Sep
9th

Oneupweb Reviews: Google’s Instant Search

Posted by Adam D on September 9, 2010 at 1:54 pm

Google introduces Google Instant! Bam! There it is. No introduction, no clever story to segue into the review. Just an instant declaration of what this review is about. So, how’d you like that? The instant introduction. My guess is that you, as a reader, appreciated it.

In our culture, where we impatiently tap our feet in front of the microwave—unless you’re instant—you’re BORRRIIING! So let’s stop wasting time and get to the review. Shew! That was close… for a second there this review almost became boring. Quick! Watch this video!

Now, when you navigate to Google.com and start typing your search query, Google begins displaying search results—as you type! Why? I have no idea! But I think it has something to do with the microwave situation described above.

It’s hard to tell from the screen shot above, but as I’m typing—not only am I getting suggestions—but I’m also seeing search results change. As I type!

Taking one step backwards, when you start typing on Google’s home page, instead of your search beginning once you hit “Google Search”, it begins the moment you type in your first character. Jumping directly to the search results page.

I personally like this new feature. However, I’ve been told I go too easy on companies in my reviews. But hey, if you’re not a fan you can always turn Instant Search off in your search settings.

I’m curious to see how Google Instant will change SEO. Some of our initial research shows that not much has changed on the back-end of Google’s algorithm. But one thing that the introduction of Google Instant will surely change is peoples’ search behavior. And the implications of that behavioral change—well, it will change SEO.

Oneupweb Reviews: Thumbs Up

Our office seems to be divided on this one. Some love Google Instant and some hate it. What are your thoughts? Let us know in the comments below.

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Aug
16th

Oneupweb Reviews: Booshaka! Facebook Public Search

Posted by Adam D on August 16, 2010 at 3:17 pm

We all love Twitter Search because it gives users the ability to see what real people are talking about at any given moment. Twitter itself offers users the ability to set their profile to Public or Private. Public allows anyone to see your tweets, where Private only allows those who are following you to see them. This sounds a lot like Facebook to me, and Twitter has a search, so why shouldn’t Facebook? I mean, wouldn’t it be great to see what is trending on Facebook, just like Twitter? Well, we found a new Facebook public search engine that claims to do just that called booshaka!

Booshaka!.com

With booshaka! (laka)— so fun to say—you can search specific keywords. If someone’s profile is public, and they are chatting about that keyword, their conversation will show up in your search results. But if you just want to search a broader topic like news, music or sports, you can also search by category.

The biggest difference I’ve noticed between Twitter search results and booshaka! is the length of the results. With Twitter search results, it’s easier to get a snapshot of what’s going on because the results are only 140 characters in length. With booshaka! the posts are naturally longer because Facebook allows longer posts.

Twitter Search Results For Movies

booshaka! Search Results For Movies

So as you can see, there might be a little more scrolling going on while using booshaka!. Then again, who would want to scroll when Vin is the top post? He’s so… beautiful.

Another difficulty booshaka! might encounter is the privacy issues that Facebook has had to deal with. Services like booshaka! only make Facebook users more aware of how public their information is. Which, I maintain, would not be a problem if Faceabook would have operated without subterfuge concerning the Open Graph. Let people know up front that their information is public, and they won’t be so surprised when they find out it is. Seems simple enough to me.

booshaka! also offers the ability to sort search results by most popular, trending now, most buzz, and most recent—as seen below. Also seen below is Vin laughing. You’re so funny Vin, you always know how to make us smile.

booshaka! Filtering Options

The ability to search public Facebook posts for keywords that are relevant to the user is pretty cool. And I like the filtering options as well. For making it easier to stalk celebrities… I mean search Facebook for Vin Diesel related news… I mean, awe forget it. We give booshaka! a…

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

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Aug
10th

Oneupweb Reviews: The Teen Choice Awards Get Social

Posted by Adam D on August 10, 2010 at 2:19 pm

After this weekend’s Teen Choice Awards, there are a few things we now know to be true. Bieber fever isn’t going away (don’t stop believing, though), vampires rule and social media needs to be a part of every business marketing strategy.

It’s abundantly clear—the Teen Choice Awards heavily markets to the teenage demographic. It’s the demographic the show was built for, so no surprise there. But this year, like Pepsi moving much of its budget from TV to social media, the Teen Choice Awards moved its focus to where its target market is—online. And to do this, they took the awards social.

In fact, the combination of social media services used to promote this event is dizzying: streaming live through UStream, then on to Fox’s Teen Choice Awards Facebook Tab, and finally integrating Facebook’s Live Stream plugin. Wow! Take a look at the Facebook tab below.

On Twitter, they created an account to share news concerning the Teen Choice Awards. Then, Fox took it one step further by creating a persona called the Teen Choice Girl. This persona claimed to have the inside scoop on all the latest TC news. It’s smart marketing, since much of Twitter consists of a younger female demographic. Check out the Twitter profile below.

Though much of MySpace is a desert wasteland compared to Facebook and Twitter, for music, it’s still an ideal place. Which is exactly why the Teen Choice Awards chose to create a MySpace profile as well.

Facebook, Twitter and UStream were strong for The Teen Choice Awards, but I think that they missed out by not using YouTube. While they did have the host of the popular YouTube show What the Buck hosting live on the red carpet, they simply did not have any sort of YouTube presence, which is unfortunate. I think it’s safe to assume that Fox was nervous about copyright laws, etc—but why not have its own channel featuring stars, or even internal employees, talking about the upcoming show?

We shouldn’t pick on Fox too much, though. After all, not utilizing YouTube is a small missed opportunity when you compare it to all of their other great uses of social media this year. So we give the marketing strategy of the Teen Choice Awards a…

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

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Jul
22nd

Oneupweb Reviews: Google’s New Image Search

Posted by Adam D on July 22, 2010 at 4:11 pm

Google’s image search has been falling behind the pack for a while. Bing and Flickr for example offer much more aesthetically pleasing options for viewing photos. It looks like Google agreed. And that’s why the search engine has released a new layout for its image SERPs.

Google’s image search used to display images that were too small, included irrelevant information, and were too few per page. Now images are large and include more images per page. Google remained consistent with the simplicity of the new image search results. In fact the pages are now even more simple than before.

Now when you click on an image you are taken to the image’s source page. But instead of the entire page loading, leaving you not knowing where the image is on that page, you are presented with an image overlay. Nice! These are just a few of the new key features in Google image search.

Here are the rest according to Google’s blog:

Dense tiled layout designed to make it easy to look at lots of images at once. We want to get the app out of the way so you can find what you’re really looking for.
Instant scrolling between pages, without letting you get lost in the images. You can now get up to 1,000 images, all in one scrolling page. And we’ll show small, unobtrusive page numbers so you don’t lose track of where you are.
Larger thumbnail previews on the results page, designed for modern browsers and high-res screens.
A hover pane that appears when you mouse over a given thumbnail image, giving you a larger preview, more info about the image and other image-specific features such as “Similar images.”
Once you click on an image, you’re taken to a new landing page that displays a large image in context, with the website it’s hosted on visible right behind it. Click anywhere outside the image, and you’re right in the original page where you can learn more about the source and context.
Optimized keyboard navigation for faster scrolling through many pages, taking advantage of standard web keyboard shortcuts such as Page Up / Page Down. It’s all about getting you to the info you need quickly, so you can get on with actually building that treehouse or buying those flowers.

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

Have you had a chance to try the new Google image search yet? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

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Jul
9th

Oneupweb Reviews: Fun Friday Videos – Skateboard Disaster & Double Rainbow Mania

Posted by Adam D on July 9, 2010 at 2:09 pm

Hey everyone, are you as excited as I am that it’s Friday? Sure you are. We here at Oneupweb are in the middle of the National Cherry Festival. We’ve seen the Blue Angels, fireworks, parades, and yes the carnival is in town! But of course we did find some time to be productive along the way. This week, while the Blue Angels were practicing right outside our window, a client told me during a call that he felt like he was in the movie Top Gun. How cool is that? Sorry, Goose, but it’s time to buzz the tower!

We also found some time to run into some very piquant (thanks thesaurus.com) videos. First up is…

World’s Largest Skateboard Disaster:

Take a skateboard the size of a house, a huge hill, and what does that spell? Disaster. Well at least according to Woodward Camp. I would describe this as amazing/hilarious, but to each his own! Watch it and let me know if you agree in the comments.

Double Rainbow:

I love this video.

In an exclusive interview with CBS’s Shira Lazar, the video’s creator, Hungrybear9562, talks about his encounter with the double rainbow (maybe even a triple).

You seemed pretty excited about this rainbow…

Because you could actually feel the rays down from the sun but it was rainbow rays. You can’t describe it. It was so powerful that it knocked me down.

The rainbow rays knocked you down?

You couldn’t see me on the ground, but at one point I had been knocked on the ground. But the rainbow was a double rainbow and then it turned into a triple rainbow. You can’t see it on my camera but the whole thing was filled in with color. It was a giant disc of color. It looked like a giant eye looking at me.

Is that common to be knocked down by rainbows?

I don’t think it’s common, but it happened. It was pretty amazing!

Since the video has hit the web it has garnered almost 2 million views, and has become an internet meme. My favorite 2 remixes are listed below. Enjoy!

Double Rainbow Song:

Double Rainbow Remix:

Oneupweb Review: Double Thumbs Up (maybe triple)!

Let me know what you thought about these videos by leaving a comment below!

To read other Fun Friday reviews click Oneupweb’s Fun Friday Reviews.

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Jul
8th

Oneupweb Reviews: YouTube Leanback

Posted by Adam D on July 8, 2010 at 3:59 pm

Google promised that this year it was going to invest heavily in YouTube’s interface and key feature improvements. And invest they have. The latest of YouTube’s improvements is called YouTube Leanback.

YouTube’s blog says:

“Leanback is all about letting you sit back, relax and be entertained.”

Now your videos will play continually one right after the other without having to queue up the next one. The interface is full screen as well so no more distracting ads (at least not yet). This allows the user to fully immerse themselves into whatever video they are viewing.

And with the introduction of Google TV, you can bet that YouTube is using its TestTube as a way to work out the kinks in Leanback before Google TV goes live towards the end of the year.

Leanback is all high definition. And even though the interface is intuitive and aesthetically pleasing it won’t run well on a slower computer.

The purpose of Leanback, it appears, is to replace the traditional TV interface. So as far as that goes it serves its purpose pretty well. I would watch videos on it. And the more content that YouTube adds to its service the more useful this service will become.

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

What do you think about Leanback? Let us know in the comments below.

And to view more articles on YouTube click Oneupweb Reviews YouTube blogs articles.

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Jul
2nd

Oneupweb Reviews: Social Networking Sites for Families

Posted by Adam D on July 2, 2010 at 9:41 am

Last week I was arguing with the wife about something I’m sure you’ve thought about: How cool would it be to be a Care Bear? Looking at an awe-inspiring cluster of cumulonimbus clouds I was thinking about how lucky those bears are – to live in the clouds, now that’s the life.

Well the wife disagreed, and countered with the fact that there is no diversity in clouds. No rivers, no trees, no variety. I was shocked, and thought how could anyone not want to live in the clouds? Besides, staring up at the clouds I have seen all kinds of shapes. There’s no reason there couldn’t be rivers, trees or whatever. Ahh, good times with family.

It’s nice to have family to share your crazy with. Or as I realize after seeing my family, I’m not that crazy after all. And that’s what Fourth of July weekend is all about, right? Spending time with family and getting some perspective on how blessed we all really are. In today’s review let’s see if we can’t help bring your family together by listing some of the top social networking sites for families.

Famiva:

Famiva allows users to build a family tree that shows how everyone links together, use a map tool that shows where family members are located, share photos, blog, create event reminders, and much more. And it’s free to use.

Family Crossings:

Family Crossings has many features that make for a great family social network. Users can share news, videos, photos, live chat, exchange gift lists, share daily calendars and more. The site offers Free and Premium versions. The Premium version allows for more storage i.e. more videos, photos, etc. and includes more features like family history, family polls, and games. Premium version pricing starts at $9.95 per month.

Shutterfly:

If it’s mostly images you’re looking for, Shuttlerfly is a popular site for storing and sharing photos. You can create a unique site with family updates, pictures, videos, and a family calendar. Shuttlerfly promises to never delete your photos. And the free services are robust and useful.

BuddyPress:

If you’re feeling a little more adventurous, you could always build your own family social networking site using BuddyPress. BuddyPress is an extension of WordPress – the popular blogging software. With BuddyPress, you can create your own social networking site complete with profiles, activity feeds, and much more. There are several plug-ins that you can use to add new features to your newly created social networking site. With Ning going to strictly paid accounts only, many users are going to be searching for new alternatives.

Does your family use any of these services? If so, let us know what your thoughts are in the comments section below.

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Jun
29th

OneUpWeb Reviews: Friendly Music

Posted by Adam D on June 29, 2010 at 1:32 pm

Have you ever created a YouTube video with just the right music, only to have the sound removed because of a copyright infringement? Yeah me too, it’s a bummer. You find the perfect music to match the mood of your video and then it’s taken away.

I understand why musicians and their record companies don’t want to give away or grant permission to use their music for free. I mean we all have to make a living. And YouTube gives owners of content the option to monetize it or have it removed. Many publishers choose to target ads on a video for example, rather than having it removed. While YouTube works to educate producers about the advantages of allowing YouTubers to use their music free of charge, the site FriendlyMusic.com is taking a different approach.

For only 1.99 a song (yes you do have to pay a little) you can use music that has been created on FriendlyMusic.com within your YouTube videos. And since the music is licensed for you to use, there’s no more getting your video pulled or music muted on YouTube. Can I get a Woot Woot? Yeah you’re right, it’s not quite that exciting, but it’s a little exciting. If you create a lot of YouTube videos, FriendlyMusic.com is truly useful.

Here’s a quick tutorial on how to use Friendly Music:

Once you select your musical keyword you will be presented with several musical options. To top it off, the music is actually pretty decent.

Friendly Music offers a way to add background music to your YouTube or other videos without having to worry about the licensing. And the music is actually good which is a plus.

Oneupweb Review: Thumbs Up

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Jun
25th

Oneupweb Reviews: Fun Friday- Academy Award, Craftsman Music & Gandolf Goes to World Cup

Posted by Adam D on June 25, 2010 at 12:53 pm

Welcome to Fun Friday! Yes, today there’s magic in the air and we have some great videos for you. Sally forth!

Academy Award Winning Movie Trailer

I’m usually one who avoids the norm, just for the simple fact that everyone’s doing it. I laugh at funerals, cry at birthdays, and sweat profusely in large groups. There’s just something in me that resists the status quo. So I was surprised when I was genuinely moved by this next video. It’s making fun of how cookie cutter movie storylines are. Watch it, and tell me if you don’t get swept up in the moment (I can’t believe I just said that; don’t judge me).

Craftsman Music Experiment – Craftsman Labs

To marketers looking for a great example of how to make a viral video, in my humble opinion, this is it. Taking a seemingly boring product line and making an entertaining music video, is a creative way to increase exposure for a brand. The one thing I might have changed is the genre of music. My guess is that Craftsman’s target market is more rock and roll or country types. At any rate, entertaining stuff. My favorite part is when the sprinkler kicks in.

Gandalf Goes to the World Cup

In traditional fashion the Vuvuzela takes something great like this Lord of the Rings film and drowns it out. There’s been much discussion about the Vuvuzela and the disturbance it has caused during the World Cup. I just recently became interested in soccer so when I heard the sounds (and thought I was being swarmed by bees) I assumed it was a “soccer” thing. But according to our resident soccer expert, Chip Rice, this is an isolated South Africa incident.

We hope we were able to make you smile today. Let us know your thoughts on these videos. We’d love to hear from you!

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Jun
23rd

Oneupweb Reviews: YouTube Video Editor

Posted by Adam D on June 23, 2010 at 3:16 pm

Recently, YouTube announced that it’s testing out a new online video editor. This editor allows even the most novice video producer the ability to shorten and merge videos into one.

To use the editor, simply navigate to YouTube.com/editor after you log into your YouTube account. All your uploads will be displayed similar to what is seen above. From this interface you can drag the video you would like edit into the editor’s timeline at the bottom of the screen. Now mouse-over a video’s thumbnail and you will see a pair of scissors. Click them. A pop up will display allowing you to move the indicators at the beginning and the end of your video. When finished you can preview your video in the upper right of the interface. You can also add a music overlay to your video. Here is a quick mesh-up I did with some Oneupweb videos.

YouTube’s online video editor will help many YouTubers improve the quality of their videos (no more awkward pauses). At the moment it’s very basic for a video editor. The main features allow users to cut the beginning and the end of videos as well as merge several together. But I would like to see a fade-to-black transition so that the videos don’t suddenly stop at the end. I like the direction that YouTube is taking with this so for that I give it a

Oneupweb Reviews: Thumbs Up

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