Amazon deserves to be as usable as possible
so I think they should develop their Lists and MediaLibrary services a little more. Of course, my hope is that this is already in development or being implemented.
Amazon has created YourMediaLibrary which is a sort of online bookshelf. You can add books, music, and videos to the MediaLibrary and keep it in your Collection. However, there are only two ways to add products to your Collection.
- You must click, the "I Own This" box under the items under your Recommendations.
- You must manually search through YourMediaLibrary for books to add to your Collection.
My concern is that I should be able to do this from the Amazon search bar. Instead of having to go an extra step to purposely add media to my Collection, it should be usable throughout normal website use, i.e. shopping and the like.
Also something I noticed is that the only way to hide items from your main Collection view is to put them in the Trash. The items I wanted to hide were books I have sold. I wanted to still keep the record that I had owned them but keep them out of my current Collection. I thought I could Tag the books with "sold" and therefore separate them from my current Collection. The tagging was simple and straightforward but there was no way for me to hide the items from my current Collection. I had wrongly assumed their tagging system had an archive or hide function. [Spending too much time on Gmail's organizational platform.]
Other than this small quall I had, the overall service of YourMediaLibrary seems very useful and interestingly styled so that it looks significantly different than that of Amazon’s main site. Maybe they want to branch off into an affiliate partner. I could see the YourMediaLibrary taking over Amazon’s main site digital content sales. However, it may be just as simple to leave all of the commerce on Amazon’s main site, so that YourMediaLibrary remains a purely social network.
[These thoughts will be merged with fancy pictures and keen looking graphs later . . . maybe. 8-]
My generation is connected so seamlessly that I am able to communicate via text, audio, or video to anyone I know across the globe. This has got to be the key to the future. Communication is at the root of most, if not all, interactions and processes. It is these two elements which can make for a productive world, in the right hands of course. Talking with my roomate the other night, we came to the conclusion that the current generation of young innovators has the power to save the world.
We all know that there are problems here and there. We all talk about fixing them and try to find ways to do. So far, not many of those problems have been solved. We are in an ever crumbling environmental state. There is an air of dissonance across the globe as so many nations are not cooperating and do not have unified human goals. Darfur’s residents are at war with each other, comitting horrible atrocities against humanity. Even the U.S. has been invading its citizens’ privacy in hopes to gain some ground on Terrorism.
We have the numbers, the influence, and more importantly the connectivity to get done what needs to be done. Global cooperation and unity is not too distant a future. Some of the first signs are the widespread adoption of online social networks and the youth political movements across the world regarding politics, social justice, and progression. I don’t mean to be "preaching to the choir", I mean to show that there are apparent signals reflecting a coming change. I believe in innovation and self preservation. I believe in cooperation and interaction. I believe in human advancement. I try to reveal these beliefs in how I live my daily life.
This morning, I voted in the New York State primary elections. In and out in less than 5 minutes! Voting, the inspiration to this post. Participation in government is my way of ensuring that I do all that I am capable of right now to live the way I most see fit.
I recently joined Pownce, a social network that enables users to send messages, links, files, and events to friends and groups of friends.
I find it similar to twitter except the posts are longer and more versatile. Twitter and Pownce are in the same class of social network, called micro-blogging. Micro-blogging is basically a short-text based message system in which users update their status via a variety of platforms.
[Cont. 1/29/08] I just received my first event! This service is kick! I am finding it more pleasant to work with as I add more connections and am able to view feedback of other Powncers. It has also served as a good replacement to my error-filled twitter desktop app. This does not mean I have forgot about twitter and all the twitterers out there, it just means I have been concentrating on Pownce a bit more.
Good job Pownce dev team!!!
Bebo CarDomain Facebook MySpace Flickr LinkedIn Friendster IMVU Ruckus Yelp Virb
All social networking sites, of different types naturally. I, personally, don’t have any need for this many different social networks. My uses of SNsites are primarily: business, music, and college. I assign one site to each of my uses. The reason I do this is because I feel that a site which focuses on a particular niche is much better at informing me of what I want to know in that niche. It is never good in any situation for one to spread themselves over many networks, in effect thinning their usability.
A recently promoted social networking site, Virb, which I was made aware of while perusing a piece by Brian Oberkirch, [His article really inspired this entire post, Cheers Brian!] combines opinion, pictures, as well as music into their platform. In effect putting the uses of Flickr, Last.FM, and Facebook into one unique platform. The only target worthwhile for them would be the newest generation of internet users. This is so because most of today’s internet users are already on a couple social networks where all of their friends frequent and of which are relevant to their interests. Why would I move over to Virb from my 4 main SNsites when everyone I know and care about are on the 4 main SNsites? It is not logistically sound to move myself and all of my acquaintences over to a new portal.
I wonder, How many people are willing to switch their networks? It is similar to getting a haircut, generally once you find someone who takes good care of your hair you stick with them. My 4 SNsites take good care of my social networking needs and I will stick with them. There are those sites however which have taken a seat on the back burner to make way for the mainstreamers MySpace and Facebook. These back burner sites, LiveJournal- Xanga-, were beginners in the social networking realm but were put away because of a younger generation of users’ grapple of new media. What is it about MySpace and Facebook that were so revolutionary? EASY! Their platform integrated ways to display and SHARE information.
People love to display themselves. They love to show off. Hence, the "MySpace TOP 8" and "MySpace pics". People love to share items with their friends, coworkers, and even strangers. "Facebook’s View Friends" feature, "Facebook’s Share a Link" feature, as well as many more. These networking sites saw a solution and optimized it for usability. What more can be optimized? Optimization will come. Soon enough MySpace and Facebook will become extinct as a result of technology advancements. Look at the Apple TV, a new piece of technology which some think will revolutionize the way we watch television. Instead of waiting for programs to come on or instead of recording them via DVR, we can browse iTunes and other Apple compatible outlets for the shows/movies we want to see. I expect soon enough an advance in networking usability. I do wonder what it could/will be.