July 2nd, 2005
I came across a blog this evening, disturbingly named Idea Sling. (Disturbingly due to the similarity in name to my current project: ideaShrub) I was very concerned that this web site was, somehow, going to be in direct competition with my work, however that does not seem to be the case.
In a nutshell: The premise is that if you have a good idea, but neither have the time nor means to implement it, you should free it up to the public. To quote their mission statement:
Creative People and Go-Getters are celebrated on this site. Those personas often don't exist in the same person.
Instead of letting your idea fester and nag you until the day you die, let it free, into the wild. Who knows it may take wings under the guidance of some industrious soul.
What this site reminds me of, more then anything, is a really slooow version of Half Bakery. Honestly, I see no advantages to using this particular service over the other long-established web site. I wonder if they even realize that Half Bakery exists? Granted, sometimes the ideas on Half Bakery are a little bit out there, it is still an excellent forum for project proposals (similar to the ones on Idea Sling).
On a closing note, ideaShrub is going to, incidentally, provide the core service of both Idea Sling and Half Bakery, and much more, giving users the ability to publish, broadcast, share, and collaborate their ideas in a much more open (or private) forum. I'm tempted to auto-create some new shrubs (using the handy API) filled with data from both of these web sites, so that people can easily browse them in a 'familiar' interface.
Tags: ideasling, review, blog, blogs, idea, ideas
5 Comments on 'Idea Sling Review'
June 14th, 2005
I just finished up a mini-tour of the new web application that I'm working on: ideaShrub. The tour comes in the form of a mini-screencast for everyone to watch. This is my first attempt at making a screencast and I think it went fairly well (save for the lack of voice over and mouse cursor, but I'm working on fixing that for future 'casts).
In this tour I cover a couple different aspects of the new site:
- A user's main profile page
- A user's shrub list (and the Create A Set and Create A Shrub widgets)
- A user's contacts list
- All communities
- All people
- All shrubs
- Options, straight to Profile Editing
- A user's main profile page (again)
- Shrub Editing (I saved the best for last!)
This portion includes moving leaves, creating leaves, editing leaves, navigation, changing text attributes (bold, underline, strikethrough), indenting, undenting)
As a note, the application itself is still a long ways off from being complete - I expect to be making a lot of progress within the next couple weeks and possibly launching at the beginning of July.
So, without further ado:
NOTE: Best if watched at 800x600, it gets kind of 'warped' otherwise.
Tags: mindmap, brainstorming, ideas, firefox, osx, screencast, ideashrub
7 Comments on 'ideaShrub Screencast'
June 2nd, 2005
If you are not familiar with the 'Thoughtless Acts' train of thought, I highly recommend that you read into it more. Here's a snippet:
Some actions, such as grabbing onto something for balance, are universal and instinctive. Others, such as warming hands on a hot mug or stroking velvet, draw on experiences so deeply embodied that they are almost unconscious. Sill more, such as hanging a jacket to claim a chair, have become spontaneous through habit or social learning. Observing such everyday interactions reveals subtle details about how we relate to the designed and natural world. This is key information and inspiration for design, and a good starting point for any creative initiative.
Julia has been getting some major press (first from a post on BoingBoing then from the Official IDEO site) for her Flickr Thoughtless Acts Group. If you're still curious as to what this is all about, check out the group - there's lots of good pictures there.
Tags: ideo, design, ideas
Comment on 'IDEO Thoughtless Acts'
May 10th, 2005
I've got some good news to announce. First off, this summer I will be working for (my company) Juniper Bay, LLC full-time. The main project of the summer is going to be the Schedule Maker (mentioned before). However, before I continue work on that, I'm going to be working with Julia and Josh to bring to light an excellent idea of Julia's. To quote my first post to the ideaShrub Weblog, ideaShrub is:
An intuitive and easy-to-use outline editor and idea manager. Real-time collaboration on ideas with your friends, clubs, or business partners. You'll have the ability to quickly publish your ideas and let the world see them. You will be able to search for users who have similar ideas as yours, cite their thoughts, and collaborate with them.
Starting this weekend we're going to be working on this non-stop until the end of May, getting this out the door. If you're interested, just drop your email address and we'll let you know when we launch - or follow our web log and watch as the updates come in. This is really exciting - I'm not sure if I've ever been a part of bringing a project to light this quickly before, but I like where it's going. Stay tuned for more details.
Tags: outline, mindmap, brainstorming, ideas, idea
2 Comments on 'Idea Shrub'
