Rev2.org

If you’re like most people online, you’ve got a collection of music files that’s just gathering dust on your hard drive. In fact, you’ve probably forgotten about it and only occasionally remember it’s there (usually when you’re getting pressed for free space).

Well, bopaboo hopes to help people like you buy, sell, or trade their unwanted (legal) music files with other users. If your files are DRM-encoded, such as from iTunes or a similar service, you can’t use them on bopaboo. Unfettered files, such as many Amazon.com MP3 downloads, are trade-able, however.

The service is currently in closed beta and by invitation only, though you can apply for an invitation from a link on their front page. No word yet as to whether RIAA has given them the nod either, so expect a legal battle as soon as they do go public if the recording industry hasn’t given them the benevolent “A-OK.”

Through the service, you list your music in your own “store,” with most individual song prices defaulting to around $0.25/song (you can set the price however you’d like). Payouts are in the form of credits which you can use to purchase more music from other sellers on bopaboo or that you can “cash out” into real money.

The service is available only in the USA, thanks to some legal restrictions the site is attempting to adhere to keep RIAA from intervening. It is set to launch publicly sometime early in 2009.

Bopaboo is a great idea and I hope it flies, since it’s a service that most of us can use and that we (legally) should be able to use with our purchased property. After all, you can buy and resell CDs, tapes, and DVDs. Right? Why not your digital music too?

“Find Alternatives to Everything” is Dooblet’s search engine motto. It’s not a Web or Internet search engine, like Google (which it is obviously inspired by) or Yahoo, but instead it’s a search engine that helps you find alternatives to just about anything.

You enter a search term, like you would any search engine, but instead of showing you a list of websites, the tool returns alternatives to what you’ve searched for. For instance, if you search for “Prius,” it will return a list of hybrid vehicles (Toyota or not), such as the Honda Civic Hybrid.

It’s an interesting tool that could be very useful. No actual Web search is available, however, and despite dooblet’s obvious Google inspiration and linkage, it does not allow you to take your search term and automatically put it into a Google or other search engine’s search. Instead, the links on the results take you to more results based on that word or phrase as a search.

So dooblet is a nice idea, but in my opinion it has been poorly executed. I will give them credit for having a simple site without clutter, easy use and a great idea. Adding actual Web search functionality would definitely make this a new home page for many users. Otherwise, it’s worth a bookmark maybe as a way to find what you’re looking for when you’re having a hard time coming up with the actual name for it.

Let’s say you’re an independent news organization with a small budget and only two mobile crews to cover an entire city with. What if, for the same cost in equipment as those two traditional crews are, you could have six or eight crews? That’s the kind of change that LiveU could mean for the world of live, on-the-spot broadcasting.

Of course, the technology isn’t just limited to television or news stations. Anyone could use it for any number of things. I foresee live, online broadcasts of news conferences, last-minute corporate updates, and amateur or semi-pro Internet news startups grabbing this technology and running with it.

It works by using wireless solutions to broadcast video uplinks—rather than the traditional satellite uplink from a large van or truck, as most news agencies use. Using small, affordable, high-quality video transmitters that convert video to wireless, LiveU can quickly create broadcasts on-demand.

Backed by Canaan Partners and Carmel Ventures, this startup has a good backing and has been around and in development since 2006. Their latest and marketable technology is labeled LU-10. Used recently by NBC at the Olympic Games in Beijing, the solution obviously has some merit.

This is one of those technologies that could, in all seriousness, change the way the world interacts. It won’t be as big as the Internet itself, maybe, but it could be up there. Any great enabler like this could be has that potential.

Crowdsourcing is a popular concept amongst so-called gurus and those who’d like to think they can predict the future of online business models. So far, though, few have been able to make crowdsourcing really work. On some levels, the idea of building a community and then later utilizing it to create a monetized business model is pretty easy, but few have successfully made the transition from community-building to actual income generation.

It appears that uTest may be one of those few. The model is pretty simple: clients post software to be tested and the community of testers at uTest then have at it. The first one to find a bug, gets paid. As more bugs are found, the price can change, going down or up. The more demand there is for the testing, the higher the payment and vice versa.

That’s the over-simplified version of how the site works, as there are many details involved in how the client can choose the criterion for testing and who the testers will be (by various grades). Testers, in turn, are graded both on how quickly and how often they find bugs and by the client themselves based on interaction with the bug reporting process.

One big advantage that uTest has is that coders, developers and software engineers have always made great crowdsource communities. This is primarily due to the already-established open community many of these software professionals are already a part of, such as open source and online tutorial forums.

Another milestone was reached when uTest converted all ten of the pilot participant clients into paying customers when they went live in August. Revenues, according to uTest, have grown 150 percent since and its community of testers spans 144 countries with over 12,000 members.

Longworth Venture Partners apparently believed that uTest has the potential to seriously tap into the $13 billion software testing industry and agreed to $5 million in Series B funding for uTest earlier this month.

With the continued globalization of the software industry, crowdsourcing may indeed be coming into its own.

Everyone’s on a budget these days and ZingSale hopes to harness that need and create a budget-minded shopping portal. It’s not a store or even an affiliate-link, but rather a sort of RSS feeder for online shopping. Basically, users put in what they’re looking for (say “Gucci Wallet”) and the site alerts them whenever that product is on sale or at a discount somewhere.

Sounds great, except that everything is “on sale” or “at a discount” somewhere. The definition of these is ambiguous and I found no way to define them on the site. As a search tool for products without the alerts, however, ZingSale is still a good solution for finding lower-cost items. The results appear to be unbiased and the site loads quickly with an easy interface.

Browsing through categories makes things even easier, especially if you can’t remember the name of a specific product. A search for “Sony” in TV, for instance, can quickly be narrowed to plasma-only and then you’re likely to find the model you were after.

The site has little information on ownership and an over-simplified privacy policy that leaves a little to be desired. Their promise to never sell, rent, etc. your information is straight forward, but finding out how to contact them isn’t easy. An email link is provided as well as a PO box in Encinitas, California. That’s about it. No ownership or corporate information is available.

I personally get worried when sites don’t list this kind of information, though I know that smaller startups are probably dubious about throwing all their info out there right off the bat. It’s a best practice, however, to build user trust by showing them all the information about you that you’re expecting them to give to you about themselves.

At any rate, to search products and prices, you don’t need a login, so this can be done without giving up anything personal. As a shopping portal for discount items, it’s a good spot and one that you’ll probably find useful.

Are you a freelancer or someone who does something that bills by the hour? A DJ or a dog walker, perhaps? Whether you work at something full or part time, you might be able to use HourVille. The site seeks to match providers with those who need them, with matchups focused on by-the-hour payments.

If you’re a person or business who’s looking for a professional for a one-off or part-time, contracted job, then HourVille might have a match for you. Just enter the job description as a search term into the site and see who’s available and looking for work.

If you’re a provider who needs a way for prospective clients to find you, then you can build a profile on HourVille and set up shop. Anyone on the site who searches for your job description will see your profile and can offer you work.

All in all, the site has a lot to offer, but nothing more than sites of a similar nature. Granted, HourVille is less “professional-oriented” than most sites of this type, aiming for a more laid-back market. The site’s design and layout make it obvious that slacks and ties are not required, but is useful enough that most can find what they’re looking for—if it’s there. The site is new, so there aren’t a lot of prospects for finding or getting work.

Many of the profiles on this site are for people offering their services as dog walkers, house cleaning, car detailing, party DJs, dance instruction, and more. Definitely not the usual for this kind of site. Right now, while the site is in beta, use is free and those who sign up as providers will receive a lifetime free account, so you’ll never pay for the service. Smart thinking on HourVille’s part, as this is sure to get a lot of interest from providers, populating the site’s database.

It seems that HourVille is worth looking at, but don’t expect it to be your only income stream or advertising venue. If you’re looking for a provider, though, you’ll likely find someone who can help.

If you’ve heard of Swurl or Sweetcron, you’re familiar with the idea of mashups of your Web 2.0 interfaces (Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, and so forth) into a single site or page to centralize your information. Storytlr is a bit different, though, bringing something unique to the stage that will, I think, appeal to a lot of people.

Often, startups are all about funding and have little to offer in real world application. Even more often, they’re about ideas with no basis in reality and little chance of success. Storytlr is neither of these. It’s a great idea, which I’ll get to in a minute, that was started on bootstraps with little focus on gaining more capital infusion and lots of focus on making the product work.

The idea is pretty simple when looked at on its face, but complex enough to be new and intriguing. Take your social networking sites like Flickr, ad in your favorite RSS feed from, say, Google Reader, and stuff up your photos from somewhere like Facebook and put them all together on a site that integrates them by timeline (which you can tweak as much as you’d like). This timeline becomes a story, which is presented to the world on your page and evolves as your sites that feed into it are updated.

Currently, Storytlr can interface with Twitter, Myspace, Facebook, Google Reader, Delicious, Flickr, Lastfm, Picasa, and several others. You can control the timeline or insertion of photos, information, and so forth to customize the output. Several other options allow for your Storytlr site to be completely unique. Your depth of control is completely up to you and even novice Web users will find Storytlr to be fairly simple to operate, but gurus will love the seemingly infinite tweaks that can be performed.

Right now, content is fairly slow to appear (taking several minutes to an hour in some cases, depending on server load), but that is mainly budgetary on Storytlr’s side. Remember: they haven’t been out begging for venture funding, but instead building a great product. The concept is solid, the application is strong, and it’s continually improving with new implementations. I expect the funding will find them on its own.

It’s free to sign up, but I caution you that it becomes addictive. You’ll find yourself spending several hours at the outset fiddling with the controls to perfect your Storytlr page. I know I did.

wePapers started with the laudable goal of making people smarter by allowing shared information on a university level, the site does all that and then some. Students or those interested in expanding their knowledge can log into wePapers and look at class notes, papers ranging from essays to full doctoral theses on every subject imaginable. All for free.

The down side is that these students and faculty who’re using the site could also find themselves victims of plagiarism. That’s a stigma that all sites of this nature must face. Too many will utilize the site to find papers they can put their name on and pass off as their own, in order to ace a class without having to work for it. Sadly, that’s how some people are.

Despite that stigma, this site is a glorious example of what the Web can really be used for. Touting itself as “the world’s biggest study group,” wePapers is that, I’m sure. Name a subject (I picked one of my favorites: history) and delve in. I was on the site to review it for this article, but ended up browsing through it and reading in-depth studies for hours. The only thing that saved me was my inability to read on-screen information for more than a couple of hours without getting eye-aches.

The site is that great. If you have time to spend reading real academic information on your favorite subject, then you’ll probably find yourself engrossed quickly. I guarantee you’ll bookmark it.

Forget Bear and Bull markets. They got nothing on the Simian Market.

Portfolio Monkey is an investments tracking and portfolio management site for self-guided investors. The site focuses not on individual buys and sells, but on management of an overall portfolio that’s healthy and growing. Through analytic tools, an easy interface, and the innovative ability to post your stock tickers online and track adjustments in real-time, the site does have the setup to provide optimal investment strategies.

Of course, this means you’re entire investment portfolio is now posted on a website. It’s secure, of course, but it’s still there and online. From another perspective, this isn’t such a bad thing since most of us who use online investment tools or firms like TDAmeritrade are already online with our investments anyway.

Despite it’s goofy name, which does little to inspire confidence, Portfolio Monkey actually has some great tools that any investor will find useful. Especially if you prefer a “big picture” approach to your investing rather than the one-off “get-rich-quick” style investing many investment sites seem to prefer.

Rather than looking at just your stock in Ford, say, you could include that in a portfolio that has stock in IBM, Sun Microsystems, BP&E, and Conagra Foods. In this way, you can look at your entire portfolio at once to see how it’s performing overall and then look at individuals (or “sectors”–smaller groups of the whole that you define) and see how they’re performing now and how their performance has been in the past.

This allows for much more intuitive and useful investment strategy and planning. All of this is on a great layout and design that isn’t so busy it’s becoming a CNN new screen during the lunch hour. The site is easily navigated and quickly understood by even the most novice investor and the tools can be customized enough that even those who are hard-core Webophiles will find it handy.

Many of us are big Gmail fans and use it as our email service of choice. One complaint many have had, however, is that for all it’s simplicity and customization options, there has been no way to make it look better or unique to you.

Sure, there were plenty of things like plug-ins by Greasemonkey and Firefox addons, but there was only so much that could be done that way. Now Google has decided to give up the completely utilitarian attitude and give us some skin.

Gmail introduced several new themes for customizing your Gmail interface with a variety of neat options and tweaks. Some of the skins, for instance, change with the time of day or the local weather reports. While probably not all that useful, it is pretty cool. Others have modified Gmail logos, much like Google’s season-changing logo to match the holiday or upcoming events.

If you haven’t seen the new “Themes” tab on your Gmail screen, it won’t be long until you do. It’s rolled out to some of us, but in typical Google fashion, caution wins the day, so it’s being slowly introduced across the Gmail servers and accounts.

So the next time you log into Gmail, maybe you too can ogle some skin.