ScreenToaster is the easiest way to rapidly create and share tutorials, demos, training and more.

ScreenToaster is a free web-based screen recorder designed to capture your screen activity, audio and webcam images in real-time then publish and share your video in blogs and websites.

Unlike others, ScreenToaster works in all browsers and doesn’t require any download so that you can use it anywhere, anytime. The only requirement is to have Java installed in your browser and you can use this in Windows, Mac OS X or Linux!

You can also embed webcam in screen capture. You can pause while recording. While playing back, you can play it in a accelerated mode or in slow-motion.

This video was completed and required approximaely 30 minutes to assemble. We have done enough testing to determine that the Animoto service is outstanding for what it offers a marketer. We are thinking the 30 second spot would be ideal in long page narratives or short information blurbs. We will move forward and purchase the service to determine how it can be used in longer play format and with integrating it with other video clips.

Using Animoto To Make Videos
This 30 second video was created using Animoto. The upside is that looks good and was created very quickly. The downside is that the model obsures the product for sale.

Will we use the video? Yes… but sparingly. We will track views and compare it to other videos that will be creating to promote the brand.

New Bobber Babe

The Little Chopper Shop from Oklahoma has a Star that is Rising

Brass Balls Choppers & Bobbers has added a new chopper babe, Emylee. She replaces their first Chopper Chick, Megan.

For the next year Emylee will be showcasing new products for Brass Balls including parts, accessories and motorcycles.

Horsepower Marketing’s Evaluation
Monthly we track the activity of Brass Balls Choppers & Bobbers and it is of no surprise that Chopper Jockeys are finding Emylee to be popular on the website.

She presents an all American girl that really sets off the motorcycle she is on.

Gratuitous Pictures of Emylee
The following are a few additional pictures of Brass Balls latest popular model.

Firefox Add-ons

Looking for the best Firefox extensions in Official Firefox Add-ons is like searching for  the proverbial needle in a haystack.

You can see a periodic new extensions in the Firefox Extension Picks series that is featured once in every few weeks.

Firefox Tips

Here are a few tips for a fun Firefox browsing experience

• It’s always a good idea to backup your profile, extensions, etc. with FEBE before you try a new extension. Some extensions don’t play well together. (Use FEBE - see below)
• If your Firefox seems very slow, it could be because you are using a lot of extensions.
• Remember the Profile Manager option. In Windows, start Firefox from command prompt: firefox.exe -profilemanager

What type of extensions are you looking for?

Shan Krila has created the following categories based on the type of extensions you might be looking for.

• Starter Pack – If you are just trying out Firefox, here are a few extensions that will introduce you to the power of Firefox.
• Power User Pack – Aimed at the power users who aren’t afraid of getting their hands dirty and who want to squeeze every bit of power from their favorite browser.
• Usability – Aimed at improving browser usability by modifying Firefox chrome or the built-in features.
• Productivity – Extensions aimed at improving Productivity while you use the web for your work
• Fun – When you turn to the web to have some fun.
• Blogging - Useful for bloggers. Look at the add-ons and you’ll know what I mean.
• Social Media - Not all bloggers use all Social Media s this category zeroes in on just the Social Media extensions.
• Web Developer – Aimed at techie’s like myself who either run a website or do some web development.

Starter Pack

If you are just trying out Firefox, here are a few extensions that will introduce you to the power of Firefox.

• Adblock Plus - Ever been annoyed by all those ads and banners on the internet that
  often take longer to download than everything else on the page? Install Adblock Plus now and get rid of them.
• Adblock Filterset.G Updater - This is a companion extension to Adblock or Adblock Plus and should be used in conjunction with it. This extension automatically downloads the latest version of Filterset.G every 4-7 days.
• ForecastBar Enhanced – Mod of the popular ForecastFox that shows weather information in your status bar. This one features enhanced animated radar map as well and I love it!
• TabMixPlus - Tab Mix Plus enhances Firefox’s tab browsing capabilities. It includes such features as duplicating tabs, controlling tab focus, tab clicking options, undo closed tabs and windows, plus much more.

Power User Pack

Aimed at the power users who aren’t afraid of getting their hands dirty and who want to squeeze every bit of power from their favorite browser.

• CLEO package – CLEO is (Compact Library Extension Oraganizer) an extension that helps you create your own extension package (as a .xpi file) from your favaorite extensions (backed up using FEBE). When you want to move your extensions to another computer or three, just copy the custom xpi package you created and open it. Voila! You have cloned your Firefox extensions..
• Firefox Environment Backup Extension (FEBE) – Schedule and automatically back up everything about Firefox.. bookmarks, profiles, saved passwords, form history, etc. No more fear of re-installing Firefox or breaking it with a new extension. You can even upload your backups to your Box.net account.
• Foxmarks Bookmarks Synchronizer – Use Firefox on multiple computers? Install this extension, create a Foxmarks account an forget about keeping your bookmarks in sync. Foxmarks will do it for you.
• Greasemonkey – Allows you to customize the way a webpage displays using small bits of JavaScript. Ex. some of the best Google Greasemonkey scripts for Gmail and Google Reader should get you started on your way to becoming a Greasemonkey script addict!
• OpenSearchFox – Add any website’s search box to your Firefox search bar by right clicking in the searhch box in a website! It doesn’t appear in the Firefox add-ons site anymore but this link takes you to the download page and it works great even in Forefox 3.0.1.
• Menu Editor – TinyMenu mentioned in the next section helps save real estate but it increases the number of clicks to get to your menu option. Menu Editor lets you completely customize your menus. Hide and rearrange options you don’t need making your Firefox menus work for you.
• Remove it Permanently (RIP) – Permanently hide content from web pages using the context menu. Very powerful to customeze your web experience. A powerful options panel that lets you fine tune your preferences to your liking.
• SecureLogin – It uses the Firefox’s built in password manager and disables automatic pre-filling. It highlights the form fields if it detects a saved password and with a customized click or a keyboard shortcut, it fills the username/password as well as signs you in, in one short step. Very useful! I, however, recommend using a more powerful password manager such as Passpack.
• Stylish – Stylish is for CSS where Greasemonkey is for Javascript. Completely customize the looks of websites with Stylish scripts. Browse UserStyles.org to find the ones you like. One of the popular example is Re-Designed Gmail Stylish script.
• Update Notifier – If you can’t wait to know when a Forefox extension has been updated so you can upgrade it right now. Also, provides a useful ‘Restart Firefox’ option in its menu to restart with one click.
• Site Launcher – An experimental add-on thats a must-have for thos who love keyoard shortcuts. Just think Launchy for Firefox. You can launch your favorite sites with just a few hotkeys. Read the full Site Launcher review here.

Usability Add-ons

Aimed at improving browser usability by modifying Firefox chrome or the built-in features.

• Back to Top – Back to Top helps navigate long pages. Go to the top or bottom of a page with a single click. Using right clicks and control clicks you can scroll a page or line at a time.
• Download Statusbar – Download and view status of downloads in a tidy statusbar. No more annoying download window blocking your browsing experience. A full view as well as a tiny view for screen real estate usage.
• Edit Middle – Firefox 3 introduced the Awesomebar. Now whatever you type searches even the middle of the url.
• HashColoredTabs+ – Adds a colored favicon square for those sites without a favicon. This helps you identify tab contents based on a distinct visual cue.
• FaviconizeTab – If you are in the habit opening a dozn tabs anytime you are browsing, this can be save you some real estate in your tab bar. You can also preset certain to sites to always show just the Favicon and not the name of the site in the tab.
• FireGestures – Allows you to execute common commands (like page forward/backward, close tab, new tab) by mouse gestures drawn over the current webpage, without reaching for the toolbar or the keyboard…
• It’s All Text! – If you hate the little comment boxes in blogs or little text boxes where you need to type a long reply or complaint, this extension is for you. It adds a little edit button to the box and on clicking will take you to your favorite editor and on saving will transfer the content over to the box in the web page. Very handy.
• Smart Bookmarks Bar – Do you customize your menu bar to save screen real estate? Now you can hide your bookmark names in the toolbar and show just the favicon saving a lot of space. On mouse over, you’ll see the name of the bookmark for those without a favicon.
• Tiny Menu – Replace the standard menu bar with a tiny menu popup… Save real estate by  customizing the toolbars while shrinking the menu space with this.

Productivity Pack

Extensions aimed at improving productivity while you use the web for your work. Supercharge it now!

• PDF Download – Allows to choose if you want to view a PDF file inside the browser (as PDF or HTML), if you want to view it outside Firefox with your default or custom PDF reader, or if you want to download it!
• Better Gmail 2 – A compilation of the best GMail Greasemonkey and Stylish enhancements in one extension from Lifehacker.com. A must have for a power Gmail user.
• Black Canvas Gmail Signatures – Another must have for the power Gmail user. Lets you create multiple HTML signatures for friends, business and others with live preview.
• GMail Manager - Allows you to manage multiple Gmail accounts and receive new mail
  notifications. Displays your account details including unread messages, saved drafts, spam messages, labels with new mail, space used, and new mail…
• InformEnter – It adds a small clickable icon (that can be turned off with a right click) next to every form field. You can configure it to fill in semi-automatic mode with any frequently used field values for e.g. not just usernames & passwords, but address, website url, multiple email addresses, phone numbers etc.
• OPML Support – OPML Support adds OPML import/export functionality to the Firefox Bookmarks manager. OPML is a file type that is widely used to distribute lists of RSS/newsfeeds…
• Web Search Pro - Search the web the way you like… Lets you add your favorite search engines from their vast repository. Don’t find one you want, you can request and they will add it. To truly understand it, see the kinds of sites you could right to your search bar.

Fun Add-ons

When you turn to the web to have a little fun.

• Better Flickr – Another great Lifehacker extension that adds the best of Greasemonkey & Stylish scripts just for Flickr. A must have for a Flickr user.
• FoxClocks – Lets you keep an eye on the time around the world or even just your local time by adding an icon in your statusbar.
• FullerScreen - Really full screen… You still have access to the tabs and the status bar in this Full Screen mode. Use F11 to toggle between the modes.
• PicLens – Lets you view pictures in full screen with a single click in various popular sites like Flickr, Facebook, Google Images, Yahoo Images, etc.
• Woot Watcher – Woot Watcher monitors the Woot! web site, and keeps you updated with the current item, price, and if it is sold out. During Woot-offs, it will also let you know what percent of the item is…

Blogging Add-ons

If you are into blogging, some of these extensions could make blogging that much fun and easy. Check out the add-ons and you’ll know what I mean.

• Adsense Notifier – Displays your Adsense earnings on the…
• Copy as HTML Link – Creates an HTML link to the current page using the selected text and copies it. Highly useful.
• Copy Plain Text – Copies text without the formatting.. no more embedded html in your copied text.
• Feedburner Subscribers – If you are not displaying your Feedburner chicklet in yoru site, you can keep track of subscribers right from your browser with this extension.
  
• FireUploader - Lets you upload  Files, photos videos to online services such as Flickr, Picasa, YouTube, Google Docs, Box.net, Facebook, Webshots, etc.
  
• Google Notebook – Add text clippings, images and links to your Google Notebook and share them with friends.
• Niche Watch Tool This wonderful SEO extension provides you the technical information required to beat your competitor websites in serps.It gives you backlinks number, indexed pages, keyword occurences on the page, page rank, all in anchor, all in title and all in text rank for both domain and webpage information.
• Screengrab! – Save entire webpages or a particular selection or a frame as images. Excellent tool to get screenshots of different things for blogging. Various image formats like jpg, png, etc. available as well for saving..
• ScribeFire – ScribeFire (previously Performancing for Firefox) is a full-featured blog editor that integrates with your browser and lets you easily post to your blog.
• SearchStatus – Displays Google Pagerank, Alexa, Compete ranking, etc. Fast keyword density finder, highlighting keyword/nofollow, backward/related links, etc.
• Update Scanner – No RSS in a website? Add the page you are interested in to this extension and get notified right in your status bar when the page has been updated. You could also use a bookmarklet such as Page2RSS to get updates via email.
• WordPress Helper – A must have for the WordPress power user. It puts the WordPress codex, forums and other WordPress relevant information in your fingertips via the context menu. Also, checkout our Top WordPress Plugins list that features some of the 65+ best WordPress Plugins!

Social Media Add-ons

Not all bloggers use all Social Media so this category zeroes in on just the Social Media extensions.

• Better GReader – A compilation of Google Reader GreaseMonkey and Stylish scripts that enhances Google Reader.
• Delicious Bookmarks – Yes, the weird dots are gone in Delicious.com. This is the official add-on for Delicious. Sidebar, tags and all the goodies for a Delicious.com user. (my delicious profile)
• Digg Toolbar – For the power Digg.com user. Digg, submit content and get notifications of popular content without ever visiting Digg.com.
• Feedly – A fun social startup webpage extension. It integrates with Google Reader, Twitter, Facebook, etc and gives you a magazine style start page. You can even annotate, share stories and leave comments in blogs right from the Feedly page.
• Sage RSS Reader – Sage is a lightweight RSS and Atom feed aggregator extension for Mozilla Firefox. It’s got a lot of what you need and not much of what you don’t.
• Shareaholic – A catch-all extension for social media sites. Supports multiple web 2.0 sites such as StumbleUpon, Digg, Delicious, Facebook, etc. If you have a social media sharing addiction, this is just for you!
• SimpleDelicious – Access to your del.icio.us bookmarks right from your browser menu. It synchronizes your bookmarks seamlessly and makes adding and deleting bookmarks very simple.
• StumbleUpon – StumbleUpon lets you “channelsurf” the best-reviewed sites on the web. It is a collaborative surfing tool for finding and sharing great sites. This helps you find interesting webpages you wouldn’t think to search for. (my StumbleUpon profile)
• TwitterFox – One of the earliest Twitter add-ons I used. It’s nice and works well. But, there are a lot of other Twitter add-on options you can choose from.. I prefer using Adobe AIR clients such as Twhirl or TweetDeck for Twitter as they povide more options.

Web Developer Add-ons

Aimed at techie’s who either run a website or do some web development.

• Aardvark – Powerful and user-friendly selector utility for selecting elements and doing various actions on them. It can be used for cleaning up a page prior to printing it (by removing and isolating elements), for making the page more readable, and (most appreciated by web developers), for analyzing the structure of a page.
• Colorzilla – Advanced Eyedropper, ColorPicker, Page Zoomer and other colorful goodies…
• EditCSS – Stylesheet modifier in the Sidebar. Great to save your own custom stylesheet in a browser and view the changes realtime. I prefer Firebug for this but some people might find this handy.
• Firebug – A must have. Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page… (check out FireBug Lite bookmarklet that works in IE & Opera)
• FireCookie – A Firebug extension for Firefox that lets you view and manage cookies.
• FireFTP - FireFTP is a free, secure, cross-platform FTP client for Mozilla Firefox which provides easy and intuitive access to FTP servers.
• FirePHP – Lets you print to your Firebug console with a PHP function call. You need to have the ‘Net’ panel enabled and also download a PHP library from www.firephp.org.
• FlagFox – Just shows the flag of the country the web server is in for the website you are currently viewing.
• IE Tab – Switch to IE for ‘those sites’ that work only on Internet Explorer without leaving Firefox. Mark it and it will remember next time you visit those sites.
• MeasureIt – Draw out a ruler to measure height or width of any element in a web page. A must have.
• Pallette Grabber -
• Server Spy – Server Spy indicates what brand of HTTP server (eg. Apache, IIS, etc.) runs on the visited sites. When a tab is selected, the corresponding server name is shown on the right-hand side of the browser’s status…
• ShowIP – Show the IP address of the current page in the status bar. It also allows querying custom services by IP (right mouse button) and Hostname (left mouse button), like whois, netcraft. Additionally you can copy the IP address to the clipboard.
• Tamper Data – Use tamperdata to view and modify HTTP/HTTPS headers and post parameters…
• View Source Chart – * Creates a Colorful Chart of a Web Page’s Rendered Source Code * Displays Source in its Altered State After the DOM has been Manipulated by JavaScript.
• Web Developer – Adds a menu and a toolbar with various web developer tools.
• Xinha Here! – Portable WYSIWYG editor! No matter what site you’re visiting you can launch a WYSIWYG right in your browser.
• X-Ray – See the tags on a page without viewing the sourcecode. …

Best of Firefox coverage

Here are some of the best of Krila’s Firefox coverage that might help you. You could also browse other Firefox posts with the Firefox tag.

• How to Run Firefox 2 and Firefox 3 Simultaneously
• Open Google Talk Gadget in Browser Sidebar
• How to Safely Try New Firefox Extensions?
• Run Google Docs in Your Firefox Sidebar

One of the things that is outstanding about WordPress as a blogging platform is how Plugins extend its functionality hundred fold. Just like how Firefox becomes more than a browser with its 1000’s of available extensions. Click here to checkout some of the best plugins.

Say it With Video – Narrate your pictures with text to tell a story. Send a message to a loved one. Create event invitations. Unlimited potential.

Animoto automatically produces beautifully orchestrated, completely unique video pieces from your photos, video clips and music. Fast, free and shockingly easy.

Animoto.com is a web application that creates MTV-style videos with the click of a button.

Users simply choose a song and images. Animoto then automatically generates a unique video for them. No two videos are ever the same.

Many of the post-production techniques that the founders used while working as producers for MTV, Comedy Central & ABC are used in Animoto’s patent-pending Cinematic Artificial Intelligence developed to think like an actual editor and director. The resulting video is produced in a widescreen format, containing the visual energy of a music video and the emotional impact of a movie trailer.

The heart of Animoto is its newly developed patent-pending Cinematic A.I. technology that thinks like an actual director and editor. The technology takes into account every nuance of a song – the genre, song structure, energy, rhythm, instrumentation, and vocals. Whether it’s punk, pop, hip-hop or a classical Mozart piece, every Animoto video is totally customized.

Animoto is inspired by the digital camera revolution where taking dozens, even hundreds of pictures at a time gives people the ability to think more like a video producer capturing an entire experience, not just individual moments. As users are discovering the limits of traditional photo services, the guys at Animoto are innovating new ways for people to share their stories and express themselves through media.

iPhone & Facebook Users – Got an iPhone? Use Facebook? We’ve got apps for both! Make videos in whatever environment works best for you.

Things to be aware of with Animoto

It’s very important to read the Terms of Service (TOS) for Animoto. Here are some things I learned when I looked into it:

1) You cannot use the free version for anything commercial – such as promoting your website or services

2) If you subscribe to the commercial version for $249 a year, you can make videos promoting your own services but you cannot use it to make videos for clients

3) If your yearly subscription lapses, you are no longer allowed to show the videos that you made while under license. That strikes me as overly restrictive. Can you imagine having to remove all those videos from video sharing sites? What an administrative nightmare.

So basically, if you want to use Animoto just to make personal videos that serve no commercial purpose – then you can use the free version. If you want to make videos that promote your business, you must purchase the commercial license. If you want to make videos for clients, you are out of luck (I suppose you could do it if each client purchased a commercial license).

What’s the difference between the free and paid Animoto?

In addition to the ability to make videos that promote your own business, there are some other differences between the consumer (free) and the commercial (paid) Animoto accounts:

1. For the commercial package, Animoto obtained a special license that allows commercial account users to use the tracks offered in the package as the soundtrack to their business videos. Traditionally, getting this sort of music licensing is very difficult to obtain, even sometimes for large companies that are producing commercials for TV.

2. The Animoto-branding is much less blatant (especially toward the end of the video). To see an example, play the main video on this page (the video with the chef’s image).

3. There are no watermark logos in the bottom-right and no link-back buttons to the Animoto site (but rather a more subtle “Powered by Animoto” logo off to the bottom right).

4. Commercial account holders get an unlimited amount of DVD-quality download (normally $5 a download for consumers).

5. Commercial users can slow down videos to half the speed at which they normally render (or twice as fast).

6. Commercial account holders get to put “call back” buttons at the end of the video, linking the viewer to your company’s website.

How to Create a Video in Animoto

* Sign up for a free account
* Choose to do a short 30-sec video or a full length video
* Choose to upload images from your computer
* Or pick one of the following services: Flickr, Facebook, Picasa, Photobucket, etc.
* I chose Flickr & chose a set from my Flickr account after authorizing Animoto to access Flickr
* Then wait a few mins when Animoto gets your images and processes them
* Once it grabs your images you can choose to keep them all or delete the ones you don’t want
* Then choose a song from their collection or upload your own.
* Then finalize your video with a title and description and let Animoto works it’s magic.
* Email the video, download it or even embed in a webpage to share in with others.

Creating your own video content online is a great way to increase brand awareness, drive traffic to your website and increase findability for your site or service. Shooting and editing video is getting easier all the time but there are other ways to get video content online without picking up the video camera. Get details here.

Google Adds Social Searches

From Google
At Google, our goal is to create the most comprehensive, relevant and fast search in the world. In the past few years, an entirely new type of data has emerged — real-time updates like those on Twitter have appeared not only as a way for people to communicate their thoughts and feelings, but also as an interesting source of data about what is happening right now in regard to a particular topic.

Flickr Update

Yahoo’s popular photo sharing site, Flickr, has addrd Facebook-like people tagging to photos. It allows users to tag people in their photos by their account name, rather than just a simple text tag.

Flickr users upload their pictures, and, like Facebook, add titles and tags.  An identifying box goes around each person’s face from the photo, and you reach into your Flickr contacts to tag each person.

Users can adjust the privacy settings to specify which members can tag them in photos, which photos they are tagged in, or even opt-out of the feature completely.

Flickr said if you do remove yourself from any photo, only you will be able to add yourself back. Web users that are not Flickr members can also be tagged in photos, but they need to give their permission via email.

Flickr also said People in Photos works in conjunction with the Recent Activity function, so users will always know when they have been tagged in an image.