Current.com Blog | July 21, 2010 | 19 comments

Feature Release: New Profile Pages, Activity Streams, Twitter, and Badges!

As far as releases go, this one is stuffed to the gills. There's a lot to cover here, so let's not waste any time.

New Profiles With Activity Streams

Ever since I began working at Current we've fielded requests for improved profile pages, and feed based activity streams. Well, prepare yourself because here comes feed overload. Today we launch a totally revamped profile page experience, and here's everything you need to know about the changes in place.

Note: Activity streams will only display the most recent 200 events to help reduce load on the system.

 

Viewing Other Peoples' Profiles

In the old system, a visit to someones profile gave you a few options to view their activity, but some of the details were missing. For example, what are they choosing to follow on the site? Did they recently connect with someone new, or choose to follow infoMania? This wasn't immediately clear.

Our new profile page layout offers a feed of activity that can either be viewed in one catch all stream, or filtered with the following options:

Viewing Your Own Profile

You might be thinking, "OK, the design update is nice, but this seems pretty similar to the old profile options." And you're right...sort of. The real difference with profile updates comes in the way your own profile works when you visit it.

Before, a visit to your own profile would show you the exact same thing everyone else saw -- a list of recent activity. Starting today, your profile will default to an all-new view when you visit it while logged in -- Latest Updates.

The Latest Updates is a sortable feed of everything the people you are choosing to follow are doing on the site, which means your profile page is now a pretty useful place to visit on a more regular basis. Don't worry, you can still see what your profile looks like to everyone else by clicking on the "My Activity" tab. Go ahead, try out the new stream of activity on your profile and let us know what you think.

Twitter Integration

We realize that many of you are active on Twitter as well as Facebook, and since you're already a fan of Current TV what better way to share your insider knowledge with your friends than by connecting your profile to your Facebook and Twitter?

We've had Facebook up and running for some time now, but today we add Twitter to the list of services you can authenticate on Current. What does this do? It makes it easy to share your activity on Current with your followers, and when you earn badges and achievements we'll even let them know about it. In addition, once you've authenticated your accounts you can use Facebook or Twitter to log into Current.

Well, what are you waiting for? Head over to your account preferences and connect your accounts!

Badges and Achievements

There is so much crammed into this release that I've decided to devote an entire thread to Badges and Achievements alone. Head over here to learn more.

This is a boatload of new functionality, so if you bump into any bugs or general wonkiness, or just want to offer some feedback, please send us a note via our support and feedback page.

 

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19 comments // Feature Release: New Profile Pages, Activity Streams, Twitter, and Badges!

  • islek
    • 0
      islek  

    • I recently noticed that my activity stream now shows the 200 most recent updates by people I follow. When the activity stream was first introduced, I'd sometimes have over 1,100 new updates on my stream when I logged in! I'm really digging that it has been modified. Thanks dudes and dudettes!

    • 1 year ago
  • jeffissleeping
  • telenetaustralia
    • 0
      telenetaustralia  

    • troppi link..siamo "linkati" e schiacciati: non so se durera'. Penso che ogni network dovrebbe essere fine a se stesso, se no diventa incontrollabile. E soprattutto la Rete perde la sua liberta'.Un mio pensiero.

    • 1 year ago
  • TurboKitty42
  • remanns
  • ScottyT
  • Stoneyroad
  • unimatrix0
  • jamieson
  • mario_a
  • kennymotown
  • jamieson
    • 0
      jamieson  
    • mario_a:

      Actually Mario mate, that was me on my phone on the way back, excited to see what changes there have been and what new cool stuff I can do with my current profile. But, I'm afraid to say now I've seen the changes I'm not sure they really work for me. I recognise the hard work you must have done on this and don't think I'm complaining, but a couple of things jumped out at me,

      I see the video player has disappeared from the profile? I'm mainly here to produce vcams and hopefully more video content, and I was hoping the new changes would give more opportunities to those looking to create their own content (pods, vcams, webcams) by displaying their contributions easier and more predominately on their profile and on the site. I need the video player to show my contributions.

      The badges don't feel great. I'm willing to roll with it for ninety days or something to see how it plays out, but really it reminds me of those facebook news feed updates of someone achieving level whatever in farmville. Since I comment rarely and contribute news even less, I don't expect to be getting many badges myself.

      But some people do comment all the time, and some add stories all the time, so to recognise that current users use the site in different ways there must be a way to allow users options to use their profiles in different ways. Right? Like a producer style layout, a commentator style layout, standard profile layout or a contributor style layout perhaps? and you pick one?

      I don't like how the badges are more predominant on the left of the profile than the connections. To me it kind of reads like stats are more important than our friends in the community. Connecting with people over issues through conversation is the best thing about current.

      I don't know, change is a good thing, but some of these feel wrong. Maybe it'll just take time to get used to it so I'll stick with it. Like I said before I think it's great how much time and work you've put into the updates and I'm definitely looking forward to seeing what else is getting changed up on current.

    • 1 year ago
  • jamieson
  • mario_a
    • 0
      mario_a  
    • jamieson:

      I definitely hear you about the video player and you're desire to see your VCAMs in a centralized place. I have a solution for you, and I'll send you a message.

      As for the updates and the conversations, we actually feel that Activity Streams on profiles open that stuff up in a much more enriching way. You can sort things down by comments or submissions to see only those posts from the people you are following, and you're alerted on the site whenever new activity is available to check out on your profile page.

      Definitely appreciate the feedback here. Thanks!

    • 1 year ago
  • digitrash
  • mario_a
    • +1
      mario_a  

    • Note: Our release is in progress, so you might see features pop up on the site over time. If you click a link that gives you a 404, or you try to integrate Twitter and it's not available, try it again in a few minutes.

      Thanks!

    • 1 year ago
mario_a
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