop button will still give you one click downloading of the widget to your desktop if you have the SpringWidgets application installed . . . we just moved it so that it would look better on some of the odd shaped widgets that we are seeing in the gallery.

If you take a moment and click on the options button, you can see that we have added in a few, well... "Options" to the widget. You can now copy the code directly in the widget, download the widget from the menu, jump to the customize/share it page and learn more about the widget you are looking at.

I hope that you like the changes and find that the added functionality enhances your widget experience. If you like the widget and have a moment, stop by our community page and send a note to the team letting them know.

I'm going to go dress up like a pirate now and try and find some buried treasure.

-Don Read More

Lamp Made Out of its Own Packaging [Package Lamp]

Reviewing gadgets on a normal basis, you really come to realize how incredible wasteful all the packaging is. Something is shipped to you in a box that's packed with styrofoam. Inside it, you find... Read More

ABC Amber BlackBerry Converter 6.64 (Trial)

Reads IPD (BlackBerry backup) files and exports selected messages and contacts to a single file of any document format Read More

Social Trends for July

Google stays at the top. Live and Furl are gaining momentum. More trends here. addthis_url = 'http://blog.addthis.com/?p=33'; addthis_title = 'Social Trends for July'; addthis_pub = '';

Google stays at the top. Live and Furl are gaining momentum. More trends here.

"Plugin Manager Enabled" Badges

Are you a Movable Type plugin developer? Have you built in support for Plugin Manager yet? If so, consider adding one of the following badges to your plugin's web page to signify the your plugin is "Plugin Manager Enabled." This... Read More

Horizon Translator 1.1

Horizon Translator 1.1
Horizon translates instantely text between English French and Deutsh, by using Google Translate traductor.

About Horizon Translator
Instantly translate text between English, French and Deutsh, by using Google Translate traductor.

Features:
- Very fast translation!
- Real time translation
- Adapting the size of the textbox according to the size of the translation.
- Using Google Translator

For more information, please visit our web site.

TheSpringBox 1.1.5

We've got a new build for you today. Most of the additions are for you developers out there. Here are some of the new API features:

Widget.onClose() this event is fired when the Widget is closed

Widget.center() center you widget on the screen

Widget.onMemoryUpdate(isTrigger) now passes a Boolean identifying the instance of the widget that updated the Memory.

We've removed Widget.setVersion() and replaced it with Widget.setMetadata() to allow you to configure an about box for your widget.

CardBoardFish SMS Widget 1.4

Send SMS text messages from OS X to over 200 countries. Receive replies to your mobile phone or dashboard.

About CardBoardFish SMS Widget
Quickly send SMS text messages from the dashboard to more than 700 mobile networks in over 200 countries. Includes phonebook with vCard import, inbox, message history and custom sender ID. Delivery receipts are displayed on your desktop if requested. Send texts of up to 459 characters in length and message up to 10 recipients at the same time.

Woot.com 3.5.2

Woot.com 3.5.2
This widget displays the current-selling product at Woot.com.

About Woot.com
At Woot.com one hugely-discounted product is released each evening at 12 midnight (Monday - Friday). This product is available for only 24 hours or until it totally sells out.

The widget now supports wine.woot, as well as the original woot site.

Feed Compare Feedburner subscriber graphs

This post is from the Newsniche website and should not be reproduced elsewhere. Why not subscribe to the RSS feed and get this information delivered straight to your News reader.

TheSpringBox 1.1.3

TheSpringBox 1.1.3
Hey Guys. Today we've got an update of our desktop platform for you. Most of the updates are purely cosmetic, but we hope they will improve you SpringWidgets experience:

Visual Updates

Lock your widgets on your screen

Performance updates

Widgets are now stored under My Documents

Happy Holidays Everyone,
- The SpringWidgets Team

Rohos Logon Key Converts Any USB Stick To a Mac Login Key [USB]

Rohos Logon Key is a bit of software that can convert any USB key you have into an actual "USB key" to unlock your Mac. The software sits in your login screen and detects the serial number of your... Read More

Cool show, Cool Widget!

Cool show, Cool Widget!
If you haven't taken a look at the show "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia", now is the time. This show is awesome in the way that "The Office" is awesome. It's a brilliant comedy about four friends who own a bar who almost universally approach every problem with the wrong solution. If I had only one word to describe the show, it would have to be "Great!"

The widget is perfectly sized for a blog post, or placement on a Myspace profile and has tons of show related content and links.

Click the options to share this now, it's a live widget!

BIG Interactive and FX Networks created a SpringWidget to help promote the show.

Like the show, the widget is great as well. There are video clips to watch, Sunny tour dates, show information and links to the polls, website and Sunny Blog and even a sneak peak video.

I had never watched this show before seeing the widget, but the widget provided me with enough video and information about the show to let me know that I had to go out and buy the first season DVD set. I didn't realize until after I was at home watching one of the episodes that a "widget" had convinced me to buy the show. I had not even visit the website before I made the purchase.

The best part of the Sunny widget is that the developers at BIG Interactive really took advantage of our platform, building in some features that are only available when the widget is downloaded. So while the online widget is cool, only users who grab it as a download get the full experience.

Download the desktop widget and you get a second widget hidden in the right click menu made to look like the star characters. This second widget is not available online.

You can click and drag the widget by the characters "head" and some pretty neat physics take place, they wiggle and bounce off the side of your monitor. when the character stops, some pretty hilarious video clips start to play.

If you are reading this on a Thursday for the next few months, including This Thursday (tonight) the show should be airing on your local FX network. Take my word for it, it's worth watching.

-Don

p.s. You can find out more about BIG Interactive here and more about FX Networks here

Critical Bug Fixed: "'mt_pluginmanager' doesn't exist"

It took me far too long to track down a simple error a number of people were reporting with Plugin Manager, but I did track it down, and did finally manage to fix it. Long story short, the deployment mechanism... Read More

foo uie albumart mka 0.1763 (Freeware)

foo uie albumart mka 0.1763 (Freeware)
Albumart mod to read matroska covers.

Adding an Item to Your Queue

From anywhere within Media Manager you can add another item to your queue. Click on the "Add Item" link in the left hand menu, or the "Add Item to your Queue" found on the main Media Manager screen. From... Read More

Sony Plans 10-Year Shelf Life For Current Generation PSP [Gaming]

We were semi-surprised that the PSP hardware update contained so few external changes, but now that we've seen Sony's plan for the system, it all makes sense. Their ten year shelf-life plan for the... Read More

A Blogger?s Life: Why Blog and When Do You Stop Blogging?

A Blogger?s Life: Why Blog and When Do You Stop Blogging?
Dr. Johnson’s Cat asks “So: Why Blog?”, a question that plagues many bloggers, wanna be bloggers, and wish-they-weren’t bloggers. Why do we keep on blogging when the fun drains away. And what keeps bringing us back. Googling the phrase “stop blogging” gets 171,000 hits: Ten Reasons Why I Should Stop Blogging; Should I Stop Blogging? 20 [...]

Dr. Johnson’s Cat asks “So: Why Blog?”, a question that plagues many bloggers, wanna be bloggers, and wish-they-weren’t bloggers. Why do we keep on blogging when the fun drains away. And what keeps bringing us back.

Googling the phrase “stop blogging” gets 171,000 hits: Ten Reasons Why I Should Stop Blogging; Should I Stop Blogging? 20 Questions to Ask Yourself; 29 reasons you need to stop blogging right now; Why Bloggers Stop Blogging; How to Know When to Stop Blogging; Stop Blogging and Get to Work; etc. The tract “What Everyone Should Know About Blog Depression” (Loss of pleasure in the Internet; feelings of sadness, disappointment, anger, self loathing, hopelessness, dementia; passive aggressive moaning and a steady lengthening of the interval between posts) is now three years old.

And why shouldn’t people be depressed? According to a recent study (via Jakob Nielsen via grow-a-brain) visitors to websites on the average read only 20% of the text; 28% tops. People starting blogs only to abandon them within months, or even weeks, is such a commonplace that you’re surprised this hasn’t become a a ubiquitous trope on sitcoms. Where indeed are the reality shows where the participants, instead of holding out to the last “What have we learned?” episode, instead wander off seriatim, not so much called back to real life as completely unsprung by despair.

Which of course begs the question: why blog at all?

The first comment asks if blogs have a “good until” date stamp on them - and if they should.

The author, Chris Hodge, tells a lively and beautifully written story about his own path through the blogosphere, blogging, stopping, blogging, stopping, finding a sense of renewal, and then depression again. It’s a great tale of a typical blog experience and challenges you to think about why you blog, but most of all, why you keep blogging.

Site Search Tags: blogging tips, how to know when to stop blogging, stop blogging, why blog, what keeps you blogging, how to blog, blog writing, blog struggles

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, the author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.

Temporary Server Issues

Update: Problem solved. Both the website and the bookmarking/sharing functions are working again. Luckily, the downtime was short and the effects minimal. Thank you for your patience.

- the AddThis team

Install Plugin Manager

Download the Plugin Manager installation script. Save the file locally as pm-install.cgi. Upload the pm-install.cgi file you just saved via FTP or some other file transfer application into Movable Type?s root/home directory. This is the same directory in which... Read More

Install Photo Gallery

Install Photo Gallery
There are two options when installing Photo Gallery: Download and install the Photo Gallery archive manually Install via the Plugin Manager plugin for Movable Type...

Woot.com 3.5.2

Woot.com 3.5.2
This widget displays the current-selling product at Woot.com.

Allok Video to FLV Converter 5.1.0814 (Demo)

Allok Video to FLV Converter 5.1.0814 (Demo)
A powerful Flash Video Encoder to convert any video into SWF video

Profile Search 1.13 Beta (Freeware)

Profile Search 1.13 Beta (Freeware)
Search the SAP Community Network profiles for like interests or needs

Mini Corvette Engine Runs at 11,000 RPM [Scale Model]

Mini Corvette Engine Runs at 11,000 RPM [Scale Model]
It may not sound much different that a weed-whacker, but I can assure you that if this 1/6 scale replica of the 1964 Corvette L76 327 cubic-inch V8 was put into a tiny car, it would give a Leprechaun...

Facebook Climbing to 3rd Spot

The October data are in! Facebook is continuing its amazing climb, taking the 3rd spot away from Del.icio.us. Favorites are back, stealing the first position from Google Bookmarks. Again, Favorites here means “browser bookmarking”, for any browser. On the Feed Reader front things are much more quiet. There was almost no changes between September [...]

The October data are in!

Facebook is continuing its amazing climb, taking the 3rd spot away from Del.icio.us. Favorites are back, stealing the first position from Google Bookmarks. Again, Favorites here means “browser bookmarking”, for any browser. On the Feed Reader front things are much more quiet. There was almost no changes between September and October.

Top Bookmarking/Sharing - October 2007

Top Feed Readers - October 2007

TheDashboard 0.1

Enhance your Dashboard. Get more widgets.

About TheDashboard
Fresh new Widgets for your Dashboard

foo uie albumart mka 0.1763 (Freeware)

Albumart mod to read matroska covers. Read More

foo lnk 1.2 (Freeware)

foo lnk 1.2 (Freeware)
Adds support for shell links (.lnk files).

Promote Your Widgets!

We've been upgrading our site over the past few weeks, adding robust search and sorting, better widget description pages and building in some new tools that can be used promote your widgets.

Almost every upgrade we added is focused on making your widgets easier to find and the promotional tools are free to use with any widget in our gallery, so I thought I'd invite you all in to try them out.

No matter if you have uploaded a great new custom widget or created a quick express widget, all the new tools that we have just added in will work to help you promote your SpringWidget!

So, what's new?

1. Tagging In case you don't know what they are, "Tags" are just words that describe your widget that are used when someone searches our gallery. "Tagging" allows you to make it easier for users to find your widget.

You should tag your widget with words that describe the content or nature of your widget. For example, the springwidgets blog is all about news on the SpringWidgets platform, so I'd tag it with "springwidgets", "widgets" and "widget news" but I'd leave out more obvious words like "blog" and "news" because they really don't help users find content that is specific to my blog.

2. Star-Ratings Another tool to help you promote your widgets is our new ratings system. You can rate any widget in our gallery and users can sort by the best rated widgets. The more that you rate, the better the system gets! Help us out and rate a widget or two in the gallery today.

Here is an important tip - we let you rate your own widget so you can start the ratings yourself... Go ahead, give it a try.

3. Favorite Widgets Every time a user "favorites" your widget, it's added to a list of favorite widgets on that users profile! The better your widget looks and works, the more likely you'll have fans.

Want to favorite a widget? Just click the "favorite widgets" button on any widget in our gallery. Much easier and faster than saying "What was that widget called again?" and banging your head on the desk. :-)

4. Social Bookmarking Links Automatically add (or help vote up) any widget in our gallery to the various social bookmarking sites like Digg and Reddit. These sites are great ways to promote your widget and find new users. Just click the icon and follow the directions to get started. The great news is that once you submit your widget with these links, users can vote your widget up with a click or two!

5. Widget Search The best way to be found is to make sure that you are accurate when describing your widget. Any user can search our gallery for your widget and find results based on your developer id, widget title and description and tags.

The more accurate and descriptive you are, the more likely that a search will include your widget in front of interested users.

6. Tag Clouds and "Sorting by" Navigation Users can now search by Ratings, Tag Clouds, Name Sorting, and Most Recent Widgets.

Since users will be looking through the gallery with these tools, the more descriptive you are when entering your widget into the gallery, the better!

7. User Comments The more talked about your widget is, the more users are likely to trust adding you to their page or desktop. Get the conversation started by adding your own comments to the widgets you like.

Find a widget you like? let the creator know that you like it. Just feel like saying "thanks for letting me use your widget?" That's ok too. We hope that the addition of comments will be a popular and helpful feature for everyone.

Now get out there and start promoting yourself!

We are continuing to make improvements every day and we'd love to have your input on what to build next, so pop on over to the forums and tell us what you think!

Thanks,

Don Read More

Sunday, August 10, 2008

How Stuff Works Hosting Detailed Guide To Batman's Tumbler [Batman]

If you're a fan of the current crop of Batman movies (you probably are) then you either love or hate the new Batmobile, affectionately known as the Tumbler. If you're in the love camp, then you can... Read More

Liz Strauss Invites You to Show Off Your Blog

Liz Strauss of Successful and Outstanding Bloggers is giving you a chance to promote your blog to the world in her Showcase Your Blog at Successful-Blog July 26-27, 2008. This is a great chance to showcase your blog to thousands of bloggers and fans on the blog by the founder of the popular Successful and Outstanding [...]

Liz Strauss of Successful and Outstanding Bloggers is giving you a chance to promote your blog to the world in her Showcase Your Blog at Successful-Blog July 26-27, 2008.

This is a great chance to showcase your blog to thousands of bloggers and fans on the blog by the founder of the popular Successful and Outstanding Bloggers Conference (SOBCon) and author of the fast selling ebook, The Secret to Writing a Successful and Outstanding Blog — The Insider’s Guide to the Conversation That’s Changing How Business Works.

To particpate, check out the instructions in the announcement of the Blog Showcase and email your blog title, URL, blog tagline, a sentence of two about what makes your blog worth visiting, and some advice on blogging or a colorful bloggy quote. The deadlines is Saturday July 26, 2008.

Site Search Tags: liz strauss, successful blog, sob, sobcon, showcase your blog, show off your blog, blog competition, blog contest, blog brag, brag about your blog, successful blogger