Then, I found Balsamiq Markups. Balsamiq Markups is like my whiteboard on steroids — yet, still much, much better than that.  Balsamiq is an Adobe AIR application that allows you to quickly prototype a site using common elements found on a web page like buttons, tabs, search, etc.  You can quickly and easily re-size elements, group them together, or lock them on the page.  (My whiteboard never did that.)

Balsamiq Mockups deftly combines a rough, hand-drawn sketch look with a smooth, Visio-like ability to arrange elements on a page.  For designers, this will save them from getting into Photoshop right away.  These mock-ups allow you to get a feel for space and alignment without needing to commit to color, design, or typography.  For everyone else, Balsamiq provides one of the easiest ways for you to get into the web design game too.  Developers can test out what they’re trying to build, product managers can test out new ideas — heck, even corporate executives can figure this thing out.

Because Balsamiq’s so easy to use, it’s a great tool for soliciting group UI discussion.  You can quickly iterate on an idea using multiple versions of a mock or by simply changing your design on the fly.  On top of all that, it’s actually fun to use.  When was the last time you picked up a new software product and said that?

To see for yourself, try out Balsamiq’s online demo.  You’ll quickly get sick of being told you’re using a demo, but you’ll also quickly find yourself feeling like you have the design skills of Steve Jobs.  For $79, you can have that feeling all you want with their full version.

As a blogger, I was granted a free license in exchange for an honest review (it meets my advertising tolerance level), so in that vein, here are a few things I think could be better:

1. The toolbar could use some improvement.  It takes up a substantial portion of the screen yet it seems like I’m always trying to find an element.  Sections labelled “Big” aren’t that helpful.  The issue’s alleviated by placing elements in multiple sections, but better labeling and smaller icons would certainly help.  Maybe a scrolling list with a single preview of the image?  I have ideas about this
2. The fade away toolbar that rests on the editing screen is also a bit tricky.  I often didn’t know what was hidden behind this section.  When it appears, it always seems to be in the way.  When I need something, I can’t always figure out where it is.  For example, clicking on the down arrow to bring up all icon options was not entirely intuitive.  I think there’s room for this to be in the top bar to save space on the editing screen and make it more visible.
3. Last, I’d say ditch the notebook look.  You don’t need to reinforce the fact that Balsamiq mirrors a sketch, and the notebook-on-a-web-page look feels very first generation blog to me.  Balsamiq couldn’t be further from first generation web and the rest of the editor should reflect that!

Thanks Balsamiq!

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Scripped follows the ‘give away your core product for free and make money on the side’ model. Their core product, their script writer, is free. They also offer script storage services for a $5 fee, editing for $100+, and script marketing and contest submission services. The support services are partly thanks to partnerships with Coverage, Ink and WordHustler.

Their editor is simple but gets the job done. User’s can write scripts directly into a format that’s production ready with the proper indentation, font sizing, and page layouts. If you’re not happy with a draft, create a new one under the same project. When you’re finished, export to PDF for wider distribution or take advantage of their partnership with WordHustler to submit your content to publishers and contests. The various features support the beginning of the content creation process through the writer’s (hopeful) pay-out

The site’s design is evocative of a bygone, pre-computer era. The editor’s font looks like it’s straight off the typewriter. Coupled with black and white cartoons throughout the site, it’s just the sort of hip throwback that should do well attracting young, wordy users.

If there’s something Scripped could improve on, it’s the organization and coordination between some of it’s various parts. The Creative Support section isn’t quite as easy to access as some of the other features, but it could be really useful — especially for the company’s bottom line at $129 per script. A better marketplace-like view into available projects would be nice too, and the site sometimes feels too much like a blog than the writing portal their products seem to suggest.

Interaction will continue to be a challenge, but judging by the list of future features in their Pipeline, Scripped is intent on building a user community that will support the next generation of screenwriters.

In plain English, Crazy Egg shows you how your visitors use your site. Where are they clicking?

Crazy Egg offers 5 free tests of their service so I recently started a month long Crazy Egg test. Soon after I began, I wrote about the wpSearch plugin for WordPress. Crazy Egg tells me that people actually read this blog and try some of these things out. That’s good to know. It also tells me people tend to click the “Enter” in “Enter Venture” because it looks like a button. The other major button, the LinkedIn button, is second only to the search bar in number of clicks.  It even tells me I need to do something about that subscribe button…

Rather than explain any more though, just check out Crazy Egg’s results for Enter Venture. The images (and free trials) speak for themselves:

The Heat View - The heat view shows you a rough focal point for a user’s eye for popular areas.

The Confetti View — This is great for figuring out exactly where your users clicked. Notice, most of my users do not click Search. They must key it.

Statistics Overlay - This view gives you both the number of clicks and the exact element that is actioned with those clicks.

The different views do overlap a bit with their function, but so be it. They look cool in the process. I’ve been thinking about experimenting with advertisements on Enter Venture at some point. Crazy Egg’s $9/month (after a few more free trials) would likely be money well spent to help maximize those advertisements.

I am, however, really excited to talk about iPhone applications because I’m really excited to have my iPhone back. I’ve been without it for 3 months since I dropped and cracked the screen. I have replaced the phone just in time for the App Store, which is a much cooler, easier to use version of the CNET Download.com site, tailored specifically for the iPhone.

Some of the blogosphere’s response to the App Store launch has been critical. That NDA issue is a big deal, but it’s solvable. I think some of the prices are misguided — $10 for Tetris?! Really? Can I get an iPhone-crash-free guarantee with that? The market will ultimately take care of this too.

On the whole, this particular user is completely satisfied with the first release of applications and looking forward to future mobile innovations on the App Store. As a glimpse of that future, here are my top applications and ideas for applications.

Feel free to add your own ideas to the Comments.

5 Favorite iPhone Apps

1. Mlb.com At Bat – Have you ever seen video playback of this quality on any computer? I have a MLB.tv subscription, and it never, ever looks as good as the replays you can watch on Mlb.com At Bat just minutes after the play occurs. Mlb.com At Bat is like having a personalized, DVD quality version of Baseball Tonight’s highlight reel in your pocket.
2. Pandora – Apparently Pandora’s been around forever because my roomate remembers first hearing about them in college. If it weren’t for the iPhone, I might never have known about Pandora. I don’t think I’m alone here. Pandora’s online radio just became a whole lot more compelling now that I can carry it with me.
3. Google – Google has an iPhone version for a lot of its major products so they’re obviously at the top of the list. GChat and Google Reader are my two personal favorites.
4. WordPress – I have not used the WordPress application too much yet, but I already know I love it. The level of control it gives me over my blog at all times is reassuring. The Guarantee Fairy has nothing on that.
5. (Tie) Truveo & Twittelator – At first, I would have said Twittelator. This level of access to Twitter has made me much more active with the service and is what prompted this post. At the same time, I just spent half an hour checking out Obama in Berlin videos on Truveo. I’m hooked on both of these applications.

5 iPhone Apps with Potential

1. PayPal – Paypal’s application is a great example of clean, simple, easy-to-use design. I wish I had more reasons to send money to people with email addresses just to try it out.
2. Bloomberg – The iPhone application is nothing compared to a Bloomberg terminal, but it’s certainly of the same quality and style.
3. NYTimes – This application would be great if it would just stop crashing. I’ll read the NYTimes and use this application all the time as soon as it’s updated.
4. All Games – Most Games are paid applications. The problem I have with the paid applications is that they’re mostly in beta. I want to see the dust settle a bit on paid applications before I start pulling my credit card out. (The MLB application doesn’t count. I had to have that.)
5. Shakespeare – I walk around with the entire collection of Shakespeare in my pocket these days. If that doesn’t get you laid in literature circles, it at least speaks to the potential of online books for the iPhone.

5 Apps I Want

1. Credit Card Sensor – This requires a bit more infrastructure than a simple application, but it’d be an amazing leap toward the idea of having one application in your pocket. If you could figure out a way to put any item in my wallet on my phone, it would also make this list.
2. More Video Applications – I want an application that gives me quick news updates, movie previews, downloadable content, etc. Truveo’s a search engine. I want a better content provider application.
3. Emergency Services Contact – By leveraging the iPhone’s location awareness services, this application could determine a caller’s exact location immediately for police / fire fighthers / ambulances to immediately navigate to the scene.
4. Level – I know, this is random, but who hasn’t needed a level when they’re hanging a picture? I’m sure someone could make a simple level tool that every iPhone-carrying-window-hanger would love. Update: There is a level for iPhone. PosiMotion has an “A Level” application. iPhone-carrying-window-hangers rejoice!
5. Fingerprint recognition unlock – I love the idea of having a lock on my iPhone. With my notes, my calendar, contacts, email, etc. on my iPhone, I think that makes sense. The problem is, I can’t stand the idea of having to unlock my iPhone every single time I want to use it. This thing has a touch screen, right?  If you can’t take an actual image, how about the shape and width of your fingerprint? I’d love to simply press my finger to a point on the phone to both activate and unlock it. That’d be both security and convenience.

I know a few of these things are impossible right now given the restrictions Apple’s put on the iPhone SDK, but give it time. The walls will slowly come down.

Whenever I go to one of these events, I enjoy a little chuckle to myself when I think of the conferences I’ve attended for my day job.  There’s typically a host of software providers, or a featured software provider, trying to sell any doohickie or widget they can stuff down the government’s throat.  I’m often the only person in the room under 40 and always the only one in the room with a spike of hair running over the top of his head.  For one of the more enjoyable conferences, NYC’s GovTech, the NYTimes tech blogger, David Pogue, gave a great, but revealing presentation about all kinds of new things on the internets — Skype, iPhone (1.0 not 2.0), etc.  It sometimes feels like stepping back in time.

Mashable was about as different from my day job’s conferences as one can get, but maybe it was a little too far in the future?  The event was hosted at Touch, a faux ritzy lounge / club that most people probably think of when they think of New York bars.  That’s right kids, plush couches, and a freakin’ DJ!  The only problem with this is that whole “Exhibit” part sometimes got kind of tough.  People were yelling over one another, and the exhibit area was packed, even during the first hour or so that I was there.  Not a bad bar scene, but again, the exhibit was kind of lost in the mix.

Don’t get me wrong.  I completely enjoyed myself at Mashable’s Exhibit Hall.  A bit of free food, (not free) beer, and internet geeks in the same room makes for a good time. Maybe they just needed a bigger space?

Rather than talk about the event, I decided to do something similar to what I did with the Columbia Venture Community article and review a few of the companies and websites I saw yesterday.  (If anyone else wants to review some of these sites, feel free to do so in the comments.  Yes, you, my 10 readers…):

NameThis – NameThis is another Kluster product and seems very similar to the Kluster site.  NameThis offers allows you to crowdsource the name of your company, product, or, well, anything.  My initial impression with the site is that I’m not in love with the wooden deck-like header overlaid horizontally on the vertically striped background.  It kind of hurts my eyes, but doesn’t keep me from being able to quickly figure out what this site’s all about.  They do a great job of using the most important screen real estate with the important functions of the site – naming competitions.

I ran into a few stumbling blocks when I tried to use NameThis though.  And by that, I mean, I can’t log in to use the site really at all.  I tried to log on to NameThis using my Kluster email account, the log on kept failing, but there was no message to tell me what was wrong.  I decided to “forgot my password” and had an email sent to me with a link to reset my password.  When I reset my password, I was taken straight back to the original log in screen as if there was another unannounced error with the system.  Grrr.  I can log in to Knewsroom and Kluster so I don’t think it’s me.

I can log in to the site and see the current naming competitions, but I can’t participate.  It’s too bad too.  The concept of this site is so simple and easy to understand that I want to participate, you know?  Just the tip, just to see how it feels?

One last thing about Kluster, they seem like they have found a system that will really be able to churn out products.  It seems like they’ve put together three different applications over night so I bet we can expect more.

edopter – edopter was probably my favorite site of the event.  Even better, Matthew from edopter was probably the easiest person to talk to of all the participants.  Great site.  Great people.  Good combination.  I don’t think I’m a part of edopter’s target market, but I can completely see the type of people who would love this site.  In fact, I have a friend of mine that I’m sharing the link with once I finish this post.

For the most part, the site design is great.  I came away with a few ideas for updating the Enter Venture blog design (whenever that will be) .  They do a really good job of focusing your eye on big, clear images and text, which makes for a fun browsing experience.

I do have a few complaints: Some of the graphic design makes it a bit difficult to scan for elements on the site.  The buttons blend in with the rest of the background and text a bit too much — for example, the log in button on the home page.  The search bar also suffers from a similar problem but looks more like a button than an input field.

Concertattack – ConcertAttack has a great, clean site that addresses the popular music / artist / fan / concert market.  I should be feeling great about ConcertAttack, but here’s the thing…  Haven’t I seen this site before?  Or some variation of this site?  I’m certainly not someone who would use the site.  There definitely are a lot of people who would — just check out the activity on the site.

My worry for them is how are they really, really going to stand out?  Something tells me the fans of these sites are pretty fickle.  Concertattack must do one or two things better than anyone else, it’s just hard for me to know what those things are.

VideoClix.tv – VideoClix was a crowded by people so I knew there was something worth checking out in them.  I just watched the demo of their product and can now see why it was so crowded.  VideoClix has made video interactive and clickable for more information and product suggestions.  While watching a video of Steve Harvey, you can mouse over the video for an indication of what’s clickable.  When you click on the video, a small sidebar slides out with more information about Home Depot, sandpaper, Steve Harvey, etc.

The product doesn’t yet seem perfect from the demo, but it’s a certainly on its way towards a really new and interesting viewing experience. I look forward to my beta invite to see more.

Rubicon – Hmm.  Rubicon.  I was at  first excited about Rubicon.  This might be something I could use in the future.  I have a blog.  At the point that I have more than 10 readers, I might want to put ads on this blog.  Unfortunately, I never found myself wanting to get started.  They do some sort of ad network optimization thing where we all magically make tons of money, or “mad cash”.  All I wanted to do is figure out what they could do for Enter Venture.  Instead, I filled out a form, that took me to their “User Interface” (I should have known to bail out here), then another set of questions, and really, I stopped there.  It was clear that this wasn’t something I wanted to use.

After writing the above, I decided to give Rubicon one last try and at least view their 3 minute demo.  Instead of a demo though, I got a voiced over sales presentation.  I think they’re really stretching the use of the word “demo” (short for “demonstration”) here.

MotionBox – MotionBox was another company and site that I really liked.  Put them in the edopter bucket.  MotionBox seems to have found a niche in the family video sharing space.  Their site uses all kinds of language and images that target the “Hi Mom, the baby did x today!” audience.  MotionBox’s user account screens look the best of any of the sites I saw at Mashable.  They’re well organized, have subtle design touches that compliment that organization, and they make it extremely easy to use their system — right down to the short but instructive step-by-step guide that’s just perfect for their target market.

Unfortunately, it’s ridiculously hot in my apartment right now as NYC just got slammed with a heat wave so I need to wrap this up here.  MotionBox deserves a more extensive review, but I’m (thankfully) short of any sample baby videos at the moment and don’t expect any soon.  Maybe then I’ll give them the full test.

Thanks again to Mashable and all of the event’s participants!