Link of the day for Friday, August 3
It's finally happened - the web 2.0 bubble has started to burst! If social networking for humans wasn't enough, we now have social networking for dogs. That's right - a new startup called MyDogSpace (and its sister company called MyCatSpace) allows your dog (or cat) to have his or her own MySpace page!Who knows what will happen if this takes off ? If LOLCats is any indication of things to come, we may be in trouble. In the meantime, let's let Fluffy or Fido have their fun.
Signing Up
As the proud owner of a pet of the canine variety, I thought I'd sign up Dusty for her own page.
Creating a free account is easy. By clicking on the beautiful web 2.0-styled Create Free Account link, I am asked for personal information about myself. It does say that I will enter my dog's information afterwards, so for now, I am content with providing a username, my email address (required to receive a confirmation email), and a password (which I must also confirm).
Interestingly enough, they also ask for my birthday. The legal jargon below advises that "By joining MyDogSpace.com, I confirm that I am over 13 years of age." As well, another note mentions that "Your birth date is never shown to other members." Hmmm - I guess I'll have to trust them. Reluctantly, I give them a fake birthday (they don't really need to know how old I am, do they ?), and start reading the Terms of Use.
Terms of Use
Now I'm confused. In the Eligibility section of the Terms of Use, they mention "You must be fourteen or over to register as a member of MyDogSpace.com or use the Website." This conflicts with the agreement on the sign-up page that said "By joining MyDogSpace.com, I confirm that I am over 13 years of age." I send them a quick email advising them of their folly.
The rest of the document is just what I expected - nothing unusual, just the normal legal jargon. I put a checkmark agreeing to give them my first-born, and click on the Submit button. After receiving the confirmation email in my junk mail account, I quickly click on the confirmation link. At my next visit to the site, I am asked for my username and password. The information is entered forthwith, and in no time, I am logged in.
My Dog House
Ah, my home page. This is where I can check my mail, set up my dog's profile, sent/receive dog pal requests, or post in the forums. Of course, there is information regarding my personal online profile, and the number of times it has been viewed. But you're not interested in me. Let's set Dusty up with her own profile.
Dusty's Profile
The profile setup page looks similar to a blogger's template page. In here, I can change the background color of Dusty's page, her background image (which can be tiled across the page in true MySpace fashion), and other useless tidbits of information. I'll come back to that later - for now, I click on Add a new dog under the "My Dogs" section.
Adding a Dog
Well, this step was easy as well. I enter my dog's name, her nickname (I didn't know dogs needed nicknames), her motto that will be displayed to her future dog pals (let's hope it's not a male named Bubba). Of course, gender, birthday (best guess), breed are all included. There is even room to enter a secondary breed. This is great, since Dusty is half Boston terrier, half pug. (I know, but she makes for one very cute dog!) There is even a large textbox for her biography. Neat - I'll definitely have to finish the bio later. I am having way too much fun exploring here.
Dusty's Picture
Okay, I've added Dusty profile to the "My Dogs" section. Now, I need to add Dusty's picture to make it look complete. It took me a while to find it, but you can manage your pictures by clicking on the "Photos" button located at the top right-hand side toolbar. I probably would have missed it if I wasn't looking for it so closely.
I upload Dusty's picture, and before I know it, her cute blue eyes and pug face are looking at me. It worked!
Background Images
Unfortunately, I am having a hard time attaching an image to my profile page. I click on the Background Image link, and it appears I can select from a number of different tiled backgrounds.
I select one, and click on the Submit button. Nothing happens. So I try to upload my own image - success! I may have found a bug - I alert them, also by email.
Dusty's Blog
Now, Dusty is ready to write her first article! I can help her out by clicking on the "Blog" button. I create her first blog entry for her (no opposing thumbs), and wait for it to show up on her web site. It does, but in duplicate! Must be another one of those bugs (no wonder they call it "Beta"!) I send a third email in less than 30 minutes.
Dog Pals
The last step in the profile setup is to find other doggie friends to play with. Luckily, Dusty already has one request to be her friend. (Wow, this social networking thing moves fast, even for dogs!) So I accept the other dog's request, and her friend can now be found under her "Dog Pals" section on her profile page.
Final Product
Well, here it is - a snapshot of the final product. (Yes, that's Dusty sitting on Santa's lap in the background. And no, she's not spoiled at all!) As you can see, it looks almost as bad as the human MySpace pages!
As the proud owner of a pet of the canine variety, I thought I'd sign up Dusty for her own page.
Creating a free account is easy. By clicking on the beautiful web 2.0-styled Create Free Account link, I am asked for personal information about myself. It does say that I will enter my dog's information afterwards, so for now, I am content with providing a username, my email address (required to receive a confirmation email), and a password (which I must also confirm).Interestingly enough, they also ask for my birthday. The legal jargon below advises that "By joining MyDogSpace.com, I confirm that I am over 13 years of age." As well, another note mentions that "Your birth date is never shown to other members." Hmmm - I guess I'll have to trust them. Reluctantly, I give them a fake birthday (they don't really need to know how old I am, do they ?), and start reading the Terms of Use.
Terms of Use
Now I'm confused. In the Eligibility section of the Terms of Use, they mention "You must be fourteen or over to register as a member of MyDogSpace.com or use the Website." This conflicts with the agreement on the sign-up page that said "By joining MyDogSpace.com, I confirm that I am over 13 years of age." I send them a quick email advising them of their folly.
The rest of the document is just what I expected - nothing unusual, just the normal legal jargon. I put a checkmark agreeing to give them my first-born, and click on the Submit button. After receiving the confirmation email in my junk mail account, I quickly click on the confirmation link. At my next visit to the site, I am asked for my username and password. The information is entered forthwith, and in no time, I am logged in.
My Dog House
Ah, my home page. This is where I can check my mail, set up my dog's profile, sent/receive dog pal requests, or post in the forums. Of course, there is information regarding my personal online profile, and the number of times it has been viewed. But you're not interested in me. Let's set Dusty up with her own profile.Dusty's Profile
The profile setup page looks similar to a blogger's template page. In here, I can change the background color of Dusty's page, her background image (which can be tiled across the page in true MySpace fashion), and other useless tidbits of information. I'll come back to that later - for now, I click on Add a new dog under the "My Dogs" section.
Adding a Dog
Well, this step was easy as well. I enter my dog's name, her nickname (I didn't know dogs needed nicknames), her motto that will be displayed to her future dog pals (let's hope it's not a male named Bubba). Of course, gender, birthday (best guess), breed are all included. There is even room to enter a secondary breed. This is great, since Dusty is half Boston terrier, half pug. (I know, but she makes for one very cute dog!) There is even a large textbox for her biography. Neat - I'll definitely have to finish the bio later. I am having way too much fun exploring here.
Dusty's Picture
Okay, I've added Dusty profile to the "My Dogs" section. Now, I need to add Dusty's picture to make it look complete. It took me a while to find it, but you can manage your pictures by clicking on the "Photos" button located at the top right-hand side toolbar. I probably would have missed it if I wasn't looking for it so closely.I upload Dusty's picture, and before I know it, her cute blue eyes and pug face are looking at me. It worked!
Background Images
Unfortunately, I am having a hard time attaching an image to my profile page. I click on the Background Image link, and it appears I can select from a number of different tiled backgrounds.
I select one, and click on the Submit button. Nothing happens. So I try to upload my own image - success! I may have found a bug - I alert them, also by email.
Dusty's Blog
Now, Dusty is ready to write her first article! I can help her out by clicking on the "Blog" button. I create her first blog entry for her (no opposing thumbs), and wait for it to show up on her web site. It does, but in duplicate! Must be another one of those bugs (no wonder they call it "Beta"!) I send a third email in less than 30 minutes.Dog Pals
The last step in the profile setup is to find other doggie friends to play with. Luckily, Dusty already has one request to be her friend. (Wow, this social networking thing moves fast, even for dogs!) So I accept the other dog's request, and her friend can now be found under her "Dog Pals" section on her profile page.
Final Product
Well, here it is - a snapshot of the final product. (Yes, that's Dusty sitting on Santa's lap in the background. And no, she's not spoiled at all!) As you can see, it looks almost as bad as the human MySpace pages!
The Good Stuff
The site could stand a little clean-up, but not bad for 30 minutes work. In less time than it takes to watch an episode of The Dog Whisperer, I have: created an account for myself, set up my profile, set up Dusty's profile, added a background image, created a blog entry, made a new doggie friend, and completed this entry.
The Bad Stuff
There is still a lot of work to do; after all, I ran into 3 bugs in the same 30 minutes it took to get set up. As well, navigation seems to be a little confusing. You expect that clicking on the "Home" button would take you to your home page, but instead, it takes you to the standard home page that you landed in when we first started this exercise.
As well, my username appears to be used in the URL for Dusty's page. (The format appears to go: www.mydogspace.com/me/username/). It would be nice if it was simple www.mydogspace.com/Dusty/.
The layout of the final product is dissapointing. Some text shows up too large, and it looks very haphazard. If the goal is to mimic the human MySpace pages, then I guess it has succeeded.
What I think about this site
Given that the site appears to be only slightly functional, and until I have a chance to evaluate what other dogs are doing, I would give this site 5 doggie treats out of 10. If they can fix the bugs and make it a little easier to navigate, I would easily raise it to a 7.
Still, looks like it could be great fun for anyone who has a pet named Fluffy or Fido.
UPDATES
I received a response from the three email messages I had sent. You can check out their response here.
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