Message Forum Tuned Up | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 9/23/2008 | Our Message Forums just got an extensive overhaul, with the goal to make it an absolutely comfortable place to communicate in - whether it's a suggestion or question about the site directed at us, or shooting the breeze with fellow Creatives.
What is shiny and new:
- New search capabilities multiple filter and criteria options.
- Points and rewards system.
- Improved forum navigation with AJAX Printer friendly option for topics.
- Email topic to a friend.
- Tag topics with keywords.
- Who’s Online with up to the minute accuracy.
- Improved upload capabilities for topic attachments.
- Use Quick Reply to quote multiple replies from multiple pages.
- Quickly jump to first unread post or the last post of a topic.
- Option to hide avatars and signatures of other users.
- Improved topic status capabilities.
- Improved method for creating polls.
- Improved support for mobile devices.
- Email notifications are sent as plaintext and html.
- CAPTCHA support to prevent spam from anonymous users.
- Automatically detect URLs in posts and convert to links.
- Automatically reduce the size of extra long links.
- Numerous performance improvements.
If you haven't participated yet, come on down and get involved - Zymmetrical thrives on your individual expertise and personality.
| | Voila! Keywording in 7 languages | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 8/6/2008 | On the flip side of having created quite possibly the fastest batch upload and describe system in the industry, the multi-language functionality of Zymmetrical has expanded further.
As mentioned in the previous news item about the new
Submissions page, Artists can translate the keywords going into the
system from the following languages, into English: Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian,
Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Italian,
Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian,
Spanish, and Swedish.
Now, the keywords (tags) of all files put online for licensing are translated into all the 6 additional languages supported by our international mirrors:
Zymmetrical.de (German, de-DE)
Zymmetrical.es (Spanish, es-ES)
Zymmetrical.fr (French, fr-FR)
Zymmetrical.it (Italian, it-IT)
Zymmetrical.nl (Dutch, nl-NL)
Zymmetrical.pl (Polish, pl-PL)
Next on the list to expand the buyer experience on Zymmetrical is the expansion of currency and payment options, to help smooth out truly useful, local portals.
| | New Submissions Page | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 7/21/2008 | It's about.. time!
We are happy to announce the launch of our new Submissions page ( http://www.zymmetrical.com/account/submissions/ ), which, thanks to lots of feedback from our members, has evolved into something we think is truly great to use.
New Features
- Quick overview of all your important numbers, no effort required to find out all your submissions statuses.
- Batch Describe, in whole or in steps. A completely open workflow: you can set your prices first, then choose categories, or do them at the same time, it's your choice. Finalize one, five, or even hundreds of files in one click.
- Don't have embedded IPTC keywords in some files? Optional copy and paste comma-separated or semicolon-separated keyword groups.
- Instantly Translate your keywords from any of the following languages into English: Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, and Swedish.
- Improved Spellcheck.
- Integrated Flash bulk Model/Property Release form.
- Flash bulk file upload form, select multiple files at once to upload.
Pretty good, eh? We hope you find the new Submissions tools to be time-savers, and we will continue to work hard to iron out any kinks in the site as we get closer to lift-off!
Be sure to let us know what you think, your input is key to shaping these improvements.
| | Now hiring! Reviewers wanted | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 7/2/2008 | As our submissions queue continues to grow like a hurricane, our dear Reviewers have been stretched thin. It's time to bring on some more talent, if you would like to:
a) work from anywhere on the internet on a freelance basis
b) join a team of enthusiastic creative types
c) help our contributors become better technically and conceptually
d) review lots and lots of great photos and graphics
..then mosey on over to the job posting board at http://www.zymmetrical.com/help/jobs/jobid/1/
At present we are hunting especially for people not from our neck of the woods (Canada/USA) and have a special priority for European, Asian, Australasian, African and South American native/living applicants.
Get your application in today, and join a friendly, growing crew.
| | AdByNet + Zymmetrical Partnership | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 6/3/2008 | Zymmetrical and Adbynet Make Advertising On the Net A Breeze!
High Quality Stock Photos, Images, Graphics, Fonts and Videos Available From More Than 4,000 Artists Around the Globe combined with high quality, low cost campaign production and tracking open doors to net advertising to millions of worldwide small and medium companies.
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada -- Zymmetrical™, the world’s first social digital art marketplace, today announced an agreement to allow users of Atlanta, Georgia-based AdByNet.com (www.adbynet.com), access to their library of digital art from more than 4,000 artists around the globe. Adbynet is an online media planning and buying firm that provides all in one advertising strategy, creative, execution and analysis services.
In making the announcement, Keith Tuomi, Founder and CEO of Zymmetrical.com, said AdByNet is the perfect partner. “We facilitate the offering and exchange of the raw material for a successful campaign. Into the expert hands of AdByNet's creative and analytical team, they become the weapons of success for anyone ready to take the net advertising plunge. Both companies strongly believe in leveraging technology to its fullest while keeping a strong customer service.”
Mr. Tuomi said small and medium businesses invest over $126 billion in advertising each year worldwide. “AdByNet offers these enterprises a compelling and results driven service to save them time and money. This agreement will save their users more than 80% of reproduction costs, and 70% off the cycle time, compared to outsourcing the work.”
Frederic Bien, AdByNet Founder and CEO, said, “ Zymmetrical has the most balanced offering of high quality stock photos, graphics, fonts and videos at very affordable prices. Thanks to its crowd sourcing approach, our clients are always guaranteed fresh and pertinent content for the ads we create, place, and track for them.”
By combining their efforts, both companies seek to lower the entry point to advertising on the Internet.
Millions of local businesses are loosing on the opportunity to drive new customers to their businesses Thanks to the budget friendly content of zymmetrical.com, and AdByNet's knowledge and partnerships in the industry, it is now possible for any business to create a laser sharp ad campaign for less than $600.
Mr. Bien said that since Zymmetrical's perfectly edited content is created by everyday people, it is quite possible that a car dealer in one part of the country might create images suitable for another dealer in some other part of the country. “This agreement with Zymmetrical make visibility and exchange possible. It's the Internet at its best!”
About Zymmetrical™ :(www.Zymmetrical.com), is the world’s first one stop shop social marketplace. Thousands of user generated photographs, fonts, videos, and graphics can be found at a price point defined by the artists themselves. In partnership with its members, Zymmetrical has changed the rules of content licensing by building the first fair trade community-conscious platform. With a 70% commission rate, and full control on pricing, Zymmetrical provides high quality content at budget sensitive prices. Zymmetrical is headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
About AdByNet : Adbynet is a media and buying agency that provides strategy, creative, execution, and analysis, in the placement of video and display Internet advertisements, and paid search solutions. Working closely with Google's AdSense network, Yahoo, MSN, AOL, online social networks, several video-sharing sites, and Yellow Pages directories, AdByNet tracks the success of client advertising campaigns with advanced mathematical techniques to optimize media buying decisions, and effectively manage client marketing budgets. For more information about how Atlanta, Georgia-based AdByNet optimizes client digital touch points in making the most of online advertising budgets, go to www.adbynet.com.
# # #
CONTACTS:
For AdByNet
David Andersen
404.514.0424
dave@adbynet.com
For Zymmetrical™
Sarah Bennet
pr@zymmetrical.com
Let us should you have any questions.
Sarah Bennett
Press contact
http://www.Zymmetrical.com
| | Vector .EPS Graphics Now Online | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 5/19/2008 | After a lot of work and some great feedback from Artists and Buyers, we've started to bring .EPS Vector Illustrations online for sale:
http://www.zymmetrical.com/art/graphics/graphicsshapesobjectspeople/fileid/zygfxobj00118/
Vectors are sold at a +40% pricepoint relative to their Raster .JPG versions, due to the great benefit of being able to manipulate the layered graphics any which way you like. Prices, are of course, controlled by the Artists like on the rest of the site, so you will be seeing some great marketplace dynamics going on as each of the Artists jockey for the sweet spot in value vs price.
Stay tuned for more improvements in this dept. in the coming weeks.
| | Tag Searches Enhanced | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 5/10/2008 | We've known from the start that our search and linguistics technology is a step up from the crowd, now we are bringing some new widgets online that take the behind-the-scenes workings a bit more forward into the users realm.
First step: 'Similar Searches' has been added to the bottom of the Tag Search Results screen, providing up to 30 related terms, and it's one smart little box.
Perform a search for a word or phrase, by entering it in our main search input, or clicking the tag link on any art page. As an example, we'll use the word 'break'.
On your results page, http://www.zymmetrical.com/tag-search-results/tag/break/, you will get the usual thumbnail results, and the following 'Similar Search' suggestions:
broken break coffee break broke
breaking broke-back break-dancer
Note the key difference between this and many other agency searches: 'break' is matched to 'broke'. Seems logical enough, however this technique of word-stemming (breaking a word down into it's root form, and matching all it's variations), is not the easiest thing to pull off in computer programming - especially so on a dynamic image library. Fortunately, our coders are well-caffeinated and highly motivated.
For our Buyers, this means a big increase in search satisfaction and more importantly, finding the images they want. In most stock search engines, typing in one variation of a word will -not- return results for the other, including pluralizations. A customer should not miss seeing a file because they typed a slightly different form of a word.
For our Artists, this means simply, more sales and success.
Next step: disambiguation. "Did you mean: Turkey (bird) or Turkey (country)". Stay tuned.
p.s. this word-stemming technology we use works equally well across all 8 languages we support on the site. ;)
| | PicLens Technology Preview | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 3/17/2008 | Think beyond the browser
PicLens instantly transforms your browser into a full-screen, 3D experience for viewing images on the web. Photos will come to life via a cinematic presentation that goes well beyond the confines of the traditional browser window. With PicLens, browsing and viewing images on the web will never be the same again.
The new interactive "3D Wall" lets you effortlessly drag, click, and zoom your way around a wall of pictures for an extraordinary, full-screen viewing experience. Why mundanely flip through online photo galleries or squint at thumbnails when you can fly through an immersive, full-screen experience instead?
To use PicLens on Zymmetrical, please download the plugin from PicLens (http://www.piclens.com/). After installation, click 'Start Slide Show' on http://www.zymmetrical.com/info/labs/piclens/.
We are excited about being the first stock agency to leverage this technology and want to know your opinion! Please drop us your thoughts in the 'Leave a Comment' area on the bottom of the PicsLen demo page.
| | Expanded Search launched | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 2/14/2008 |
Expanded Search launched
Digital Art site Zymmetrical, the first user generated marketplace for photography, video, fonts and graphics where members can price their offering, today announced the launch of its new “expanded search”, reinventing the search for visuals.
With hundreds of millions of images and graphics available in the stock photography world, the “expanded search” delivers the highly-focused results that buyers need. After extensively researching and analyzing user needs, the Zymmetrical team has created new query tools that allow for a more natural approach to finding the perfect video, graphic, font or image; all at a budget-friendly price.
The Freerange ™ option allows users to find images with a designated area of blank or clutter-free space to facilitate adding a logo or text. When combined with the Color Picker tool, which allows users to select the dominant color of a visual, the result is a highly accurate result. “Image buyers already know what they need when they perform a search,” says Keith Tuomi, CEO and founder of Zymmetrical, “our new tools allow them to get to the perfect result much faster.”.
Zymmetrical’s breakthrough approach to search blends a semantic search with a purely intuitive experience. While the majority of midstock and microstock sites rely heavily on a basic keyword search, Zymmetrical is building a user-friendly site with intelligent search options.
The many “expanded search” tools work in perfect combination with each other, acting as a virtual search assistant, quickly filtering out the unnecessary content explains Tuomi. “We have sprinkled some human intelligence in our search tools”, he continues, “making it more useful and less complicated”.
Zymmetrical is also the first and only midstock site to offer a Free Firefox plug-in (available here) that allows to search right from your tool bar.
With traffic doubling every six months, Zymmetrical is quickly becoming a familiar destination for anyone in need of a video, font, graphic or photograph. Moreover, available in 8 different languages, it is fast becoming the preferred creative tool to a large international community of art buyers.
About Zymmetrical.com:
Created in 2006, Zymmetrical offers a unique one-stop-shop experience for creative professionals worldwide looking to greatly expand their inspiration. It is the premier destination for user-generated royalty-free photos, graphics, videos and fonts at budget friendly price.
Zymmetrical features a high-end technology platform, a Fair Trade approach to crowd sourcing and a Google-Search friendly design maintained by a highly dedicated international team. Visit http://www.zymmetrical.com for more information. |
| | Firefox Search Plugin | (Published by Keith Tuomi) 1/4/2008 |
Firefox Search Plugin
Do you use Firefox? If not, shame on you, it really is a nice piece of internet browser.
You can now search Zymmetrical art from the Firefox search input (on the top right of the browser).
Click here to install our custom search.
|
| |  |
|