.oO Tailwind

By Warren Hutchinson

Hot on the heels of my posting about Multimap being honored at the Webby Awards in the Service category comes some great news that a new feature-set has been implmented.

Those that have watched closely would have been expecting this due to the recent acquisition of Multimap by Microsoft.

But ah-ha, it’s not all MS integration stuff.

First up, Improved mapping functionality with Microsoft’s ‘Birds-Eye View’. While I wasn’t a great fan of Microsoft’s mapping solution, I did quite like the idea of the Birds-Eye view, a 3/4 isometric view from above.

It definitely taps into that ‘thing’ that makes looking at maps quite addictive and for me is a nice step ahead of Google Earth in terms of flying about. GE is slightly limited (unless you use the 3D buildings) at providing a decent non-distorted angled view.

Also note the Wikipedia view, overlaying information from Wikipedia that has a geospatial reference.

I find this sort of view really useful when it comes to looking at directions to a place that I have never visited. Mostly as a way on envisioning the route before I drive it. Overhead view is useful for orientation and proximity purposes, but it doesn’t really look like the real thing. Only the other day I sat down with my father to ‘fly’ him through some directions on GE.

I’d like to see Bird-Eye View fly-thoughs added to Multimap Directions at some time. I think Map24 has some sort of solution for this. Yes you can switch on Birds-Eye when in View Map mode of the Directions service. But it’s not a prime feature.

I should quickly add that Multimap’s Birds-Eye Vie isn’t available for all locations, just “major cities”. Although my town is covered and I live out in the proverbial ’sticks’.

In this new release they have also improved the directions functionality with better, more coherent step representation for journeys. When I played with it yesterday, the map view wasn’t quite working as the site was obviously rolling out across the servers. But it looks promising indeed.

And lastly, exacerbating the blur between location based services and directory services, Multimap now has Business Listings. The Multimap communications said:

Now you can use our maps to find businesses in your area - or your destination. We’ve got details of everyone from accountants to woodworkers in the UK, US, Canada, France and Italy - with other countries coming soon.

For those ardent lovers and web 1.0 stalwarts, the old site has finally gone. but don’t fret. If interactive maps really aren’t your thing or you are on dial-up or have an old system then you’ll be happy with the introduction of ‘Basic Site’ functionality. Essentially a rasterised map offering with some new features, but optimised for more basic delivery.

I like the way Multimap have retained this as important. When we at LBi first engaged with them, Sean (Founder), Eric (CTO) and Jeff (CEO) were all fairly adamant from the get-go that ALL users were important.

Anyway, there you go. Have a play and switch your favourite mapping service over to Multimap.

BTW - I do have integrity and this isn’t a shameless plug for LBi work. I firmly think that this is the better browser based mapping solution out there at the moment.

Nearly 2 years ago here at LBi, we started working with Multimap to redesign their public .com web property.

It was time for their loved, but ageing raster-map offering to be dragged inline with, then new and innovative, Google’s ’slippy’ Maps.

With a raft of new features including drag, zoom, pan, hybrid view,all stuff we take for granted now, we set about defining a sharpened mapping proposition that worked for both Multimap users and advertisers.

It was a brilliant project, great fun, hard work and really quite challenging. The guys at Multimap (which sold to Microsoft in December last year) were all smart cookies and pleasure to work with. Personally I see it as one of the triumphs of the team I work in here at LBi. Not only was it great solution, it was a great learning experience and those two things make for great projects. Certainly satisfactory ones.

Stephen Barber was, and still is, ace on this project. Will Bloor was his usual unremitting creative self, Peter Jupp smashed the design and Mike McIntyre and Gavin Edwards aced some complex interaction and James Norton provided some wonderful interface development. It was also a pleasure to see Lorenzo in action, which doesn’t happen nearly enough for some of us here at LBi.

Well, enough spouting from me. Multimap.com has just been named as an Honoree in the Service category at this years Webby awards.

This is no mean feat as only the best 15% of submissions attain the accolade and this from a pot of nearly 10,000 entries received from all 50 US states and over 60 countries.

Multimap is now owned by Microsoft, so expect to start using it a lot more as it integrates into all their properties. Exciting stuff indeed.

The guys I worked with on this project were:

• Stephen Barber
• Will Bloor
• Peter Jupp
• Mike Mcintyre
• Dave Dunlop
• Lorenzo Wood
• Darren Gerry
• Gavin Edwards
• Phil WHitehouse
• James Norton
• Marcus Alexander
• Suzanne Chapman
• Claire Freund

All this digital stuff is funny isn’t it? My ‘digital friend’ @Charliegower is more up-to-date with my moods, locations and general activity than my real-life, long term buddy Nick Foster (who’s not plugged in enough to have the Twitteresque ‘@’ prefix on his monicker).

Charlie and I have only met once, we share a mutual friend in Nick, but we’ve hardly met really. Yet somehow, some reason we’re connected on all the usual social properties, Last.fm, Facebook, Flickr, Plaxo, Linked In, Twitter, Plazes, Dopplr etc etc

Twitter in particular interests me at the moment because of what it’s doing to relationships I have with people. The ambient familiarity is an extra layer that I think is only beneficial. It ‘warms the cockles’ as they say to know that:

@drpig (Will Bloor) is making homemade pasta

@brackers (Andy Braxton) is engaged!

@casablance (Phil Whitehouse) is struggling to install his BT Vision box

@melb (Melissa Bezar) is off to another posh London restaurant

@charliegower (Charlie Gower) is (again) procrastinating by going swimming

@gavinedwardsuk (Gavin Edwards) is on the train to Sheffield, again

@stephenbarber (Stephen Barber) is picking up his guitar (which is what he should do more often)

As we all know, Twitter is a broadcast medium where users can announce ‘what they are doing’ via sms, instant messenger or the web. It’s predominantly utilised as a ‘I’m doing…’, ‘I’m feeling…’, ‘I’m thinking…’ medium.

I’ve also used it in a practical means when trying to navigate New York looking for a top-drawer deli for breakfast, but it’s mostly used like Facebook Status, informing your ‘followers’ of what you are are doing.

Personally, I protect my updates a i don’t want people I don’t know seeing that I’m ‘out of my house’ or I’m ‘away on business’. Scamsters could mine a lot of information from active tweeters.

It stands to reason, that people ‘Tweet’ when they are doing something interesting or when they are killing downtime in a bus queue or on a train (see my post on living an ‘ALt-Tab’ existence), so you get a skewed view, but it makes entertaining reading nonetheless.

Of course, you would never say ‘Just listening to some Mariah Carey’ (Gavin Edwards) or ‘Having a poo’ or ‘Just had a row with the other half’.

No. That’s too much. You have to filter.

It’s interesting that people whom I work with are the ones I engage a lot with via Twitter. None of my ‘friends’ use it, of course I consider many of my colleagues and ex-colleagues friends, but I also Twitter with clients, friends friends, and as a result I feel like there’s something there, known between us that in some way, sustains or affects the personal relationship. Not in all cases, of course.

Phil WHitehouse wrote Ten Commandments of Twitter, which I wholly disagree with. the only rule should be ‘there are no rules’. Although I HATE people who follow but don’t Tweet. Lurkers. Blurgggh!

So, to wrap up, I could meet @Charliegower down the pub and have a rip-roaring evening of conversation, feeling like I already know him. I know his work situatiion, his exercise habits, his music taste, hi ideas and via Plazes or Dopplr, his location.

That’s all bonkers. But if you keep it real by only using such technologies with real people you are likely to meet, I think it’s quite a nice relationship enhancing tool.

Fancy a beer?
Continue reading ‘My Twitter Chums Know More’

I know that I never ever read those emails you get from the websites you subscribe to. Mostly because a) there are too many and b) they are often useless.

Who does?

Anyway, I’m not exactly sure when this feature appeared, probably ages ago, but Flickr now allows you to see the activity on your pictures above and beyond how many ‘comments’, ‘favourites’ and ‘views’ you have had.

Here’s a screen grab from mine today:

I think seeing this kind of information makes a site particularly addictive, it certainly works on blogs. I know because WordPress offer a similar deal for free and they’ve done it for a long time. It keeps me going back every day to see how my blog is performing.

I must say, that my activity on Flickr has increased a lot since I started getting feedback from other users. It’s rewarding you see, it feels like you’re getting something back for your efforts. I feel the same about blogging. Many read but few engage, add comments or send email.

It makes writing a blog quite a lonely thing.

However on Flickr, I’m now submitting photos to groups more and more and getting a lot more interest in my images. I’ve used it a while but it’s only now I’m really using beyond a tool for backing up and sharing with family.

Now that I have a stats package I can monitor interest in more detail and I think I’ll now add Flickr to my ‘must visit every day’ website list.

These kind of metrics are valuable to individuals who put effort into a site. From a site owner point of view the level of engagement of an individual user is measured by their content, activity and good citizenship within the network> In return this is often rewarded. However from a user point of view, you rarely get feedback so it’s very rewarding to be able to see level of engagement on your content too.

Nice move Flickr. Thanks.

JOSH DION BANDOriginally uploaded by yeyo1

Whilst in New York I had the pleasure of one of those serendipitous moments when going out on a Thursday night.We jumped in a cab in Times Square, and whilst being with two American colleagues, we were none the wiser as to where we should go for a decent, non-toursity night out. Even though we were tipped to hit Greenwich Village for a few bars.

We said “take us to the decent bars” and the cabbie, all polite and trusting like, suggested we go down to Bleeker. When we got there we strayed into a bar called ‘The Bitter End‘.

For a $5 cover charge we could grab a stage side table and enjoy one or two beers. There was a band on who were okay (Stratespherous) and then a second that were really very good (Fools for April) an the third (The Josh Dion Band Official site MySpace site) were really really awesome.

This very energetic American, rocky, soulful, bluesy live group made my trip.We were on our way out after Fools for April as we wanted to see more of Bleeker, but when I saw the next band carrying in a Fender Rhodes. If you don’t know what one is (!) remember the opening to the TV show Taxi?.Anyway, I’m a fan of any band that has one. Then I noticed their bassist had a very similar bass guitar to me and I was staying. He was gooooood btw.

They set-up in an interesting way, with a drums at the front and as soon as they started energy and soul were the name of the day. They belted out what appears to be a set that’s done the rounds as you can buy a live album with something very similar to what I heard.No matter. they had the now full crowd of The Bitter End head-nodding, foot-tapping and jumping.

As it turns out, The Bitter End has somewhat of a pedigree when it comes to live music. Apparently a recognised hang-out for record industry types and new emerging bands, people to have played there include Stevie Wonder, Gil Scott-Heron, Curtis Mayfiled, Joan Baez, Jonie Mitchell and a few other names you may have heard of.It made me think that you couldn’t do this in London.

London is a place that requires not only inside knowledge, but clear planning. you couldn’t walk into a place like this, off the street and only pay $5 and see such quality bands.The Josh Dion Band are well worth checking out as they now have a residency, every Thursday at The Bitter End. I think they start at 9pm.

When I head back to NYC I’m making sure I’m there to see them. I only hope they come to London at some point.Thanks for making my trip guys.Anyone in New York on a Thursday - go check them out. Seriously. Go check them out.New York 1, London 0.

Back in March I bought a pair of Shure e2c heaphones.

I was quite impressed. It took me a while to work out which ’sleeves’ to use but once I did, nice.

Then the legendary build quality failed me. The left headphone started to develop a loose connection so I could only hear music if I wiggled the wire, tilted my head and stretched my neck.

This is no way to behave on a packed commuter train.

So, as they had a 2 year warranty I contacted Shure and returned them. The then promptly sent me a shiny new set of SE110s which have replaced the e2c.

Two things; first these are fantastic headphone for the price (about £65) and secondly this was superb customer service.

The Headphones:
They take all the good bits of the e2c and work them into a better package. the sleeves are way more comfortable, produce a better seal (they are noise ‘isolating’ you see, not noise ‘cancelling’) and they are in a lighter unit. Even with MP3 encoded tracks on my iPod I hear brighter, wider sound, an elevated stage and clarity on the instruments.

If you are using the standard buds, CHANGE THEM!

At home I sport some Sennheiser HD25s (turntable usage) but I want something pocket size for the commute.

The Customer Service:
I once returned a set of Oakley Eye jackets after 3 or so years ownership only to have the cracked frame swiftly replaced. this was back in 1997ish.

I’ve bought Oakley eye-wear ever since, be it sunnies or snow boarding goggles.

Of course they are amazing lenses, but the fact that they stuck to their promise and respected the lifetime guarantee I’m an Oakley customer for life.

Shure have now instilled me with the same loyalty for a set of entry-level £65 headphones. So long as they produce quality products I’ll keep buying because I know if things go wrong there is integrity behind the brand.

Thanks Oakley. Thanks Shure.

You know those times when you pick something up and play with it only to find your self continuing to play with it some 20 minutes later because you like the way it does something?No? Oh well, just me then…But I was fiddling with a colleagues cigarette packet the other week and thought it such a good piece of packaging design, I’d share it here.In the UK, Marlboro have released a limited edition pack which is a new style design that opens up on the side using a built-in hinge rather like a Zippo. Ergonomically I think it gives you better access to the contents, but stylistically it’s a nice change.The engineering that has gone into the packaging design amazes me; as the hinge, made from cardboard; and the clasp, also made from cardboard can be used again and again and never seem to weaken.It’s cool, look out for it in a bar near you.When you see it, open it, close it, open it, close it ad infinitum.

The BBC has given up control of its promotion slot for the sake of cricket.It allows users the ability to have ‘Ashes Mode’ on or off so that coverage of the Ashes (which is real man’s baseball for all you US readers) can be displayed upfront and central.Here’s an overview and explanation and here’s the BBC homepage. Go play.I just love the Beeb.