plaxoed!

Spotted in GMail today:

Happy thanksgiving everyone!

I’ll be back in Detroit today through next Tuesday so posting might be abysmally slow…

Today is an exciting day here at Plaxo! We’ve been working on integration with AOL Instant Messenger for most of this year and today the new AIM client has been released to the web.

If nothing else, the UI has been given a much needed refresh. Take a look at the new sign-in screen below; to me, the visual design is much cleaner and aesthetically pleasing. Call me shallow, but for me one of the big reasons to upgrade to the latest versions of software (like Windows and Office) is oftentimes the new UI - not the 100 new features in Word that I never use anyways

Where’s Plaxo? When you pop-up AIM for the first time, you’ll see a setup wizard that looks like this:

Don’t close it! It’s not the old and busted AIM Today or profile setup wizard. It’s the new hotness - Plaxo integration setup. It’s a pretty quick setup and the payoff is great: we can help you build your buddy list from your other address books. Plus, you’ll be able to get your address book in AIM too, which means if you’re an Outlook, Outlook Express, Yahoo!, Hotmail, or Thunderbird user, you’ll be able to get all your contacts quickly and easily inside AIM anytime you need it.

So how does the build buddy list function work? After you import your address book, we use the e-mail addresses you have to look up your friends’ Screen Names. Then we show you the list of Screen Names we find and you have the option to add them to your buddy list. A few clicks and you’ve filled in your buddy list with a bunch of your friends’ Screen Names that you didn’t have!

Additionally, if you use Outlook or Outlook Express, you have the option to get enhanced functionality there too. For example, you can get AIM Presence icons in your Outlook. This allows you to see when people that you e-mail with are available to IM with you.

Anyways, give it a try and let me know what you think - we’ve been working on this for more than 6 months and we’re all ears

Got an anonymous link to check out http://domains.live.com/. Looks like Microsoft is offering free e-mail hosting (20 e-mail accounts, 250MB / account, web-based access) and automatic .NET Passport access on those accounts (enabling MSN Messenger, MSN Spaces, etc.). Here’s a screenshot in case they take it down soon

I’m going to try signing up this domain on it; I wonder if they use the new Hotmail as the webmail client?

I hope they’ll offer hosting services soon too

We had a good turnout last night here in Cambridge and it turned out to be quite a fun evening.

Turns out the hotel didn’t have a projector so I had no powerpoint to hide behind… Oh well, at least my slide deck served me well as a good set of notes to speak from. I’ve posted it up and it’s available for download.

We had a good sized group of probably 20 people show up for food, my talk, and a lively discussion afterwards. I hope the attendees had as much fun as I did. Here’s what the place looked like before and after, we definitely did a number on the room

The Kendall Hotel was actually quite nice; it’s a small boutique hotel right on the MIT campus and the service was excellent. They’ve decorated the hotel with a unique flavor and each room is unique – different furniture, decorations, and color schemes. My room had a cool window with a semi-view of some buildings.

Right now I’m at the MIT career center and I’m connected to the campus wireless network. It’s really fast. Ahh… the joys of college

Did anyone else get a small version of Google Maps lately? I’ve gotten it twice, I open up a new browser window and it’s back to normal… I assume maybe they’re testing something, but I don’t see any advantage to this smaller map.

Just a reminder for students at Harvard and MIT and anyone in the Boston area looking for a job (or just anyone who’s bored), Stuart and I will be in town running a talk and dinner tonight 7PM at The Kendall Hotel (350 Main Street Cambridge, MA 02142). See you guys there!

Plus, check out this cool t-shirt we’re giving to attendees! Dang! We’ve got food… t-shirts… Lucky!!! You ever take if off any sweet jumps? See you there

I saw on Slashdot that AdSense added a new type of revshare today: Referrals. (Don’t worry, these graphics aren’t actual ads) Slashdot talked about how they are paying publishers $1 for every Firefox + Google Toolbar download. I wonder how much each Firefox + Google Toolbar user is worth to Google (I’d have to assume it’s something > $1). Along with the Firefox referral, they’ve also launched a system where you can get paid out if you refer another publisher to AdSense (if you refer someone to AdSense, you get a $100 bonus after they make their first $100). Sounds like it might be non-trivial to get paid in that program, but hey, for $100 a pop, I’d try it

So what does this mean for YPN and MSN? Well, from what I can tell from the ToS, Google counts each of these things as an Ad Unit and you can’t run any competing ads so if you want to get in on the $1 / Firefox user deal, you can’t be showing YPN or MSN contextual ads. Smells slightly anti-competitive, but I’m not a legal expert.

I think this is a brilliant move, and unless YPN can match (or exceed) $1 / Y! Toolbar user, they might be in trouble. Then again, maybe this stuff won’t take at all and contextual ads will continue to be the main revenue driver; I guess we’ll find out.

From Microsoft’s perspective, this has got to be an interesting move on Google’s part. Basically, they are now paying people to encourage users to switch away from IE (from my reading of the ToS, you can readily recommend Firefox/AdSense, as long as you don’t draw undue attention to the referral links). Does this one-up the “use IE because it’s included with your OS” strategy?

Next step… Google paying users to browse using Firefox + Google toolbar? Maybe we’ll be partying like it’s 1999 with those “get paid to browse” outfits that got scammed; then again, Google can solve that problem, just like they’ve solved the click spam problem right? ohhhh snap!

Hmm… did people already talk about this and did I miss it in my aggregator? Or where is everyone on this?

I just spent a few hours playing a random game on Yahoo! Games that Rose pointed me to called Insaniquarium. The object of the game is to feed fish which then poop coins. The value of the coins you collect allow you to buy upgrades for yourself (such as better fish food, more fish, etc.). After each level, you win a special character that has beneficial characteristics. I beat the playable demo and played one more round to see how much I would accumulate before getting bored. Check out these screen shots:

Ahhh… playing this on a Friday night has got to be the pinnacle of geekness.

We’ve been scouring all the usual channels for more graphics designers, but we haven’t been able to come up with much. We’re pretty focused on tight visual design that’s both functional and consumer friendly; if you’re a hot shot designer, we’d love to hear from you.

To the right is an example of some of our recent stuff (click through to check out more).

Here’s “officially” what we’re looking for (as always, if you’ve got insane talent, feel free to apply ):

Plaxo is seeking a contract web designer who can immediately assist with the visual design of our web pages, emails, and production graphics. The primary role will be to work with the Creative Director to apply and extend the existing Plaxo look-and-feel to new products and services. The estimated workload is anywhere from 30 to 40 hrs a week. The ideal candidate must have a passion about creating clear, clean, “noise-free,” and compelling designs, be obsessive about “pixel-perfect” finished work, value design consistency, be extremely familiar with the web design and production process, and feel extremely comfortable with rapidly prototyping design alternatives within Photoshop. You must also feel comfortable with sharing and discussing your work with all team members, demonstrate the ability to quickly comprehend visual design requirements, and to clearly explain the reasoning behind proposed design solutions. In addition to the Creative Director, you will be working with Producers, Developers, and Senior Management within a very open, collaborative, and iterative work environment to produce designs that will directly contribute to Plaxo’s continued growth and success.

The ideal candidate will also:

• Be willing to spend time on site in order to clearly understand visual design requirements.
• Be used to tight deadlines.
• Be a quick-learner.
• Be familiar with evaluating complex visual design trade-offs.
• Be able to take a design from conception to HTML production-ready mock-ups.
• Have experience working from wireframes and redlines.
• Be extremely well organized.
• Have a great personality.

Qualifications:

• 4–5 years experience in web/online design.
• At least 5 samples of web design work available for online viewing.
• Have access to all hardware and software required to perform work.
• Thorough knowledge of Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, GoLive, Macromedia Dreamweaver.
• Flash experience a plus.

All candidates must also be willing to take a short test to assess their visual design and teamwork skills.

Drop me a line if you know of where we can find great talent!

Well, first Google had it; then Microsoft followed suit. Now Y! Maps is interactive and draggable. They’ve taken some ideas from Google and MSN’s Virtual Earth and combined them with their own little touches.

I like the little “nearby” pane that shows the stuff next to your current detailed view. I also like how the local search doesn’t limit itself to 10 items (like VE); giving me more options to choose from. Plus, if you type in an address next to local businesses, it’ll ask you if you were looking for one of them - super cool!

Interesting that they decided to make this a Flash app. It enables some really cool click-drag functions (try dragging a local search result into the “Get Maps and Directions” area ). I guess that most everyone has flash by now, so it’s probably a safe bet; I’m sure most people won’t even notice that it’s Flash, they’ll just notice how cool it is.

I hope they improve the map drawing a little bit (I think VE currently has the nicest looking maps), but I see some really promising features here.

Looks like at this point in the game, Google Maps is actually behind the competition… hopefully they’ll release some new stuff soon

(Originally found on Y!’s blog, but I see Jeremy’s on it and so is Mike over at TechCrunch)