Skip to Content

Free TUAW iPhone app -- try it now!
AOL Tech

buzz posts

Filed under: web 2.0, Microblogging

Trendsmap is a slick Google Maps - Twitter trends hybrid


While it won't give you any local insight if you happen to be from just about anywhere in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, or the Dakotas, Trendsmap is a slick, visual way to see what people are buzzing about on Twitter.

This isn't just another boring Twitter-Google mashup, though. It's got some added explorational sizzle. Click on any of the tags, and the introduction window you see in the screenshot will change to a topical display. The box contains not only relevant updates, but also displays the tag's 7-day local and global popularity, images and videos which have been mentioned, and popular topical links (see inset).

Trendsmap's toolbar is minimal and includes only five quick-access items: zoom in and out, snap to your city, snap to your region, and show the globe. I'll go out on a limb and say that the snap buttons will work for those of you in more cosmopolitan areas.

Read more →

Filed under: Web services, Social Software, web 2.0

Traackr: gauge your popularity across social sites

Traackr
Traackr is a free web service that lets you aggregate data about your media presence on the Web. Just create an account, add your "subscriptions" (flickr username, last.fm username, etc.), and wait about 24 hours for Traackr to get statistics.

Each day Traackr will get information like number of views, comments, and ratings, with trend graphs to make the data pretty. It will also show you which of your tags get the most views (helpful for getting user attention). You can also create campaigns to track how well certain media objects are "performing" which could be very useful for a photographer to see how popular certain groups of photos are.

Traackr could be a great tool for musicians, photographers, videographers, and the ego-centric social-site user. It's a central location to see how popular you (or your work) are, and it gives you seemingly arbitrary "Buzz" and "Populartity" scores.

Filed under: Internet, Yahoo!, Beta, web 2.0

Yahoo! Buzz: Digg clone now in beta

Yahoo BuzzAs we reported earlier, Yahoo! Buzz is now in public beta. Buzz is similar to Digg in that it lets users promote/demote ("Buzz") content to the top of the metaphoric hive. However, currently only publishers involved in the beta can have content submitted to the site, which makes Buzz (much) more restricted than Digg.

Yahoo says that they have "members of their team" choose promoted stories to appear on the Yahoo homepage, but they do not choose what appears on the Buzz site. Like Digg, Buzz uses an algorithm to determine a story's "Buzz Score" based on number of votes, number of times the story is shared, and the number of search results for the story's subject matter.

If you want to start Buzz-ing, you'll need a Yahoo account. Then, like Digg, click the voting button next to the story to promote a story. Oddly you can also submit stories directly to other social news sites (including Digg). You won't yet be able to view your voting history, and Buzz lacks "community features" like seeing what your friends have Buzz-ed. Oh, and you can't comment on stories on the Buzz site.

So if you want a featureless Digg clone with stories coming only from a specific set of sources, then try Buzz now! But hey, it's still in beta.

[Via PC Pro - Computer Buyer]

Filed under: Internet, Web services, Yahoo!, Social Software, web 2.0

Rumor: Yahoo! to launch Digg competitor

Yahoo! Buzz
While Yahoo! fields merger/hostile takeover offers, the company's development team continues to push out new services. Today Yahoo! launched a retooled version of its video site. And Valleywag is reporting that the company will be launching a brand spanking new service on February 26th: A news and entertainment page featuring popular stories from around the web.

Yahoo! Buzz as it will reportedly be known will be something of a cross between Digg and Google Trends. Top stories will be chosen through a combination of user votes and popular search results.

But Digg has one thing that Yahoo! Buzz won't. At least not immediately. And that's a list of links from an unlimited number of web pages. Yahoo! Buzz will only feature links to about 100 web publishers at first. Eventually the company will reportedly open Buzz up to the Yahoo! Publisher Network, which means that anyone who sells Yahoo! ads on their site could be featured on Yahoo! Buzz.

While that might sound like a good reason for people to sign up for the publisher network, as incentive to get more social networking traffic, it also means that Yahoo! Buzz is by definition going to be more limited than Digg, StumbleUpon, or other social news and bookmarking sites. But this is all rumor and speculation at this point. It's possible Yahoo! Buzz won't be as limited as Valleywag suggests. Or maybe it's not even real.

If you go to buzz.yahoo.com today you'll find a page with top search results trends. But if Valleywag is correct, that site will be the future home of Yahoo! Buzz.

Featured Time Waster

Graveyard Shift - zombie-busting Time Waster

With Halloween fast approaching, it's a great time to get in some practice defending your territory against zombies. In Graveyard Shift, you take aim at zombies and other creepy-crawlies, blasting them into splatters of cartoony green guts. It's a casual first-person shooter, and it's very easy to get the hang of - use the mouse to aim, click to fire. Graveyard Shift has at least 15 levels, and it might even have some secret stages I haven't unlocked yet. They key to getting good at Graveyard Shift is learning to use ...

View more Time Wasters

Featured Galleries

Defective by Design, London: Protest Pictures
Microsoft Security Essentials
Chromium Pre-Alpha on CrunchBang Linux
Safari 4 Beta
10 Firefox themes that don't suck
IE8 RC1
Download Squad at the Crunchies After-Party
Download Squad at the Crunchies
WordPress 2.7
Cooking Mama: Mama Kills Animals
Windows 7 Hands On
Comodo Internet Security
Android First-look: Amazon.com MP3 Store
Android First-look: Twitroid
Google Reader Android
Android Hands-On
Twine 1.0
Photoshop Express Beta
Mozilla Birthday Cake
Palm stuff
Adobe Lightroom 1.1

 


Follow us on Twitter!

Flickr Pool

www.flickr.com

More Tech Coverage

AOL Radio