Charl Norman

Finally, we have completed development and launched the video sharing area on Blueworld. We now have four areas on the site controlled by the user’s generated content.

videos.blueworld.co.za - Video sharing, mms videos, tag videos, rate and comment on videos

photos.blueworld.co.za - Photos uploaded by our users from their user galleries on their profiles

blogs.blueworld.co.za - Our micro publishing platform featuring all the users blogs and comments

genderbash.blueworld.co.za - Gender debating area, ask questions to the opposite sex and learn a thing or two

Being able to mms videos or photos from your cellphone straight to your Blueworld profile and the areas mentioned above is a piece of code we are very proud of - here’s the ‘how to” text from the MMS page

The BlueWorld mms software has been created to help you share your experiences with your friends and families from anywhere in the world.

Its quiet simple!
Make or find a video clip stored on your cell phone. Open the file you want to send, click send and select multimedia message. Instead of typing in your buddy’s cell phone number you simply send the message to videos@blueworldmedia.co.za and in the subject line you fill in your BlueWorld username comma your password. See below for an example:

To: videos@blueworldmedia.co.za
Subject: Sally22, p@ssw0rd

The cellphone icon below the video thum indicates the video was mms’d to the site as where the LCD icon indicates the user uploaded the video from the Blueworld website.

Full screen shot of the video area

We recently completed a major revamp of Blueworld’s layout aligning the site’s functionality with modern internet trends. You might say we’re playing catch up in the international game but locally few have jumped at the opportunity to create social networks.

I was responsible for strategizing blueworld’s functionality and designing the front end. Content layout design is what brings a smile to my face, setting out user functionality and plotting out how users will navigate throughout the site from their first click to their exit.

I started with the Blueworld’s homepage and turned it into a summary of the websites most dynamic content. The homepage changes on a hourly basis with new user registrations and uploaded galleries etc. So I placed these items in the ‘feature row’ of the page - right at the top of your view everything above the taskbar in your browser. The feature row of content contains stories around a set list of topics which we duped “For Him” & “For Her” - more on that a little later. Also in your first line of sight is the core of Blueworld’s business - clubbing pics. Almost every night our photographers are out on the scene snapping up the memories driving users to our site to retrieve the pics. Lately we have even expanded to photographing social events such as the J&B Met, One day cricket matches and private birthday parties! This ensures a constant flow of traffic to the main page. The gallery area is the most visited on Blueworld, my goal was to keep the users online after they saved their pics.

What better place than Blueworld to meet new people and socialize online, after all its socializing at nightclubs that got you on the site in the first place. So the second row of content features the Blueworld community with the latest users (get your five min of fame), most popular guys and girls with a Top 100 tags below each. From here any user logged in or not can surf onto user’s profile and view their info. We decided to open the site up more to the general public compared to before when you had to be logged in to view anything. The site looks good, I’m confident visitors will surf around and be impressed and then willingly signup, I don’t want them to be scared off by a 10 field signup page before they’ve seen anything. Although to interact with users and view the larger version of photos you need to be regged.

The Blueworld community content boxes - Black indicating new users and off course pink female and blue male:

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