Widgetbox gets a stats upgrade

By Josh Lowensohn – December 21, 2006 3:22 PM PST

(Credit: CNET Networks)

Today Widgetbox launched its new syndication metrics service for widget developers. Fancy name aside, this service lets users keep track of how many visitors are using the Widgetbox widgets on their MySpace profile, their Web site, or any other online location. Once you've registered your widgets, you can easily monitor their usage with a simple dashboard that offers data visualization such as graphs and charts. It's a cool tool for individuals to track basic traffic, but it holds more potential for attracting advertisers' attention to the potential for money-making widgets.

Widgetbox has had their syndication metrics service charting data for a long time, and today is simply the rollout of the tools to make use of that data. In fact, if you've been using Widgetbox since its inception, you'll be able to keep track of data going back to August 2006.

Hopefully your graphs will be going the other way.

(Credit: www.Widgetbox.com)

We covered Widgetbox back in August, and since then it's been pretty active, rolling out new features to its casual development platform and Web site. Most notably is the user interface for trying out widgets, which was introduced in late November. You can now tweak widgets in a variety of ways and see real-time results. There's almost no coding required to make basic changes. When you're finished, Widgetbox spits out code that you can easily copy and paste wherever you'd like.

Widgets are nearly everywhere now, and their presence in Windows Vista will likely make sites like Widgetbox thrive. The advertising potential is huge. I just hope that, whatever happens, there won't be Gore-Tex ads on my weather widget.