Streamy: Doesn’t Intend to Kill Digg, but Somebody is Dying
Finally, after getting my groupie on and hanging out at Streamy Forums, I finally managed to get an invite. I have seen a few screen shots, but nothing could prepare me for the full experience once I started navigating the site.
Streamy, while avidly advertising that they are not a Digg killer, will manage to kill loads of other things. It has real-time chat, status updates, link sharing, subscription communities, group chat, and tons of other features that are listed below.
“With that in mind, we do intend to kill the dry, boring RSS reader. I’m talking about the inbox-style RSS reader that is not intriguing, not social, and makes little or no attempt at personal relevance. We have created a system that aggregates syndicated content, channels it through your new and existing social networks, and creates a sum that is greater than its parts. Otherwise, as an aggregator, we do not replace tools - we mesh them into a new experience.” (Streamy Blog)
Current Features include:
- Add/Remove/Share Feeds
- Ability to create category folders
- Upload OPML files
- Interact with other Streamy members via different Streamy Groups
- Create Streamy Groups (public or private).
- Make friends and chat with them
- Ability to see what your friends are reading
- Create Feed Filters
- Leave comments on articles
- Pull data from 9 Upstream sources (Google Reader, Twitter, Pownce, Digg, del.icio.us, YouTube, last.fm, Jaiku and Facebook) and show them on your profile.
- Create and save personal notes
- Discover new blog feeds
- Search Streamy member database, blog entries, feed resources and groups
- Ability to see how many other Streamy members are subscribed to the same blog feed. .
Streamy is advertised to be the next generation feed reader. It was developed by two dudes, Donald Mosites and Jonathan Gray. Upon navigating the site, it’s obvious that they had “beauty” in mind while designing.
After a grand total of an hour or so of usage, it managed to convince me to fire Google reader. I loved Google reader, but everything in Streamy from the viewing to the subscription navigation is GREAT. I will go as far as to say that Streamy is miles ahead of most paid feed readers I tried. Features such as the instant chat, and status updating, tip-toe on twitter and pownce like features just a tad. Once enough of my active pownce friends navigate over to Streamy, pownce will surely be fired as well. That’s just my opinion of course. I only need one place to real time chat with friends and status update.
The shot above is how the profiles look. It shows subscription, friends, and feeds from pownce, twitter, digg, jaiku, last.fm, and a few other sources. It also displays your updates and saves.
The above shot is the view of the “Downstream”. Here you can see updates from your friends, along with shared and saved links (options are provided to select what you want displayed).
This is a shot of your “Networks” sidebar. You can drag stories above friends or groups to share with them instantly. VERY useful and beautifully implemented. I link spammed a few people during my experiments. 
This shot is a shot of a real-time chat I had going on while browsing within one of my groups. The real-time chat is outstanding and seamlessly integrated within the site. You can surf around and maintain the chat at all times. You can even create group chats by dragging other friends into the conversation.
Feast on these few shots while I dive back in and feed my newest addiction. I will post another update pretty soon once I get more friends added. Sadly they only gave me two invites which I used already. 
Posted in Just Blogging, Social Networking
You have reached the personal blog of Howard O'Berry. I enjoy blogging about tech and current events, but being that this blog is personal, pretty much anything goes. You can catch me on 
ob81 September 8th, 2007 at 2:31 pm
As soon as I get some more invites Geoff I will be sure to hook you up. They are being pretty stingy at the moment.