Regular Webware readers who have been playing around with Facebook's new platform will likely recognize many of the sites and services that are offering their own applications. At almost 90 apps (and growing), there are a lot to choose from. After spending the better part of a day experimenting with many of them, I've chosen five of my personal favorites that I think people are bound to use, and come back to in the long haul because they're useful, and that's ultimately what makes repeat users.
Note: The bold links below won't take you right to the application unless you're logged in to Facebook.
Picnik. This is one of my favorite Web-based photo editors, and the team working on it keeps adding more tools and features all the time. Picnik will sync up with your Facebook photo collection instantly. If you're already a Picnik user, you can login, which will give you access to your photos on other services like Flickr and Picasa Web albums. The best part is that you can grab these photos and send them to Facebook. Picnik has also done something really neat with its full-screen toggle, which lets you escape the confines of Facebook's limited width, and edit shots using your entire monitor without having to navigate away from Facebook.
SplashCast. Facebook's video player that was demoed yesterday is mysteriously missing, but you're probably better off using SplashCast's application. If you're unfamiliar with SplashCast [review], the service lets you combine all sorts of media into one player and publish it in various locations. SplashCast's Facebook player operates in the same manner, and you can showcase it big or small on your profile depending on where you want to place it. Unlike some video embeds, instead of having to remove any video you've posted when adding another, you can simply drop it into a playlist. You can also add photos, and video and audio podcasts.
The box.net widget lets you share files with friends. It also doubles as a media player.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Box.net is one of our Webware 100 nominees, and their file-sharing widget is now available for Facebook members to use. Once you add it to your profile, you can immediately begin dropping in files to share with others. This is great for any general users, but for the people who still actually use Facebook as a tool in school, it's a very simple way to actively host files to other people and not have to rely on e-mail. Like SplashCast, shared media files can be previewed right in the widget.
30 Boxes calendar. Up until now, the only loose scheduling system on Facebook was a small space on the home page that listed people's birthdays and events that had been set up in groups. 30 Boxes [review] provides an integrated, Web-based calendar that's skinned to match the rest of Facebook. You can plan events and invite your Facebook friends to share your plans with others on your profile. You can also take a "peek" at what your friends are up to on their calendars. For current 30 Boxes users, you can sync up your current account, and if you're already using a calendar service, you can slurp your schedule in as a ICS or CSV file using 30 Boxes' importer.
Yackpack Tag gives you instantaneous chat with others right on your profile. It's a sister application to Yackpack's walkie-talkie widget and provides nearly identical results. Users need simply activate the widget, and then push the big talk button to communicate using their computer's microphones. The Yackpack team is working on adding built-in voice mail, which they say is coming soon. It will then have a similar functionality to Jaxtr's voice widget, which also lets people make calls to your telephone, and is incidentally also available as a Facebook application. Yackpack's CEO BJ Fogg, who teaches at Stanford, uses this widget as a tool for his office hours so students can get in touch with him. For other tech-savvy professors, this functionality could make this widget very useful at colleges.
If there's one thing I've already begun to enjoy about Facebook's approach compared to third-party tools in MySpace, it's not having to go in and hand-code my profile to make adjustments. It's a pain many people have put up with out of necessity, and given Facebook's implementation, I don't think I could go back.
Have you been playing around with the new Facebook applications and found any particularly useful? Let us know in the TalkBack.
- MyPunchBowl adds themes, public events. The invitation service we've been keeping an eye on since its January launch has updated with several user-requested features (75, according to its blog). One of the new additions is themed invitations, a feature we asked for in our original hands-on MyPunchBowl review. Also new is the option to create public events, so people can share a party's URL instead of requiring the host to manually go in and send out invites. Our favorite theme? Pretzel Day.
- Clipmarks gets searchy with ClipSearch. Clipmarks, the Web bookmarking service, has added a search engine to its service called ClipSearch. The new tool searches through user-submitted Clipmarks content to pull up results. Users can also add tags to their bookmarked items to help the engine out. Read our Clipmarks hands-on review for more information.
- PBwiki integrates Yackpack. PBwiki, The popular wiki service, is adding Yackpack's walkie-talkie widget to user wiki pages. The goal is to make it easier to communicate with wiki contributors and visitors. We covered the widget last month, and it's a really simple solution for adding instant voice chat to a blog or social networking profile. Related: Wetpaint adds private messaging to Wiki service.
- Quintura adds results from Blinkx. Quintura, the cloud-tag enabled search engine, has partnered with Blinkx, the video search service, to bring Blinkx results to all Quintura searches. Interestingly enough, Quintura hasn't chosen to replace its own video search tool with Blinkx's, as there's still a video search option next to the new Blinkx tab.
(Credit:
CNET Networks)
(Credit:
CNET Networks)
YackPack, the group Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) chat and messaging service we covered last month, has launched a new zero-configuration widget to complement its chatting service. The new widget can be placed in blogs, Web sites, social networking profiles, and forums--practically anywhere embeds are allowed. It's dead simple with a single button you push to talk with others. There's no registration, and no need to install any software--it just works.
The widget has three flavors: one that starts live (meaning you hear others chatting whether you want to or not), an opt-in that requires user input to begin, and a custom URL version that will work across your entire site, no matter how many different pages you embed it in. In all the versions, there's a small number in the bottom right-hand corner that will let you know how many other people are using the widget. If you've had enough of their chatter, there's an X button on the top right to put the widget to sleep.
The Walkie-talkie widget joins YackPack's YackPlayer widget, which lets users embed and share audio messages in a way similar to Jaxtr's VoiceBlast, which we wrote about earlier this week. See also Snapvine.
We've embedded the widget after the break to speed up our page load, so just click "Read More" to begin chatting with other Webware readers.
... Read moreLast time we covered services that required no install or downloads to get a chat going. Today we're looking at seven embeddable objects and extensions for your browser or Web site that give you some additional features over those services:
(Credit:
CNET Networks)
- Weezu is a small extension for both Firefox and Internet Explorer that creates a cartoon-like chatting area on the bottom of your browser. Users get their own avatars, and the interface is completely skinnable. Like some of the services we covered in the first chat roundup, Weezu requires no registration to get going.
- Me.dium. This plug-in lets you chat with others at any Web site and follows you from site to site. Me.dium gives you a friends list, profiles, and forums. In case you're worried about privacy, Me.dium automatically turns itself off when you're visiting secure pages like banks or Web mail. See our previous coverage.
- Dai.sy is similar to Me.dium but with a file-sharing twist. You can chat on any site together, and swap files like documents or pictures. There's also a built-in blogging tool. Dai.sy works with Firefox and Flock and requires no sign-up.
- Chatsum shares features with Me.dium and Dai.sy, but is also at work on a widget to use in Mac OS X's Dashboard. Also neat are two different tabs, one for the site as a whole and one for whatever page you're on, which means you can visit individual stories or sections separately.
- Yakalike is a Firefox extension that feels similar to Yaplet's (see our coverage of Yaplet here). It also works with IM client Jabber, meaning you can continue to chat with others outside of your browser without installing another app.
- The Planet Minibox chat box can be inserted in most Web sites. Planet Minibox logs everyone's messages for the owner to keep track of. It also has some customization and skinning options, which means you can tailor it to match the look and feel of your site. See our hands-on review here.
- Yackpack. Interested in adding voice chat to your site? Yackpack is essentially a push-to-talk voice meeting service mixed with voice mail. You can embed it on your site or create your own and send others a link for them to join. It runs straight in your browser (Internet Explorer- and Firefox-friendly) and requires no install. Previous coverage of Yackpack here.
There have been several communication tools on Webware in the last few days. Joining the party is Yackpack, a messaging tool that lets you chat live as a group or swap recorded messages to group members, all within your Web browser.
Yackpack creates a visual chat room for you, with floating faces representing users. Playing and recording messages is handled through a slick and simple player that sits in the top right of the interface. Handling who you are and aren't talking to is as simple as clicking icons. Toggling all group members is managed with a single select all button. You also can add and remove users without having to leave the app, which is very nicely implemented.
Leaving voice messages for others is a simple affair; however retrieving them is a bit cumbersome. When someone sends you a message, you'll be notified by e-mail. Clicking the provided link takes you to a separate Yackpack module where you can listen to the message. If you're already using Yackpack, you can just click under a user's name, and it pulls up an in-box of sorts with messages he or she has sent. I'd like to see some sort of notification within the app, though, and a centralized place to view all your messages.
Group chat is fairly simple, although not compared with a software alternative such as Skype. Yackpack is similar to using walkie-talkies or a push-to-talk enabled mobile phone--it's turn-based instead of real-time chatter. This could be a problem in a real brainstorming situation where you can't just jut in with your ideas, and you also might be unable to click the talk button if you're doing something else on your computer.
What might be Yackpack's coolest feature is its ability to embed on Web sites or blogs. Below I've added our Webware tester. Yackpack requires registration, but keep in mind you're providing them with a way to let you know when you've received messages from other users. We've also set up a Yackcast, which is an open channel anyone can listen to.
Yackpack is pretty neat, but not without its caveats. If you're used to Skype's no-nonsense group chat, you're likely to hate the need to click a button while talking. On the other hand, getting a bunch of people to install an application to talk can be a pain, which is where embedding makes Yackpack really neat. The fact you can do it for free is even better.
Thanks Jason
Update: Looks like our embed is having some issues. Sorry folks.
Update x2: And we're back up thanks to the devs at Yackpack.
Update x3: We've taken it off the post to speed things up a bit for new posts. In the meantime, you can still find our Yackpack board here: 
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