Can Animoto make you the next Spielberg?
I've spent the better part of the day today checking out a new web video creation site, called Animoto. The concept behind Animoto is that you upload images to the site, either from your computer, or online photo sites, such as Flickr, Facebook, or Photobucket, pick a song to go along with it, and Animoto will automatically create a cool video for you. Unfortunately, right now Animoto doesn't include support for putting videos into your masterpiece. Yes, there are already services out there that make it easy to create picture slideshows, but Animoto takes it a step further.
Animoto uses a technology, developed in house, that analyzes the pictures and music that you upload and creates a movie, based on the genre, energy, build, and rhythm of the song. This ensures that the movie flows well with the music that it is set to and that no two movies that Animoto generates are the same. After Animoto analyzes, produces, and creates your video, you can tweak it by adding or deleting images, or changing up the soundtrack. You can also perform, what they call, a "One Click Remix." That feature tells Animoto to generate the movie again, giving it a new feel.
If you are questioning whether or not these people know what they are doing in video production, no need to worry. The company was founded by producers from Comedy Central, ABC, and MTV. Animoto is launching to the public on August 14th and I recommend that you give it a spin. Can Animoto make you the next Spielberg? Well, probably not, but Animoto is definitely a slick, fun, easy way to compile your photos into energetic videos.
Harrison Hoffman is a tech enthusiast and co-founder of LiveSide.net, a blog about Windows Live. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
Ecommerce free to start, free to use.
Free internet stores always have a catch. That is what makes the http://www.fastcommerce.com free shopping cart so exceptional. Think of it as a free utility that lets you get your online business started, like a free web-based email application. It is easy to set up, and it is easy to use. But make no mistake, this is genuinely free ecommerce that lets you create a free online store with a free shopping cart, and all the tools you need to run your business online. You can run your free web store with a complete package from online store, online product catalog, free shopping cart, order and account management, a shipping calculator for UPS and FedEx. It is free ecommerce, and you?re free to use it to grow your online business.
So open a store online. No need to wait. No need to sign up for a free trial. Sign up and get to work building your own free web store from Fastcommerce.com. It?s completely free for up to 250 products. Unlike OScommerce, our free webstore is a hosted solution: you simply set it up and it works automatically to present your free online store to the web. Our applications are a true Volusion alternative. But unlike Volusion, Monster Commerce or a Yahoo store, you don?t get charged monthly fees, or costly transaction fees. The Fast Commerce free website software is a completely free ecommerce store. You decide when you want to upgrade. Until that point our service is a free shopping cart service, and more.
When you open a store online with Fast Commerce you will find that it is easy to set up, and easy to use. So simply sign up and start building your online store. You can go live online immediately. Start selling right away.
About Fastcommerce
Fastcommerce.com provides business management software to small businesses, delivered on demand as a service via the web on a free or paid monthly subscription basis. We provide small businesses with a complete fully integrated package that run their entire operations, from inventory control, sales, marketing, support, online catalog, e-commerce, backend order processing and built-in UPS and Fedex shipping tools.
The only requirement to use our software is an internet connection. Unlike a traditional software company, our small business customers do not need to buy and maintain expensive software and hardware
http://www.fastcommerce.com
FastCommerce.com is WEB 2.0 Ecommerce Software
Web 2.0 is simply software delivered over the web, via an Internet connection. But the big deal in Web 2.0 ecommerce solutions is that web-based ecommerce software now rivals in-house solutions in features and functions, and also in speed. A web-based application is great if it only does one thing like email, less great if it runs the whole of your business, right? Guess again.
Among the number of trends driving innovation in ecommerce software is the development of WEB 2.0 technologies that not only deliver low-cost ecommerce applications, but deliver speed and performance as well. Speed for the online store customer as they roam an ecommerce site, and speed for all the ecommerce utilities that drive the business end of the ecommerce software.
The ultimate goal of WEB 2.0 ecommerce software is to replace in-house and legacy systems with ecommerce web applications that offer the same features and functions, but at lower costs. Web applications can also be updated on an ongoing basis so that the Web 2.0 ecommerce application incorporates the best possible ecommerce web applications available at any time.
Google, and now Microsoft, are now offering many applications as web 2.0 applications. The FastCommerce.com ecommerce solution delivers ecommerce applications on this same model. We've developed an ecommerce software that enables small to medium sized business to have access to a single-system that can run the whole of their online store and online business are one application, delivered over the web, delivered at and no or low cost. FastCommerce.com's Web 2.0 ecommerce includes a website, online product catalog with related products, order capture and order processing, a shopping cart, contact and customer management, as well as shipping, inventory and more.
All the tools are there in a high performance and inexpensive ecommerce solution that will let small business grow their online stores while not having to worry about costly investments, or having an in-house IT department. With the FastCommerce.com Web 2.0 software, Internet retailers can focus on running an ecommerce business, on customer service, not on hardware and software support.
FastCommerce.com will being rapidly developing products and features to its main ecommerce software: the goal is not simply to be an ecommerce shopping cart provider, but a platform that gathers together all the features and functions (for example, ERP) that a small business need to run the whole of their business. FastCommerce.com is a small business ecommerce utility that is pure Internet Web 2.0 in easy of use, speed and performance, and at low or no cost for businesses large and small.