More Music – Less Committment

If you run from commitment like a 26-year old guy living in his parent’s basement still dating his high school sweetheart, then SeeqPod is for you.  Go ahead, take a taste, it won’t hurt.  No download, no install, no diamond ring to buy; just lots of free music right in your browser.

You even get to indulge your voyeuristic side (we all know you have one) since you can watch what other people are searching for.

Yes, it does videos and other stuff, but really…who doesn’t?

Asking “where does all this free music come from” is like asking “is there really a Santa Claus” because first of all, why do you want to spoil the magic for little Susie, and second, who cares?

I still mourn my MusicMatch Jukebox with it’s bloated footprint and rip-off Yahoo Music replacement.  So, no more commitments!  I’m packin’ light baby, nothin’ but my browser between me and the music.

Sure, it has plenty of downsides (did I mention it was free).  Seems like I can’t even make it through a playlist without half the songs going AWOL before I get to play them.  No equalizer, no liner notes, no band history, no album-ography thingy, but it’s less filling.

Check out their really nice Ruby On Rails interface here: SeeqPod

Hey, tell ‘em Oomoo sent ya and get 10% off!!!

How Does ZOHO Do It?

ZOHO is delivering web apps like rabbits deliver bunnies!  I swear, every time I go to their home page I see some new app or plug-in.  I write web apps, and I would probably kill to get my hands on their development toolbox.  They must have some really nice libraries developed by now that they can just piece together to form a new application.  They must!  It’s the only way they could be so productive.

If you don’t believe me, go check them out… click here –>  ZOHO Home Page

 

Now, these apps aren’t perfect by any means.  There are some minor bugs in many of them (and a few have Texas cockroach sized bugs).  But, when you are rolling out, what seems to be, a new application every month or two, this is to be expected.  I will be interested to see if ZOHO has the manpower to stick with their older products to enhance them and fix bugs while still keeping up this furious pace of development.  I have noticed that one or more of the support forums need a live body.

Integration is currently a problem.  Their CRM tool has a lot of overlap with their business desktop for showing contacts, appointments, tasks, etc., but the data in the CRM does not show on the business desktop.  I’m sure that once their stable of products is built out, the folks at ZOHO will do a thorough integration job to make sure that data can pass from one product to another easily (and automatically).

And what’s the deal with their E-Mail product?  I would like to use the ZOHO Business application more, but let’s face it, e-mail is the backbone of most businesses these days.  The ZOHO E-Mail application has been in “private” beta for… like… forever!  I have requested a sign-in, more than once, over the past 6 months or more and never gotten an invite.  When they say “closed” beta, they mean it!  Hey, Google may never take any of it’s products out of beta, but at least you can usually score an invite.  Also, the 1 Gig. space limit is soooo last year.

The newest applications coming out of ZOHO are very rich indeed.  They allow an extensive amount of screen and field customization.  You can basically tailor the CRM and the new HR applications until your heart’s delight.  I have never seen this level of customization in a web application that didn’t carry a six-figure price tag.  Kudos.

If it sounds like I am telling you to hurry up and wait to use ZOHO, then you misunderstand me (use them, you’ll like them).  I am asking ZOHO to hurry up and don’t make me wait!  I just can’t wait for ZOHO to finish growing it’s stable of applications and go to work on integrating them and doing some really deep user testing.  I think their Business Desktop is a great play, but it just won’t fly, for example, if you have 3 different calendars that won’t synchronize.

PowerPointless

Is PowerPoint really such a complex product that the Webbers of the world just cannot create a reasonable facsimile that actually works. I mean, who knew that putting a row of bullet points down the middle of a page was such a technological feat?!

The other day, I was trying to put together a very basic presentation. Good opportunity to show everyone watching the presentation that it could be done on the web.

So, I fired up Google Apps and everything was going fine until I did the unthinkable… I tried to use two (yes 2) fonts in the same bulleted list. Well that list got scrambled so badly that I doubt the NSA could unravel it.

It was okay, I still had Zoho “Show”. It has more bells-n-whistles than Google anyway. I didn’t even make it through the first page! That sucker locked up tighter than Fort Knox. I had to actually end the browser task to make it stop telling me to hold on just a little bit longer.

Dejected, I started up PowerPoint. The logo appeared and I actually saw it give me a wry knowing smirk. That cash-cow smirk. I couldn’t give up that easy! I just couldn’t let the cow win!

I decided to give Google another go (because at least it didn’t just bomb). I carefully crafted my list, being certain not to confuse it with fonts and such. Oh, I wanted to go bold; I was itching for italic; I yearned for some color; I even wanted to go bolditaliccolorunderline!! But, I refrained. I finished it and it looked “okay”.

Then, I reasoned that it couldn’t hurt to change the background. I mean, the text was already set. I was just changing the picture that lays behind the text, right? Well, it was weird. Every time I closed and opened the presentation, it looked just a touch different than the last time. By the time I gave my actual presentation, the last couple of “bullets” had fallen off the page and struck an innocent border.

So, I can only conclude that PowerPoint is so complex that neither the Google minions nor the prodigious Zoho can duplicate even it’s most basic functionality in a stable product.

Who knew?