2 posts tagged “features”
Now for some wishlist items:
- I want my own style. The current template options feel too limiting. I don't have a MySpace account, but I imagine many who do will want more control over the style of their page (at least colors, typefaces, and some of the layout) before seriously considering using Vox.
- Side dishes. More sidebar control - kinda like what you've done with Typepad+
Friendster. Number one thing for me would be more options around displaying my neighborhood (on/off/friends only) - "How do you know so and so?" Facebook has a nifty feature along these lines, where two contacts can describe their relationship... feels almost like an adlib so it is really easy and inviting to fill out. Then when you are viewing someone's neighborhood, you have a much clearer picture of why those folks are nearby.
- Let the content come to you. Namely, I want to be able to point Vox to a Flickr photostream (my public photostream / all photos tagged x / a photoset / etc.) and have that automatically show up on my blog. I don't want to keep saving everything to my library (for stuff I want to include in a blog post, that's fine).
- Groups. I'll purposely leave this one vague. Groups is a hard feature to really do well... but if it's done right, it could add a lot to the Vox experience. It gives users more things to identify with and more things to do. I could see a "send this post to group", "browse people in this group", "name.groups.vox.com" etc.
Ok, after having lots of fun with Vox the past few days, it's time to give you some feedback.
- You made it about me. You made the blog central to the social experience. My thoughts and musings and links to stuff I find interesting are all at the center. My friends and things that are "related" spin out from that center. A much more interesting homepage than some top 10 or "did you know?" or worse, some boilerplate marketese that I would have ignored. Plus, I totally dig the personal url.
- You made it easy. Ok, it's obvious that Vox is trying to appeal to a wide audience, especially people who may be new to the blogging scene and aren't super familiar with html, handling photos, links, etc. Besides some of the obvious things, several of my favorite UI elements that seem to be unique to Vox are: a) top navigation that follows me on everyone's blog; b) the modal dialogs that prevent all sorts of browser history confusion and remind me (via faded page underneath) why I was performing an action in the first place; c) easy image placement in the rich content editor, and that images and other media are pulled into my library so there are no worries of future broken links.
- I love your metaphors. Neighbors - perfect! No anxiety over assigning friendship status to acquaintences or strangers. Just like blogs, the link love doesn't have to be reciprocal, and with the neighbor metaphor, it's not as creepy (I hope) when a stranger links to you.
- Exploring is fun. It feels a lot easier to walk through the neighborhood on Vox than on other social networking sites. Again, since the blog is central in purpose, each page is unique and makes me want to click around more.
- Yet I feel very safe. The privacy controls are just right, so I don't worry about what I say or do. I can always hide things I don't want the entire world knowing about.
- You give me things to do. Writer's block, not a problem, thanks to the ingenious question of the day feature. A great continuous icebreaker, it encourages a lot of new daily content, and I lot of people's posts to read. Usually that gets the mind going and helps me think of even more to say.
So, this is stuff Vox already knows, and consciously designed, but I wanted to say thanks and emphasize that you really nailed these parts. Vox strikes a great balance of community and individual. I needed a home for a more personal blog, and I'm hoping this turns out to be it.
