I'm going to work my way backwards, I believe I jumped in too early with a shock earlier. I thought I'd have my peace with Eric & Co by writing them an email but there's just way too many things to go over in an email, so here it goes ... (Austin, pardon my critique of CM on your clip, may be you'll add your two cents as well).

When you visit the main website, which is obviously clipmarks.com, then you're presented with a dark theme and three bix boxes in front. This is obviously for the newbies. So what would a newbie think upon landing on this page? That Clipmarks is a firefox extension, it is a tool which will let me clip parts of the web and it will let me create a slide show of my ...

I'm going to work my way backwards, I believe I jumped in too early with a shock earlier. I thought I'd have my peace with Eric & Co by writing them an email but there's just way too many things to go over in an email, so here it goes ... (Austin, pardon my critique of CM on your clip, may be you'll add your two cents as well).

When you visit the main website, which is obviously clipmarks.com, then you're presented with a dark theme and three bix boxes in front. This is obviously for the newbies. So what would a newbie think upon landing on this page? That Clipmarks is a firefox extension, it is a tool which will let me clip parts of the web and it will let me create a slide show of my clips (based on the text I read). I also see a word called ClipCast, which makes it little confusing for me of what Clipmarks is, is it Clipmarks or ClipCast.

All good and dandy (except for the black theme, I'd say 50% of the people would want to see any color except for black).

As a newbie, I'm going to clip and create my slide show. I'm going to take my slide show to my Facebook, MySpace, and wherever and everywhere I go.

So now what?

Q. Am I going to look at my own slide show of clips I made? Why would I do that?

Q. Am I going to campaign for others to see my slide show? Again, why would I do that, especially with Clipmarks tool? Am I not doing this campaign already by being in Facebook, MySpace, Blog, etc, etc? There are lots of tools out there which creates the stream of your feeds, Grazr is one of them.

More to follow.

But ClipCast as I see it, gives me complete functionality of Clipmarks website, so it is a portable tool on my own site, alive and breathing. I can interact with it, I can play with it, and above all, others on my site (Facebook/MySpace, Blog etc) can also interact and play with My ClipCast. This makes it different from Grazr or any other feed tools.

Here is my question again. Why would I look at my own ClipCast and why would I expect others to do the same on my own island?

In Classic view of Clipmarks, I do not look at my own Clips (unless someone has left a comment for me). I hardly find a need for me to look at my own clips. So the big orange button on the front page of Clipmarks: ...

But ClipCast as I see it, gives me complete functionality of Clipmarks website, so it is a portable tool on my own site, alive and breathing. I can interact with it, I can play with it, and above all, others on my site (Facebook/MySpace, Blog etc) can also interact and play with My ClipCast. This makes it different from Grazr or any other feed tools.

Here is my question again. Why would I look at my own ClipCast and why would I expect others to do the same on my own island?

In Classic view of Clipmarks, I do not look at my own Clips (unless someone has left a comment for me). I hardly find a need for me to look at my own clips. So the big orange button on the front page of Clipmarks: [Go to My ClipCast] is some what misplaced in a long run, i.e, it defeats the purpose of being in the community environment (if I'm being led to visit my own things then I'm obvioulsy not beign led to visit others).

So for a newbie, the community environment at Clipmarks (what is now called Classic) potentially does not exist anymore, because I'm being asked to carry my stuff with me wherever I go.

This is basically the initial problem as I see it.

Regarding the various types of functionality of the Classic View that is missing from the ClipCast, some are just not realistic...you can't necessarily build all the functionality of our entire web site into the flash widget. However, others of them will be built in (are being built in as we speak). We just didn't feel that the release of it should be held up until it is a mirror image of the Classic View, as this is not its purpose.

Arifsali, you make a number of interesting and thought provoking points. I will take them all into consideration. The one i want to address here is the question "why would i put a clipcast of my clips on my site?"

I think that one of the most interesting ...

Regarding the various types of functionality of the Classic View that is missing from the ClipCast, some are just not realistic...you can't necessarily build all the functionality of our entire web site into the flash widget. However, others of them will be built in (are being built in as we speak). We just didn't feel that the release of it should be held up until it is a mirror image of the Classic View, as this is not its purpose.

Arifsali, you make a number of interesting and thought provoking points. I will take them all into consideration. The one i want to address here is the question "why would i put a clipcast of my clips on my site?"

I think that one of the most interesting things people can do as a form of communication and expression about their interests is clip the most compelling things they come across on the web. Being able to instantly share those bits with friends anywhere on the web is, in my opinion, a meaningful, valuable opportunity that transcends the typical sharing of links that most people have become accustomed to. I could say more, but i think it's that simple and straightforward. We'll see.

Actually, I was hopping people would discuss the whole thing on my clip, arifsali, remember- I'm a discourse clipper, and I want interesting discussions! So thanks.

At Eric, I know how releases go, and I'm glad you made the compromises you did so that we could all move forward rather than dreaming about the perfect update that never arrives. I'm just here making notes on the usage as I go along, seeing which things I miss, and which I don't.

In that vein I also miss the counter that shows how many times a clip has been viewed. I think it's interesting to hash that information with the pops, tags, and comments.

Other than these hicups, I've almost totally switched over to the clipcast, a...

Actually, I was hopping people would discuss the whole thing on my clip, arifsali, remember- I'm a discourse clipper, and I want interesting discussions! So thanks.

At Eric, I know how releases go, and I'm glad you made the compromises you did so that we could all move forward rather than dreaming about the perfect update that never arrives. I'm just here making notes on the usage as I go along, seeing which things I miss, and which I don't.

In that vein I also miss the counter that shows how many times a clip has been viewed. I think it's interesting to hash that information with the pops, tags, and comments.

Other than these hicups, I've almost totally switched over to the clipcast, and I think it's a big improvement. And anyway, I like black.

What are my thoughts, though?

Here's why I like clipcast: it broadens the clipmarks community. I love my clip-friends, but I have other friends out there in the real world. I also like talking with them about what I read, and although I have convinced some of them to come over to clipmarks, I have to say this makes clipmarks much more accessible and a useful tool for communication with people in the outside world.

Id est: Spreading the Clipmarks revolution. I view this as a very important step. For me, Clipmarks isn't just about social-networking, it addresses a critical failure in our society, just when we need it most. Today people are often belligerent and uninformed. The constructive e...

What are my thoughts, though?

Here's why I like clipcast: it broadens the clipmarks community. I love my clip-friends, but I have other friends out there in the real world. I also like talking with them about what I read, and although I have convinced some of them to come over to clipmarks, I have to say this makes clipmarks much more accessible and a useful tool for communication with people in the outside world.

Id est: Spreading the Clipmarks revolution. I view this as a very important step. For me, Clipmarks isn't just about social-networking, it addresses a critical failure in our society, just when we need it most. Today people are often belligerent and uninformed. The constructive exchange of opinions has been stifled by pseudo-facts and polemic diatribe.

Clipmarks solves this by linking evidence with commentary (why I want to see the comment on the same page as the clip, once again.) This is making honest scholars out of us all, but forcing us to do the research and provide citations, simply by virtue of the fact that we physically need to find the evidence first in order to clip, then form our opinions.

This is an elegant challenge to the status quo where we form our opinions first and simply find evidence to match.

Using the clipcast, we can spread this thoughtful medium to other sites on the web, and hopefully bring a little bit of civility as we go!

Another reason to put clipcasts on your websites is that it helps you manage your different internet identities. As I mentioned above, I reorganized my old labels (now clipcasts) into a few broad genres.

Suppose on clipmarks I am known as an erudite scholar and man of letters, but on Facebook I'm well established as a jovial prankster with a dirty sense of humor and an out of control drinking problem? (There's only one way for you to find out!)

Clip casts are the solution. I can create a separate clipcast for Facebook, one that reflects the part of my clips that fit with the social aspect of my persona that is established there.

Clipmarks brings out the best in the internet, but a few...

Another reason to put clipcasts on your websites is that it helps you manage your different internet identities. As I mentioned above, I reorganized my old labels (now clipcasts) into a few broad genres.

Suppose on clipmarks I am known as an erudite scholar and man of letters, but on Facebook I'm well established as a jovial prankster with a dirty sense of humor and an out of control drinking problem? (There's only one way for you to find out!)

Clip casts are the solution. I can create a separate clipcast for Facebook, one that reflects the part of my clips that fit with the social aspect of my persona that is established there.

Clipmarks brings out the best in the internet, but a few well organized clip casts will bring out the best in Clipmarks. I find myself wanting to save much more of other's clips to various clipcasts. My clipcast is no longer viewed as mine, a product of my research, but as something I cull from the multitudes of information on clipmarks, of which I am a contributor.

So here's how I see it shaking down:

Tech:
+ Customizable background, more personal.
+ Can be taken to my other networking sites
- Doesn't always open a window after I hit "clip"
+ Displays clip content well
- Doesn't display commentary with the clip
+ Easier to use and organize
+ Faster load times surfing between clips

Community:
+ Spreads clip-munity to Facebook and MySpace
- Makes the commentary process less fluid
+ Lets me selectively follow people by loving their clipcasts. (There are many people who I like but don't follow because they clip a lot of stuff I'm not interested in, but being able to favorite a specific clipcast solves this problem.)
- Community frontpage seems a little l...

So here's how I see it shaking down:

Tech:
+ Customizable background, more personal.
+ Can be taken to my other networking sites
- Doesn't always open a window after I hit "clip"
+ Displays clip content well
- Doesn't display commentary with the clip
+ Easier to use and organize
+ Faster load times surfing between clips

Community:
+ Spreads clip-munity to Facebook and MySpace
- Makes the commentary process less fluid
+ Lets me selectively follow people by loving their clipcasts. (There are many people who I like but don't follow because they clip a lot of stuff I'm not interested in, but being able to favorite a specific clipcast solves this problem.)
- Community frontpage seems a little less straight forward than the past.
+ Encourages me to combine clips of others in my clipcasts, getting the best of clipmarks. (Essentially, clipping clipmarks by adding to varrious clipcasts.)