28/02/2007

New Coriander version of Netvibes is Charging

Hi

the announced Coriander update version of Netvibes is now on (February 28, 2007 à 03:58 PM Paris Time) just 8 days later than announced and after 2 hours of server upgrading.

New features:

1) Columns are finally Resizable: you can now arrange your 1, 2, 3 or 4 columns as you like by dragging and dropping the unobtrusive handles between the columns to make them wider or narrower. Good news! It works fine

2) a New Coriander theme is available: let's wait and see for the "Shiny colors and round corners (that) will give some eye candy to your modules". I prefer the darker background look of the previous Halloween theme and the use of my preferred module: Netvibes Customize .

3) Feeds navigation: It is now possible to read your feeds beyond the display limit. (This feature can be enabled in the "Settings" panel.)
That one is also a good news!

4) new Mac mail module. No use for me but ...

So I am waiting to see my own Coriander version and will give you more comments.

22/02/2007

Netvibes announces Cross-Platform Widget Compatibility

Hi,

yesterday in London, Tariq Krim (CEO of Netvibes), as reported by Michael Arrington from TECHCRUCH has announced that the new Coriander version of Netvibes (still to come...) will provide a solution to allow cross-paltform compatibility of widgets.

In this way, developers will have just to develop their widgets (module, flakes,...) as the compatibility on every platform will be guaranteed by an Universal Wideget Api.

The advantages according to 606TECH are:

"- widgets created for Netvibes will work on Vista, Opera, Google and Mac, with Yahoo support soon to follow
- this universal widget is important because a single widget created will be able to be embedded in most platforms
- it also allows for an outward growth of Netvibes widgets so they can become increasingly mobile and personal
- the incorporation of OpenID goes along
- open sourcing with the Coriander release of Netvibes means anyone can increase the number of platforms Netvibes widgets can operate on . "

And the advantages for us Netvibers, will be that widgets (modules) already developed for Netvibes will be available for other platforms (Google, Yahoo, ...) .
Well, it would be better if it was the other way round...

21/02/2007

Some Netvibes improvements

Hi,

Tariq Krim has just announced some new improvements to Netvibes waiting for the new Coriander version as I had announced previously.

The improvements according to Krim:

1) Improving the RSS and introducing the Media RSS support with introduction of small images in the feeds.

2) More choice in the search modules with more sites: metacafe.com, sevenload.com (videosearch), pixsy.com (pictures) and blogsearch.google.com (blogs).

3) a new Craigslist module

4)Introduced possibility of making a Backup copy of all your feed subscriptions

Now let's wait for the Coriander version improuvements.

17/02/2007

Home pages comparison_Part 1

Hi,

I am trying to start an Home Pages comparison.

In the mean time check this one on WebWorkerDaily. It refers to Ajax Start Pages:

1) Google’s Personalized Home Page

2) Netvibes

3) Pageflakes

4) Protopage

5) Yourminis

For each there are pro e con but the general conclusion is not yet a positive one :

"That "All those home pages" have a ways to go before they provide the informational richness and immediate action that this web worker needs. "

15/02/2007

Check your own Netvibes Active User ID number

Hi,

In the comments of my post concerning the 7 million users claimed by Netvibes,
Webmonkian said...
if you clear your cookies and go to netvibes and then look at your cookies you can see how many 'users' netvibes has.

So I did it! (Thanks Webmonkian!)

I looked for my "netvibes" cookie , I read it with Notepad and I saw the
userID that seems to be to Total Registred Users of Netvibes. This number went up and down 7.000.000 (ex: 7.041.021 or 7.927.351) and is in line with the 7 mln users claimed by Chappaz in my other post.

But I saw also the activeuserID, a number that did not change even by changing PC and erasing the cookies. It is my own user ID and this Active user ID is in the 3.700.000 range probably related with my registration in mid November 2006.


Questions:
1) why the userID changes so much (900.000 in a few hours) ?
2) are the activeUserID related to date of registration or to another event?

Wait and see...

13/02/2007

Who is behind Netvibes_part 4

Hi,

we continue the original post " Who is behind Netvibes".

6) Marc THOUVENIN, Business Development Executive at Netvibes, French, 31.

In charge of Business Development since August 2006, Marc Thouvenin is now hiring Partner Program Specialists.

7) Chris DAMSEN, VP U.S. Business Development, American

During his six-year tenure as Senior Director of Business Development at Ask.com/IAC, Chris led its syndication division to more than $200M in annual revenue. He also established key relationships with more than 100 partners including AOL, Google, Lycos, BellSouth, CNET, Apple, EarthLink, and InfoSpace.


to be continued (Part5)

12/02/2007

Netvibes2Go: New Mobile version for Netvibes

Hi,

Netvibes is testing a new Mobile version called: Netvibes2Go

Just go to : http://m.netvibes.com
and Create a tab named "mobile" and add modules among compatible ones:
iCal
Todo List
Web Note
GMail
Yahoo! Mail
Hotmail
AOL Mail
PopMail
Feeds
Weather
Web search
Blog search

Some French users have already tested it: see captures.

10/02/2007

New Netvibes version named "Coriander" out the 20th

Hi,

WiredNews has just announced the New version of Netvibes called "Coriander" .

It will get out at The Future of Web Apps conference in London on Feb. 20 - Feb. 21 and will introduce several new features:

1) a new integrated RSS reader (similar to Google's reader)

2) Users will be able to share customized modules among friends so that with just one click, a user can send either a full content module or a tab within a module via e-mail or instant message.

3) a new set of modules offering site-specific searches.

For what I am concerned, I think that the possibility to Share with Others was one of the most important features missing in Netvibes.
Let's wait and see if that new Coriander version is up with my expectations...

07/02/2007

Netvibes has 7 Milion users says Chappaz (co-CEO)

Hi,

In a statement made by Pierre Chappaz, co CEO at Netvibes, during the Web2 summit in San Fransisco - Netvibes say they are going to integrate the use of Google gadgets, of which there are 1,531 (although it can be discussed as to whether or not some of these qualify as widgets & not just RSS feeds) but also that Netvibes has over 7 million users, up 2 million since september. Half of those using Netvibes are in the USA.
Numbers are confirmed in the French Blog of Pierre Chappaz.

In a new post in his Blog, Chappaz talks of "nearly 10 millions users" and refers as a source to... Alexa. As I already posted, Alexa data seem ridiculously inaccurate ...

Security issue with Netvibes_2

Hi,

Just a month ago I was writing about the Security issues with an Ajax Home page and just last Monday Netvibes released a note about "Security update in 3rd parties modules on the ecosystem".

Netvibes writes " (we found) a security vulnerability in webnotes when using a 3rd party module. A fix was due to be launched later this week, but given the recent alert, we have decided to push it today: this vulnerability is now fixed."

And as future solution Netvibes mentionned: "We will also start to introduce the user rating and the certification of modules in the Ecosystem."

So, point 2 of my first post (external modules not verified) has already been proved a real Security problem.

Now, what about my point 1) " Netvibes can help me looking at my gmail, ebay, yahoo, and many other registred services if "I give them" my passwords in order to access directly to the services I am registred to.Passwords must be stored somewhere and there are surely risks of hackers "getting them"." ?

Wait and see...

NETVIBES numbers (Updated 7/2/2007)

I have done some data-mining on numbers about Netvibes (data in brackets= old).UPDATED: 07 FEBRAURY 2007 (JANUARY 2007)
SIGNED-UP users claimed by Netvibes : 7.000.00 (5.000.000) +40%
ALL DAY USERS declared by Netvibes : 10% = 700.000
number of employees : 11-50
number of deli.ci.us bookmarks: .17.796 (16.460) +8%
total number of Modules available: 650 (566) +15%
most downloaded module : Netvibes Customize by FaziBear : 24.191 (21.1813)
second most downloaded module : Sudoku by Netvibes user 18.164 (15.532)
total number of Feeds available: 9.618 (7.986) +20%
most downloaded feed: Dream Girls by Kenny : 6. 734 (5.705)
second most downloaded feed: Flickr Babes: 3.910 (3.206)
total number of Podcast available: 743 (655) +13%
most downloaded podcast: this WEEK in TECH by Netvibes user : 1.307 (1.148)
total number of Events available : 161 (140) +15%
most downloaded event: Musicians Birthdays by ZsoltP : 1.966 (1.760)
total number of Tabs available: 2.987 (2.406) +24%
most downloaded tab: Web 2.0 by Netvibes user : 4.925 (4.536)
number of Web result for "Netvibes" on Google: 24.400.000 (20.800.000) +17%
number of Image result for "Netvibes" on Google: 4.760 (4.760) +0%
venture capital investment: Accel Partners and Index Ventures for 12 mln US$ (August 2006)