Update (June 14, 2008): Victor says his project, vi.sualize.us, has been around longer than the sites I’ve mentioned here. So, again, this is another image bookmarking site worth checking out.
I smell a web trend. In the last few weeks I’ve discovered two new image bookmarking sites in addition to the insanely famous but still exclusive FFFFOUND!—We heart it and typeish.
To those who are asking “but why?”, normal bookmarking services aren’t visual in nature. Whether it’s social bookmarking like del.icio.us, or social voting like Digg, or serendipitous discovery like StumbleUpon, users decide if a website is worth visiting by looking at its name, description, tags, and popularity.
Granted, those sites are getting smarter by taking snapshots of what the sites look like, or by isolating thumbnails for if it’s an image or video being bookmarked. But it’s nice to have a dedicated tool that satiates your hunger for all things eye candy. The question is, are these image bookmarking sites effective?
Battle of the bookmarks
We heart it is like a blog in CSS gallery format, but for images. It’s got user registration, tagging, and a few other characteristics typical to a social network (which is just a fancy term for online community).
typeish is much more sparse. No permalinks, just direct links to the images themselves, which are organized only by categories.
FFFFOUND! is the most mature of the three, with keyboard shortcuts for uninterrupted browsing, related images, and an already extensive data and fan base.
Trendy or trashy?
Will this become another sleazy way of making money, like CSS galleries? Will it get little attention, like tlbox? Or will it turn into a really neat idea for a Web 2.0 product, like Twitter?
We can never run out of places to find inspiration, so I say, bring it on. Like the information design and patterns space, I will keep my eye on this category and keep on wishing for smart new features for it.
Originally posted on June 11, 2008 @ 5:09 am