Users are able to search accounts and follow each other, as well as re-post other users content. You have the option to post text, images, video and audio for each post which is pretty awesome. I am not sure on the character limit for text posts, but its pretty big, not like twitter’s at all.

Photos can be uploaded from the local computer system or by pasting a link into the upload form directly.
Videos are currently only accepted from Youtube and Vimeo and music can be pasted as a link that needs to point to an mp3 file on the Internet.

At the moment, Yahoo Meme is in testing mode, so you can only get access if you are invited by someone else who already has an account. A new user is getting 15 invites to pass out right now.

So…..who wants an invitation? There are loads of good user names still available, so now is your chance to sneak the cool ones before everyone else!

I use websites like Twitter all the time, and see loads of shortened URL’s being used, and every time I see one I dont recognize, I go check out the website, to see what they have to offer. Some of the websites simply create a shortened URL, that redirects to your website link, these ones sometimes expire after a certain amount of time, so beware!

I absolutely hate tinyurl.com, and think the only reason it has been so popular, is because it was one of the first, and because it was super simple to instantly shorten a url, no login or account required.

That being said, one that I have come to really like is called Trim (http://tr.im), and is one of those ‘no hassle’ websites we all like. Its possible to sign up for free, and be using their services in no time whatsoever.

What I like about their service, is that you have a record of all your shortened URL’s, and can see stats on them at any time.  Another great feature, is the option to automatically tweet your links as you make them, which is pretty sweet. For me though, the icing on the cake is the ability to custom make your url! Yep, you heard me, you can customize your URL, eg http://tr.im/FrancoisHarris will take you through to this blog!

Another really good one is http://bit.ly, which seems to have the same functionality as http://tr.im, also allowing you to also create a custom URL, and track the click through stats, as well as giving you the option to tweet your shortened URL. It also seems that bit.ly and twitter are good friends too, as twitter is using them for url shortening now.

One downfall Trim and Bitly both seem to have, is that I am not able to edit the destination URL AFTER it has been created.

I would like to be able to use affiliate links for instance, so that they are shortened and I can track the clicks, but what happens if I want to change the destination URL to a different provider, but keep the custom URL I have created? It would be far better to edit the destination URL, than to go through all my old websites, changing all the shortened URL’s. ClickAudit was able to do this, and it was one of their great features.

I do realize that these services are designed primarily for shortening the length of a URL, and NOT for tracking affiliate clicks, but why cant they be used for both?

I would love to hear what services you are all using, and what makes them so special, please feel free to post a comment.

Cheers for now

Firefox is a browser that I really really like, its fast, easy to use and the amount of great extensions available is insane! The main reason I originally stopped using the very crappy Internet Explorer, is because of the way it rendered CSS in websites I was working on. Basically it did, and in some instances STILL displays the CSS incorrectly, making your well designed websites look crappy! This is NOT a problem with real browsers like Firefox and Flock.

I wanted to make a comparison between Firefox and Flock, but I dont think I need to. For me, Flock has everything Firefox has, and can do more. As you know, I am very into Social Networking, and this is an element of the web that Flock has embraced by building social networking and other Web 2.0 features into its interface. Cool! Flock is also using the same architecture as Mozilla Firefox, so basically its Firefox that has been pimped out for Web2.0. Excellent for people like me!

Did you know that Flock was voted #6 in PC World’s Top 100 Products of 2008?

Social Networking and Media Services

Flock has the slogan “The Social Web Browser”, and they are not kidding…

Flock easily integrates social networking and media services including Facebook, Digg, Pownce, YouTube, Twitter, Flickr, Blogger, Gmail, and Yahoo Mail to name a few.

Cool things Flock can do:

1. Flock can indicate when friends have updated their profile, uploaded photos or other things.
2. Flock has internal features that allow simpler sharing for text, links, photos or even entire videos.
3. Flock has its own system allowing quick preview of online videos and photos, and subscription to video feeds.
4. Flock’s Feed Reader organizes Atom and RSS feeds.
5. Flock’s Blog Editor allows direct posting into a designated blog, along with being a blog reader.
6. Flock also allows for third-party add-ons, including a number of Firefox extensions.

About point six above, what is also cool about flock is that because it uses the same architecture as Mozilla Firefox, many of those Firefox extensions work perfectly fine in Flock! That is awesome! I still have to come across one that DOESN’T work, so far, I haven’t had any problems

Speeding up Flock

Yes, you can speed up your browsing experience! There have been some people who have had speed problems browsing with Flock. I am not one of these people, but I do have a solution for those of you who need it. Follow these steps to speed up Flock once you have installed it successfully:

1. type about:config into the address bar at the top and wait for page to load
2. in the filter type network.http
3. locate the strand called network.http.pipelining and double click it to change the value from false to true
4. Do the same to network.http.proxy.pipelining
5. Then locate network.http.pipelining.maxrequests – double click and change the value to 30 or higher
6. Finally, close flock and load it up again…

Now I just have to get over the guilty feeling I have from not using Firefox anymore!

I have discovered a great little site called http://Ping.fm, its really cool for updating many of your social networks with one posting!

Check out the website, it is still in Beta phase, if you need to sign in with a Beta code, you can use “landofping” as your code, which will allow you to complete the signup process.

Networks that it will update for you are:

1. Bebo
2. Blogger
3. Facebook
4. hi5
5. Jaiku
6. LinkedIn
7. LiveJournal
8. Mashable
9. MySpace
10. Plurk
11. Pownce
12. Tumblr
13. Twitter
14. Xanga

You are able to post to specific services by grouping, such as bloggin, micro-blogging and status updates.

You are also able to get a “ping this” code for your blogs etc, so that visitors to your site can share over all their social platforms they have setup.

I am still new to the system, but so far am impressed!