Touchgraph is a cool web tool. I use it in “educating” clients on how linking works, and how you can make an interconnected mesh of websites. Anyway, here’s what the White African TouchGraph looks like:

Ever since KikuyuMoja reminded me that Flock was out, I’ve been having a lot of fun. In fact, maybe too much fun.

If you didn’t know already, Flock is a new web browser. Some would say that there are too many web browsers out there already. Lord knows many web designers are sick of having to ensure that their pages are optimized for Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Safari – much less Flock now.

Anyway, what I’ve been enjoying is customizing Flock with the many extensions available. If you’re familiar with Firefox, you’ll recognize the usual suspects: Greasmonkey, Web Developer, GMail Notifier, StumbleUpon, etc… The direct tie in with Del.icio.us is an interesting feature – I’m still trying to come to grips with the fact that my favorites are viewable by everyone.

Flock is in Beta right now, it has some problems – like when you have a number of tabs open (like I normally do) then it gets a little slow. I’m sure that a full release will have most of the bugs worked out though. Since it’s being built on the Mozilla platform, that should make for easier bug fixes. Give it a whirl, see if you like it.

UPDATE: I came across a great review of Flock by another blogger, which is well worth checking out. Visit The Lonely Canadian to read it.

I’m testing Flock, the new web browser built along the Mozilla Firefox infrastructure.  Find out more at the Flock Website or this Businessweek Article. Yet another article from eWeek.

Well, the first thing I have to say is that I like the integration. I’m having a little difficulty trying to blog through Flock instead of just going to my normal WordPress admin area. I’m sure there’ll be upgrades in this area as we get past beta, but it’s one of the areas I’m going to focus on. Also, it has a very easy to use tagging tool.

Technorati Tags: Flock, web browser, internet tools, internet

Not even a week after I posted an article about 37 Signals and their great products, they go and launch another one: Writeboard. Think “wiki made simple” and you’ll understand what writeboard is.

If you don’t have a clue what wiki’s are, a wiki allows anyone, using a web browser, to edit, delete or modify content that has been placed on the web site including the work of other authors (Wikipedia being the most famous)

Here’s what they say about Writeboard:

Writeboard makes it easy to…

• Write without fear of losing or overwriting a good idea
• Compare different versions of a document
• Collaborate with colleagues on copy, proposals, memos, etc.
• Subscribe to documents via RSS and be notified of changes
• Keep your writings organized with Backpack integration

Writeboard is perfect for…

• Authors, journalists, PR folks, editors, and publishers
• Bloggers or freelance/independent writers
• Letter writers, songwriters, poets, comedians, creatives
• Students, professors, and groups collaborating on a paper

Now, I swear I’m not on the payroll of 37 Signals (though maybe I should be), I just like their products and how they do it.

Similar to eSnips, which I outlined in a previous post, Backpack is a personal organizer, project and data management tool. Backpack has a big brother that goes by the name Basecamp, which is useful for the small- to mid-sized business as a project management tool. While I’m at it, I might as well mention their free Ta-da List tool, which is a free list management tool that you can share with others.

The following quote is what I love about this company:

Who is 37signals?
We’re a company of five committed to building the best web-based software products possible with the least number of features necessary. Our products do less than the competition — intentionally. We’ve been in business since 1999.

You can’t help but love a small company who provides simple and useful web-based tools – tools that aren’t overdone or overcomplicated and that actually make your life easier (imagine that!). I suggest reading 37Signals Manifesto as well, it helps why they make their products the way they do. An example:

Some have called Backpack “a wiki with out the wacky.” Others have called it “blogish.” Others have said it’s a project management tool for all the little things in your life. Some say it’s a application that helps you get things done. Some have called it Basecamp’s little brother. Call it what you will. We call it useful and hope you do too.

37Signals is a savvy enough web team to realize that you need to provide a free offering for each service, so you can try out any of their products for free and if you like it enough, just upgrade. I haven’t used the Basecamp product yet, but after reviewing Backpack over the last 2 months, I firmly give it a thumbs-up. My one knock on their products is that they don’t have as much storage space as you get from an eSnips or Gmail account.