thomas marban | notes

quick update: hide twitter

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 13:48:56 GMT

if you prefer the prior version of the popular today section you can now disable the twitter news block via the customize menu.

mobile updates

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 09:36:48 GMT

here’s a quick update on recent changes to popurls mobile editions:

iphone & android now include a native search feature for all real-time buzz (a mobile version of search.popurls.com)
popular twitter stories have been added to the regular mobile & blackberry edition

on a side note, the regular mobile site currently uses a gateway to reformat web sites for phone browsers. given the increasing capabilities of those devices i will soon change all links to go directly to the target sites - let me know if you’re a heavy user and think that you might run into problems with that.
thanks

twitter back on popurls

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 22:19:39 GMT

the twitter section on the top right of popurls which features the most talked about stories in near real-time is now back after a short break to put a better spam filter in place. in addition you can now expand this news block to get a couple of more popular stories from all around the web.

minor content update

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 18:51:42 GMT

welcoming good magazine and the pbs newshour as well as ecosalon and travelpod on popurls.

contents updates 09/05 #2

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Tue, 19 May 2009 05:16:17 GMT

quick update: welcoming the new nyt lens, laughingsquid, vi.sualize.us and failblog to popurls.

popurls 101 - part I

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 04 May 2009 16:25:12 GMT

although popurls looks deliberately simple at first glance, there are quite a few handy features that i’d like to point out once in a while with a series of 101 posts.

i receive a lot of emails from users who read an interesting story the other day but forgot to bookmark the url. popurls archive to the rescue - a daily snapshot to catch up on the news in the unlikely event that you missed a day of popurls or just lost the link to that flickr photo.
popurls search is not only the fastest buzz index next to twitter but it also offers you a neat way to track certain keywords in near real-time by subscribing to the feed url that you’ll get for each query on the results page.
the quickies section on the bottom of the page is still one of the most frequented parts of popurls, but unlike its name there’s also a widely unknown feature to view additional stories from a site by simply clicking its name which opens the respective headline box.

thanks for taking the time!

content updates 09/05

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 04 May 2009 16:01:03 GMT

here are a few fresh & excellent sources in popurls land, now all to be found in the quickies section:

twitter section inactive

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Sun, 03 May 2009 06:48:44 GMT

over the last few days the amount of link spam on twitter has gotten out of control and there’s still no adequate quality control on the part of twitter so i’ve deactivated the section at this point until they come up with a solution.

new: login with your twitter account

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 06:51:36 GMT

in addition to many other authentication services you can now login with your twitter account to store your custom popurls settings. it’s a simple two-click process via the popurls login hub and does not require you to put in your credentials.

quick content update

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 10:03:39 GMT

new sites added: fora.tv, charlie rose, ednews, ground report & instructables.

rewirepopped is the new slashdotted

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 16:51:37 GMT

so they say ;)

iphone/android update

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 23:12:05 GMT

the iphone & android version at i.popurls.mobi does now include an alternative link to the digg and reddit comment page as well as a new twitter section that features the most talked about stories of the last five hours.

new: suggest a story via twitter

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 14:45:35 GMT

here is a new experimental feature: there’s now a chance to influence the popular today ranking on the top of the page by sending your tip to popurls via twitter with a simple "@popurls here goes the title http://example.com".

quickies now fully customizable

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 15:20:34 GMT

by popular demand: you can now sort, hide/show topics in the quickies section as well as put the whole block on the top of the page.

three years of pop

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 21:32:32 GMT

it’s been three years since i pushed the first version of popurls and it’s come a long way since then. not only did it become one of the most popular news destinations, it also turned into a full-time job and made a lot of new acquaintances around the globe.
to celebrate three years of pop the site has undergone a small facelift (+ new feature) and i’m giving away a brand new sony playstation 3 in classic popurls black. all it takes to enter the contest is sending a quick birthday greeting to @popurls on twitter before march 8th (option is for the US or EU version of the PS3; make sure your twitter user is linked to any way of contact).
thanks and keep on popurlizing!

free comes at a price

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 18:55:00 GMT

as you might know, readbag was one of the first services to run on googles app engine cloud infrastructure. starting march, google will charge for highly-trafficed and high-availableapplications such as readbag.

in order to compensate for those costs and keep the application100% ad-free, readbag will now bepriced at $10 per year & user, charged securely via paypal.

apart from operational costs, readbagas simple as it isenhances your reading productivity and keeps yourregularbookmark collection clean which, i believe, is worth a small fee.

thanks
thomas

popular today | revamped

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 19:22:28 GMT

the popular today section got a little update with a dedicated twitter column on the right. usually, the top stories were derived over a period of around one and a half days to discover long-term trends. in contrast, this new twitter section is a near real-time view of the most talked about stories, thus making the top news block a neat blend of worldshaking linkage. in addition, there’s a little icon on the right of each link that does a straight twitter search for an in-depth view on the story.
thanks!

shout-out 09/02

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 14:43:18 GMT

i certainly appreciate it whenever the big boys give popurls the plug but what delights me even more in times of 140 character reviews is when guys like rockwell schrock take the time to examine an idea from start to finish. sincere thanks!

iphone version update

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 22:41:38 GMT

the iphone & android version now features a full mobile equivalent of the quickies section as well as a custom setting to define either a compact or full-length view of headlines that automatically adapts to portrait or landscape mode. iphones and g1 phones are forwarded to the appropriate version if you open popurls.com on your mobile browser.
thanks!

content updates 09/02

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 12:20:36 GMT

today’s popurls content news:

tipd (emerging financial community)
unplggd (better living)
failblog (zeitgeist by popular demand)
fandome (giving them a chance after their highly popular jumbotron video)
rex sorgatz (his excellency)
anderson cooper (AC360 staff blog)

feature updates

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 14:47:00 GMT

here are a couple of new features:

the title of an entry can now be renamed after adding it via the bookmarklet
new setting: disable confirmation for deleting links
new setting: disable sharing to increase loading speed
target url of an entry is now visible on hover
increased loading speed for rss feeds
dramaticallyimprovedreliability for offline & mobile viewing

popurls search now with twitter results

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 21:02:56 GMT

popurls search just got one step ahead in providing a convenient real-time search by integrating results from twitter next to all internal hits. the current index provides access to the 1,000 most popular websites within just a few minutes after publication making it an appropriate one-stop shop for breaking news.

windows live id support

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 11:19:59 GMT

popurls now supports windows live id accounts for signing in on the network. the process works just like using any other existing identity at http://popurls.net/user.
remember: signing up with popurls gives you sharing features, a custom widget & feed page, personal story recommendations and the possibility to access your customizations across all your computers.

popshuffle out in the wild

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 20:58:18 GMT

popshuffle.com is a new micro subsite in the popurls network with the single goal to be a great playground of inspiring amusement. it features only the most popular stories from a constant pool of more than 4 million stories that popurls has collected over the last years. also, whenever you come across an interesting story, hit the "popurlize" button and all other visitors will likely see it in the new live section on popurls.com. too distracting? you can disable it in the design menu at any time.
thanks and enjoy.

popurls now android-ready

thomas@marban.at (thomas marban) — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 21:45:05 GMT

users of G1 phones can now enjoy the special iphone & android version for their mobile news dose. simply point your browser to popurls.mobi and you’ll be automatically redirected to the appropriate site.
ps: if you’re looking for a G1 twitter client, give twidroid a shot.