With an ever-increasing number of places to publish content online, keeping track of it all can be difficult. Pulling it all together and presenting it all in visually pleasing way is a surprisingly difficult task. Quite a few ‘Lifestreaming’ solutions have sprung up in the last couple of years, allowing you to turn your website into a diary of your web content. The question is, are any of them the perfect solution? Let’s take a look.
FriendFeed
Although it’s refocused on being a content discussion service in recent months, lifestreaming is at the heart of FriendFeed’s offering. Requiring nothing more than a few lines of Javascript, their Feed Widget is probably the easiest way to share what you’re up to online. You can configure how many items it displays, its width, whether people’s comments and likes on your content are displayed and you can even switch off the FriendFeed logo so the widget fits better into your web page’s design.
If you’re a heavy user of Twitter your tweets will dominate the feed. To exclude tweets (or any other content you don’t want to display) you could set up a custom feed within FriendFeed that only displays the information you want to show in your widget, then set the widget to display that feed.
The main downside to FriendFeed’s Feed Widget is that it doesn;t separate out all your content, for example, you can’t switch to a display of all your blog posts or all your photos – it’s a simply list of your content. It’s a simple lifestreaming solution but if you’re after something that’s good looking as well as functional there are better options.
Sweetcron
If you have your own website and want something more powerful and flexible than a widget, Sweetcron is one option. It can be thought of as a ‘lifestreaming engine’, doing the dirty work of pulling all your content into one place and leaving the design to the user’s taste. It’s also a simple blogging platform, allowing you to run a blog alongside your lifestream. There’s no rich text editor for the blog, though – you’ll be using HTML even for simple things like adding a link or putting text in italics.
It’s self-hosted, so you have to install it on your web server and set up a PHP database for it. It’s a simple enough installation procedure and if you can install Wordpress, it’s not any more difficult to install Sweetcron. It works by regularly pinging the feeds for all your web content and then displaying it in whatever way you choose.
Sweetcron uses CSS for formatting meaning that if you have the skills it can be sculpted to look however you want it to. For those not too hot on CSS coding, a number of ‘themes’ have been developed to give the service a variety of different looks. Unfortunately most of them are quite basic, bordering on ugly. However, one theme, Tangled Up In Blue by Tom Beardshaw, shows just how powerful Sweetcron can be.
The biggest problem with Sweetcron is the invested of time you have to make to get your theme looking the way you want. If you use one of the themes that come with it you can be up and running quickly but they’re not exactly good looking. When you get into the realm of custom themes you have an added problem. Unlike with Wordpress, theme configuration isn’t a simple task and you may find yourself having to manually edit the CSS to get it working the way you want it to.
The list supported services in Sweetcron isn’t anywhere near comprehensive, missing off services like Qik. These can be manually added but that requires hand editing of code, an arduous process. Thankfully help can be found at the Sweetcron Support Google Group, but unless you’re a person who likes tinkering with code it might be worth giving Sweetcron a miss.
Amplifeeder
As if to provide an answer to Sweetcron’s shortcomings, Amplifeeder has recently launched. Another self-hosted solution, this is essentially Sweetcron, but much more user friendly. It has a Wordpress-esque admin pannel, offering lots of control over your lifestream. Developer Jon Paul Davies has put together a great walkthrough video that explains it all in detail.
Much like Sweetcron, a number of themes are available and they’re generaly better designed here. Mostly named after Joy Division songs, the ‘Disorder’, ‘Komakino3′ and ‘Irresistible’ themes are the most pleasing to these eyes. More themes are promised soon but in the meantime you’re able to get down and dirty editing HTML and CSS to create your own designs.
Amplifeeder has a lot going for it – ease of use, some good looking default themes and a good level of customisation for those willing to get coding. The only thing that lets Amplifeeder down at present is the requirements for installing it. Your web host must support ASP.NET 3.5, IIS6 or 7 and Microsoft SQL Server 2005 or above. Not all hosting companies offer these resources and those who do often charge a premium for them.
Thankfully, versions for Google App Engine, Ruby On Rails and LAMP are on the way, as well as a hosted version which would mean you coul simply sign up for an account and use the service without having to install anything. News about that final option is expected very soon.
Cliqset
If you want a hosted solution *now* and can’t wait for Amplifeeder’s solution, Cliqset might be for you. Once you’ve signed up and imported all your feeds from around the web you have a profile page that can be used as a simple and effective lifestream. Aside from adding personal information there are no customisation options here, by default Cliqset is a pretty plain affair.
Cliqset’s strength is its developer platform, offering all aspects of your social activity across the web up for use in whatever applications they choose. At present their App Directory is a little on the empty side, with just five apps although this is bound to change if the platform gains traction in the developer community.
Currently available apps include one to update your Facebook, Myspace and Twitter status via Google Talk and one for syncing contacts between Cliqset and Microsoft Outlook. Looking at the documentation, it seems like much more complicated apps and lifestreaming solutions could be built using the Cliqset platform. One to watch.
The hand-coded option
If you’re experienced with coding you could try building your own lifestreaming solution. Many other have tried it with spectacular results. Just take a look at what Shimone Samuel, Rafael Cruz and Joery Bruijntjes have produced – they put everything produced by the services to shame. If you have the skills and need some inspiration, the highly recommended Lifestream Blog has a regular Custom Hosted Lifestream Gallery.
With an ever-increasing number of places to publish content online, keeping track of it all can be difficult. Pulling it all together and presenting it all in a visually pleasing way is a surprisingly difficult task.
Quite a few ‘Lifestreaming’ solutions have sprung up in the last couple of years, allowing you to turn your website into a diary of your web content. The question is, are any of them the perfect solution?
Let’s take a look at some of the best options out there right now. Which ones strike the best balance between good looks, ease of use and flexibility. You might just find the perfect answer for you.
Written on 16th April 2009
2 COMMENTS Zee, Editor in Chief at The Next Web, Principal at WeDoCreative.
Matt Mullenweg, who at 19 years old founded Wordpress, gave an inspiring presentation on our need to find better ways to absorb the informati0n thrown at us on our travels through the world wide web.
Firmly believing social media, as we know it, is dead – Mullenweg uses a wonderful analogy to illustrate his point. He shares a story of Solomon Shereshevskii, a Russian journalist who became famous for not taking notes during a speech yet afterwards could recall the speech word for word. As wonderful as that may seem, Shereshevskii suffered profusely from various issues. His condition often produced unnecessary and distracting images or feelings. He had trouble memorizing things which weren’t literal in meaning, and had trouble remembering faces, which he saw as “very changeable”.
Mullenweg relates this to blogs, social media and information on the web in its current state. Better ways of digesting information are needed, different ways of taking in information and absorbing everything currently thrown at us.
As an open source advocate, Mullenweg shares his hope for a future where open source won’t just be application specific but data too. He ends with a passionate plea for everyone to try and spend at least a few hours of their working week involved in open source projects. Whilst we may not immediately recoup the benefits, generations ahead of us may.
Written on 15th February 2009
9 COMMENTS Srikanth AD, Web Designer, Search Engine Optimizer and Google Devotee
The UMapper plugin is a universal mapping platform that makes it easy for you to create custom maps and add them on your WordPress blog posts.
You can choose a title and a description for you map, customize the markers and objects on it to suit the right sort of color, font sizes and labels.
Microsoft Virtual Earth, Google Maps, Yahoo and OpenStreet are all supported by this plugin.
Key Features :
Provides collaboration tools, map wiki, and social networking features (comments, ratings, etc.)
Switching between map providers when creating a map, and later on while editing.
Map Editor has HTML capabilities and allows Wikipedia and Geo Names search.
Integrated map editor – manipulating geographical contents to suit your site requirement.
Allows map distribution via embeds and widgets.
Allows syndication of map data using KML.
Some potential ways of using it:
If your blog is based on e-commerce or shopping, then you can integrate custom map(s) onto your blog posts, pointing to the retailer’s location, address and other directions.
If your are addressing about an event, public meeting or gathering on your site then you can indicate its details by using custom objects and markers on the map.
UMapper is certainly a stand out plugin to aid your visitors with appropriate directions on the custom map based on your subject of interest, making your blog posts more lively and interactive.
Oh how I love blogging platform Wordpress. They launch cool features every two weeks or so. To me, they appear like a bunch of enthusiast who want to conquer the blogging world.
Their latest baby is Wordpress.tv. On this site, you’ll find tutorials for both WordPress self-installs and WordPress.com to help get their users blogging fast and hassle-free. Good move, as the documentation wasn’t always too clear for not so web savvy people. You could definitely tell some enthusiastic Wordpress-worshiping geek wrote it. So yeah, this lowers the barrier for many folks to go and start blogging with Wordpress.
As always, Wordpress launches a basic concept and now it’s up to us to tell them what to do next with it. Drop your brilliant ideas at Wordpress.tv/contact.
Written on 13th January 2009
21 COMMENTS Srikanth AD, Web Designer, Search Engine Optimizer and Google Devotee
WordPress, one of the leading open source blogging platforms, holds an extensive directory of plugins and widgets to enhance your blog functionality and performance.
If you are jaded of copying and pasting the embed code from sites like YouTube to embed videos on your blog. Then, here is a collection of some cool video plugins we compiled for you to embed videos from services like YouTube, Vimeo, Google Video, Metacafe etc. the easier way on WordPress.
1. Viper’s Video Quicktags
This plugin adds on new buttons to the rich text editor on WordPress. In order to embed a video, you just need to paste the video URL into the prompt box. With this plugin you can also fully configure the width, height, colors and alignment on the page.
The main function of the plugin is to correctly embed YouTube videos into your blog post. It’s designed to be small and fast with customizable options for colors, border, full screen etc.
Apart from video embed this plugin also includes the ability to upload/ record/import videos directly to your post, edit and remix content with an online video editor. You can even enable video responses, manage and track your video content.
Includes custom sizing of the video player, advanced sharing options and allow readers and subscribers to add video and audio comments.
Using this plugin the videos can be integrated from external sites or they can be uploaded to the web server or a remote server and integrated as well. Additionally, a corresponding link to the video on the particular video page or a download link to the local file can be generated automatically, if demanded.
To embed a video using this plugin, all you need is the ID of the video. With this plugin you can manage the settings for all of your embedded movies from the WordPress settings for Video Embedder, the properties for all the movies will be updated instantly as soon as you save the settings.
This plugin allows you to easily embed YouTube and Google Videos using one simple tag and places a preview image of the YouTube videos in your RSS feed linked to the video.
Perfect when you’re only using videos from Google.
This plugin supports video sitemap generation, includes options such as auto start and menu control bar. It also supports text only output for RSS that prompt readers to visit the original post for Flash content.
There’s a new breakthrough in the battle against the blank avatars in the comments section of a Gravatar-compatible blog. Smashing Magazine asked Ricardo Sousa, a young designer with a strong passion for WordPress and Joomla!, to develop a plugin that pulled the avatar from a different service.
Have you ever heard of that micrblogging service Twitter? Supposedly, quite a lot of blog readers are active over there. Hence Sousa’s decision to compare a commenter’s email address with Twitter. If the plugin finds a similar email address, it displays the Twitter avatar. Genius, uh?
Here’s how it looks. Like it? Download the plugin from Smashing Magazine.
Add a few more services and the blank Gravatars are history. By the way, we’ll include avatars in our upcoming redesign. Stay tuned, happy blogging.
When you’re blogging every damn day of the week, Wordpress becomes your main living environment. Thus a little disclosure would be correct. If you feel my reports about Wordpress are a little bit over the top (maybe ecstatic), it’s only because I spent too much time working with it. Now that we’ve got that out of our way: let’s talk about Wordpress 2.8.
In an article on the official Wordpress blog, Jane “working on experience stuff” Wells writes that after 600,000 Wordpress 2.7 downloads, it’s about time to work on Wordpress 2.8. Screw Christmas, let’s prioritize. That’s basically her message.
Instead of chewing away turkey, you better complete the Wordpress 2.8 survey before noon on December 31, 2008 UTC. In this long list, you can rate which new possible feature you’d like the best. Do you prefer an “Embedded theme browser/installer” or will a “Threaded view in comments admin for replies” improve your work flow? Cast your votes at Polldaddy’s.
Oh and you know what? The best thing of the story is that you don’t have to manually upgrade Wordpress anymore. Just hit an ok button, and 2.8 will be yours.
Ozh jumped in the Wordpress game when version 1.0.1 showed up, so I guess it’s safe to say he’s a true expert. Thus make sure to check out his post, as he wrote down some witty comments.
Here’s a Flickr slideshow with the screenshots. See it grow man!
Written on 15th June 2009
28 COMMENTS 
With an ever-increasing number of places to publish content online, keeping track of it all can be difficult. Pulling it all together and presenting it all in a visually pleasing way is a surprisingly difficult task.
Written on 11th June 2009
Written on 16th April 2009
Matt Mullenweg, who at 19 years old founded Wordpress, gave an inspiring presentation on our need to find better ways to absorb the informati0n thrown at us on our travels through the world wide web.
Written on 15th February 2009
Written on 17th January 2009
1. Viper’s Video Quicktags
2. Smart YouTube
3. Interactive Video Plugin
4. Embedded Video
5. Video Widget
6. Flash Video Player
7. Video Embedder
8. EasyTube
9. Youtuber
10. FLV Embed
The Next Web Blog is closely associated with The Next Web Conference which is held annually in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. At this event speakers from all over the world come together to talk about, and show off, the future of the Web. (More info 
