The brand new Voice Mark App is now available on the iTunes App Store! It was previously called GeoGraffiti, but we have since  rebranded it to Voice Mark by GeoGraffiti. It has been a roller coaster ride building this new app for our users because we decided to rebuild it from scratch.  Why did we do this?  We spent many months collecting feedback from users and friends about what the new Voice Mark App should be able to do.  We ended up with a huge list of features that, after careful analysis, indicated that users basically wanted ALL the functionality of the GeoGraffiti Voice Mark Map within the iPhone App.  We were able to build most of the functionality in for this initial 3.0 release.  The features we were not able to complete will be coming to our users in the 3.1 version which is a very short time away from release.

One of the biggest complaints from users and friends was the App’s design.  It just wasn’t “sexy” or “pretty” enough.  How were we going to solve that problem?  Simple!  We decided to hire a very talented summer intern, Yannell Rodriguez, who would lead the graphic design of the new app.  As you will see in the video and screenshots, she did a fantastic job!

So let’s get right to it and start you off with a nice demo video that was produced by our friends at Scraster who also published a nice blog post about the new Voice Mark App.

Get the App Now

Key New Features

• Google Maps Mashup Interface
  • You can now create and browse Voice Marks using the familiar Google Maps interface.
• Facebook Connect Single Signon
  • To customize their accounts, users can now sign in to the Voice Mark App by using their Facebook account.  This eliminates the need to remember yet another username and password.
• Twitter Account Linking for Voice Tweets
  • Link your Twitter account and now every Voice Mark you publish will automatically update your Twitter status with a link to your Voice Mark that your followers can listen to.  It’s essentially a Voice Tweet!
• Email and SMS Notifications
  • You can configure your account to notify you when you have a new Fan/Follower and when someone responds to your Voice Marks.
• Social Sharing and Bookmarking powered by AddThis
  • Sharing Voice Marks has never been easier!  Clicking the “Bookmark and Share” button for a Voice Mark will let you share the Voice Mark using hundreds of social sharing services such as Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Digg, Delicious, LinkedIn, StumbleUpon, and Yahoo Buzz.  You can also forward Voice Marks to your contacts in your address book via email.
• Create Voice Marks by inbound telephone call or iPhone Microphone
  • Voice Marks can be easily and quicklly created using a standard inbound telephone call (we call you and your phone acts as the microphone).  You can also create Voice Marks using your iPhones built-in microphone in situations where you want to capture something immediately (e.g. breaking news) and can’t wait for a phone call or when the phone lines are busy (e.g. New Year’s Eve).
• Customizable User Profile
  • Create a user profile with a profile pic and other information such as User Name, Birthday, and Location.
• GeoTag Voice Marks to any location
  • You have the option of using the iPhone’s GPS to GeoTag your Voice Mark to the exact spot you are standing at or to a remote location that you designate via Search/Google Maps.
• Search for Voice Marks in any location
  • You have the option of searching for Voice Marks around you using the iPhone’s GPS or Voice Marks in a different location via Search/Google Maps.

Before & After

Old Version 1 & 2:

All New Version 3:

To view more info and screenshots of the new app, visit the product page

What Users are Saying

“The new app is so much sexier!” — EJ Liao

“Voice Marks are truly powerful” — Cordell Kennedy

“Extremely handy & innovative app.  Very user friendly.” — Karina Amezaga

“A quick and easy way to share info on locations I’ve been to” — Ben Graham

“I updated and wow the entire interface is different! Not bad.” — Eva Cheung

“I love hearing real people talking about their favorite restaurants and bars.  They give me a better idea of what a place is all about” — Luis Sotomayor

“Great way to share without typing!” — TJ Thinakaran

“An awesome informative app when on the go and need to know!!!” — RC Villareal

“I love the new design and add ons to this update.  The whole voice networking concept is definitely a great tool for tourists and education.  I like how this app has the yelp-fiend effect except through voice reviews.” — Gisselli

“I love being able to hear the genuine emotion in people’s voices … something I can’t get through reading reviews on my phone.” — Stephanie Kim

So there you have it folks … our brand new Voice Mark app!  We’ve enjoyed building this and look forward to improving it in the coming months.  Please let us know what you think and if you have any suggestions for improvement.  We’d like to thank all our beta testers for the time they spent testing the app and offering suggestions.  We couldn’t have done it without you!  Thank You.

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iphone, iPhone App, iphone voice app, ipod touch, twitter, twitter integration, voice 2.0, voice app, Voice Map, Voice Mark, voice tweet

We’ve been incredibly busy during the past couple of months with a big GEO SEO project.  We can’t describe everything about it in one post so we decided to talk about a new feature every day for the rest of this week.

Our first feature we’d like to show is our brand new Twitter Integration.  The feature is really simple.  All you do is enable Twitter Integration on your GeoGraffiti account and any Voice Mark you create will result in a Tweet to your Twitter account.  So what appears as your status on Twitter when you create a new Voice Mark?  Here’s a screenshot of my recent Twitter updates.

Status message from GeoGraffiti/Twitter integration

Your new Voice Marks will update your Twitter status with a message similar to what you see in the screenshot.  So why not put the text transcribed Voice Mark as your Twitter status message?  Well… it’s just hard :).  We can’t possibly transcribe audio real-time in order to update your Twitter status.  This process still requires some human aspect to it so there’s just no way…right now…but soon!  So, you’ll get your nifty Voice Mark title along with a direct link to the Voice Mark where users can listen to the audio.

So why is this cool?  

There are many reasons, but I’ll list a few below

• Just because you are away from your computer doesn’t mean you have to stop Tweeting!  With any regular phone, anyone can call the GeoGraffiti TUI (Telephone User Interface) @ 213.221.3802 to leave a Voice Mark.  As long as you’ve created a GeoGraffiti account and enabled Twitter Integration, all your Voice Marks will be posted as Tweets!  You’ll run into situations where Tweeting is actually cumbersome or somewhat limiting (not because Twitter is bad, but because Twitter may not be the right medium).  Imagine you’re out and you find some interesting museum or hole-in-the-wall restaurant that you love.  If you want to talk about the places in detail, writing a review via text on a mobile phone will just take too long and you only have the 140 character limit.  Instead, just use GeoGraffiti and get on with your life :).  It’ll take a about a minute.  Plus, your Voice Mark will be there for the rest of the public to benefit from.
• It doesn’t matter how you create the Voice Mark… your Twitter status will always be updated.  There is no need for any fancy equipment!  Remember that GeoGraffiti is a platform and all our our end-user interfaces are simply interfaces.  All the magic happens on our servers.  This means that you can use GeoGraffiti on iPhone or TMobile G1 to create a Voice Mark and your Twitter status will be updated.  Your tech-challenged grandparents can use their plain ol’ mobile phone or land-line and their Twitter status will be updated (of course they might need your help setting up a Twitter account for the first time)… they might not even go on Twitter at all…all their tweets can be Voice Marks :).  
• People are apparently making money from Tweets…???  That’s what I saw on the news a few days ago.  Well… if that’s the case, then they too can keep earning $$ by leaving Voice Marks!  
• Our not-very-publicized Biz Marks (Business Voice Marks for free advertising) will benefit from this by using Twitter as a medium to spread the message.  Basically anyone interested in using GeoGraffiti for SEO/GeoSEO purposes will definitely want to enable Twitter Integration.  I’ll write about this in more detail in a blog post later this week dealing with SEO/GeoSEO.

So there you have it.  These are just a few ways to use Twitter Integration.  I’m sure you, the user, will come up with more and have better ideas.  Don’t be shy!  Let us know what features you’d like to see and we’ll crank it out :).  

Ok.  Enough out of me… here’s a short video to demonstrate how to enable Twitter Integration.

features, GeoGraffiti, tweet, twitter, twitter app, twitter integration, voice 2.0

It’s done…well it is for now. GeoGraffiti’s new Voice Marking map mashup UI. I guess you could say it was a team effort, but really there was only one “man” behind the man who did all the heavy lifting. He was born to code, likes working the vampire schedule, but can occasionally ignore public guidance.

No seriously check out the new UI and features at www.geograffiti.com/map

Some of the most notable new features are:

• Search – We have enabled our Voice Map @ www.geograffiti.com/map with content search.  When a new Voice Mark is published, its title, tags, address information, and category will become searchable within within a few hours.  What does this mean for you?  It’s now easier than ever to find Voice Marks.  You can type in what you are looking for in the WHAT box and, optionally, constrain the search to a specific location by typing the location into the WHERE box.  The better part of this search comes into play within a few days (it could be as short as one day or as long as three).  That is, we index your Voice Mark audio content and it becomes searchable so you are able to search for Voice Marks where a person mentions, for example, “parking” in “Los Angeles,CA” and all Voice Marks related to parking will show up.  It’s not perfect, but it is WAY better than what we had before (nothing) :). 
  
• Social features – You now have the ability to view who your fans are, who you are a fan of, and view user profiles.  This can be done by clicking on the “My Account” tab on our Voice Map.  To view user profiles, you can click on a Voice Mark’s creator link or search for users by clicking on the “Search Users” link on the top right-hand side of the Voice Map page.  You can also upload a profile picture to associate with your profile by clicking on My Account.  We have also enabled a rough version of groups support.  We are still actively working on this feature so any input on what you want “groups” to do will be greatly appreciated.
• Notifications – This feature will allow you to keep up-to-date with the latest buzz.  You can now enable notifications for “users responding to your Voice Marks” and “users becoming your fan”.  To do this, you simply click on the My Account tab and then proceed to the Notifications section.  You can enable two types of notifications:  Email and SMS Text Message.  In order to have a text message sent out to you, make sure you select your Carrier in the My Phones section.  You will now be notified when someone responds to your Voice Mark (good for Voice Marks about help, advice, dating) and when someone becomes your fan.  Some of our users will be happy about the response notifications because they want to use GeoGraffiti Voice Marks to “hook up”.  Hook up?  It seems like plenty of users want to post a Voice Mark that functions like a personal ad (…looking for woman in …. that likes dogs…).  If someone is interested, they can reply and the user will be notified and the two users can take it from there.  Pretty cool, eh?
• A “prettier” look – You may have noticed that our Voice Map and home page have been redesigned.  We wanted to provide you with a better user experience so we redesigned everything… our company logo, the voice map page, color scheme… One of the best parts of the new Voice Map is the resizable map.  That has been a complaint from users from day one.  People with huge monitors or high resolutions were not able to see a bigger map.  This is all taken care of now.  The Voice Map will now stretch to accommodate your entire screen.  If you have any comments or suggestions about the redesigned look, email us using the Contact Page.
• Social Sharing – Every Voice Mark now includes a [better] Sharing feature.  You can retrieve the direct link (just like before), send to a friend’s phone, or share via Email,AIM,etc (provided by AddThis).  Our Send2Phone feature allows you to send a Voice Mark to your friends via telephone.  You type in their number and click Send.  Your friend will get a phone call (your number as the caller ID) and GeoGraffiti will say “GeoGraffiti will now play that Voice Mark that was sent to your by your friend” and then play the Voice Mark on their phone.  There is one catch though… YOU MUST be signed in and have a verified phone number.  This is to comply with the law and to prevent anyone from sending out Voice Marks as spam to annoy other users (remember YOUR phone number will appear as the caller ID on the other person’s phone).  The other sharing feature is provided by AddThis.  This will allow you to share a Voice Mark via Email, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and a whole lot of other services you currently use.  To try this out, just click on the “Share via Email” link on any Voice Mark on our Voice Map.

• Better URLs – Aside from this being a no-brainer must-have feature, this was inspired by a friend of mine that left a Voice Mark from his iPhone for a waitress at a restaurant.  But how would that waitress listen to the Voice Mark?  Prior to this release, you’d have to link to a Voice Mark like this http://www.geograffiti.com/gu/SearchMap.html?vmid=1. YUK!  That won’t help my friend at all because the link doesn’t even fit on a napkin!  Instead, you can now link to our Voice Marks like this:http://www.geograffiti.com/X or http://www.geograffiti.com/voicemarks/X where X is the Voice Mark’s ID.  For example,   http://www.geograffiti.com/2708 or http://www.geograffiti.com/voicemarks/3114What’s the difference?  Not much.  We provide the former style for scenarios like “I want to leave a Voice Mark for a guy or girl at a bar”  The latter style is what you should use when linking from a blog, website, etc.

GeoGraffiti is platform to publish a voice message and geotag the message to a location.  It is not a private voice mail service.  Rather, every Voice Mark message is made available to the public and accessible from anybody’s mobile phone (although the GeoGraffiti iPhone3G and G1 apps make geotagging easiest).  Everybody has local knowledge, opinions, advice and warnings that the rest of us can benefit from. It’s wisdom of crowds intelligence.

GeoGraffiti offers a public voice information exchange that all generations (Gen-Y to Boomers) can relate to and use because it just requires phone, an opinion and a voice message.  Our voice2.0 map mashup website interface is most convenient for setting notification preferences, joining social groups around a topic, and searching or filtering for specific content.  The phone interface (either from an iPhone, Android G1, or direct call to GeoGraffiti at (213) 221-3802) is available when you are mobile on location.  Why voice?  It’s expressive, personable and authentic.  We have nothing against text messaging and are exploring the idea of partnering with a text messaging platform, but our focus and goal is organizing location-specific voice content.

To hear a little more about the idea and use cases for GeoGraffiti, view a TechZulu interview with Chad taken right after our launch a while back.  Note:  Chad drank enough gin & tonics that our gin bottle was 3/4 empty :) … but somehow still managed to finish the interview.

– Adrian & Chad

geograffiti 2.0, geotagged audio, google maps mashup, local search, voice 2.0, Voice Map, Voice Mark, Voice Marks, voice mashup

We released our 1.0 version of GeoGraffiti on the Android Market two days ago on 2.11.09.  We are VERY impressed with the Android community!  Let me tell you how it went down…

Picture this:  It’s 8PM at GeoGraffiti Labs in Los Angeles and I (Adrian) am staring at some code wondering why it won’t do what I nicely asked it to do…you might know the feeling…sitting there frustrated with your hair looking like you just woke up, fist clenched, and veins popping out of your forehead…yup that’s the look.

Chad sends me an IM saying, “Dude?  I think we have traffic.”  I glance over at monitor 1 and 2 and whatttttdya know!… the logs are going crazy!  Request after request from “Google Android.”  That woke me up.  It was pretty exciting to see that within minutes of the application being made available, people were downloading it and trying it out.  5 hours later at 3AM and I’m still sitting here making sure everything is up and running and the amount of traffic has just slightly lowered…my head hits the desk with a thump….zzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZzzzzzz.

Well it’s now 2.13.09 and we are still getting traffic from Android users.  Our hats off to all of you!  We aren’t playing favorites here, but you guys have put the iPhone users to shame with the amount of VoiceMarks that were created and listened to.  Thank you all for trying the app out!  We received a bunch of feedback from users and we’re going to sort through it this weekend to plan our next set of features. If anyone wants to submit feature requests for the Android Version, iPhone Version, Telephone Version, or Website Version please let us know…send us an email, send us feedback, or just reply to this blog post.  We’d love to hear what everyone thinks and how we can improve GeoGraffiti for you!

Some of the major gripes have been about the lack of VoiceMarks in certain areas and missing features on the app.  We hear you!  This content is all community generated and we’re in the beginning stages of getting a community going so no worries…we’re only going to get better.  Anyone can help by spreading the word about the application.  You don’t have to be a G1 phone owner or even an iPhone owner.  Our application is accessible from the web @ http://www.geograffiti.com/map or even from a standard non-fancy telephone by calling 213-221-3802.

We have some very exciting updates planned for GeoGraffiti so stay tuned (subscribe to this blog’s RSS feed for the latest announcements).  If you want to talk directly to me or Chad you can even email us directly for an immediate response.  What are our email addresses?  Well…. read back up on this blog entry…. could it be our names @ our service.com???  I guess you have to try to find out!

Thanks again for trying out the application and for all your feedback!  We really appreciate it!

Here are a few of the VoiceMarks that were generated from the Android community.  Be aware that some of these could be stamped with “Parental Advisory:  Explicit Lyrics”… yep we heard that feedback item numerous times so we’ll be pushing that out soon.  For now, those of you who don’t mind listening…here are the direct links:

http://www.geograffiti.com/gu/SearchMap.html?vmid=2611

http://www.geograffiti.com/gu/SearchMap.html?vmid=2581

http://www.geograffiti.com/gu/SearchMap.html?vmid=2414

http://www.geograffiti.com/gu/SearchMap.html?vmid=2368

http://www.geograffiti.com/gu/SearchMap.html?vmid=2323

– Adrian

android, android app, g1, g1 app, maps mashup, phone mashup, tmobile g1, voice 2.0, voice mashup

We have recently released a few new features.  The first is a feature for the small business and enables the owner to quickly publish verbal message advertisements or promotions concerning their store’s special offerings, and target those ‘Biz Voice Mark’ messages to mobile users traveling within the store vicinity.  You can read more about the new Biz Voice Mark feature in the below press release.  We hope this free Biz service helps small business owners communicate with mobile users and brings relevant information to GeoGraffiti end-users looking for local promotions, etc.

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2008/6/prweb1038134.htm

Also, we have added another way for users to designate their location (for phones without GPS capabilities).  The new feature gives the user the option to enter a location’s phone number (previously only zip code).  GeoGraffiti will look up the address of the location based on this phone number and geotag it accordingly.  A phone number can be used to designate a location for searching Voice Marks, or used to publish a Voice Mark about a particular location.  Since we correlate the phone number to an exact address, it is more accurate than using the general area zip code.

Finally, we will be a sponsor at the Twiistup 4 event in Santa Monica, CA on July 17th.  It is currently a sold out event, but if you are luckly enough to be attending, please stop by our booth to check out our latest demo.  Not only will we be giving away some fun gifts, but we’ll be demoing an exciting new feature and announcing an upcoming ’Best Voice Marker’ contest to win a new Jawbone bluetooth headset.  We have one spare ticket to the Twiistup event, so if you are interested in going please contact us – the first request will get this free attendee ticket.

We are working hard to bring new and useful features to GeoGraffiti.  The location-specific voice platform was built for you the people and like all platforms dependant on community generated content, it will become more valuable as more content is added.  So please take a minute and Voice Mark your hood with your opinions or advice!

Cheers

Biz Voice Mark, google maps mashup, mobile Advertising, phone mashup, Small Business, voice 2.0, voice mashup

So a bunch of people have asked for links and description about GeoGraffiti. The main page is at www.geograffiti.com/map To register you can click on the Login link on the top right-hand corner of your screen. There are 2 ways to register. If you have a Facebook account, you can sign in through Facebook by clicking on the Facebook icon. If you don’t have a Facebook account you can register with GeoGraffiti by clicking on the Register link. What’s the difference? Not much. With Facebook sign-in you don’t have to remember yet another password and we offer some basic integration with your Facebook account. You and your friends will receive messages on the news feed and mini-feed about the stuff you publish on GeoGraffiti. Aside from that, nothing else is different.

Before you sign up, watch this video to get the basic gist of what GeoGraffiti is. I warn you, it’s a bit long, but worth your time since this concept is new and hasn’t been seen before. N.B. The UI has been updated since this demo was created but the basic functionality is very similar. We’ll have a newly updated demo soon.

GeoGraffiti Voice Mashup Video Demo v1.0

Ok. so after you register, you will be asked to verify your phone number so have that phone handy. GeoGraffiti will call you and give you a code that you enter on the site. Once the phone number is verified, you can continue and you’ll be taken to the map. Click down into the area you want to search for Voice Marks in. Right now all Voice Marks are in the Los Angeles area, but you can add them anywhere you want. Having trouble deciding what to contribute? Why not search for your favorite restaurant, bar, or club and say a few words on why it’s cool and unique. Maybe suggest the best hostess or drink to order. Seeee that wasn’t so hard! Feel free to browse, forward, and respond to other Voice Marks, etc.

Will my phone number be made available to the public?

Absolutely not! We ask for your phone number for internal reasons so our system can associate the Voice Marks you create with your GeoGraffiti user nickname. If you choose to activate the advanced notification preference, GeoGraffiti will call you or SMS a notification to your phone when somebody publishes a response to one of your Voice Marks, but this is an optional setting that is not active by default. To be clear, your number will never be seen or revealed to the public.

How do I get my Facebook news and mini feed stories to work?

First make sure you are signed in to Facebook and then click on this link http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=3344130540&ref=mf to install the application and register with GeoGraffiti. If you click on the GeoG application in your side bar, you may experience an error. We don’t know why Facebook is doing this yet…we’ll figure it out. For now, just click again and it should work. When you start the GeoGraffiti app in fb, we take you to the GeoGraffiti.com site since the fb canvas size isn’t big enough to support our google map-mashup, but all your Voice Marks will appear in your fb news feed so you can keep track of who is leaving new Voice Marks.

So what should I do after I create Voice Marks?

Because we released this yesterday, there isn’t a lot of content on there. We want to encourage everyone to make this work as a community much like the Wikipedia or Yahoo!Answers. The content will get better as time goes by and more users sign up. Please email info@geograffiti.com with your feedback and suggestions. We want to work hard to make GeoGraffiti work for you so send everything you can :).

Parting Words

Keep in mind that this is a new beta service so don’t go out and have a milllion people sign up…you’ll kill us :). We will adjust as the traffic and users grow to accommodate the load. Feel free to forward the link to a FFFEEEWWWWW of your friends…not your entire entourage…especially if you roll 1000 deep :).

Thanks for helping out! We really appreciate it!

Cheers,

The GeoGraffiti Chief Tech Monkey

getting started, howto, tutorial, video, voice 2.0, voice mashup

On behalf of GeoGraffiti (GG), I should begin with a great big THANK YOU to our talented group of developers and dedicated group of private beta testers. Today, GG emerges from hiding and formally announces its public beta availability. Anybody with access to a US-based telephone can now Voice Mark the World!

As I review GeoGraffiti’s bug report and feature list accumulated over the past year, I find it hard to believe we solved all the minutia involved in creating GG. But I’m sure we missed something, probably lots of something … so we look forward to your comments, suggestions and critiques. Please be civil when contacting us – we created GG for the public’s benefit and enjoyment, and its free :)

There are many GeoGraffiti features to be discussed, but this entry will start with our Facebook integration feature. The Facebook application lets you and your friends stay up-to-date on each other’s Voice Mark activity on geograffiti.com by publishing stories to your mini-feed and your friends’ news feed. Currently you will be notified about new Voice Marks and Voice Mark responses created by your friends. So how do you get it? Here is the link: 

http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=3344130540&ref=mf

If you have any questions or suggestions, don’t hesitate to let us know.  And check out our very first Voice Mark: www.geograffiti.com/gu/SearchMap.html?vmid=1

Cheers,

The GeoGraffiti Chief Exec Monkey
and
The GeoGraffiti Chief Tech Monkey

Callfire, Facebook Application, GeoGraffiti Launch, GeoGraffiti Live, Launch Date, voice 2.0, voice mashup