Archive for the ‘Applications’ Category
Find Out How Beautiful You Are on Facebook
Thursday, May 8th, 2008
Some people say that beauty in on the inside. The people over at nip/tuck believe that beauty comes in the number 1.618. While I’m not so sure about the accuracy of this number, nip/tuck has built an application which tests to see if you face comes close to the golden ratios. The application lets you select a photo from your albums and test out your beauty.
I didn’t have a proper portrait to test but I’m sure it would have come out a perfect 1.618 
This application could be pretty controversial and as such I would have imagined it to gain some more substantial traction but so far the application has reached less than 3,000 people. The application also had a problem with zooming in to my my photo large enough. I’m not surprised that this application wasn’t successful because it has absolutely no social feature whatsoever.
It just goes to show that no matter what your brand is, it doesn’t mean your application will be successful. I think that they could have potentially made this application into some sort of beauty contest and offered rewards of some sort but all they really ended up producing was an ineffective flash application. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to gain much value out of using this application and I don’t think other users were able to either. If you want to have a shot at it and see if you can extract some sort of value from the application, go install the nip/tuck golden ratio application.
Fresbo World Brings Avatar Worlds to Facebook
Monday, May 5th, 2008Asia has been one of the leaders in monetizing social networks. How are they making money? Virtual goods. Those virtual goods are sold so users can build virtual houses, clothe their virtual avatars and a number of other things. I’ve found one of the first avatar worlds on Facebook called, Fresbo world. The application provides you with an avatar that you can proceed to purchase clothing, furnish your apartment and play games with.
Currency in the game comes in the form of points and credits. The credits can be purchased and the points are earned. The only way to earn points currently is through a game called “Pass the Bomb.” Pass the bomb is a game of chance with a little bit of strategy. All you have to do is guess what number is under the bomb and based on the number you think it is, you ad 1, 2 or 3 clicks to the counter each turn. If the counter reaches the number under the bomb during your turn, the bomb explodes and you lose points.
I’m embarrassed to say that I played “Pass the Bomb” for a solid hour this morning. Honestly, the game is not that unique and it isn’t challenging. I just found it interesting that I could use the points I earned during the game to go purchase more goods from the local shopping mall. Currently there is only 1 village in the game and it’s called “Noob Villiage.” Given that the game is in beta they will be adding a lot of features.
I can see people figuring out a way to pour a lot of time into this virtual world, the same way people spend time on second life. While there is not as much customization as there is within second life, there is enough for those looking to have fun and waste time. I’ve argued that there is no real point to second life in conversation with my friends and ultimately there is really no point to Fresbo world except for building up your avatar’s inventory and wasting time playing games.
Perhaps I’m just frustrated that I don’t get paid real dollars to play games in real life. Either way, Fresbo world is a great application if you are looking to waste some free time or get sucked in to building up your own virtual character. If you are interested, go check out the Fresbo World application.
A Store in Fresbo World
Pass the Bomb Game
When Gift Giving Isn’t Spam
Monday, April 28th, 2008
This past weekend I was browsing through the Facebook applications directory and came across the “Send Ben & Jerry’s” application. My initial response was that this is yet another gift giving application. I then noticed that close to 4,000 people had used the application the previous day and almost 200,000 people had installed the application. This is an impressive number for a general Facebook application.
The reality is that non-generic versions of standard Facebook applications can actually succeed. Apparently popular brands can produce simple applications that grow virally. I would have thought that gift giving applications have already been dominated but it appears as though some applications are still figuring out ways to launch and succeed. What extra features does the Ben & Jerry’s application provide that traditional gift giving applications doesn’t already have?
Truthfully, not much. The one addition is the ability to unlock other gifts based on the volume of ice cream that you send to your friends. I decided not to barrage my friends with a bunch of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream goodness but it looks like a lot of other people are. If you want to send ice cream to your friends as well, check out the Send Ben & Jerry’s application.
Already Tired of Chat? Block it!
Thursday, April 24th, 2008Facebook chat rolled out yesterday but apparently some users are already tired of it. Jesse Stay just contacted me to tell me about a new greasemonkey script that he hacked together that blocks chat for Facebook users. Personally, I’ve kind of enjoyed the limited amount of Facebook chat experience I’ve had so far aside from the fact that it’s limited to the browser. I’d like to have a standalone Facebook chat clients as well as an email client.
Seriously I have no idea what’s taking Facebook so long to roll out an updated messaging system but the current one is horrendous. My current inbox on Facebook has over 250 messages and there is no hope of recovery. Anyways, aside from my Facebook inbox, having a tool to blog Facebook chat could be useful for many. The only problem is that even though the Greasemonkey script will block chat, your friends will still be notified that you are online.
Receive a message? You simply won’t receive it causing your friends to assume that you have now ignored them and no longer want to speak to them ever again. This is the risk you take when you play with greasey monkeys. Still though, for those that have 5,000 friends (or close to it), signing on to Facebook can be a detriment to your health with an instant influx of 30 plus messages taking up your entire screen. For those few that have friend overload, I’m sure that this tool will come in handy.
Update
As a number of people pointed out in the comments, apparently there is a way to simply go offline. All you have to do is go to the right hand side of the Chat bar and click “Go Offline.” Figuring out how to use chat would definitely be a good idea, prior to building applications around it 
Animoto Beats Slide at Their Own Game
Monday, April 21st, 2008A little over a month ago I announced the launch of the Animoto Facebook application. At the time I suggested that this application could easily become a competitor to Slide’s primary application that became popularized via millions of MySpace profiles. Well it looks as though my prediction has come true. Animoto is now the 16th largest application based on daily active users and the application continues to grow.
While Slide has over 10 times the number of active users that Animoto currently has on Facebook, Animoto has destroyed Slide when it comes to their own game: slide shows. A quick look at Slide’s Slide Shows application shows a measly 3,000 active daily users and horrible reviews. Does this mean the end of Slide? Definitely not but it definitely means the beginning of a new leader in the dynamic slideshow space.
Animoto differentiates itself from others (dynamic flash based slideshows) by actually creating a rendered video of your photos intermixed with audio. You can choose to upload your own audio content or you can select from their library. This application is a perfect example of an application that succeeded even with a late entry to the platform. If you spend time developing valuable applications that help users express themselves more effectively, you will surely have a popular application on your hands. If you haven’t had the opportunity to check out Animoto, go install the Animoto Facebook application.
As a sample of what can be produced I have included a video of a Social Times party I threw at the end of last year.
Six Apart Launches Facebook Blogging Application
Wednesday, April 16th, 2008Earlier today I had the opportunity to speak with David Recordon of Six Apart. He has been working on a Facebook application for the past few months that is pretty interesting and extremely simple. The application enables bloggers quickly post their blog posts from within Facebook and send notifications of that post to Facebook, Twitter and Pownce. I’ve been wondering for a long time why nobody had created an effective blogging software for Facebook.
While there is currently no WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) editor, it creates a simple interface for posting to your Typepad, Wordpres, Blogger or Movable Type blog. As David Recordon told me on the phone earlier today, the goal is to “bridge the gap between social networking and blogging.” The application makes it easier for bloggers to pull in their content from their own sites.
The application is extremely simple but David expressed the desire to add on features if the users express a need for more. You can find more by reading about it on his post on his blog. Six Apart decided not to add any viral components to this application because they wanted to focus on utility. While this will most likely have a negative impact on the growth of the application it will most definitely have a positive impact on the user’s experience.
If you want to blog within Facebook go check out the Blog It application.
New Causes Application Looks to Raise Money Without Donations
Tuesday, April 8th, 2008The causes application has been up for almost a year now but many critics have complained about the lack of money earned for each cause even though millions of users have become supporters. “Support the Campaign for Cancer Research” has attracted over 3 million users and $61,440 has been donated. This amounts to approximately $0.02 per user. Dank Apps attempted to find a solution to this problem and came up with a set of ad supported social change applications.
Users earn money by generating karma points through inviting friends, sending gifts and participating in the community. As you earn more karma points, the donation goes up. Since launching yesterday, the Earn for Breast Cancer application has generated almost $63 wial ith only 212 users. If enough users join this application, it actually has a chance at generating substantial money for charities.
There have been other attempts at this on Facebook but so far they have failed. One of the breast cancer awareness applications required that you download a toolbar to earn money. The only problem with that is nobody wants a toolbar on their computer. As such Dank Apps thinks they have a solution. If the 3 million members that added the Campaign for Breast Cancer Research on causes, the application would generate $60,000 just for the users adding the app. After interacting with the application, significantly more could be generated.
If you want to help bring change but don’t want to make a donation, go install the Earn for Breast Cancer application, Earn for Aids application or the Stop Climate Change application.
American Airlines Launches Facebook App: Guaranteed Failure
Friday, March 28th, 2008
Yesterday I read a press release about a new American Airlines application. As usual the release provided no link to the physical application but after searching I was able to find what I was looking for. The new Travel Bag application, provides users with a forum for talking about their travel experiences. It’s pretty much a travel journal for travelers. I can understand the ease of use of uploading Facebook photos via my mobile device but logging in to this application to describe where I’ve been traveling seems a little bit tedious.
Additionally, this application has absolutely no engaging content for me to interact with. If I’m not currently traveling I have absolutely no use for this application. Get this, I can’t even view my friends’ travel logs within the application! I hate to really criticize an application but when you figure American Airlines probably spent $30k building this application, you would hope that they had produced something highly useful.
One commenter on the application’s wall summed it up well:
I’m glad to hear that AA is getting such great reviews. That’s really great. However, I believe that AA would be an even better company if it went bankrupt. From really bad customer service to the computers that are unable to go back and look at previous reservation data, I would recommend this airline to anyone who is looking for a waste of time and money.
I don’t think this commenter spoke for all the users because one or two (possibly seeded) commenters appeared to actually enjoy the application. It’s great to see travel companies making an effort to enter the social networking space but next time they may want to focus on actually making the application social.
If keeping a travel journal sounds like something that would appeal to you on Facebook then go check out the Travel Bag application.
Track My Location With Findme
Wednesday, March 26th, 2008
Are you a fanatic about complete transparency in this digital era? If you are then you must add the new FindMe application to your Facebook profile. Every 15 minutes your approximate location will be updated in your Facebook status thanks to a simple technology similar to Google Maps mobile technology which determines where you are based on cell phone towers. I’m not quite sure why on earth I would want to let anybody know where I am at any given minute but this is a great tool for parents that want to track their activity offline.
Did your girlfriend say she was going to a movie with her friends today? Why is she driving around another state then? You can now put your relationship to the test by adding the FindMe application. Then again I would suggest against this application if you want to maintain any sort of normalcy in your life. Imagine your friends calling you “Hey man you just drove by my house but didn’t stop by! Great friend you are!”
This application also makes sense for those hard working truck drivers but really how many truck drivers are really active on Facebook? This tool raises the bar for invasive technology but then again you have to opt into it. Do you think this application is useful? Will you be installing it? If you want to you can go grab the Findme application.
Beer Pong Comes to Facebook
Monday, March 24th, 2008When the Facebook platform first launched, you wouldn’t believe how many people contacted me and said “I’m going to make a beer pong application.” It has been 10 months since the platform launched and finally a top notch beer pong application has been launched. As you would expect, it’s also very popular. In just a few days almost 15,000 people have added the application and the growth is steady.
Mike Lazerow of Buddy Media, the company that developed this game, sent me an email when it launched and I had to check it out. I ended up playing the game for a couple hours trying to get on the leader board. Interesting enough I came very close to reaching the top 10 but I didn’t make it. I had however perfected my game so if you want to test the master, I suggest you challenge me to a round of beer pong.
As has been predicted, social gaming applications have become the focus of Facebook for the most part. There are also utility applications but there is only so much value that you can easily add to Facebook profiles. I think games are the way to go and from an advertising perspective, custom games are highly valuable. You get targeted individuals engaged in a branded environment for an extended period of time. If you want to play a round of beer pong, go check out the Campus U Beer Pong application.
