BlurbEM! – Another Twitter wannabe? (Screenshot: Terence Huynh/reawaken Media)
BlurbEM! is one of the sites that have submitted itself to a recently announced, non-backed by CNET (or CBS), competition by Molly Wood for a Twitter alternative.
Some short information about the competition: She will use the service for 30 days and will get all of her friends and Buzz Out Loud listeners to try it out. Tom Merritt and Leo Laporte have also said that they will get their friends to the chosen winner.
Anyway, we have decided to review every single entry since we like to be harsh to some sites. Our first victim/reviewee (is that even a word?) is BlurbEM!
For a site being created in one night, it is actually a good service. It is powered by the Google App Engine with Python. He says it is a “work in progress” in a comment to the competition announcement.
The design is a bit bland, but it’s good enough. However, being a Twitter-like program, it has a lot of drawbacks.
For one, you cannot reply or delete your “blurbs” and there is no FAQs for newbies – like me. As well, the site has no customisation features, but does allow you to change your location. There is no SMS service. But the creator has said that he is adding more features quickly, so we look forward to this.
But for now, the site looks very promising. It could actually be a good Twitter competitor, but not better than Jaiku and Pownce.
Below is our score breakdown.
| Criteria | Score | Reason |
| Design | 5/10 | Bland colours, hyperlink colours. |
| Twitter-likeness | 4/10 | Twitter for the Web, without SMS. Can’t make friends nor cannot delete or reply “blurbs”. |
| Fans | 2/10 | Not a lot of users, but being generous. |
| Hopeful Startup? | 7/10 | Looks very promising, and may become popular. |