Dopplr “Copenhagen” release: Public Profiles!
One of the most requested features we’ve had from you all is the ability to extend the sharing of information within Dopplr to the entire internet.
We conceived of Dopplr as a tool for small groups of people to share important information with those they trust, but we always thought there would be a public component if we could do it right without compromising that core of the service.
And, for better or worse, we though it prudent to take slow steps towards this, as we knew we couldn’t get the toothpaste back in the tube if we got it wrong.
Today, we think we’ve got there, and we’re pleased to announce the first version of our public profile feature for our “Copenhagen” release.
The public profile feature allows you complete control over what you display to the rest of the internet outside of Dopplr, or whether indeed you do so at all – you can hide your profile from the internet at any time, and prevent search engines from finding it.
It’s completely modular – meaning not only can you switch on and off the panels of information you want, but you can also embed any individual panel as a widget in your own website or send it as a link in email or IM.
As well as being able to show your past and planned trips, illustrated with maps and photos – you can publish your tips about your favourite places around the world.
A lot of people tell me that although they don’t travel a lot, they love hosting friends who do in their home cities, and want to share their tips more freely – so this is one of the first steps in making Dopplr more satisfying for them.
We’ve also, as you might expect from us, added some “data toys” for you to play with and display on your profiles. We’re hoping to add more toys from ourselves and ‘guest toymakers’ in the near future.
As well as your personal “Raumzeitgeist“, we’ve made a fun toy called “Personal Velocity”, based on the concept at the heart of Joshua Cooper Ramo’s Newsweek article “Living at Jet Speed”.
Personal Velocity works out your average speed through the world in the past twelve months, and then, naturally (!), compares that to the nearest speed in the animal kingdom.
If there any zoologists out there, we look forward to you correcting our estimates…
There are also a couple of (very cool) surprises in there for those of you who aren’t tearing round the planet like cheetahs, antelope or whippets…
But – like our “Your Carbon” feature – this isn’t meant to be a competition or a judgement, but offered up as something it might be fun (or terrifying!) to reflect upon, and start conversations. Perfect for a public profile we thought.
Here’s a quick screencast of me creating and publishing my public profile that shows how easy and flexible it is.
The best way to find out is to play with it though…
Looking forward to seeing your profiles on the internets, and as per usual, hearing any feedback and comments you have here or over on our Get Satisfaction forum.
I’ve been looking forward to this for quite a long time. Thanks for making it happen!
[...] of one of my favourite location aware web applications Dopplr, has a fun new element as part of offering public profiles. Your “Personal Velocity” compares your travels and the time taken to make them, and [...]
Looks great guys! Using my Atom feed and Yahoo! Pipes, I had actually just hacked together an upcoming trips map for my site’s new design and have several friends looking to do the same. Extremely timely, to say the very least.
John,
Yahoo Pipes is a nice way to get custom control to make your own blog badge. If you want to publish the pipe we’d be happy to link to it from our FAQ.
Matt,
I’ll have to admit, I picked up the idea from Lifehacker: http://lifehacker.com/350560/show-gcal-events-on-google-maps. After toying around w/ the published pipe they link to, I dove in and created my own that aggregates my Dopplr upcoming trips, Upcoming.org events and Facebook events. It’s been my first and so far only experience with Pipes. I’ve yet to master it enough to let other people enter in URLs so you’re probably better off having it point to that Lifehacker post and people can start using Pipes themselves, entering in their Dopplr feed, etc.
I’d love to put my official Dopplr public upcoming trips map on my blog but each time I try, the map doesn’t show and only the text notes. Is that b/c my sidebar is too small?
It’s interesting that you mention the Your Carbon feature, but there doesn’t seem to be any way to display it in the public profile.
[...] We launched public profiles on Dopplr yesterday – and the thing that seems to get people talking is their personal velocity, rendered as an animal. [...]
Hi Richard – we’re going to be working on more modules in the coming months and Carbon is going to be one of the first, for sure.
[...] Dopplr users’ profiles looked somewhat different than others’ and wondered why. Well, now it’s public: Dopplr now offers trips with several stops (which is very useful), but also access to more travel [...]
[...] Dopplr launches public profiles. If you want to share your trips with people, and get to know about those coincidences when you happen to be near good friends, Dopplr is the place to go. Dopplr CEO Lisa Sounio did an appreciated talk at SIME 07, and with her team she has now launched public profiles on Dopplr, so that trips can be shared with people outside Dopplr as well. The feature would have been announced at the Reboot conference, but due to illness it was released on the Dopplr blog instead. [...]
[...] Perfiles públicos en Dopplrblog.dopplr.com/2008/06/26/dopplr-copenhagen-release-public-… por r0uzic hace pocos segundos [...]
[...] aprendo Doppplr abbiamo trovato una novità: la possibilità di creare un profilo pubblico visibile non solo agli utenti registrati del servizio, ma a tutti gli internauti che, [...]
[...] a lot of friends, we’d like to direct your attention to the new features in Dopplr’s “Copenhagen” release, which has been out for less than a month. The key improvements include the ability to add [...]
[...] recently launched a new version called “Copenhagen” and amongst the new features there is this possibility to insert new trip to Dopplr directly via [...]
Matt
What application did you use to produce the screencast of you creating and publishing your public profile?
George Boutilier
New York City
[...] don’t think the speed at which you read means anything, as long as you read at all, but, like Dopplr’s personal velocity, it’s a neat data toy, and could be implemented fairly easily with book page numbers from [...]
[...] 21% of the distance to the moon. And elsewhere in the document, it revealed that I have the personal velocity of a [...]