Thunderror.com » plurk

Updating.me: Microblogging simplified (Get your invite code here…)

thunderror — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 08:12:49 +0000

I actually stumbled upon this one…Updating.me. First thing that impresses me is the interest domain name. And the site does just that. It is for all those microblogging fanatics who have got an account with every microblogging site in the universe….

Now, Its similar to ping.fm. But, different in many ways…I personally prefer updating me over any other simultaneous posting service…Plus it supports all those services which I need…Right now, they support

TwitArmy and of course,

Twitter

Now, if that doesn’t satisfy you…they have their own Adobe AIR app which lets you update all these services without ever visiting their website. And, if you are on updating.me, you get to see your stream on any of these services all the time (yeah, you have to do a manual refresh, though)..

Right now, it is limited private beta and you are going to need a secret invite code to get in.

So here it is, just for thunderror.com readers

invite code: thunderror

Rejaw – the new microblogging site

thunderror — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 09:34:47 +0000

Rejaw. At last a microblogging site which feels good…Well, now lets not start comparing with twitter..Considering that twitter has been around for long…but its always great to have comparison in the arena.

Microblogging has several contenders but none have even managed to shake twitter even a bit, except for maybe, plurk. Microblogging is the post of small messages, limited by character count which can be seen by the public(or maybe restricted to a group). Few of the contenders in the market other than the leader being twitter are Plurk, Identi.ca, Kwippy, Beemood etc.

Anyone who has used Twitter will find themselves familiar with the interface at Rejaw. The site is friendly, very minimalistic. No nonsense and has a smooth interface which I love. It is not that I am switching from twitter..but its good to have an alternative…Identi.ca was slow, sluggish and boring…Kwippy was good, nothing spectacular and I am already a fan of Plurk…

Join me on Rejaw!

Plurk from your desktop

thunderror — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 14:43:35 +0000

I have been using twitter fox for a long time now..for the uninitiated, twitterfox is a firefox extension for twitter. But, firefox was acting all weirdly in the morning and I had to close it down for sometime. I downloaded twhirl, the desktop client for twitter meanwhile. Adobe AIR based Twhirl has one of the best interfaces out there and really makes me want to use it just for that…This got me thinking, why plurk which was more closer to chat did not have a desktop client and there I was searching for a client for plurk and I found 3.

Both the applications require Adobe AIR which can be found here.

Plurkair

An Adobe AIR based application which is a desktop application for plurk. I used it, liked it and recommend it. Though I would like a few more features, I need to consider that this application has been developed even in the absence of an API from plurk. Plurkair uses the plurk mobile version of the page and is quite decent for a desktop app. Download it here.

Plurkit

Same as Plurk air, except for a few minor negligible differences.

Plurk Firefox Sidebar

This is to plurk, what twitterfox is twitter. You need the firefox browser, which you can get here. But I am sure you already use it.

Plurking

thunderror — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 06:19:00 +0000

I wanted to review Plurk when I started using it..but never got around to writing this post…Plurk basically took the idea of using status msgs/microblogging to the next level by a little bit of social networking features as well.

Plurk allows its users to update their current status using 140 characters (just like twitter does) But, their similarities end there..Plurk uses a concept of a visible timeline (all your posts are chronologically arranged on an animated timeline) This is in contrast with twitter’s way of presenting your (and your friends’) posts in a fashion similar to an RSS feed. A follower is someone who is informed of every update of yours and a friend is a follower whom you follow as well.

The most talked about feature of plurk is the karma feature which tracks the level of your interactivity and assigns a number to it. Higher karma allows you to unlock more smileys, more interface changes etc. Karma could very well encourage people to interact more, but would also make them very well spam to increase karma. Plurk is soon revamping its karma system..so that should be taken care of..

Another much appreciated feature is the ability to carry out entire conversations over an update. This allows users to interact more freely and responses are chronologically ordered and grouped with the original status message allowing users to follow a complete conversation from beginning to end. For the first few days I used plurk, I completely ignored twitter..but after the new shine washed away…I use it alongside twitter. Plurk unlike other web 2.0s does not share its API..However, there are many sites such as hellotxt, lifestream, ping.fm which already support integration with plurk.

Join me at Plurk!