Blogger, which is owned by Google, has updated the Navbar that is displayed across the top of every blog page, except when a Dynamic View is used. Many bloggers hide/remove it, but I like keeping it there for my readers to use if they wish. The right half remains the same.
The old Navbar:
When you clicked Share it opened a pop-up window to share to Twitter or Facebook:
The new Navbar:
Upon clicking More it now opens an in-line dropdown menu:
The changes are small, but powerful! Having the G+ Share button in a prime visual position will certainly increase sharing to Google+. They have also added Share by Email as an option. Each post will continue to have the Share Buttons which includes the +1 widget.
Do you like the new changes? What else should they change? Share your thoughts below.
I would like to see more options available for publishers other than only having the ability to change the color. An additional change that would be nice to have is the option to display a Twitter and/or Facebook share button in addition to the Google+ one. Lastly, I want the other sharing options to perform like the G+ Share functionality where it overlays on the page instead of opening a new tab.
What happened to being able to share things you found on the internet fast and easy with your friends and family? In the early days if we came across an interesting message board post, picture, or website we would quickly let our fellow AOL users know. This new found communication channel proved to be reliable and speedy, and everyone had it. It was called email!
Email is still with us today and is the number one electronic communication channel, even though it is not as cutting edge or sexy as Google+, Facebook, or Twitter. Everyone has an email address, everyone checks it (mostly), and it does not matter if their provider is Gmail or Lycos.
Handpick simplifies sharing by using email as it's notification tool. The improvement is that you do not need to copy and paste links one at a time into an email and your shares are sent once a day. By using a Chrome extension or bookmarklet sharing is one click away from whatever webpage you are on. The link and link's title are automatically gathered for the share.
When you share a page you are doing so to a group that is predefined or that can be made on the fly. Groups can have as many, or as few, people as you want. Set one up for your family, friends, work friends, professional contacts, and even yourself as a way to save pages to read later. Your group's email is sent once per day and includes all links shared. Group options include:
You can allow other members of group to also sent links to your group
Emails can be sent with the recipients in the BCC field so that know one knows the other groups members
The time to send the daily digest email can be adjusted
Handpick was created by Alvin Lai (on Twitter) and is currently in private beta. You can sign-up on the homepage to try it out; it only took a day for me to get my invite.
Facebook announced many changes last week, and over the weekend the chatter around the web and in the real world has focused on the privacy implications and information overload from their "auto-sharing" feature. There are many services like Spotify, Nike+ GPS, Foodily, and Words With Friends that are using this enhanced sharing. Lets take a look at what is going on and dispel some myths.
The one item that really needs to be clear to everyone is that you are in full control of what is shared, and who sees what is shared, on Facebook. The sharing is not automatic and needs to be specifically approved. With these new apps that connect using the Open Graph (Facebook's enhanced sharing protocol) there are new line items on the approval screens that we have become accustomed to. There could be new little check boxes to either check or uncheck, so be sure to read everything when connecting a Facebook account to an application.
You will see new questions about adding the activity to your timeline which encompass the news feed and ticker. This is where you approve/disapprove the apps access to share the activity. If you do share your activity you can further control who sees it through the privacy settings. The traditional public, friends, and friend of friends settings can be used as well as the lists and individual people, the option is even there to hide it from specific friends or lists. You have total control!
If you need to change your current settings head over to the privacy settings, edit settings for apps and website, edit settings for apps you use, then find the specific app and click edit. Once in there you are able to remove specific functions of it, change the overall viewing privacy, or completely delete it. If you want to take it off your new profile, once those are publicly launched, you can hover over it and select "remove from favorites" from the drop down menu.
On the receiving end, seeing all these updates can be just as annoying as the games. Luckily you have the "hide all by ..." option for these as well. I hope this clears up some of your questions and concerns. If not, please leave a comment below with your question.
Knowing what you know now, this video isn't so scary:
Stellar.io is a new discovery and favoriting website announced and created by Jason Kottke (his profile). The details are limited and he is slowly letting users in for testing. "Stellar helps you discover and keep track of your favorite things on the web", says Jason, and also that "if you like playing around on Twitter or Flickr, you'll probably enjoy Stellar". Sign up so that you can reserve your user name and wait in line to check it out.
Once I am in I will be sure to update everyone. If you read Jason's blog you will know that his attention to detail and design is top notch; we could be in for a treat.
