Bring Some Humanity to Your Site with Voki
David
in Technology, Friends, NYC
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Today, Charlie from Oddcast (the creators of Monk-E-mail and Sitepal) announced the launch of their new service, Voki. Voki is a service that allows you to build a custom avatar that “enables users to express themselves on the web in their own voice using a talking character.” Think of it like a Nintendo Mii character that you can publish to your website, blog, social network profile, cell phone, IM platform, and more. With the ability to add your voice by phone, microphone, or by uploading it, it can bring a piece of you to life anywhere on the web.
I’ve spent some time using the service this morning, and have had a great time with it so far. My first creation was inspired by one of the pre-fabbed avatars on the site…
Get a Voki now!
Sorry, I couldn’t resist, and having a choice of urinals in the background and a zipper fly just made it too good to pass up on.
I found the site easy to use and the process of avatar creation was very intuitive. Further, getting my Voki here onto my blog was a snap. My only gripe was that my ability to customize my Voki was a bit limited. I found that different head choices had different custom options to choose from. People can get obsessive about making the perfect representation of themselves online, so I’d love to see more choices given, and I imagine it’s in the works - I’m sure its not a simple task to add more customization features.
What I love most about the service is that it allows you to easily change what your Voki says at any time. While I wouldn’t necessarily post an entire podcast here (though having an Voki recite an entire cast would be awesome), I could definitely see myself updating its message often to greet my friends, or perhaps even talk about my status, ala Twitter. Since you can make these updates by phone, it’s conceivable that you could call in from a starbucks and record a status update on the fly. Since most phones now have voice recorders and email capabilities, I’d also love to be able to record my voice on my phone and then email it to the service. The possibilities are really endless…
All in all I’ve had a great time using Voki, and can definitely see myself creating more characters and sharing them with family and friends. Congrats to Charlie and his team on the launch - a ton of work goes into getting a product to market. Clearly a lot of work went into this product, and it’s visible in the intuitive design and UI, the rich features, as well as the simply fun and enjoyable experience of using it.
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Response: Digital Glamour Modelinghey great stuff
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