Some 1+ year ago i heard that Finnish Jaiku was sold to Google. I got excited. I wanted to share this news immedeatly and discuss this with my close friends and colleagues. So first I thought about sending the news link via email, but rarely people click links they get via mail as its so polluted with mails, let alone having some sort of discussion with multiple people via mail is just nightmare.
So i thought tweeting it (the time Twitter was way less popular) but realized I don’t really want to send it just somebody who happens to follow me, i don’t actually no them and many are not my friends outside Twitter. So I finally ended up copy pasting the link to multiple people on Skype. Then I thought, isn’t there really a better tool for sending links and web content to selected friends like via e-mail, but just designed for this.
So we started to plan Spark – system for sending Web content to friends, links, videos, pics and so on and to have discussion around it. According to studies, 30% use e-mail for sending links (http://lifehacker.com/5318802/how-do-you-share-links-over-the-internet), 23% via IM and 20% via Facebook. Twitter is popular, but many this it’s too restricted for it (http://www.wordyard.com/2008/10/27/twitters-link-sharing-limits/).
So what is Gspark? Its like email but dedicated for sharing Web content with good tools for discussions. It has great features like you can see if the receiver has clicked the link you sent, which for me is important info.
spark pic
Some months back we wanted to tighten our focus and started to build tools for media companies to use Spark as a way to add micro-messaging by users to their Web site. We are really proud that Aamulehti (Finnish local newspaper from Tampere) saw the benefit and opportunity and started to work with us. So that today as part of Gspark early beta launch, also Aamulehti launches their new service based on Gspark called “Viidakkorumpu” (http://www.aamulehti.fi/viidakkorumpu/). It allows selected users to post Sparks to Aamulehti Web site to let readers know what is happening in the world right now, interesting stories, funny videos and pics.
Still there is lot to come is Spark and we have just started to scratch the surface. Join the sparking team and let us know what you think. Just add me as your friend send a spark (http://www.gspark.com/users/stobekum).
macoute said
Maybe you should make your links clickable. Will GSpark have clickable links or do I need to use copy-paste there as well?
erainteractive said
Zemalf said
As a blogger I couldn’t help noticing some mishaps on the blog. It might cause a few laughs down the road that this post is just an edit of the example “hello world” post (as seen on the URL).
It’s a good policy to delete all the WP defaults (links, posts, pages, etc.) when starting a blog — and the post should be categorized to something else than uncategorized. Oh, and do write an actual about page too.
GSpark itself looks like a great tool and the micro-messaging platform feels solid after trying it on beta.