Monthly Archive for October, 2007

Sexy SMS!

Published
by
Katie
on October 30, 2007
in SMS
. 1 Comment

caroline_texting.jpg

We are planning to go to Berlin in a few days - for Barcamp, and Web2Expo, Ignite, and Web2Open.  I’m a fan of ‘open’ conferences / unconferences / meetups / knowledge exchanges. It’s always a great chance to hear what other people are up to - to learn loads, to get ideas and of course to share. So yeah, of course we’d like to show off the new Treasuremytext & invite some beta users and so on, and also to share some thoughts on what’s made it popular with really a non-geeky crowd.

So I just applied for a quick fire presentation slot at Ignite. No idea if we’ll be selected but here’s what we proposed to talk about:

“Sexy SMS! Millions know the joy of text! Reality Texts: Sexy SMS is a short expose of what real people really say by SMS.”

So I’m not proposing to expose our user’s content, but what unites all treasuremytexters is a love of SMS. Many use SMS as a primary tool in conducting personal relationships, and whether their messages are relationship based, they are “sexy” in the sense that they are things / objects / messages that people feel attached to; that they want to keep. The SMS message has replaced the letter. It is one to one, inherently private and personal. It is just not like email or like group communications; in the main at least.  Having worked with SMS for years I am continually amazed by how it remains so important for so many people. It hasn’t peaked, it hasn’t lost anything; even as newer ‘better’ technologies come along.

The mobile technology “scene” is used to discussing Series 60 phones, Java apps, & converged devices enabling IM, group chat and a host of features - as long as you (and all your friends) have a compatible devices and a great data package. But SMS is absolutely the preferred way of just getting in touch with someone to say something. And those personal ‘micro messages’ are often really important to people.

So I’m hoping to create and deliver a little presentation about what we learnt about SMS and why so many people think it’s so ’sexy’; still! If you want to hear more and you’ll be in Berlin for the festivities, let me know.

(Picture: is of the lovely Caroline!)

We like Pingdom

Published
by
Katie
on October 29, 2007
in Design
. 0 Comments

pingdom.jpg
We’re experimenting with / evaluating various bits of operations software for Treasuremytext2. Can’t remember how we heard of Pingdom, but we’re glad we did. Pingdom is website monitoring made easy - and very cost effective. Whilst there are a lot of more complex services in this space, if what you really want is something that tells you if theres a problem then this does the job.  And at $9.95 it’s a bargain!

FavIcon generator, my how things have changed

Published
by
Paul Stringer
on October 19, 2007
in Design and Development
. 0 Comments

iheartsms.jpgThe last time I had to make a favourites icon with it being a windows .ico file and me being on a Mac meant an afternoon of trying to find instructions about how to do it & then tracking down oddball plugins for Photoshop to do the task.

Today a 0.13456 Millisecond search on google for ‘How to make Favourites Icon’ yielded HTML Kit. 30 Seconds later I had my new heart shaped Favicon which should now be displaying in your browser if you visit the beta.

It includes an option to make an animated scrolling one just for some late 90’s web throwback feel. I resisted as I think we’ve already gone to far with our under construction animated gif

It’s only a small thing but it keeps underlining how much the Web has shifted in just a few short years from being mostly a resource of hyperlinked documents to being a place of services and applications. A few years ago it gave me instructions on how to make a favourites icon, now it gives me the actual service to accomplish the task, web you’ve come a long way!

Pretty in pink

Published
by
Katie
on October 17, 2007
in Design
. 0 Comments

blog_prettyinpink.jpg

And so we’re about to start inviting beta people, now I’ve got my background sorted out it’s all good! Speaking of backgrounds I just love my new pink heart theme to my SMS ‘Soap Opera’ Text Stream. However we will hopefully be making a set of cool and ultra sophisticated backgrounds for use in Treasuremytext2 and elsewhere. I think we’re gonna ask Charlie Nelson (our chic fashion designer friend) to help us out on that.

A slight change of heart…

Published
by
Katie
on October 11, 2007
in Beta and Design
. 1 Comment

99852849_5ba906053f.jpg

I had hoped our Treasuremytext2 beta would be live by now. It is very nearly live and we’re having a ’specially invited guest preview’ (to iron out any alpha bugs) next week, but we do actually have some genuine reasons for the delay. So without sounding too much like we’re not sure about *stuff* I wanted to explain about our change of heart regarding a couple of our more socially oriented ideas.

Being an ‘early dopter’
I’d class myself as an early adopter of web2.0 (blogger, facebook addict, social media strategist etc). I like ‘lifestreaming’ lifecasting, passive publishing, presence and future presence, portable, tight, close and loose networking stuff.

The Treasuremytext Proposition: It’s Personal Storage (and everyone gets it)
Since we’ve been (re)making Treasuremytext as a web2.0 app, when we start describing it “A mobile to web app - save your SMS online” some people have tended, over the last few months to reply “Oh, you mean like twitter, or jaiku“… Well, in so far as you send a SMS message and it ends up on a web page, yes, but in other respects, no. I love those services, and I use them (but I’m a geek / 2.0person / early adopter / social media tart). And I like using such services for that ‘what I’m doing now’ shouting type ’status’ updates.

But…Treasuremytext is about personal storage and “personal storage” is not ‘lifecasting’. The ‘Treasuremytext specific’ need I have is to store things I feel are important. And I don’t want to treasure important stuff on twitter.

So whilst we’d love Treasuremytext to be as popular as twitter, we have to stay focussed on what it is and what it isn’t. We know that our users love the service, and that more people want to keep with mobile stuff. And that whilst social features help in the network effect / marketing / growth we have to stay focussed on doing the core stuff well. We have many thousands of users who just want to keep their SMS safe online. They ‘get’ personal storage, and I’m not sure they ‘get’ lifecasting. Whilst many of them are media ‘literate’ they’re not the web2.0 / geek crowd. They are the millions of people who just love SMS.

So the delays?
So the delay in launch is about that - we’re slightly reworking a few social features - which whilst ensuring our text treasuring fans can publish, republish, promote and ‘connect’ - that we’re not forgetting the well loved, well tested concept of ‘personal storage’. Also, we also recognise that if people want to text chat with friends they should use twitter and if people like me want to lifecast by mobile or via feeds they should use jaiku. We’re just making a few tweaks to ensure we keep personal storage personal.

Personal Content Manifesto
Is “private-personal” making a come back? Some of us like doing everything online and in public, some of us just want to keep stuff. Hey, as long as there’s something out there for everyone, it’s all good.

Treasuremytext2 beta is coming very soon - it’s about treasuring texts; loving your SMS.

Very soon, honest!

Image: Duncan on Flickr.

FOWA Expo London

Published
by
Paul Stringer
on October 3, 2007
in Events
. 0 Comments

FOWA and Stickers

Future of Web Apps is underway in London between 3-5 October. Katie will be there with demos of TMT2, invites to our beta and a box of iHeartSms stickers. Get in touch if your attending and think there may be some synergies in the air or simply would like another sticker for your laptop.