3/13/08

RateItAll on MySpace

We are working very hard to build a RateItAll feature for MySpace that will let you do cool things like post reviews, read your MySpace friends' reviews, and check your ratings compatibility against your friends.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, my goal is to make RateItAll available on ALL of the sites that folks spend their time on - blogs, Facebook, MySpace - it shouldn't matter. I want you to have access to all of your reviews, and to be able to accumulate helpful votes wherever you spend your time on the Web.

Stay tuned....

Compatibility Test Results Now Displaying on FB Profile Pages

Check it out


3/11/08

Lots More Compatibility Tests on FB

We've launched a few more compatibility tests for our Facebook App:

  • March Madness Compatibility
  • Test in Men Compatibility (I did not make this test, not that there's anything wrong with that)
  • NBA Compatibility
  • Web 2.0 Compatibility
We have more in the works as well.... Star Wars (thanks for the suggestions Numbah), Movies, Music, etc..


To check them out, add our FB app.

3/6/08

I am 64% Politically Compatible to Wiseguy

That seems to be about right.

Want to test your own compatibility against me or Wiseguy? Go get the RateItAll for Facebook App, find us here, and challenge us to a compatibility test.

We also have compatibility tests for beer, the NBA, San Francisco, Taste in Women, and more....

If you are on Facebook....

.... please become a "Fan" of the f the RateItAll App here. This way RIA regulars can find each other on Facebook.

Also, feel free to post your RateItAll nickname in the thread so that folks can decide whether to add each other as friends on Facebook.

Why would you want to be friends with RIA'ers on Facebook? Because we have these cool Compatibility Tests on RateItAll for Facebook that allows you to check how compatible you are with other folks in things like Politics, Taste in Beer, etc.

Wiseguy is completing the politics compatibility test now... and we'll find out once and for all how politically compatible we are. I'm not overly optimistic that we're going to be very compatible :)

3/5/08

Tampa!

Is going on live on RateItAll's local business review directory.  Here is the Tampa Directory.

Let me know if anybody else has city requests - Twansalem has been adding stuff to Iowa City and it's starting to take shape.

2/26/08

Changes to Recent Reviews Page

Have you noticed that they Recent Reviews page looks a little different?

We trimmed down the time stamp that was displaying seconds, we reduced the breadcrumb trail to show only the item name and the list, we put the item name in bold, and we've added the image of the reviewer to the review.

Looks better, no?

We have one more tweak in the works as well....

Database Clean-Up (with some collateral damage)

Guys,

I'm sorry to report that any ratings / reviews / and lists posted yesterday are gone. We had to revert back to our backup db that was updated through Monday at 1AM.

Here's what happened:

A long time ago, we set up our system so that non registered users could rate and review things. These reviews would not post live on the site until the person registered, but we had to save user information about EVERYBODY - registered or not.

Well we quickly realized that people found this system confusing, so we scrapped it. However, we did not scrap the process that "remembered" anonymous users. So every day, we were accumulating thousands of these "anon" users in our database, that were just taking up space.

So as of yesterday, we were up to MILLIONS of lines in our database of worthless anon info. We kept putting it off, and putting it off, because a clean up of this magnitude is a big exercise.

RateItAll's CTO last night made the call that it was time to clean this stuff up. In the process of removing all of these anon listings, there was a problem with the db. We were forced to go back to Monday morning's backup (this is why we do backups every single day).

The good news is that all of those ANON listings are out. The bad news is that we lost a day's worth of data.

We're making a concerted effort to get our technology in order, to make the site faster and better. This was a very unfortunate side effect, of an initiative that in the long term will improve site experience.

2/24/08

San Antonio is now Live

We just turned on our San Antonio directory in RateItAll's local business review channel.

2/21/08

Add your city to RateItAll Local

Twansalem recently suggested that we add Iowa City to our local business directory. Unfortunately, I didn't have the data. So what we've done is added a skeleton Iowa City Directory with a couple of categories - Iowa City Pizza, Iowa City Restaurants, Iowa City Bars, etc.

Twansalem can now add his favorite establishments at his leisure, and if is participating in the RIA economy program, get a rev share on any any local business listing that he adds to the directory.

Let me know in the comments if there are other cities that you'd like to see represented, and I can see if we can work something similar to what we did for Iowa City.

2/18/08

Two New Cities in RIA Local

We've launched two new cities as part of our local business reviews section: a Richmond, VA Directory and a Madison, WI Directory.

You can now rate restaurants, doctors, hotels, mechanics, bars, and much more in both Richmond and Madison.

2/15/08

Best Song from the 1990's?

I don't know what it is, but you can probably find it on Jamie McBain's Music from the 1990's list.

I was speed rating this list, and I couldn't get through it. Nearly 800 song titles, all with descriptions.... incredible. Remember, on these song lists, you can actually embed the track by grabbing song widgets from Imeem.

2/13/08

Weblist on Phoenix Local News

I've heard from a couple of reliable sources that HistoryFan's weblist "Worst Valentines Day Gifts" was featured on the Channel 10 local news in Phoenix.

Nice work HF.


2/7/08

Don't burn yourself....

... on RateItAll's screamingly fast web pages.

RateItAll's new CTO, Mathew, was up most of the night working on our database. He upgraded some software that allowed us to fully use more of the machine's memory, and he fiddled with some settings.

In poking around just now, the site is flying like I haven't seen before.

Nice work Matt.

2/6/08

Scheduled Maintenance Tonight: 12AM PST

Guys, we're bringing the site down tonight at midnight PST for no more than 2 hours while we drop in some new db software that should help performance.

Thanks for your patience.

2/5/08

Profile Page Fix

Several of you have commented that the links from the section on the profile page called "Reviews from My Trusted Network" weren't working. Well, they're working again.

2/3/08

Super Bowl Ads

We have the 2008 Super Bowl Commercials list up, and each commercial has the video embedded. Try speed rating it... it's cool.

1/31/08

Some Good News from the RIA Community

Slow databases? Broken web pages? These aren't problems. Problems are what ZB describes here. If you have a sec, send some congratulations to this man and his family. They've earned it.

1/29/08

Some Small Fixes / Changes

Couple of things we've been working on:

  • You can now read RIA's entire database of reviews on Facebook. Before you could only read your friends' reviews and write reviews. Try it out - the easiest way to see the new functionality is to try searching for something, then click "read reviews."
  • We've fixed a design issue that caused the hottest reviewers section on the home page to occasionally jumble.
  • Also on the Facebook App, we've made it easier to see what your friends are reviewing. To try this out, click the "Friends' Reviews" tab.

Apture