donloeb.com

we’ve been working with the del.icio.us folks to create a new dynamic feedflare that leverages the api they released today (12/20/06) as part of their new badging solution (dubbed the “tagometer”)…

essentially, our new flare lets publishers put “save to delicious” links on both web sites and in rss feeds…but, these aren’t just any links…in fact, they are little web services that contain dynamic information. so, rather than just having a simple link like “save to delicious,” this flare displays live information about content items -> number of saves and the top three tags….

here’s a screenshot in the new yahoo mail beta…you can also see it live at the bottom of this post on my blog or in my feed…

also, here’s a great video that matt mcalister from the yahoo developer network put together on the api and how we’re taking advantage of it…pretty cool.

again, feedflare allows publishers to deliver this cool and simple user experience in a consistent manner across sites and feeds…

so, go get the new dynamic delicious flare…put it in your feed and on your site…add some more flares from digg, facebook, netscape, sphere, technorati, etc. all of these services help users act on your content (save, share, etc.) and lead to incremental social media traffic - aka, non-search traffic…

btw, you can even create your own personal flare (see halfway down this post) that promotes another site, a store, an event, etc…

update #1 (2/28/07) - we are now providing stats on how these widgets are being consumed across the web - in email, rss, on myspace, etc.

update #2 (8/1/07) - we now have self-serve feed-powered ads.

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lots more to say about this later, but fred wilson wrote a short note about this today (thanks fred!)…and, here’s his first try at a “live ad.” while pretty cool and not bad for 5 minutes - clearly, he’s not a designer by trade :)

my post from yesterday on spiderman3 (official blog from sony pictures) has a better example of something that might work as an actual ad…they created it to cross promote their blog on various other sony pictures sites…

and, the average joe might create something simple like my “ad” below…i created it to put a badge on my myspace profile…yeah, i need a better picture….

any feedburner publisher can now easily make these…so, go have some fun with our new headline animator! btw, as you can tell from my frequent posts on this new product, i love it…

nice use of our new headline animator by sony pictures…

↑ get the code

they’ve put it on their official message board as a way to promote their spiderman3 blog…of course, it can also go on myspace or wherever…

or, have they already left? can’t believe these docs got out and that they are up on the web…i’m speechless…

it was great to hear gore and others give impassioned speeches about democracy and the importance of documentaries / journalism…i wonder what would have happened in 2000 if he had been allowed (or felt comfortable enough) to talk like this…

also, congrats to carrie and all the winners!

we’re very happy to have the wall street journal, marketwatch, and barrons join the feedburner family…here’s their press release and our blog post…

everyone (raanan, maria, etc.) at dow jones has been great to work with. they truly understand syndication and social media (as evidenced by their widespread adoption of blogs, rss, podcasting, and social services like sphere, digg, delicious, and facebook).

In addition, by utilizing FeedBurner’s “FeedFlare'’ service, Dow Jones Online is able to help users interact with content by leveraging popular social sites like digg, Sphere and http://del.icio.us. FeedFlare adds simple one-click links to each feed item, making it easy to build “interactivity'’ into the content and making it simple for RSS subscribers to tag, email or share their content with others.

“Our adoption of FeedFlare, coupled with FeedBurner’s growing suite of tools that leverage RSS, will yield tremendous benefits for our audience and advertisers,'’ said Raanan Bar-Cohen, director of product strategy at Dow Jones Online. “Working with FeedBurner gives us the ability to rapidly test and deploy integrated offerings in our feeds, providing the flexibility and speed that is critical in today’s media marketplace.'’

of course, they are also going to use feedburner for monetization :)

now, go snack on some feeds! wsj, marketwatch, podcasts…

on friday we announced the first major update to our “headline animator” service. our old offering had one truly ugly “style” and a more recently added very simple, but cool email signature version.

now, publishers can create their own feed-powered animated gif -> any size with any background image.

in essence, publishers can pretty easily (we’re going to make it very easy in future versions) create branded “live” widgets that are just animated gifs powered by feeds. publishers have complete control over the look and feel - i.,e can use any background image (with or without any mention of feedburner), display the feed title (or not), & display the date (or not)…

so, pubs can make IAB size images and all sorts of little badges that can be used to cross-promote network properties or allow other publishers to virally distribute them via myspace, etc…

here’s an example - yeah, i need photoshop help and a better picture…

↑ get the code

check out steve’s hl animators…

finally, john’s is quite pretty… :)

this is a simple product, but incredibly powerful…

so, now feedburner publishers can create a bunch of different web widgets:
- branded animated gifs (headline animator)
- headlines and full content via javascript (buzzboost, grazr, bitty)
- branded flash objects (via our partnership with FIM (SpringWidgets))

much much more to come soon :)

update: steve pointed to a very cool skin…and, in french…

note: one of the most important upgrades will be to allow multiple versions per feed…

my wife was sick and i was tired from my chicago trip…so, we stayed in (sure, that’s the excuse!).

since we missed grey’s anatomy on thurs, we decided to check out the free streaming on abc…and, guess what, it worked. plus, the experience was pretty darn good! i even remember the home depot ads - much more than any 30 sec spot on tv…

see…who needs cable? :)

looks like i got out (last night at 10pm) just in time! while it looks like fun, i might not have made it out today…

rick - looks like you had a great time with the kids this morning!

love the flamicon :)

go buy one…