Chrome to Phone is an application that utilises this service to allow you to instantly send links from your Chrome web browser on your desktop or laptop computer to your phone. There are two parts to using it; a Chrome browser extension (available here) and a mobile application available for the Android Market.

It places a button in the browser window and whenever you want to send a link to your phone, just click the button and it is sent. Instantly, in my experience. It’s a very handy feature to have. If you have to go out you can send a link to the website you were reading which is handy to say the least.

Not only is the extension itself exciting but the technology behind it should also give you goosebumps. I’d like to see it implemented into the Facebook application, which compared to its iPhone cousin is rather lackluster.

The key findings of the research revealed that 14 to 24 year olds amass a collection of around 8,000 tracks on average. If these were all gained illegally, that’s about six to eight thousand of our Great British pounds the music industry has lost, just from one person. My music collection barely tops two thousand tracks so for me this is quite a surprising statistic. On the other hand, the accessibility of illegal music on the internet – forums, torrents etc. – means that huge numbers of tracks can be downloaded over a small period of time.

A multi-million dollar industry

Another result of the study revealed that, although the percentage of people who admitted to illegally downloading music has reduced by 3% on last year, 61% still admitted to it this year. This is not as high as I would have expected but I think you still have to account for those who did not admit to it when answering this question. The real value may be a little or a lot higher than this.

Illegally downloading music, among other media, is a huge issue at the moment and it seems it will continue to be unless the music industry and their customers listen to each other and compromise. People want free music and they want it on demand. This will never change. Some service providers, and even governments, have taken drastic action to stop illegal file sharing but people have found, and always will find, ways to get around the blockades imposed. Have a read of the report and see what you think and whether you agree with the findings.

The first iteration of the iPod competitor was frankly awful. It lacked features that cheap Chinese MP3 player rip-offs excelled in, it looked ugly even compared to the slightly uglier iPods that were available back then and the interface had nothing on its competitors. It had promise though. Saying that, even the second generation of Zune didn’t quite hit the nail on the head. The thing I most remember it for is the Zune Pad – or the squircle – that was used as the main means of navigation through the product’s interface. Microsoft seems to have gone back to the drawing board, looked at what people love about other products in the personal multimedia player market and, probably just as important, what people don’t like about them. The result is the not yet released Zune HD and from preliminary reviews it is one damn sexy beast.

The main features of the Zune HD are its beautiful 3.3″ OLED touch screen display, unusual HD radio tuner, Wi-Fi connectivity and an internet browser that’s said to be good, even though the team behind Internet Explorer produced it. Another thing about it is that this will be the first Zune released outside of North America so it’ll be that bit easier to get your hands on it.

Firstly, along with the integrated HD radio and high-definition video playback (through an optional dock), the 3.3 inch OLED screen is something the Zune HD has that its main competitor, Apple’s iPod, currently does not. Early reviews, and especially leaked promotional photos, suggest the screen is beautiful. Secondly, unlike most players in the market, a HD radio is integrated into Microsoft’s latest entry. HD radio is very similar to DAB digital radio here in the UK and Europe. Hopefully when it is released here, the Zune HD will be modified in whatever way to allow us to receive DAB stations – a selling point very few MP3 players boast at the moment. The third important feature is that of a web browser. These days, any serious mobile entertainment device has to have the ability to surf the internet. Pre-release reviews of the web browser included with the Zune HD have yielded significant praise – especially considering the browser was born from the same team behind Internet Explorer. It apparently behaves almost exactly like the browser included with Apple’s iPod and iPhone. This can only be a good thing but with the good obviously comes the bad and at the time of review the browser on the Zune apparently did not include support for Adobe Flash. Hopefully an update somewhere along the line will bring this near essential functionality.

The Zune HD is shaping up to be a nice piece of technology and a huge improvement over previous generations. It’s not confirmed but suspected to be launched around early September this year although in which markets are anyone’s guess. Nor has pricing been confirmed but hopefully it will be priced competitively against other products. I’m going to go out on a limb and say around £190. This is one Microsoft product I can’t wait for. I won’t be one of those buying it as soon as the shop doors open, but I think I’ll be getting my hands on one if everything that’s been said is true.

Round-up of the Zune HD’s features:

• 3.3″ OLED multi-touch touchscreen
• pocket friendly size
• nvidia Tegra graphics chip – challenging the iPod touch/iPhone’s gaming dominance?
• HD radio tuner
• Wi-Fi connectivity
• web browser
• equaliser
• 720p HD output (with optional dock)

Evolutionary algorithms have been used before to design aeroplane wings and also art but I think this is the first time they’ve been used to design the perfect web page design. Unlike these two uses though, it requires human interaction which is both a positive and a negative.

“The mutations will always occur and while they are responsive to human attention, they are not bound by them. It is possible to develop unique mutations that may actually influence human goals (rather than the other way around).”

It would be interesting to see this technique used on sites with different functions: social networking sites, news sites etc.

Cow’s Blog | New Scientist

Wubi is an unofficial Ubuntu installer currently in beta that takes the risk out of installing Ubuntu alongside an existing Windows partition. It runs Ubuntu from within Windows from a disk image. Its aim is to get the Windows user aquainted with Linux and Ubuntu. Anything that prevents me from wiping my hard drive or braking partitions gets a thumbs up from me. But, does it do what it says on the box?

Installation

On running the Wubi executable, you’re presented with one screen where you choose which drive to install your choice of Ubuntu or one of it’s forks. One click and it does it magic. It downloads the required disk image and then works even more magic. Afterwards you’re required to restart. If the post finishes here, it means I broke it.

Using Ubuntu

Unfortunately, on reboot and selecting Ubuntu from the menu resulted in several freezes when trying to active the swap partition so I didn’t actually manage to get into Ubuntu. I was surprised however that the experience provides the experience of Ubuntu but without the risk of installing it as an inexperienced user. As it is in beta I am not surprised that my experience failed however I have high hopes for the software and its part in the spreading of Ubuntu, and Linux in general, into homes around the world.

Conclusion

Wubi allows the quick and risk-free installation and uninstallation of Ubuntu and its many forks which makes it an ideal piece of software for those not experienced with partitioning and the like.

The ease of installation and uninstallation surprised me and even though I didn’t get to actually use the installed OS, it would appear that if the experience is just the same as installing Ubuntu manually, it could be an invaluable tool to convert people to the world of free software. Go and give Wubi a test drive today: download.

Microsoft recently released a group of their newest applications under the Windows Live brand name, aimed at the general computer user and recreational blogger. This suite includes Microsoft’s successor to Outlook Express, a new version of the popular Windows Live Messenger (MSN Messenger if you’re not keeping up with the trends), Windows Live OneCare Family Safety and a host of other tools Microsoft seems to think we need/want. I have had some experience with some of the products before, most in beta form, and just wanted to share my voice.

Mail

During my extremely short use of Vista, I used the Windows Live Desktop mail application that was included with it at the time. My experience was less than pleasing and an installation of Thunderbird promptly followed. The new application gives the user the Vista inspired interface (if you’re on XP) and a much needed clean and polish of the user interface that Outlook so desperately needed. I don’t think this application is meant to replace Outlook Express as Windows Live Mail doesn’t provide all the features that some individuals and businesses would require.

Messenger

The next upgrade to the popular Windows Live/MSN Messenger, version 8.5 or version 2008 depending on where you look, is part of the Windows Live family and an option in the pack. This new version seems to improve the speed of the application as I’ve had no conversation freezes or lockups since upgrading to the newest version. Also provided in version 8.5 is an improvement a change to the interface to bring it into line with the rest of the Windows Live theme. It is a nice improvement, I have to admit but only a minor one. Maybe the design team should take some notes from the Yahoo! Messenger team.

Writer

Microsoft’s attempt to make blogging easier has definitely improved since its initial public release – and I’m not just talking about the snazzy splash screen in the newest version. In earlier versions, Windows Live Writer didn’t exactly agree with WordPress in a number of areas. Whether this was because of WordPress or Writer, who knows, but I’ll bet it was Writer who was at fault.

Final Thoughts

There are other products in the Windows Live suite of application but I wont go into them right now; you can check them out for yourselves if you’re curious enough. This re-brand is just Microsoft’s attempt to push their products into the faces of ordinary PC users and given them software that in some cases just isn’t needed by the most inexperienced users.

There are some applications that are essential to most Windows users though. The update to Messenger is recommended for users who want a more stable chat program and for home users who don’t know better, Windows Live Mail is a nice replacement for Outlook Express though I continue to suggest you come out of the stone age and use Mozilla Thunderbird!

Go and download the applications – but watch out for the pre-ticked boxes that install the Live toolbar and set your homepage to something evil – and give is your comments on them! That’s an order.

First Impressions

My first impressions are that this is indeed true beta software. My experience is that it is rather slow and feels rather heavy as an application. As with all Apple software, the user interface is indeed nice. It’s not clogged with buttons and only the bare essentials are shown but it still allows for nearly as much customisation as Firefox, although it’s not quite on par at this stage. The traditional brushed metal theme has only been on my screen for a few minutes and it’s already growing on me. Although it’s default font choice as Times New Roman isn’t to my taste, it doesn’t take anything away from the browser.One thing I will say is the option to resize most text areas is a nice feature.

Get it Now

Go and get the beta from the Apple site, try it out and return here. Mac or PC users can download the beta and I advise that you do. Give it a go and come here and leave a comment! Below are a few screen shots to tickle your fancy.

Before you read on, to view the things I’ve made, go to the download page and download the cross-browser plugin.

Silverlight Basics

I’m not going to turn this into a tutorial on how to setup everything – it can all be found in the official SDK, also available on the download page – but I will show the XAML and relevant JavaScript files that accompany each of the things I am to show.

The SDK’s quickstart guide was a really simple and easy explanation of the process of creating very simple shapes at first. I was a little confused at first because the XAML files I create utilise the canvas tag and initially I got it mixed up with the HTML tag of the same name. Firstly you create the canvas you’re going to ‘draw’ in. [Nearly] everything else goes inside this. The layers on the canvas, or z-index, are defined by the order the objects are created – those created later on in the script are on the top layers.

My first foray into it was a simple monochrome target which just created several ellipses in each other with the smallest one having a border instead of a fill. Here’s the .xaml file:

You can view the example’s finished product if you have the plugin installed.

Using Images

Next I did a bit of playing around with images. There are several ways you can use images on your canvas which include using them as a filling for an object or importing them on their own. In this example, I’ve created a rectangle and used an image of a pound coin and then overlayed it with 4 rectangles of differing colours with an opacity set. Along side it, I’ve added a gradient overlay to the image.

You can view the example’s finished product if you have the plugin installed.

Adding Multimedia

Adding media like music and video is incredibly easy for beginners to grasp. A single deceleration is used for both music as well as video which is rather handy. Controlling the media object is also incredibly easy and my quick look over the documentation for the MediaElement object showed a lot of options are available for controlling it. Firstly I tried just simply embedding a sound:

Next, I added the parameter to stop it automatically playing when loaded and added the controls for stop, pause and play the file. These controls also work with video media, as shown in the quick start guide provided in the SDK. The code involved this XAML code and the following JavaScript.

  
    
      
        
          
          
        
      
    
    stop
  

  
  
    
      
        
          
          
        
      
    
    pause
  

  
  
    
      
        
          
          
        
      
    
    play
  

And this JavaScript, inserted either in the head of the page or an external JavaScript file:

You can view the example’s finished product if you have the plugin installed. Click the play, pause and stop buttons to test it out.

Lighting up the web?

Obviously I have to take into account the infancy in terms of development of Silverlight but it’s wide array of features is quite appealing. It took me a quarter of the time to stream a video in Silverlight than it did to do it manually in Flash via ActionScript. At the moment, Silverlight isn’t anywhere near Flash in terms of functionality but even at this early stage it does have some advantages over Flash in terms of the time saving it allows.

I’ve quite enjoyed doing some stuff in it and I’m sure that the abilities of Silverlight go far beyond drawing circles and streaming media. One nice example of the capabilities is this page turning program and this interactive WYSIWYG editor. For me it still feels like it’s a glorified version of the HTML canvas element with some JavaScript added. It doesn’t feel smooth like Flash and currently feels slightly buggy and laggy but I hope this will change in future revisions.

I’ve enjoyed using HTML, XAML and JavaScript and I think that it will eventually catch on – if it doesn’t then Microsoft will probably force it on us in some way. At the moment the plugin is available for both Windows and OSX but I hope Microsoft don’t make the mistake Adobe made by not keeping the Linux community up to date. Try it out.

Although the functionality of the service is some what limited at the moment, the dream is there with custom playlists, the ability to upload your own songs and even more in the pipeline. If the ability to add songs or albums to playlists is there, I can’t find it and it may be due to the rather unintuitive user interface on some points.

The song database is actually quite varied. From ‘Beautiful World’ by Colin Hay to Counting Crow’s cover of ‘Big Yellow Taxi’. There’s some recent artists such as Mika and Fall Out Boy as well as some golden oldies like Elvis and Lulu.

The site’s legal stance basically allows them to escape any blame if organisations such as the RIAA, BPI or IFPI came a knocking on their door. All the blame is placed on the user – you and me. I’m not going to go into the legality of the service – you can make your own mind up whether or not you want to use it. But, it’s a nice ‘jukebox’ service and helped me dig up some songs I’d long forgotten but wanted to hear again.

Internet Adoption

As I said in a previous article, adoption of broadband internet access here in the UK has been increasing rapidly over the last couple years. BT has over 10 million broadband subscribers alone. Soon, broadband adoption here in the UK will surpass that in the US – we’ve gone online crazy. Why have we welcomed broadband access with open arms?

Broadband internet access has become a lot cheaper and a lot faster. Consumers are now being treated to speeds as fast as 24mbps in the home starting from just £14 a month. Speeds like this and costs like this mean more people can afford to get them and so more people now have access to online shops. Prices have come down because 2006 was a year of competition between companies. The year brought news of mergers such as that between NTL and Telewest and also news of new players in the market such as Sky and the Carphone Warehouse. All this activity and competition has lead to reduced prices and more choice for consumers.

Consumer Trust

Last year was also a year where security was a major issue. 2006 was a turning point where banks no longer accepted signatures when processing card transactions and ‘Chip & Pin’ became the standard verification method. This, I believe, also lead to an increase in the security that online shops provided when buying goods. Anyone who’s ever shopped online before knows that the padlock icon is something we trust and look out for. We’re becoming more liberal with our card details online. Another factor has been the increased usage of online banking – I use it myself – and the usage of sites such as PayPal to manage money.

Online Advantages

Besides the increased ability to access the online shops now, there are some major advantages to shopping online. Firstly there’s the fact that normally, goods cost less online. Secondly, you’re restricted to what shops you have near you if you shop in person. Online you have the pick of all the shops you could want which means you can get the best deal and not just settle for what you’ve got.

Usually, goods to cost less online. For example if you went into a PC World store (hypothetically) you’d pad a lot more for some products than if you shopped on their website. This is because they offer ‘web-only’ exclusive prices. Another example is video games. Take the collector’s edition of Lost Planet for the Xbox 360. Down your local shops it would probably cost you between £45 and £50 but online the price could be as low as £37.50 if you search in the right place. Also, loads of places now such as Play will deliver your item for free.

All these incentives add together to provide a cheap method of getting the item you want and quickly.

Final Thoughts

I’d say I do 3/4 of my shopping online. If I need something for school, food, clothes or if I want a DVD then I generally go down my local shopping centre or to one in a nearby city because the price difference isn’t worth worrying about. But items such as electronics, books and music require me to get them online. Online, these goods can be found much cheaper and my personal experience has been that returning goods to online retailers has been much more pleasant than returning them to high street stores.

£7.7bn over two and a bit months. I can’t even imagine that sort of money. The problem is that as we continue to spend more and more money over the ‘tubes’ we’re going to become less cautious and fraud is going to increase a lot. As long as we keep a mix of spending online and down the high street I think we’ll be okay.

About ChaCha

ChaCha was launched late last year and has grown to a company with thousands of guides. The basic principle of it is that you search for whatever and you’re connected to a guide who is experienced in searching on that particular topic. He or she provides a number of links for you which they deem most likely to be what you want. When you’ve got the information you wanted, you then have to rate the guide – either good, okay or bad. Hence why they’ll always be nice to you. This service is free.

The ChaCha Experience

I’ve been playing with ChaCha for a few hours now and I am a little impressed with the service. When I first used it I thought that it would be much easier just to search for the things myself. Although this was true in some respects, in others it wasn’t. The times when the service was most useful was when I was searching for a particular type of document or a website for a company or organisation that isn’t well known. I tried searching for the same things with Google and it took me quite a bit longer to find the same documents they had provided me. Other requests such as the website for Dell and Microsoft was a waste of time.

All the guides that I used were very friendly and actually used proper English unlike other live chat applications I’ve used (ahem Dell, Linksys). Another plus about this service is that is leaves you to do other things while the guide is fetching your results. This could be particularly useful in the workplace and I found it useful searching for sample business plans during ICT class.

Final Thoughts

As it’s a free service, it must get most, if not all, of it’s earnings from advertising displayed next to the search results. This, I would imagine, would not provide a lot of money for them so I think that there will have to be a limit to the number of guides they hire. At $5 to $10 an hour, they get payed a reasonable amount for what they do but the limiting of the number of guides leads to another problem. If ChaCha gets extremely popular then there won’t be enough guides to satisfy the number of requests; and as being a guide is supposed to be a part time appointment, the number available will be even lower. This will not please the users.

As I said earlier, ChaCha is both a normal search engine and a search engine made personal. I don’t think Google or Yahoo have anything to worry about any time soon but I do feel that ChaCha is a very useful outlet to find specialised items of interest and is a lot quicker than searching for them yourself. Try it out for yourself. You’ll obviously get a varied response because there are many guides waiting to help you but give it a go and leave a comment.

Using the Software

Once you’ve downloaded and installed the software, it’s a simple matter of logging into your account – whether or not accounts will be needed when it becomes publically available remains to be verified. The user interface is very nice and does not get in the way of the video you’re watching. The current beta is definitely not a ‘proof-of-concept’ such as the early releases of Songbird were. Although it uses much of the same technology, it’s quite a smooth program to use and the user interface has been designed with simplicity in mind. The icons for the controls are easily recognisable and you pick up how to use it pretty quickly.

At the moment, there is only a Windows XP version of the software but the creators are saying that there will be versions available for Intel Macs and Linux in the future.

TVP Content

At the moment, the content available isn’t that substantial but what is available is a nice look at the potential of the concept. I was pleasantly surprised to find clips from the highly popular British motoring show Fifth Gear on there but most of the other content is American and honestly not pleasing to watch.

The quality of the video was rather surprising. It’s not quite DVD quality but it’s better than most PVRs on the market. The idea behind The Venice Project is to allow you to watch what you want and when you want it so there’s no need, or reason, to save the content locally. This idea is important because it means that content providers such as the BBC, ITV, Fox and ABC etc. don’t need to worry as much as they would. Saying that, The Venice Project is meant to deliver programmes from big content providers such as BBC and Fox because they’re high quality (both in content and in resolution) and they’re recognised names in TV and film.

Other Features

Although not fully functional there are additional features in the software that have real promise to make the TV watching experience more interactive and more integrated into our daily lives. Because it’s based on the same technology as Songbird and Firefox, there is the future possibility of extensions such as news tickers which could allow extra connectivity and a world of new options.

Current features in the program include channel chat, clocks and although it currently doesn’t function, The Venice Project also appears to want to integrate instant messaging via the Jabber system. That means that you can chat to your friends or complete strangers while watching TV. The extensibility of the software is promising.

Final Thoughts

The Venice Project is both an exciting idea and even more exciting to actually use. It’s got a lot of features to brag about and the software engineers and all the team behind it certainly have something to be proud of. It will certainly make an impact on the way on-demand content is watched on the computer but the mystery is how it will impact; especially with the imminent release of Apple TV.

Certainly here in the UK, I can say that the concept is something I welcome dearly. The closest things we have to a product like this is Sky+ or Freeview coupled with a DVR. The problem is neither of those are free. I’d love to see The Venice Project take off but the problem herein lies with the content providers. Recently, Channel 4 launched an on-demand service for the computer where you rent shows to watch. ITV have their own on-demand service and I was told today that the BBC are going to launch their own service in the very near future. I can only say that what differs TVP from other on-demand services is the fact it’s on your PC, it’s peer-to-peer technology and its free. The fact that it’s free for consumers would most likely put off content providers from showing anything.

Another worry is that people who have caps on their download and/or upload bandwidth will face problems. According to the site “In one hour of viewing, approximately 320Mb data will be downloaded and 105Mb uploaded, which means that it will exhaust a 1Gb cap in 10 hours.” I don’t have caps so it wouldn’t worry me but even people who don’t are subject to ‘fair use policies’ which mean that excessive viewing through the software will most likely make your ISP a little unhappy.

So, is The Venice Project going to be plain sailing or is it going to get lost? We’ll have to wait and see…

It was then, in 2000, that I was introduced to the wonderful world of dial-up internet by a friend. Her dad hooked me up with a lovely and loud 56k modem and helped my parents sign me up to NTL’s offer of free 56k internet access (the one that eventually led to their bankruptcy). When I first heard that sound of the modem dialling up I was so excited. Obviously, I could only access it during certain times of the day because it used the main phone line which the telephone also required. I was happy anyway – I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t connected earlier!

In 2004, my parents gave me the opportunity to purchase a new computer to help me with my continuing studies and also because I wanted to take advantage of the broadband revolution but my Packard Bell PC did not have enough juice for NTL’s liking. Back then I wasn’t tech-savvy enough to know that Dell do suck but I was knowledgeable enough to realise that internet connectivity was going to play a major role in my purchase. The broadband revolution changed the way I looked for a computer.

Yin and Yang

The internet and the world wide web play an enormous part in our lives today whether it’s at home, at work or at school. Work and school tasks would be a lot harder to complete if we didn’t have internet access. Computers and internet access now go together hand in hand – one without the other wouldn’t mean anything. There are more internet service providers than you can shake a stick at and some are now taking advantage of the complimentary nature of the computer and the service they offer: internet access. ISPs such as RedTen Internet are now enticing customers with the offer of a free computer with their broadband packages. Now the offer looks genuine but the catch is you have to stay with them for a few years before you can keep the computer.

This move, and I think many more ISPs will also offer this incentive in the near future, shows us just how interconnected a computer and the internet now is. Ten years ago there was very little you could do if you were connected to the internet unless you were part of specific social circles. Now, as Bill Gates puts it, we’re moving more into the digital decade and we’re ever increasingly reliant on internet access to give us our information, to connect and interact with our friends and colleagues and to provide content for other users. Without access to the internet our computers would only be as half as useful. Although we can still edit graphics, edit video, listen to music or even play games, when used correctly the internet and the world wide web can provide some invaluable resources which could not be crammed onto our current home computer hard drives.

Conclusion

This whole post has most likely just been a long winded way to tell you how I think our computer purchases have been influenced by the internet, and access to it. When I bought my first computer seven or eight years ago, I had to intention of connecting to the net but now, when we buy a computer our first thoughts will contain a plan to get internet access.

Sorry it was so long winded (I forgot the direction of the post half way through).

Mice Behaviour

There is a lot of statistic services out there that track your visitors, where they come from, where they enter from and how long they stay on your site – some even go as far as to provide a heat map of ‘hot spots’ on your site that are clicked more. But what ClickTale does is unique in that it tracks the mouse movements of the visitor around your site, whether they right or left click and also what text they enter into fields such as searches. It records these movements and allows you to see what the visitor is checking out when and where – where do they go as soon as the page loads?

This is useful to site owners because in order to optimise your site or service you first need to understand the habits of your users. ClickTale bridges the gap between eye tracking and statistics for websites. I’ve found that when I’m browsing a website, especially a text heavy site, I follow my mouse with my eyes as a reading aid. Watching how a user navigates around the site, how a user responds to links or images can be vital information for any site owner not only in designing the user interface but other style decisions.

Data Analysis

Having all the data being made into the movies of the users’ movements and actions is very nice but what ClickTale also does is provide a statistical analysis of the data it collects. Much like Google Analytics (although at time of writing much less advanced) it provides data grouped by country, language, browser, operating system, screen sizes and window sizes. Although the statistical analysis is not as comprehensive as Google Analytics or say AWStats, I think that the main feature of seeing what your visitors do could potentially be more useful and important. At the moment the analysis is limited to what I’ve mentioned above but I feel that a lot more could be done with the data.

The data could be transformed into a ‘heat map’ of mouse movement and actions – which parts of the page does the mouse move over most, which links are most clicked and which parts of the page are seen the most. Services such as Crazy Egg already offer a service that creates ‘heat maps’ based on where users are clicking. This is useful as it shows which links are used the most but tracking mouse movement could potentially be more useful. Mouse movement usually signals interest on the visitor’s side. In my own experience, if I’m weary of a link I hover over it first and see what it points to. If I’m not, I go straight to it. The behaviour of the user’s cursor can say a lot about how visitors perceive your site and provide suggestions on how you can make the user feel safer browsing your site.

Privacy Issues

Obviously, with the fact that visitors’ mouse movements, text input and mouse actions are all recorded, the issue of privacy arises. ClickTale battles some of the arguments about privacy by not recording password inputs, not recording any activity outside the web page, not tracking visitors between websites, not tracking any personal files, internet history or interacting with any local files or software. Also, only authorised people (people with the username and password) can actually view the recorded data.

Although the creators have good intentions for their product, it could be used in the wrong manner. Passwords could be captured via a normal text field, some crafty JavaScript and ClickTale. If the users are properly screened though, this could be avoided.

Final Thoughts

I love the idea of ClickTale and since trying it out on my own blog, it’s been interesting to watch the visitors’ movements, where they click, and how much of my posts they really do read! Although it’s been in closed development and testing since the early part of this year, it seems the wait will be worth it. In my case as a small blog owner, it has been interesting to see how the users interact with my bookmarks, seeing whether or not that use the lower part of the sidebar and also seeing whether or not they find searching intuitive.

Also, the fact that adding the service to your site is done by just two pieces of JavaScript means that site operators will find it incredibly easy to use. Once the user interface has been polished, I think that it would be a vital service for any serious website owner.

Oh, and a special thanks to Arik for giving me permission to write this review and including shots of the current user interface.