Introducing the rebuilt, redesigned Clipmarks web site and an upgraded version of our firefox extension

The new Clipmarks web site:

The first thing I should say is that we’re definitely not done with the site (never will be), as there are many more features that we’re eager to offer. But we feel confident that this new site can provide the foundation upon which all additional features are layered. Our goal is to provide a platform for people to individually and collectively reorganize the web’s information in a more manageable way. We hope you find that our new web site is a giant step in that direction.

When we started brainstorming, a few major themes made their way to the whiteboard. The three main objectives were simplicity, community interaction and speed.

 1) Simplicity. Much like many RSS readers and email clients, our navigator utilizes 3 columns that interact with each other to provide you immediate access to what you’re looking for in a way that you are accustomed to getting it. For example, doing a search or clicking on a tag from the left column immediately loads a list of clipmark titles in the middle column, which immediately responds by opening a full Clipmark in the right column. One trip from left to right through the navigator and you should feel totally in command!!

 2) Community interaction. This is a big one. It’s obvious that when a Clipmark is posted to the public, it likely contains information that the clipper thought others would find interesting. But that should be where the life of that Clipmark begins, not ends. And the lifespan of a Clipmark should vary depending on how interesting the community thinks it is (not every Clipmark is created equally). To bring this to life, we have introduced three important activities:

 
a. Popping a Clipmark: When you see a Clipmark that you like, pop it. Pop it where? Back to the top of the results (for anyone who has their sorting options set to include popping…more on that below). Hopefully this will result in the more interesting Clipmarks consistently rising to the top while the less interesting ones sink to the bottom.

b. Meaningful conversation. Each Clipmark in the public can now be commented on without having to go to a new page. When you load a Clipmark in the right column, there is a comment box right below it so you can add your own perspective on the Clipmark. After composing your comment it loads immediately on the page for you or anyone else looking at that page to see…no refresh or reload required.

c. Sorting results by pops and comments: There are three sorting options that determine the order of the list of Clipmarks that loads in response to any query. Your results can be sorted chronologically based on 1, 2 or all 3 of the following: when the Clipmark was first posted, when it was most recently popped, and/or when it was most recently commented on. So, if you just want to see new Clipmarks as they’re posted, only check that box (located at the top of the middle column). If you just want to see Clipmarks as they’re popped, just check “popped” box. Combos are cool too. By default, we have it set to sort by all three. One other thing I should point out is that the list of Clipmarks is set to update live so that you see new Clipmarks come in they are posted, popped or commented on (no need to ever refresh the page). If you want to turn off the live feed, just click the pause button at the top of the middle column.

 3) Speed: Google initially set the gold standard for speed of returning search results. We set out to take it up a notch. Here’s the benchmark we used. When you type a search query into the search box on our site, the results have to load on the page before you can move your hand from the keyboard back to your mouse. By the time your hand is back on your mouse, the results of your search are waiting for you. That way, you are literally never waiting!  To accomplish this, we have built an entirely
ajax based environment that is optimized for providing rapid responses to your requests without ever reloading the page.

I want to apologize for making this sudden change in our web site without any advance notice. We really weren’t sure whether we would take the prior one down right away or allow them to co-exist for a while. But to be honest, we think this one so substantially kicks the original one’s ass that we just couldn’t leave the old one up there. We sure hope you agree :)

Over the next several weeks we’ll be introducing a bunch of additional features at a pretty rapid pace. We’ve got quite an extensive list of things we plan on doing, but if you have any ideas or requests for how we can improve the site, we’re all ears!

 

Upgraded Firefox extension (5 important changes):

1. Much smaller buttons!! For this, we owe everyone an apology. Our initial buttons were unnecessarily big. Thank you to everyone who put up with them!
2. A new button has been added (drumroll please)…………introducing the print button. That’s right, the print button! Might seem worthy of a “so what”, but here’s the deal. You can now use Clipmarks to easily print any thing or set of things you find within web pages without having to print the whole page or copy and paste into some other document. Just click on as many pieces of information as you want to print (just like you would if you were going to create a Clipmark) from the web page(s) you’re on and then click the print button. The content you have clipped is then displayed in a print preview window. In that window you can add your own title or notes to the content. It may not sound like it’s all that, but I think you’ll really like being able to print things so easily and add your own notes as well.
3. You can now click your mouse inside search boxes within web pages while you’re in Clip mode. This is big! Since you can create Clipmarks that include information from multiple pages/sites, it’s important that you be able to search (google, amazon, del.ico.us, wherever) while you’re in Clip mode. Now you can.
4. All links (other than images that are linkable) within pages are now clickable while you’re in Clip mode. This is also big, because it allows you to easily create Clipmarks from multi-page articles or as you jump from blog to blog and then save them all together in a single Clipmark. Not only that, but it means your natural surfing behavior isn’t limited when you’re in clip mode by being unable to click on links.
5. We fixed a bug that was reported to us by some of our members regarding code we were loading on certain web pages. This has been fixed. Thank you to those of you who informed us about this and for being patient as we fixed it.

I hope you enjoy using the new Clipmarks web site and Firefox extension (Internet Explorer users, we expect to have an upgraded version of the Clipmarks toolbar available next week). Please let us know what you think of the changes. If we don’t respond for a while it could be because we’re sleeping for the next 100 hours…it’s been a rough couple of weeks :).

Comments

[Mia]

e.

the new site is outstanding. GREAT work to all that were involved!

m.

[eric goldstein]

Thanks Mia! One thing i should mention (probably a few more that will come to mind throughout the day) is that the Clippers I Follow and Tags I Follow are still there, just with a new name. Trying to incorporate the lingo that seems to be prevalent these days, we've changed their respective names to ClipperRoll and TagRoll.

[bala]

Eric,the makeover is fantastic..love the new inerface..now that's called intuitive..one more feature i would like to see is ability to add another user's clipmark to my clipmarks list.Guess the idea of having clipmarks is to have a copy of something that you find interesting on the web,so can't add a feature like its on the social bookmarking sites..?..Thanks again for a wonderful utility.

[Oscar Jauregui]

I really like the efford you are putting on clipmark to make it better, I agree with Eric Goldstein about add another user's clipmark to my clipmarks list, another suggestions can be a spell checker LOL.

[eric goldstein]

Thanks for the compliments! It's been a crazy week for us, but so gratifying because of the great response we've received from our members. Lots of smart suggestions too, so we'll be back it monday - after a much needed restful weekend - making things happen.

bala - we're all on board with your idea of being able to add a clipmark you find in the public to your own collection. probably a few weeks away, but we definitely plan on offering that.

eric

[Lux]

I am big fan of Clipmarks, so I have talked about it on my blog: http://luxinfinita.blogspot.com/2006/01/clipmarks.html Hope you like it.

One feature I would ask is being able to see any clipmark as its original size (of the item saved), since now a clipmark seems a thumbnail of the item saved, unless I see it in its print preview mode (the the size is right).

Keep the good work!!

[ycc2106]

It's like a rebirth! renaissance!
Display is faster thanks to the ability to diable(this was the 1st thing I wanted. + no more div's!), visibility much better: I had thought it difficult to have all that information displayed at the same time and stay clear + it's liquid!
Thank you for making our experience even better.

Bravo, you guys have done a great job! :-) happy!

[eric goldstein]

A renaissance...i love it!! Thanks everyone for the great feedback...and also for the suggestions you've provided. We'll be back at work tomorrow (a great, restful weekend for us has left us recharged as psyched to get back at it).

eric

[Ricki]

I am so pleased with the new change. Makes it more pleasent to deal with all the links!
Waiting for more......
Keep up the great work!
Ricki

[eric goldstein]

The slider works in Firefox and IE. After clicking the 'clip' button you can right-click inside the orange lines to access the slider.

[marcel]

Yeah, the longer I look through the new site the more I love it.
It's much easier to browse through the site now.
The only thing I need now, is inetaccess at home again...;(

hats up to the people at clipmarks.

[eric goldstein]

Thank you Marcel...great to hear!!

[danielle]

Looks great! How can I install the new, smaller Firefox buttons?

[Danielle]

I upgraded to the new buttons, but I can no longer highlight text and save it - I can only use the clip feature. Is anyone else having this problem?

[eric goldstein]

Danielle,

You can still highlight text and save it, you just need to do it after you have entered Clip Mode by clicking the clip button. Please let me know if that doesn't work.

eric

[Uri L.]

Well, actually I liked the original design :) but the new one indeed push performance better.However, something in the gfx design is still less sleek than the previous one.

The borders of the main page items are a bit loosy..maybe it could be useful to find a way to highlight the borders and direct the viewers eye more easily to the relevant parts.

At the moment, on the first sight, you feel a bit lost between the different page items- headlines, menu button, screenshots, tabs etc.

[eric goldstein]

Uri,

Thanks for the suggestions. We'll take a look. We're very happy with the way the navigator pages are developing...but not nearly as happy with the more standard web pages. Hoping to devote some time to them soon.

[Zmajrxc]

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[Zmajrxc]

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