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Visa's Go Visualization

Advertising Age just published an article on how the next frontier doesn’t seem to be better search, but better synthesis. Given that there are so many people publishing images, video and text (tweets, blogs etc.) the velocity of that information is increasing and there are so many point of views on each event that we’ll need better tools then just search to make sense of all of the information. 

Garrick Schmitt says ”the art of “data visualization” has exploded recently and it is fundamentally changing the way we create and consume narratives about events, products and services”, here at Dipity we couldn’t agree more. We’re constantly thinking about how best to aggregate new types of information, sort and display those in the most interesting ways to improve the context of the information we have access to.

It’s a great read check it out here: Data Visualization Is Reinventing Online Storytelling

I took a field trip today to talk with our newest customer, San Jose Museum of Art . The museum is using Dipity on their web site, and they had let us know they were using it on a kiosk in the museum.

I was not prepared for this…

WOW! I got a little teary-eyed when I saw that for the first time. Kind of like what it must feel like for a parent who sees their kid off to college.

They told me that this was a very popular feature, with some folks spending lots of time exploring the timeline, and other visitors watching. Imagine that — timelines as a spectator sport!

We’re very impressed with how SJMA is using Dipity, and we discussed many more possible uses for them — not the least of which is a museum timeline that can use Dipity’s content update features to notify interested visitors when a new exhibit is added to the schedule.

This was truly an inspiring meeting…

Today we released new sharing features focused on events, with an emphasis on Facebook integration.

Now when you are looking at an event you can share it with anyone.  Be it on Digg, Delicious, StumbleUpon, or Facebook.  The link that is sent out will bring a person back to the timeline page with that event popped up (and optionally to the original asset URL for our paying customers).

Click the Facebook icon, authorize Dipity to post to your  Facebook wall, then preview what it will look like. One of the coolest parts of the Facebook integration is that if you share an event with a video on Facebook, your Facebook friends can watch the video right there in your Facebook mini-feed.

This gives you a new channel for sharing, whether it’s your favorite video found on one of our MTV Video timelines, an event from one of the celebrities who use Dipity, or if you represent a brand or personality and are looking for a platform to simplify managing your content on the myriad of social sites online.

Give it a shot, and give us a shout if we can help out.

With the help of a hotshot designer and information architect from New Zealand, Dipity got a makeover today.

Petra Quilitz of Quilitz&Quilitz Ltd really got into what Dipity stands for and submitted a very comprehensive set of ideas for us.  We were absolutely floored with her understanding of our problem space and her ability to execute on that understanding.  We haven’t implemented everything that she suggested (yet) but made some important strides today.  Awesome work, Petra!

With this redesign, Dipity takes a step forward in the timeliness of its look and feel, gets bolder and sharper, and first and foremost showcases your content.  We’ve decided to forego the “sunny day in the park” thing we had going on, and instead let your content do the talking over a neutral background.  Giving you the ability to choose a theme for your timeline is on our shortlist of to-dos, so if you really liked that fair weather theme you will be able to get back there soon.

There are some under-the-covers things that went out today that should make things feel zippy, and be easier on your computer’s processor and memory.  We also started using Amazon’s CloudFront content delivery network last week, and that’s proving to bring a measurable improvement to page load times.

Most of this is in preparation for some more very exciting stuff we’re going to be rolling out in the next week or two.  I can’t say much yet, but our focus is going to be on offering our incredible platform to whomever wants to use it, however they want to use it.

Please let us know how you like the new look and feel by sending Feedback from the site.

These are awesome times to be a Dipster!

Dipity called in sick for a few of you guys today, but we’ve shaken that bug and we’re back up and kicking.

Looks like the problem started with a little traffic spike over the weekend and it got the best of one of our servers. Some of the other machines were a little distracted by all the commotion, but we gave them a pep talk and they have their eyes on the ball again.

I’ll keep this one short (aka I’m out of metaphors for database slave replication issues), but things should be working for you again, and thanks for hanging in there.

Good luck to all you DipStars, and we hope you’ll keep letting us know how things are going for you.

Last week we moved the DHQ (that’s Dipity Headquarters to the uninitiated) to a swanky new three-sided location in South Park.  We had spent the last year and change in a quadrilateral live-work space in a slightly less savory location.  While we’re going to miss our friends at Luna Taqueria and SOMA Cafe, we’re looking forward to making some new Amis and Amigos on our new street.  It’s a shorter and less, shall we say, “dangerous”, walk from the Caltrain Station so those of use who are not yet cool enough to live in SF are happy.

Our triangular office is quite spacious, yet has only 75% of the walls of the previous location.  Architectural genius!  It even has a little stairway that leads to the basement — which is where we’re going to put Derek’s army desk if he gets too loud.

Our neighbors and landlords are Get Satisfaction — a great solution for small to mid size businesses to provide customer support.  We also share logo typefaces, so it’s clearly a match made in heaven.  The building was once inhabited by the great and powerful Twitter, so we’re hoping some of that mojo is still left.  Maybe in the basement…

We are really looking forward to what 2009 will bring to Dipity, and what we’ll be able to build for you in our “acute” new space.  When you visit dipity.com, send us Feedback.  We really love to hear what folks have to say, and jump at the chance to help out when there are problems.

We just launched our “Election Center” today, and new community features for the 2.0 release.  Check it out at http://www.dipity.com/election.

The new site lets users to follow their candidates, and show off their allegiances.  Users can get official updates from the campaign via YouTube, blog posts, twitter messages, Flickr photos, etc. through Barack Obama’s and John McCain’s Dipity channels.  Votes are counted and compared to see how interest in the candidates stack up.

On the heals of our 2.0 launch last Thursday, we’re hoping “Election Center” will be a good way to shows off the capabilities of  the new Dipity.  Users can get the best updates about anything they care about, and one thing we know a lot of people care about right now is the election.

We also have some cool new features.  Users can now carry out conversations around any update.  Updates with comments show a special icon on the timeline view and users can carry on a conversation about any update from the candidates, or on any channel.

Follow your favorite candidate, and be sure to leave a comment too!

We unlocked “Dipity 2.0″ today with one simple goal: letting you follow updates from the people and topics you care about, and have fun doing it.

The new Dipity organizes updates from sites like YouTube, WordPress, Twitter, and 7500 news sites into “channels” on our interactive timeline.

Dipity is the best place to go to catch up on your online world.

You can create your personal channel to broadcast updates to your friends, and can start a channel about anything from Darfur to Dave Mathews in just a few seconds.  Start a channel is super-simple fast new options:

* Web Search: Enter a keyword and we’ll scour the web for the most popular content
* Feeds: Drop in an RSS feed and we’ll take it from there.
* Fresh: Start fresh and update with links, video, images and more.

We hope to make the web a lot easier to follow, and a little more fun too.  Let us know what you think!

We’re taking all the great energy you’ve put into Dipity and re-inventing the site around the features you liked and requested most.   We can’t say too much yet, but the New Dipity will include a ton of new social features and a full-on redesign.For a sneak preview in a couple weeks, and to be first on the Private Beta lists enter your email in the “get alerted” box on the homepage.Stay tuned for another update at the beginning of September.  We think you’ll love it!

Yahoo! announced their new Fire Eagle service today with a few launch partners including… you guessed it: Dipity!  The idea behind Fire Eagle is simple, users should have one place to update their location, and many places to use it.  This struck a chord pretty quickly with Ryan Romanchuk, our resident geo-location nut expert and award-winning engineer.

Since then he’s been hard at work to let Fire Eagle users track their location over time and share it with their friends on Dipity.  Users can also post their location back to Fire Eagle from Dipity from their own events or events they find through their Dipity friends.

Signing up on Fire Eagle is a snap, and adding it to your timeline (and map view!) is just two clicks from there.  We hope you’ll give it a go and give us your thoughts.

From 920 Harrison St., San Francisco, Ca., this is Dipity saying congrats to Yahoo! and happy travels.