Another quick hack project. »

Just a quick head's up that I have released another quick hack for people to play with:

whotoget.com

It's a little hard to explain (and if you check it out, you'll see that's one of the big issues I have yet to tackle around the site)...but basically the idea is a quick and easy way for a group of people to filter a CSV file.

The idea itself came to me as a specific request from some friends who needed something like this to (hopefully) save them some time in deciding as a group who they should or shouldn't invite to various events they host.

As explained to me, the process that they go through involves a flurry of emails and spreadsheets so that everyone has a chance to get the people they want onto the list for a given event...and then someone has to step in and complete the busy work of doing the final merge/purge of the results.

So what they were looking for was a simple system where they could upload a CSV file that all their employees could then, at their leisure, go through and mark which records should be moved to a 'yes' list and which can be put on a 'not for this event' list. Beyond that they had a handful of other basic ideas and rules around what they were looking for (for example, when you are saying 'yes' or 'no' to a give record within a dataset, you can just use the 'Y' or 'N' keys on the keyboard instead of having to click the yes or no buttons).

And so I really used their soft requirements as the basic road map for what to build in this initial version...of course I also threw in a few more things that I felt were required to make the system a bit more generic and scalable beyond just their specific needs (like the ability to work with variable length records in your CSV file, manage permissions on who has access to each of your datasets, and the ability to export the filtered results for each unique set of answers back out to a CSV file).

Overall, I'm pretty happy with this initial version and the basic feature set but the site itself could use a lot of help in terms of explanation (and general user interface stuff)...but I'll wait to see what feedback my friends who requested it and others have before I spend too much more time polishing any of it up!

Fuzzypop version 0.14 released! »

Threw together a few key updates to fuzzypop today that I thought I would share with you real quick:

1. Added tabs to the bookmarking form so that instead of one long form, there's five simple tabs ('URL', 'Tags', 'Note', 'Share', and 'Alert me'). The only required field when bookmarking is 'URL' and so that's the default one you see loaded when you click the extension icon (or use the form on the homepage of fuzzypop.com).

2. The 'Note' feature is new as well and does what you would think (let's you store a note along with your bookmark). The Note field also doubles as the message that get's shared if you use the new 'share' feature.

3. Speaking of the 'share' feature, it's new as well and let's you post the URL you are bookmarking to your Twitter and/or Facebook stream along with whatever note you added.

TIP: If you put in a note like "@falicon check out this cool site" and share with your 'Twitter' stream, your tweet will be logged as a mention in your Twitter stream...if you put in a note like "d falicon check out this cool site" and share with your 'Twitter' stream, your tweet will be logged as a direct message in your Twitter stream.

4. Cleaned up some of the basic graphics and buttons and moved around a few things on the 'your account' page...but I've got a lot more to do in this area before I feel like it's even close to 'good' and useable.

That's about it for today (it took a lot longer to implement than what it sounds like in this post!)...up next I'll be spending some more time trying to figure out/clean up the actual web site interface and document the API (btw, the extension and website are both just interfaces to an API that I haven't released to the general public yet -- once I do, anyone could write their own interface on top of all this functionality!).

I'll also be integrating some bit.ly information into the extension soon so you can see some quick details if other people have shortened a link to the URL you are on as well as how many people have clicked on those shared links.

I'm also thinking about adding in some extra behind-the-scenes features that monitor Twitter and Facebook for links you've tagged to see who in general is mentioning those links (even if they aren't specifically tagging them with fuzzypop)...there's a bit of a scaling issue to tackle before I could release this to the general public, but I think it's a cool idea that people would really like and so I'll probably spend at least a little time trying to figure it out.

Didn't you just start four months ago? »

For those of you that don't know, I recently transitioned out of being 'the tech. guy' behind Catchafire.org...and since I was only there for about four months in total, you might be wondering just what happened? So I thought I would take a quick minute to explain myself.

Before I get into any details though, I want to say that this move was entirely initiated by me. Once I made my decision the team supported it and I believe we made the transition happen quickly and friendly. And I really believe we all came out for the better in the end (they found a SUPERSTAR in Andrew Lin to replace me). Plus I still intend to pitch in as they need me, and I *think* we are all still on good terms...and I know personally I would be happy to work with Jane and Rachael again in the future.

Anyway, getting back to just why I decided to remove myself so shortly after having joined the team...

The core reason is that I just couldn't find enough passion within myself for the project (this was my concern going in, but I thought I might be able to build up the passion once I got into it full time - I was wrong)...it wasn't that I didn't like the idea or think that it would work out (actually I love the idea and I'm certain that they are going to build a huge industry around it)...it was just that, no matter how hard I tried, I wasn't loosing sleep over the idea. I could easily focus on it from 9 to 5, and then shut down for the night.

I know that when I'm truly passionate about a project or a problem I go into 'nonstop' mode and literally can't go to sleep (or do just about anything really) without thinking about what I'm going to do/try next to move it forward...so I've been doing this sort of thing long enough, and know myself well enough, to know when I'm really just calling it in...

And to me that's a HORRIBLE way to be within such an early stage startup...and completely unfair to the rest of the team that's pouring so much of their heart and soul into the project.

Could I have made it work? Yes, without a doubt...and in fact, I did manage to build the initial alpha version (that was already bringing in sales) and was heavily into a Beta version we were just about to release (though I suspect my replacement will take things in a different direction and eventually throw out all the code I was putting in place -- which is completely fair and understandable given the position).

But I'm a big believer in passion...and I think it's a NECESSITY in any early stage startup where everyone's gotta be working 24/7 doing the work of a small army...and if someone's not putting everything they have into it, it's to everyone's advantage to get them out as quickly as possible (there's just no room to waste time trying to make it work at such an early stage).

So, I decided to remove myself as quickly as possible (it took about a month or so to find what we think is the perfect replacement and only a couple of days to make the actual transition once we found Andrew).

Though my time at Catchafire was short, it really was sweet...and I like to think I learned a lot more about myself, what really motivates me, and what sort of things I personally need to do different in my next adventure (which I'm already lining up and will talk more about shortly).

As I mentioned before, I'm sure Catchafire is going to continue to build an amazing company going forward (if for no other reason than they are already an amazing team of people who I think are doing the right things for the right reasons)...and I look forward watching them do just that (and kicking myself in the future for not sticking around long enough to earn any stock!)

Looking for ideas... »

I've got about 60 domains in my collection right now and only about 17 of them are actually 'in production'...and though I've got ideas (or some might say dreams) for the 43 that I haven't yet 'officially' released, I'm always in search of new and better ideas for things to build.

I can also say that without a doubt, the best ideas for projects and things to build come from other people (ie. not me)...so if you've got something on your mind that you'de like to see built or played with a bit, drop me a comment and maybe I'll hack something up for you!

p.s. I'm especially having fun with Google Chrome extensions...so a good idea involving a Chrome extension would def. jump to the top of my list right now ;-)

Introducing fuzzpop »

Today I 'officially' released the first version of fuzzypop.com as yet another wow.ly tool for social data.

For those of you counting, that makes six 'in production' projets within the wow.ly suite (Conversationlist.com, FriendStat.us, fuzzypop.com, HiveMind, pu.ly, and URIData.com)...and I have at least seven more 'in development' at the moment as well...but that is really a tangent to this post because what I really want to talk about is fuzzypop!

So what is fuzzypop and what's it do?

On the most basic level fuzzypop is a tool that uses your social graph to help you manage information overload. On a slightly more technicnal level, it's really a social bookmarking tool that includes a 'tipping point' feature.

The primary feature is an extension for Google Chrome that hopefully users install and start using to tag/bookmark the things they find interesting around the internet...so in this way, it's very much like delicious.com...but what I think makes it very different is that there is also an option to set a number so that you can be alerted when enough of your friends also bookmark the URL.

In fact, one of my primary motivations for building fuzzypop was to try and tackle the 'tipping point' problem for events...I give an example of the tipping point problem and how I think this new tool helps fix it on the fuzzypop.com homepage so I won't repeat it here, but it definiately was the primary motivation behind many of my design decisions and general thinking behind the project.

So I think the alerting bit is really cool...and actually the extension itself will show you the number of your friends that have already marked the page (and who they are) whenever you visit the page (for those friends that tagged it before you)...but I *think* the angle of tying social bookmarks to your social graph also gives the project a lot of potential and options for the future.

For example, once enough people start using it, I'll be able to tell you what things and events are trending within your own social graph...I'll be able to tell you what parts of your social graph are interested in the same things as each other and which have very different interests (making you the interesting intersection of both)...plus I'll be able to do some really interesting people focused things (remember I'm all about the people focus) and introduce you to interesting things AND people based on what your sharing, what your social graph is sharing, and what's passing through fuzzypop as a whole...

Anyway, overall I think it shows potential for being a good solution...but there are a lot of little UI issues I've still got to figure out and improve (especially the hooks into each user's social networks as it's a bit clunky right now)...and, because it's a multi-step process, I think I've got a bit of an uphill battle on getting people to understand AND start using it (so please give it a go and make sure to tell all your friends about it too).

But hey it's a start...and it's been fun/interesting to build so far regardless of where it goes from here (and if nothing else, it gives me more experience with Chrome extensions and a nice little bookmarking tool for my own use).