SteveHeyes .co.uk

This evening I had a very quick play with Tumblr Ask. I thought I would share with you a couple of my thoughts about it.

First off, what is it? Tumblr Ask is a way of asking a tumblr user a question. Simple as that really. As far as I can gather, they seemed to of taken their idea from Form Spring which according to their site is a way of “Send[ing] and receive anonymous questions, and learn more about people you find interesting by following their answers.” I have seen this on a few tumblr blogs but not really bothered much with it, but thought I would try out Tumblrs version.

So my experience with it. Honestly, I found it a little clunky to use. The javascript used to answer a question seems to be very slow and sometimes it took me 3 or 4 attempts to answer a question. I know that it is in testing, so I don’t hold this against them. Also, the counter next to ‘Messages’ in the side menu on the dashboard seemed a little unreliable. Saying that, Tumblr probably have hundreds of users trying this out (they had 843 notes on last check of the post) and are ironing out the bugs.

I do like the design of the posts on the dashboard. Due to how new the functionality, my template doesn’t display them as nice. But that’s fine, it will either get updated, or I will use one which has the functionality built in. That will just take time.

You might be wondering why I am making a deal out of this. Basically, it comes down to user directed development, which seems to be a patten in web applications recently. I would define user directed development as incorporating functionality that the users are already doing or want.

For example, the majority of Twitters current features (@mentions, #hashtags, search, ReTweet, lists etc) have either come form users constantly using the same techniques (@mentions for example) or an in house recreation of a popular web service (search and #hashtags). I think the same kind of thing is happening on Tumblr.

I say this is happening, but I may be getting a head of myself. There is only the one new feature that has been added due to a popular web service being linked with tumblr a lot. However, I do know that the guys at Tumblr HQ go through the stats of what people are blogging, so it wouldn’t surprise me. They have also added a number of functionality that users have suggested (‘J’ & ‘K’ scrolling, video thumbnails) Also, I haven’t been using Tumblr long enough to comment on whether ‘rebloging’ was created because people where already doing it.

So, in conclusion, Tumblr Ask is fun and pretty, if a bit buggy. More interestingly to me is that it is part of a wider pattern of user directed development which is an interesting way of growing an application.

deplorableword:

It’s happening!

When: 6:30pm, Thursday 11th February

Where: The Victoria (2 mins away from Birmingham New Street), they do excellent Beers and Cocktails.

Reblog and RSVP to tom@devart.org

Interesting… May pop along to this.

Song of the Year

Sometime Around Midnight by The Airborne Toxic Event

Ever since hearing this song for the first time I have loved it. It is a song about a situation I think nobody wants to be in and describes it so well. It draws you into the story and then leaves you at the end filled with melancholy and pity for the protagonist. While not the happiest song, the effect it had on me was startling.

Album of the Year

Sigh No More by Mumford & Sons

Easy this one really. Every song on this album is amazing, every lyric edifying and every note pure audible joy. Stunning album. Just stunning.

Film of the Year

Watchmen

This was the hardest one to choose. Mainly because I haven’t seen that many films this year. Saying that Avatar stood out mainly because of its ground breaking CGI. However, after reading the graphic novel first, I still find Watchmen fantastic to watch. Maybe it wasn’t the greatest film out this year but it is my favourite.

Website of the Year

Tumblr

Tumblr have really grown over the past year. I have been using it for 18months or so now and they seem to be getting better and better. I used to be annoyed with the way you can’t search by type, however adding simple tag solves this. Especially now tags are shown in the dashboard and are available in templates. Good work Tumblr.

Favourite Posts of 2009:

Text: http://steveheyes.co.uk/post/159382303/things-ive-learnt-today-9th-aug-2009
Photo: http://steveheyes.co.uk/post/89066600
Quote: http://steveheyes.co.uk/post/201795747/ive-just-found-out-that-when-i-saw-a-patch-of-oil
Link: http://steveheyes.co.uk/post/112075559/so-youre-in-love-with-one-of-your-friends-but-she
Chat: http://steveheyes.co.uk/post/82030417/me-say-hi-to-brandon-flowers-for-me-we-used-to
Audio: http://steveheyes.co.uk/post/103278324/brie-stoner-come-down-this-has-been-my-prayer
Video: http://steveheyes.co.uk/post/110421412/funny-talking-animals-walk-on-the-wild-side

oh-sarah:

I DON’T UNDERSTAND

Do i want the tumblr application on facebook?  Does that mean every post I make on tumblr comes up on facebook? Because I don’t want this. 
I would like the choice.  Do I have the choice of linking them?

It currently does mean every tumblr post comes up on your facebook feed. If you don’t want it, don’t have it :)

For the twitter integration you can choose wether to send a post to twitter or not. I would not be surprised if in a couple of months or so there will be a tick box for facebook too.