Lighting up your ride
We’re used to seeing cyclists using every safety contraption imaginable, from flashing lights to helmets and hi-vis vests. The US-based Mission Bicycle Company, well known for smart urban cycles you can design yourself, has hit Kickstarter with an alternative.
Lumen turns the whole bike into a light using what the company calls retro reflection: a process that uses a special powder coat to return light from things like car headlights to their source. Mission’s bikes aren’t cheap: it will take a pledge of US$1245 to get a complete Lumen cycle.
Hard as nails
Also on Kickstarter is Nailsnaps the app that lets you jazz up your nails with stickers created from our Instagram snaps.
The app takes a user’s image and lets them splice it the way they want it to appear across their digits. It then prints the design onto the stickers for shipping. With Instagram images turned into everything from postcards to calendars, this idea could well get strong backing.
Back to the chatroom
It seems the concept of the chatroom is making a comeback in social media circles. For the spring chickens among us, chatrooms were the very ’90s virtual rooms that let people take to the internet to talk about what interested them, without having to reveal who they really were. Now Nurph.com is bringing chats to Twitter.
Users can create their own chats with an accompanying hashtag for other tweeters to join, or participate in an ever-growing list of upcoming chats spanning everything from brands and bloggers to youth unemployment.
A word from your friends
On the subject of handy Twitter services, Friendster creator Jonathan Abrams is back with a new venture for seeing tweets only from the people you want to hear from, rather than that sometimes chaotic chronology you usually get. Nuzzel works by selecting the messages most shared among those you pick, then serving those up when you check into the site or via an email digest. Nuzzel will also suggest people you might like to follow and display a list of news from accounts your friends follow.
