meowkitty’s Neighborhood

The eagle-eyed among you might have spotted this already, but for those who had to blink at some point yesterday - MOO's launched Business Cards! As so many of you have asked for the MOO MiniCard magic just that little bit bigger, we felt duty bound to indulge you. MOO Business Cards are a similar size to standard business cards, but with some very cool differences: Unlike lots of business cards, MOO gives you the option of a different image on every one. Using magic technology we've decided to call 'PrintFinity', you can have a different photo, logo or design on every card. So, when people ask you what you do, you can show them - everything! It's a little portfolio in your pocket, a product catalogue, a trading card, anything you like. You can buy your Business Cards in super-short runs We're an experienced bunch at MOO HQ. We've all worked in different companies before, and we still have the business cards to prove it. The traditional way is to buy business cards in batches of 250, 500, even 1000 or more, and no matter how hard you network, its impossible to get through so many before something changes - your phone number, your job title or even the company you work for. We realised if we still have stacks of old cards sitting about, you probably have too. So, we give you the option to buy in smaller batches of 50: - it's more economical (much less waste) - it gives you the chance to update your cards as you update your products or your details - it's greener - even if you're using virgin stock, at least you're not throwing it away! And talking of 'green' - there are now two paper stock options available We're slightly obsessed with paper at MOO, and take a great deal of care looking for the best paper, with the best feel, print quality and outstanding credentials. We've decided on two different stocks for our Business Cards: MOO 'Classic' - which is sustainably sourced and elemental chlorine free. Matt-laminated, it has a smooth and sturdy feel. It's the same stock you've seen and loved on MiniCards. MOO 'Green' - which is 100% recycled, 100% recyclable and biodegradeable. It's totally chlorine free, uncoated, crisp white, and prints nicer than any other recycled paper we've seen. (And we've seen a lot.) The cards come beautifully packaged Every pack of cards comes with a free Business Card holder. Designed by MOO, the box is made of recycled pulp board and fits in a briefcase or bag. We've even included two (recycled) dividers too, so as you empty the box of your own cards, you can fill it up with the ones you're given, without mixing them up. (Another problem we've had ourselves, that we thought it would be good to fix). So, there you have it. MOO Business Cards - as nice as MiniCards, but bigger, and a little bit different. We like them, and we hope you'll like them too. Oh! And if you want to see what other people have been doing, check out our ideas pages. See what other people have made, and how you could use the cards yourself.

Although almost every day at Six Apart is Take Your Dog to Work Day, Friday was extra special because it was the official Take Your Dog to Work Day! Plus, as lovers of blogs and animals, we think it's great that active blogger and Human Society's President and CEO, Wayne Pacelle, thinks having dogs around the office is a good reminder of "who we're working for."

We realize some people have it ruff and aren't lucky enough to be able to bring their dog to work, but hopefully these pictures taken at Six Apart last Friday will get your tails wagging... And let me tell you, it's harder than it looks to get all the doggies and their fetching owners in one picture.

6adogs

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And Penelope Trott took Rudy for a quick spin in her wagon while Mom and Dad were hard at work

Penelope and Rudy

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For those of us in the northern hemisphere, today is the summer solstice. For ancient civilizations, this day was akin to our modern day New Year's Eve and was viewed as a time to reflect and renew. So why not kick off your summer celebration with a new theme?

See all of our themes in the Design Area.

Or choose from one of  these brand-new themes. (Available under "New.")

Vox Themes June 08

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Our first intern has flown the nest. We knew this day would come - it's kind of what interns do I suppose, but it doesn't make it any better. Rui, who we introduced all those months ago has got a brand new job back in Japan. On the one hand, we're really happy for her - the job sounds great - but we can't help feeling a wee bit sorry for ourselves.

But, we shall let her speak for herself:

"Hi Moosters,
It's very sad to announce that I have to leave MOO and cannot be one of the MOO staffs any more. I found a career opportunity at an international organisation, which deals with environmental problems in Japan. In spite of my position as a temporary staff, I stayed at MOO for a quite while, because MOO is very comfortable and I love all the MOOsters.  

The MOO community is so cool, creative, kind, nice, supportive... well, I need 100 pages to describe how great you are. Thank you very much for all your supports, and wish you the best luck! Arigato!"

Rui, we will miss you! We've got someone waiting in the wings to continue your Japanese blog, but you know what? You're a tough act to follow! Please keep in touch.

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And now, after after the rain, some sunshine. Julien, our guitar-hero-playing French intern has been getting out and about on MOO's behalf.

Before we start, this photo might help you get a better feeling of Julien, and how he's getting on at MOO. He's the one with his hands in the air... (The one with the green glasses is Jakob - and you'll be hearing more about him soon).

And here's what Julien has to say:

"I wanted to share with you some of the things I've been doing as the (official!) French MOO ambassador. Well, I went back to France last week-end, and as I wanted to present MOO to a lot of people (I haven't left my MiniCard Holder the whole week-end... just in case), I've attended a very cool bloggers' event – and MOO were 'sponsors' too.

We were around 30 people, discussing geeky stuff and gossips about the blogosphere. We spoke a lot, had (a few) drinks, and it was very very interesting. A lot of French bloggers already know us, but the ones who didn't were really (positively) surprised. Have a look at some pictures! And you can learn more about it on the French MOO blog.

It was a real pleasure,

Julien."

We announced MOO's API the other week - which allows people with just a little tech knowledge to create cool apps that integrate with MOO's process. If you don't have the tech knowledge but still fancy making something cool, you could try using Photoshop instead.

Two talented MOOsters, Dawn Mikulich and Aral Balkan have posted their creative Photoshop templates online. Each produce very different, but very cool results.

First up, Dawn. A talented photographer based in Chicago, Dawn recently made this set of MiniCards:

With beautiful bright images, the cards are split into sections, perfectly showcasing several photos at once. Dawn has kindly put the template online - and it sounds like it's going down a treat! If you use it, do let us know in the comments, we'd love to see how your cards turnout.

Next up, Aral. You might remember him from last year. He made MiniCards featuring the code needed to get the 100 most recent photos from Flickr into Flash, using SWX. They're very cool - take a look

This time, he's been making mosaics. (MOOsaics? Gah!)  
Here's a photo, taken by Relly so you can see what I mean:

Aral's online template is pre-set to the correct dimensions, and is 'sliced for your convenience'. All you need to do is import your photo, make sure it fits in the document correctly and 'Save for Web'.

jenschr has already tried it out - and got a great result:

Again, if you make cards like this, let us know!

And finally, many congratulations to MOO customer, Yves Snoeren. The Snoren's have recently had a new addition to the family, in the shape of a beautiful baby girl. There's been no time to waste since the birth however, as Yves has been racing about creating the birth announcements! With custom M&M's and a cute little teddy, all that was missing was something small and funky, with the details. Luckily, MiniCards did the trick:

and they didn't do it just the once - but many times!

Congratulations, from everyone at MOO :)

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Ps - our Flickr pool recently got it's 6000th member! Congrats to Katie Strang... Now, who'll be the 10,000th?

Blog It

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A couple of months ago, we told you about Blog It powered by TypePad, the first cross-platform blogging application for Facebook the enables you to post to your Vox blog - and ALL your blogs - with a single click.

Within a week, Blog It had nearly 4,000 active users posting tweets and creating blog posts, as well as updating their status messages with the title and link to the published post. Today, Blog It's Facebook application has nearly 10,000 users. But here's the thing: You're not always sitting in front of the computer when the inspiration to blog strikes. And at Six Apart, it is our goal to provide you the tools you need need to blog where you want, and when you want.

Blog It for iPhone

Which is why this week we introduced Blog It for iPhone, a free web application just like the one we introduced for Facebook - only now - on your iPhone. Built specifically for iPhone's Safari browser, Blog It for iPhone enables you to post blog entries or status updates from wherever you are to more than a dozen different online services. And just like the original Facebook version, you can choose to share your posts with the people you know across various social networks.

To start blogging with Blog It for iPhone, go to  http://blogit.typepad.com with your iPhone's Safari browser and install the Blog It icon onto your mobile desktop. Then, all you have to do is click the Blog It icon and start creating posts!

Whether you're riding the bus to work, cheering on your team courtside, or enjoying a picnic by the lake, now it's easier than ever to Blog It.

It's funny when you look round, realise your CEO isn't here, and only figure out where he's gone by reading the national press. Luckily for us, the mention is in a broadsheet, and no, Richard isn't embroiled in some tabloid fiasco. He's been at the Webby's!

The mention was in the British paper, The Guardian, where UK blogger Zoe Margolis was live blogging the event. Richard was there to pick up the People's Voice Award (that's you) for Best Service (that's us). It was super cool for us to even be nominated, let alone win, so we can only thank you again.

The Webby's are famous for various things, not least the fact they insist on 5 word acceptance speech. We were pleased to hear Richard used his 5 words wisely. Zoe reports:

"Next up, the British Moo.com: "They said print was dead." Classy: us Brits rule, clearly."

Classy? Us? Well... You know.

One last thing, before we stop showing off, the award itself:

And while we're on the subject of print, and it's lack of being dead, look!

Yes, believe. It's chocolate, but printed with little versions of the MOO logo. No, we're not branching out in business, just in waistline. Dan, king of the MOO Warehouse has friends in high places. His lovely friend Angela, who works for T Shirt Patisserie, made us these as a special treat. This shot is actually nothing short of a miracle, because seconds later, all the white chocolate truffles you see there were... gone.

One of those rare posts from the technology department. I'm very pleased to announce the MOO API. The API allows those with some programming skills to write programs that can specify all the data required to make an MOO product (including fully variable images AND text), and then redirect a user to the checkout process for that product.

At present, the API is in beta - we think it's mostly done, but we might make a few changes before we 'go 1.0'. We expect any changes to be backward-compatible at this point. What's more, when we go 1.0, we'll be sharing revenue back with the API key holders (and we'll backdate for any packs made during the beta period). The exact revenue structure is still being worked on, and we'll announce it nearer the time.

At moo.com/api, you can sign up to play, find the documentation, and join the developer's mailing list.

So, what can I do with it?

Simply, if you have some images that you want people to be able to print, you can build an integration to connect up to MOO.

I'm more excited by things that people will make that we haven't thought of, but here's some things that have been done:

I hooked up the TheyWorkForYou.com API to our API to produce a stats-based political trading card game, a project I've been meaning to do for about 5 years now.

Dan Coulter (of phpFlickr fame) has written a PHP wrapper library that makes building MOO API applications really very simple indeed, and a couple of sample apps

Basic - add some images, make a pack. Basic, indeed.
Mosaic - takes a big picture and makes pack of minicard tiles from it.
Rainbow - makes a pack out of your most interesting flickr photos, sorted by colour.

Alberto from Tagmore has a 3D barcode sticker generator.

I'm looking forward to many more!

Enjoy.