A few things to round off the year.
Best music app of the year: This Is My Jam
Why: Because it takes the hassle out of trying to find interesting music and it keeps its focus squarely and constantly on one thing.
Best reinvented platform of the year: Yahoo!
Why: The changes to Instagram’s ToS might have been the main cause, but I think the newly-designed Flickr iPhone app was a major factor in people migrating from Instagram to Flickr over the last couple of weeks. For the record, I’m a Flickr Pro user. While I agree the UX isn’t quite there yet, it’s a vast improvement from the Flickr of yore. Having all your photos in one place in the cloud just makes sense. The new Yahoo! Mail has also been drawing admirers, and rightly so. MySpace’s new look isn’t bad, but I’ve never been a user of the platform so my vote goes squarely for Yahoo! Marissa Mayer is definitely changing the business for the better.
Best new platform for advocating women’s talents: Articulate.
Why: They’re building a database of talented women who are open to speaking so that no conference organizers can hide behind the ‘but I couldn’t find any women to speak’ excuse. I hope this is soon replicated across the world, specifically India. I’m looking at you, Medianama.
Most underutilised resource of the year (for me): Google’s Think platform.
Why: Amongst other things it has some excellent tools for media planners. Most recently, I thought their Smartphone Launch Predictor was ace. Their Think Quarterly always makes for a good read and I hope to wade through more of their stuff in the new year.
Favourite abbreviation of 2012: TIJABP from Dave Winer.
Why: It’s something I should do more of – and I’ll endeavour to do more of that kind of writing in 2013. Over the last couple of months, I’ve been hindered by a blogger’s block of some sort, which the TIJABP philosophy should help get rid of.
Best seasonal gimmick of the year: First Round Capital, with this video.
Why: Watch this! Hands down, they win.
Here’s looking forward to 2013!
One Size Fits One 