My "New & Neat" Nominee this week is Clip2Net, a (free) little Windows utility I seem to be using constantly.
Clip2Net does one simple thing: screenshots. But it does it with such quick,
fluid ease, I find myself getting much more visual in everything I
write because what used to take a half dozen steps to snip, save and share now takes only two or three moves from me. It's a dream date for visual thinkers who like to show as much as tell.
Clip2Net does two things: (a) it turns your cursor into a temporary marquee to grab any part of what you see on screen and (b) saves that image to clipboard or disk or to a private online bin with its own URL that you can share anywhere. If you register your copy you also get control panel management of all your uploads, including a download counter and a generous hunk of storage space. You can also tag your uploads for how long you wish to keep them.
Consider the effect of simply putting the C2N logo at the head of this post. You instantly see if you already know what I'm talking about, and if so, you keep surfing. Or you have your interest piqued and decide to keep reading. So you, the viewer, can maximize the ROI on your time, while I, the author, can add visual impact, and the developers of C2N can reap more eyeballs if you decide to use it too.
That's the kind of thing I am talking about when I mention the "Win-Win Web" which is what all of Web 2.0 is rapidly coming to mean to me. But more about that in the next post and back to this handy little utility. Read on to find out more about what Clip2Net.can do.
Clip2Net is not just about screenshots you save to disk or upload to share. You can also use your online bin to store and share files with a simple URL.
I just used my C2N bin yesterday to hold a memo
that a friend wanted to share in a setting where he couldn't know in
advance how many others would want to read it too. I uploaded his file
by right clicking on the C2N icon in my task bar (click on image at left for a sample of what you see). Then I gave my pal the URL
to his memo to paste into his email. Today, I could tell him how many
times his file had been downloaded, which gave him an added sense of
how many colleagues cared about the topic in question. Now I think he'll be checking out C2N for himself. Win-win-win again.
Since installing C2N two weeks ago, it's already helped me speed response and solution to a help ticket I submitted in two different settings (in one case by showing a screenshot of where I got stuck, and in another, confirm that I had already tried the things suggested). It also helped me illustrate a few dozen online postings. And it let me share some grins in email that would would have otherwise taken several more steps to attach to a note in Yahoo. Meanwhile, it's become the "right brain" to my other favorite utility, EverNote2, which keeps my left brain organized. (More about EN in a future post too.)
Altogether, Clip2Net is a great example of how applications online in the "cloud" are taking us towards the "Next Gen" of computing in which it won't matter where you are sitting, since both the app and the data all live online. More thoughts about that in my next post, "Joining Hands Across the Cloud."
Meanwhile, to read all about Clip2Net or view comments in their user community, click here.
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