Roundup : RedBubble, txtms, Searchbots, IMVU, Swivel
RedBubble - An Australian site for hosting artwork in a social network environment. Add tags to your works, browse around and add friends and also add favourite works of art. But that’s not all, the power of this site is that you can sell your artwork/photos as prints and even framed prints…see my post on similar sites.
If your website already has a gallery of your artwork you can place a link next to each piece that is labelled “Buy a print”, and this can link to that artwork in RedBubble (the buyer is being taken to another website, being RedBubble, to make the purchase, but that’s ok).
They have widgets coming soon, so you will be able to promote your artwork on your website or blog, I’m thinking slideshow widgets are even better. Check out Abby’s (my wife) artwork.
txtms - create a virtual business card with details and a photo, people can access it by sending an SMS with your user ID to x@txtms.com. I wonder if there is space to enter your web 2.0 identity, eg. ProfileLinker, also see SocialNetwork.In, Profilactic, and Pidy. The ProfileLinker portable profile looks awesome, but it seems you need the mobile web to see it. I wonder if txtms could use MMS instead that way your card is a kind of slideshow or has fade out/in pages.
Even better, similar to Hictu, it could have a further purpose, you can SMS or MMS for a person’s contact/profile, and this will also tell you of their presence, whether they are online, their location (plazes), their IM status, maybe even a status message eg. “gone fishing, back at 7pm”. This is like a non-mobile web version of The Swarm.
Searchbots - create your own bot to trawl the web for you and report back…searches keywords, tags, locations
IMVU - desktop IM where your avatar is a 3D character, and you are in a virtual room with the person you are chatting with…the text appears as bubble captions. In this virtual room you can move and interact with the other person (not sure if you can have a group of people in one room). Just like buddystumbler and Tworl you are not limited to chat to people in your contacts list, you can chat to anyone (feels a bit like meeting a stranger in a room).
This seems like a feature you would have in second life, I can see it handy for business conference calls).
Also see other virtual words where you can chat citypixel, there, Hive7, moove, cyworld, faketown, Habbo Hotel, Gaia Online, and Wallop.
NOTE: When you finalise downloading IMVU make sure it doesn’t send an email to everyone on your email contacts list.
Swivel - charts and graphs social network
![email.png](http://services.nexodyne.com/email/icon/GxbiQvgbwBgCnw%3D%3D/oIp%2BJMQ%3D/R01haWw%3D/0/image.png"){kind=icon}
I like Redbubble, but I think www.myartspace.com looks more promising. Myartspace is testing print service right now and they will soon have shops that both their free members and Premium members can use. Their also going to have forums, blogs, and group features. It looks like it is building up to be a great site and the fact that they have video capability is a plus for me. Here are some samples of the profiles on myartspace below. Anything is better than www.artwanted.com! And www.deviantart.com has a very negative vibe if you look up how one of the founders was let go for no reason AND there volunteer staff tend to delete any forum topic that includes links to other art sites. In that sense they are a very large, but closed community. Deviantart also does not allow people to delete their accounts fully so their membership numbers may very well be higher than what is actually active, but what can you expect from a site that is so focused on ad profits. I also think deviantarts traffic is overstated since most of it is from young teens who most likely will not buy prints. Other sites are smaller, but I think they probably have quality traffic compared to deviantart. I also like the interviews that myartspace does at www.myartspace.com/blog and www.myartspace.com/interviews. As for Redbubble, I do like their forums and sense of community. I’m also looking into www.nobullart.com. But for now www.myartspace.com looks to be the most promising site I’ve seen in some time. Samples of myartspace accounts below.
http://www.myartspace.com/wayneriggs/
http://www.myartspace.com/CHARLIEARTS/
http://www.myartspace.com/sarahmaple/
http://www.myartspace.com/balhatain/
http://www.myartspace.com/scottwolfson/
Comment by Woolff — April 6, 2008 @ 5:24 pm