WidgetLaboratory

Focusing on output can become quite an obsession when one is in the creative arts or marketing field. How many blog entries did you write this week? How many widgets did you sell? How many new customers did you add to your roster? When one is entirely focused on the output of your creative work, it is easy forget the need to spend time on input.

Think of it like a rechargeable battery. If one is constantly drawing amps from that battery, with no charge time, then one may  (quite literally) drain the battery past the point where it can be recharged. Not good.

WidgetLaboratory has been spending the last few days working on input rather than our output. Why? Two reasons:

ScribeFire is a great blog editor to have running in your FireFox browser.

Provides you with the extra "zing" you need to be a power-blogger on your SocialGO or Zocku networks.

Miro has a simple, gorgeous interface designed for fullscreen HD video. Since Miro downloads most videos, you can take your site shows with you, even on an airplane. Quite simply, Miro is a better way to watch all the video you care about.

Since your members can automatically download your site videos one time and then watch them locally, you save a bundle on your site bandwidth charges. MiroFeed can pay for itself in a very short time!

Simply install MiroFeed into your site and your members will then be able to instantly subscribe using the free Miro desktop player from http://getmiro.com/

Miro will only show videos that have actually been uploaded to your site, it will not create a feed for videos that are embedded, which will help to ensure that only original content displays in the feed.

Available now in the WidgetStore for a $49.99 one time purchase price (special price of $39.99 available to all MyLaboratory Club members, so join now for free and save!.

If you want to hide individual LabTabs but retain the page content (so you can link to it discretely), this is really easy with CSS.

Just use the following code in your Ads & Custom HTML area within the Admin Center. Put the code into the Head Meta Data area.

Change out the "_forum" below for whatever element ID you have assigned to each tab, and repeat this same block of CSS for every tab you want to hide (only use one set of style tags though).

<style>
#labtab_forum{
display:none!important
}
</style>

A neat little extension for those of you who update your Twitter account often, and use Firefox. It's called TwitterBar.

It allows you to add your tweets directly from Firefox, and also add the URL of the page you are browsing on by typing "--post" at the end of your tweet.

Here's a legacy video showing our LabCards widget in action.

The product is now being updated and prepared for use on your SocialGO and Zocku sites. When it is ready for delivery into the WidgetStore we will have an updated video and more details, but for now... enjoy the preview!

Have you ever been writing a blog or forum post and find yourself searching for a "special" character such as a bullet or copyright symbol? Are you unfamiliar with how to find such symbols in your system's character map? Here's a quick and easy way to get these using just your browser.

Bookmark CopyPasteCharacter.com

Next time you need a special symbol, just pop over there and click on what you need, and it will be copied to your system clipboard. You can then go back to your blog or forum post and paste it in. Voila!

Seth Godin has another great post this morning that graphically demonstrates the dynamics of growing a popular Social Network with this video from the Sasquatch Music Festival.

Watch closely up to the 1:00 mark. First there is an early adopter, then a second guy who joins in. But ultimately, it is the third person who opens the floodgate. After that, all hell breaks loose.

It is this 3rd brave soul that is ultimately seen by the rest of the crowd as representing the "safe spot" where group-think takes over and they can jump on in as well.

What is the lesson here?

IF you want to create and grow a popular niche Social Network, then you have to be brave enough to be Guy #3... the one who is neither too far out ahead of the crowd, or just another early adopter. Instead, you have to establish your niche as having one foot ahead of the crowd, and one foot in with the crowd.

BE the Tipping Point.

If you are, then you will open up the floodgates of membership to your site.