The Joy of Xobni

In the world of plugins, widgets and random data, Xobni is actually pretty cool.

Posted 10/09/2008

This week I discovered Xobni. The plugin for MSOutlook allows views your e-mail as a steady stream of data, then provides you with a vertical toolbar that lets you surf that stream in ways Outlook does not.

Xobni (in case you hadn't noticed yet, Xobni is Inbox spelled backward) focuses on the person that sent you the e-mail. So, for example, when I have a message highlighted in my Inbox, the Xobni window brings up an image of the person (pulling information from LinkedIn), their phone number (either pulled from their e-mail signature or Outlook contact entry), tells me which of my contacts are in his network (making it easy to click and send an e-mail to someone else related to that e-mail chain) and tells me in terms of ranking how often I converse with this person via e-mail.

The window also keeps track of messgage by subject line allowing you to view them as conversations. (GMail does this all the time, but doesn't have the rest of the features Outlook does.)

The bottom window keeps shortcuts to all files exchanged making an easy click through on a single topic without having to dig.

Xobni also allows you to look at your e-mail habits such as response time and how you communicate with other people.

According to Newsweek, Bill Gates called Xobni, "the next generation of social networking." In typical digital world fashion, Xobni was created in a dorm room at Cambridge by Adam Smith and Matt Brezina. Xobni is downloadable for free at http://www.xobni.com

Cathy Hutchison is a freelance writer and the Director of Connection for Acoustic Dimensions. She can be reached at chutchison@acousticdimensions.com. See http://www.acousticdimensions.com/.

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The Joy of Xobni

In the world of plugins, widgets and random data, Xobni is actually pretty cool.

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