I responded to the invitation of busy.org to be a beta tester of their new platform. You can read more about it here
If you want to know some of the new things that will be included in this new version, check their wiki here: https://github.com/busyorg/busy/wiki/%5BND%5D-Tester
So let's jump into it, shall we?
The Text Editor : 7/ 10 (Revised to 9/10 -> See top comment by @fabien)
To be honest, this is the one thing that is the most important for me: a well functioning text editor. This is the first thing I tested and it' been just a charm to work with. It's beautiful and easy to work with. So why am I giving it a 7/10? Well 2 things.
The text isn't auto-saved. So if by mistake I were to click and lose my page, I could potentially have all that I have written lost. This is one of those features that I LOVE on steemit.com
The ICON to submit a post is not ideal. I would use something much more self evident than a small icon of a pen on the top right. I like the obviousness of the blue button that we have on steemit.com
Apart from those 2 things. This is a really cool interface to work with.
Navigation: 7/10
Navigating Busy.org new interface is easy and pleasing to the eyes. I like the suggestion box on the right side of the navigation. It helps discovery of new authors and content.
One thing that becomes to be clearer and clearer as time go by is that I can't wait for communities to be implemented. I don't enjoy the trending section. Too much stuff that I am not interested about. But that can't be a criticism of busy.
I like that the icons under the post are big enough for me to jump directly to the comment section of a post.
But I think the interface miss the point...I wish the app was different enough from steemit.com to justify it's existence.
The image thumbnails are beautiful and it would make it a perfect platform to post photos, outbound links with a short commentary "a la facebook". An "Album" function would be wonderful. If all interactions happened in the newsfeed than I think we would have a winner here.
Bottom line, the experience is too much like steemit.com in my opinion.
Conclusion
In the next few weeks, I'll make a point of using busy.org for most of my interaction with the STEEM blockchain. Whenever I find something to review, I'll post a blog about it.
Thank you for your review! It's great to have you testing the new Busy :)
About the editor your post is not lost when you close the page, it's saved automatically in your drafts, you can manage multiple post drafts and they are synchronised across devices, you have the same drafts if you login in your desktop or mobile. There is an indicator when the draft is saved near the button "Publish", but we probably need to make these more visible.
I'm also waiting for communities :D, i'm sure it will help a lot content discovery and it's something we want to integrate when possible.
Now we mostly been working on the user experience for the same use case than Steemit. We definitely need something different and your idea of posting directly from the feed, it's part of the things we want to do and the way we tend to go.
I will make sure your comment is top so that people know there is a draft function. (it's a really good idea)
I'm really glad to know that you are looking to differentiate from steemit.com. You've been doing an amazing job and I can't wait to see what you'll come up with in the future.
i shall check it and if found better, i shall use it.
The text is autosaved. It's in the drafts afterwards.
Edit: And you can access drafts from different devices.
thanks. Good to know. I didn't see that.
That's a plus feature, Steemit.com should take notes.
I rather use Steemit myself as I am already used to it and I find it easier to navigate myself looking for certain posts. The trending page is something I often find kind of hindering myself as well, cause a lot of the same authors keep showing up.
I agree with your point. It's too much like steemit to justify it, but it will be nice to have an alternative to steemit.com whenver the website is down from a DDOS attack or the variety of other things that can cause a website to crash.
nice post my friend and thanks a lot for sharing with us your experience about busy, well i think busy.org is fantastic alternative to steemit.com, i experience it once the steemit.com is down and i am impressed with it's performance, i feel much better browsing experience while using it and another think which i like is their notifications they also give us notifications about latest news of cryptos, blockchain and bitcoin and it's great for us because we also stay updated about what's going on latest in cryptos, so all in all it's fantastic development and surely strengthened the steem blockchain, stay blessed my friend and have a fantastic week ahead.
Hello man! If Steemit was not down last Friday and earlier today, I would not have discovered busy.org at all!
As I was not able to access steemit, i went on busy.org and tried it out! For a first time, it was hard for me to understand how it works but less harder than when I joined steemit though!
I am planning to use it more and adapt to it, as we never know when will the next downtime of steemit be and having this alternative is very useful.
Thanks so much for your review!
really need a community type of platform like subreddits for steem
it's coming...it's coming
I am failing to understand what the purpose is in creating alternative steemit like platforms. Why not work on making steemit better? How is this good for our community? Are these just experiments to create ideas for steemit?
The more interface the better. Some interface will focus on photography, other on blogging, other on micro-blogging(like twitter). The more choice and entry point to the blockchain, the better. (more users)
Will this end up diluting our community by spreading out users on to different interfaces based on there category? Maybe I'm wrong but "together we are strong" no?
No, it only increases the value of Steem! The power of a currency lies in how many people use it/invest in it. This is an opportunity to get more people to invest their time into creating value for Steem! Steemit isn't for everyone, a less blog oriented platform could draw in new faces!
Ok ya I get it now. I just posted on busy and I figured out what its all about now.
good, for when steemit.com is down.
Wow beautiful post
i'm too middle-aged and lazy to switch, i'll stick with steemit thru hell and high ddos water
nice information for us @cryptoctopus
sometime when steemit down we can open busy.org
Just tried the old busy out. I am not even cabable of puting a picture in my text. If I am pressing the little plus sign a camera sign pops up. However if I am pressing it nothing happens. Any advise welcome.
By the way I like the simplicity of that site.
I faced a issue that is,
If my connection disconnects, the header that shows the username and searchbar breaks. Have you faced the same issue?
I'm used to steemit, lets see in future I feel like switching. @cryptoctopus
Amazing post and narrative.
Thanks for sharing such great post with us!
Thanks good good nice post shearing pelese my vote halp me
good post
let's approve to see how this is and how it works. and help beta
Im thinking that i should try that as soon as possible :) thanks keep sharing
Thank you for sharing information science. I still have much to learn again. I have not been able to argue. But I share your best opinion.
i tried it too looks perfect :D neat and clean UI easy to understand and ready to go ;)
@cryptoctopus,
I think you made a great review about it! That's awesome and personally I like the UI of the new version too! Thanks for sharing such great review about it and I agree "The text isn't auto-saved"! Hope to here more reviews about busy.org from you!
Cheers~
You should try it again. There are drafts. There is your autosaved text.
@espoem,
Thanks friend, I will test it again! By the way while we have steemit, I don't know why we need busy.org :D
Cheers~
I think we all saw why it is good to have an alternative. When steemit wasn't working, busy worked well.
wrong forum
@cryptoctopus - Sir, you made a nice review. Talked goods & bads about new version of Busy.Org. I wish Busy developers will see your post Sir. Nice you decided to share your viewpoint about this incredible platform with Steem Community.
+W+ [UpVoted & ReSteemed]
amigo #resteemia at your service
fantastic analysis about busy.org. but i prefer steemit than it. impressive work done by @cryptoctopus
ReSteemia
'UpVoted ReSteemed Commented'
Great guide and tips! I spent a long time looking for something like this!
I stopped using busy.org after the extension came out.
Thanks for your review.
That Platform is still in Beta phase so I'll refrain from giving my logins there , Who knows what will happen when some people test it !
steemconnect is working well and endorsed by Steemit INC. All future login will be done through that app. You can trust it in my opinion.
I thought about Busy.org while waiting for my Steemit approval. But now I am here, I think I will stay with Steemit. Liking what I see so far. Good post though.
Excellent post @cryptoctopus. you create such a nice post which is very useful for steemit community.
"The Busy team offers open-source projects on Steem. Our goal is to develop the best tools and strategy to enable billions of people to take part in this thriving ecosystem."
hold on a second, what? Is it a collective hub to talk about projects that run on the steem platform? (steemit being the main one?)
Not sure to understand your question. Busy is a development team for the steem blockchain.
OH, that makes a lot more sense now. they are just developing more tools for the steem platform.
This is going to be a dumb question but who owns steemit.com?
Dan Larimer and Ned Scott... and We are all shareholders in a way :)
Dan Larimer does not own Steemit.com. He used to be the CTO of Steemit but he resigned several months ago.
Thank you for correcting me :) is it just Ned now?
Ned is the CEO of Steemit Inc but there is a whole team behind him.
Steemit INC owns steemit.com (and his the main dev team for the steem blockchain)
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I've read some reviews about this alternate option. So far, people have talked good about it be it here at Steemit or at YouTube as far as my little research is concerned. There are some cool features specially the editing without html or markdown is what I liked the most. Great post @cryptoctopus.
Now, here is a conspiracy theory that I just created: :p
These recent attacks on the website justified the inevitability of these alternate sites. Can attackers and the owners of these sites be the same guys?
Pardon me if I'm using my not much used investigative neurons too much on this event. :d
Superb post. Keep writing more. Stay awesome.
Steem On!
Short answer...no. Busy received funding from Steemit Inc and both teams work in partnership
dude thats pretty cool
busy.org nicely explained all the new features and nothing being left out , like the conclusion part interesting :)
You have a lot of awesome posts, but this is
by far one of your best ones man. I needed
this one today! Thanks.
Any Dutch people here who can test my Dutch translation of busy.org ?
I tried it before but I didn't have very much luck with it. I couldn't find anything I was looking for. I'll check it out again.
I only found out about Busy.org today, and I'm really interested to know if you need a steemit account to use it? I try really hard to get my family and friends onto steemit, but its not always a good fit. Is the etiquette the same there? Are shorter typical social media posts of original thoughts/ experiences encouraged? I scrolled for about an hour so far, and what I see is in many ways another steemit, same lingo ect. Certainly not facebook, which is by no means a complaint! If the two accounts exist separate from one another, in time we will see new comers who don't blog here turn Busy into an entirely different place! It is exciting to think of another way to give value to Steem, and I'm excited to recommend Busy! Thank you for the post!
the interface doesn't encourage a "facebook" like experience. The exact same content, for now, appears on busy.org and steemit.com so I wouldn't say there is a different etiquette.
wow
Thank you for your review!
interesting your post...thank you for sharing.
please sir upvote me i'm adnan7813 my username
I gave it a try after reading your post. The editor is too simple for my taste but I guess it's good enough for simple on the go posts. We definitely need the drafts option, like yesterday! Hopefully, the guys are working their ass hard for the communities feature and just don't have time for the simple things ^__^
Sounds great and it might attract more users and help build the community more and more.If it goes well then let's see what happens ;)
Actually I love the design of busy.org, really worth watching.
I always use this cause Steemit is blocked at work, lol.
Hi, wondering where to leave feedback on the site/app?