Shopit was originally supposed to go up to San Francisco solely for the PorC conference (see post below), but then, we were invited to attend Yahoo’s Openhack08 conference!  Sweet!

We hopped on a train and headed to Yahoo’s main campus in Sunnyvale, CA.  We got there, registered, and attended the crash courses.  Some of the topics covered in the courses were: Yahoo’s mobile platform Blueprint which let’s you easily build apps for the iPhone and other basic phones. OpenSocial, OAuth, and Y!AP.

After attending the Yahoo Application Platform (Y!AP) course, I got the urge to start up a Shopit hack for a possible entry into the openhack08 contest. I left my mouse at home but luckily Kent Brewster from Yahoo was kind of enough to lend me one so that I can move much faster.

I ended up successfully porting the Shopit application to the Yahoo Platform in about 4 hours.  Yahoo has put together a really nice platform and made it really easy to port.

After deciding that we were not going to stay an extra day (which required us to sleep in tents or on the floor of classrooms), we did not enter our “hack” into the competition.  Congratulations to cafe.com for winning openhack08.

Toward the end of the day, I sat in on a course taught by the one and only Rasmus Lerdorf (the creator of PHP).  I felt like I should write him a check!

We were then allowed to socialize a bit with some Pizza & Beer.  Geek to Pizza is like Cop to Donut.

We headed home and caught a flight out of San Jose to LA.  Surprisingly I ran into my cousin on the flight home and had a good time catching up.

All in all, it was a nice experience to mingle with some of the industry’s finest… and bitter sweet because although I was tired and wanted to head home, I would’ve liked to see where we would have stood in the contest…  oh and I missed an awesome performance from Girl Talk!

You can see all pictures via flickr from the event here.

–Troy

Wednesday I had the pleasure of flying up to San Francisco, CA along with Rhett McNulty, Shopit COO, for a PorC (Portable Contacts) hackathon hosted by Six Apart.  The plane ride was sick!  We flew Virgin America.  I watched TV, I played DOOM, and I even tried to chat with strangers via the Chat feature. Sadly nobody wanted to accept my chat invitation :(.

Once we got off the plane, we hopped on the BART and headed to the city.  We walked several blocks to the Six Apart office — thanks to David Recordon for hosting — and started munchin’ on some of the best pizza I’ve ever had.  Once we were plenty full, we got right to work hackin’ away on Portable Contacts.

At first we were having a few issues with the implementation but thanks to Joseph Smarr from Plaxo, we were able to get those all squared away.

I’m excited to fully implement all that PorC brings to the table.  It makes my job as a developer really easy and provides a lot for the Shopit users to easily transfer their data from their existing profiles.  For example, a user can come to Shopit and specify a social network like Plaxo and pull all of their data down with just a few clicks.  This data can be used to present users with products that they would be interested in purchasing by cross-checking our database of products with a users interest that are stored on the Plaxo side!

After a long night of fun, hangin’ out in a very informal setting, we called it a night.  We woke up and had coffee with some of Rhett’s buddies that happened to be driving through town.  His Buddies Jared and Mike are traveling across the country: surfing, mountain biking, and kayaking for a few months.  Living the dream.  They were kind enough to drop us off at MySpace for the Portable Contacts summit.

The Portable Contacts summit was very informative.  Joseph Smarr did a great job hosting the event and John McCrea did a great job managing it.  Diving in together felt like we were all playing a key part in setting the tone for the future of the web.  Because everything was so Open, we could do mashups of data without ever writing any code.  For example, Kevin Marks from Google and Joseph took the hCard data from Kevin’s twitter page and converted it to a vCard using technorati’s hCard to vCard converter.  They then used that vCard as a data endpoint for Portable Contacts.  This is super important because the architecture of the PorC standard was to follow existing Open standards like the vCard which maps one-to one.  Very cool. 

We finished up the night with some good beer (Pacifico) and a lot of help from Paul Lindner from hi5 for a little hack session the two of us had to hammer out a few OAuth issues we were having with our soon to be release Shopit hi5 app.  All is good.  Thanks Paul!

Stay tuned, more to come.  Tomorrow, we’re heading to Open Hack Day at Yahoo!

–Troy Payne (Social Apps guy)

Shopit graced the red carpet at the the film premiere of “Forever Plaid the Movie” at CBS Studios on August 7, 2008 in Hollywood, California.

It was a tough day of work… so a big thanks to Johnny, a diligent member of the Shopit team for participating in the event.

More Pics of the Forever Plaid Launch Party

That’s right, your favorite social commerce site is changing it up…only this time with style (bling bling)

Style. We all have it. You’re style, his style, my style, her style. Sounds like a “Cat-in-the-Hat” book gone wrong. But it’s true. And when it comes to style, we try to keep up with the times. Of course, in our case, were not talking about fashion. Were talking about the big old “WWW”, the matrix, the spider confection we call the Internet in all it’s web page glory. On the Internet, styles tend to change dramatically, and as such web companies need to stay on top of upcoming trends, semantic technology, and user wish lists.

That’s where you come in. The user. The Site. The Magic. We want your ideas for design.

So don’t be shy. Send ‘em over. We need them, we crave them, we want them. Because once we know what you want, we can do something great. No matter how large or small, your ideas for this web site are what make it tick. Have an idea for your profile? Share the love. Want to see a new feature for the site? Pass it on. Something not working they way you think it should? We can dig it.

You are the citizens of Shopit, and we are your public servants. So let us serve you what you crave by dishing out a sizzling redesign that puts the It in Shopit. BOOM!

-Alessandro
‘the’ designer

Brad Stone of the New York Times recently published an article about the deal between Buy.com and eBay. This seems to signal eBay’s move to become more of a retail listing house than a true peer-to-peer commerce platform. Stone writes, “Since eBay’s search listings favor larger sellers who can add perks like free shipping, which improve their feedback ratings, Buy.com’s presence has hurt many smaller sellers that compete in those product categories.” Because of our ability to allow users to sell on their very own blogs and social network profiles, we believe we offer a true peer-to-peer experience which allows for users to effectively communicate before, during and after the purchase of an item. This user experience will cut down on some of the problems and favoritism that eBay is facing today.

We wanted to remind our current and potential users about our one-click eBay import which allows users to easily port their catalog to Shopit. Sellers can decide whether to list those items solely on Shopit or connect them to Shopit’s network of Applications on Facebook, MySpace, Bebo and AIM.

In the coming months Shopit will be furthering it’s push to be more open and portable by integrating into multiple communities and platforms. Make sure to check the blog or subscribe to our RSS to stay up to date with our latest progress.

I feel like the whole world’s a-Twitter these days! So we’ve finally jumped on the Twitter bandwagon. And from the experience so far, it’s no wonder people are addicted to this new communication phenomenon.

If you haven’t heard of or checked out Twitter yet; it’s a service for friends, family and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through quick, frequent communication that pretty much answers one question: What are you doing?

On our Shopit Twitter you can find out about our latest company info, keep up with stuff were blogging about, and even see what we’re up to in the office. So start following us, and let us know if you are tweeting too!

All this talk about who’s Great on the Green? Time to put your Putter where your Mouth is!

Tournament Eligibility and Entry

Eligibility- Participants must be part of the Shopit Team or friends thereof. No handicaps under 15 allowed.

Starting Time- Tournament begins tomorrow promptly after lunch. Lunch will be served at 1:30pm, so all you early birds eat a big breakfast.

Carts and Cart Fees- Please no carts around the cubicle green.

Player Responsibilities- Show up, get in line, bring your A-Game.

Appropriate Dress- Polos, Vests, Khakis, Plaid and Argyle are the only acceptable attire in order to participate in the tournament.

Code of Conduct- Do onto other as you’d have done onto you. No heckling on the course.

Tie Breaking Policies- A sudden death playoff will be used to determine the tournament champion. All other ties will be decided by official rules and judges; ie Stephanie.

Tournament Prizes- Three prizes will be awarded for the top three contestants. Winners will have their gift of choice!

Pace of Play- It’s still a work day. Let’s get through this thing in an hour.

Electronic Measuring Devices- Whatever floats your boat, if you really think it’s gonna get the ball in the hole, by all means.

Cellular Phones and Beepers- Please have ringers turned on loud, Bluetooths in ear, and be readily available at all times.

Complaints- Complaints of any nature must be made in writing and sent to: Steven Kantor 11726 San Vicente Blvd Los Angeles, CA 90049.

Contest Pictures and Results to follow tomorrow…

We’re running for a cause! Recently two of our Shopit team members have spent months training and fundraising to run in their first marathon. Rhett our COO, and Stephanie a member of our Marketing team, are participants in the Team in Training Organization; raising money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Both spent five grueling months training for this 26.2 mile lifetime accomplishment. Together they raised thousands of dollars for patients and families who are on the front lines of the battle against these diseases.

Lookin’ good after 5 hours of running!

Hello fellow Shopiteers,

We’ve added another platform to the Shopit network and we’re stoked about it!

AIM (AOL Instant Messenger) has been added to the Shopit external applications family. This means more eyeballs for your products, and more sharing tools in your arsenal.

You can instantly tell your friends about your stuff or ask them to tell their friends.

This functionality is built right into the sharing tool… through links in an IM, your friends can do the ultimate hook-up and share your products with their friends. My favorite quote when I’m shopping something is: “Do you know anybody who wants to buy a [insert product name here]“… works every time.

Also, along with this powerful new way to share products, the Shopit Store on AIM gives you all the power you have in external applications… without opening a browser.

You can grab the application here. It requires AIM 6.8 which you can grab here.

Be sure to let us know what you think about it and comment & rate it on this page.

Thanks and enjoy!

–Troy (lead applications developer)

Your products come in all kinds of shapes and forms and now you can let your customers know it right from the Shopit Social Applications.  That’s right, we’ve added Colors and Sizes to our apps, that lets you create the right options for all your products.

How it Works

1. Click on the “Add Colors and Sizes” link when you’re adding a product.
2. Add as many colors and sizes as you want by entering the quantity, size, and color for your product.

• Tip:  You can add either a size, a color, or both!