izimi gets superb launch reviews

The Web 2.0 internet publisher/social network start-up called izimi, which went live 5 March 2007, has managed to get itself some great post-launch reviews. The service turns your PC into a personal web server and gives a persistent URL to every file you decide to publish - that's any file of any type and size!

Here's an idea of the reaction it's getting from the media and bloggers:

FT.com: 'izimi in PC file sharing advance' by Chris Nuttall
"An internet service that allows users to bypass social networking sites and host their own videos, pictures and other files launches on Monday. izimi takes to its logical conclusion the Web 2.0 trend of users having more control of their internet content. It allows them to serve material from their own computers instead of uploading it to a website, such as MySpace, or Flickr, the photo-sharing site."

The Social Networking weblog: 'No More Uploading Music and Videos'
"izimi is a new kind of social networking site. On your izimi profile page you can have as many music, video and picture files as you want. Unlimited content of anything you want!"

Computer Active: 'New website turns your PC into a file sharing server'
"Uploading of any type of file visible to all on website - A new website called izimi has launched that allows you to upload any kind of file for sharing with the world. Files are hosted on your PC and made visible on izimi's website."

internetnews.com: 'A New Angle, Peer-to-Web Publishing'
"If YouTube and reality television haven't already given most folks the 15 minutes of fame predicted by Andy Warhol, perhaps izimi will do the trick."

TechNewsWorld: 'The Next YouTube' by Rob Enderle
"Every once in a while, I run into a product that gets me to stop, pause and rethink things, and last week I had such an experience. izimi, which launches today, is such a product....It's worth checking out. As we think about what happens when we move to the next generation of broadband, instead of going the Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) Latest News about Google direction where everything is hosted, things could come back to everything being local. Peer architectures could rule, pushing the pendulum back to where Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) Latest News about Intel and Microsoft would like it to be -- in the home and closer to the client. I actually think this would be a really cool part of the new Home Server platform, since that product is designed specifically to do things like this......."

Memex 1.1: 'izimi - self-hosted user generated content'
"izimi places the power right in your hands, where it should be - it’s a truly democratic web. With izimi there’s no need to upload your content to any server: you decide what you’ll publish, there are no limits on quantity or quality ([it] won’t degrade your videos, photos or music), and you retain ownership and control."

The Web Pitch: 'The Top 25 Web 2.0 Start Ups from the UK'
"izimi - Self-publishing, being able to serve files, photos, music and videos up from your computer to friends through their web browsers."

North River: 'izimi'
"One company we will discuss is izimi, the new file sharing software. Basically, izimi obsoletes YouTube. This is a phenomenon I advised customers about over a decade ago when I demonstrated that when information costs fall far enough, strange things happen."

I'm only blogging to be trendy: 'Middleware players'
"Today Ive come across izimi. This thing rocks for many reasons. Primary among which is that its another Web20 UK start up.. we cant have enough..really. At the moment, it allows you to upload anything to a social environment... yes... anything.. so you tag it and push it out and send the links to your mates..nifty."

Indian Inside - Technology, Entertainment and Me: 'Turn Your PC into a Media Server with izimi'
"izimi allows you to serve files, photos, music and videos straight from your PC to anyone with a browser …Full Control of your media and that too totally FREE of cost ! isn't that interesting ? No uploading business and no hosting hassles too.. You can just publish and serve any file type, any size, any quantity to anyone – all [they] need is a web browser."

Go2Web2: The Future of Internet Publishing
"izimi is a new SUPER application that allows their users to share any file (type or size), right from their machine to the web in no time!"

That's not a bad start!

izimi - You control your own media

YouTube-killer uses P2P

So izimi is now live, in beta, awaiting launch date: Mon 5 March 2007.

The above article - probably the first of many - has appeared on the PC Advisor site, written by Paul Trotter, about izimi's enormous potential and its imminent launch.

Paul calls izimi P2P, but it's actually P2B (Peer to Browser) - a term coined by David Ingram I believe, izimi's VP of Product Marketing. It means that you can serve files, photos, music and videos straight from your PC to anyone with a browser. The izimi application (not available until 5 March) enables you to easily publish any form of electronic content to any other internet user with just a few mouse clicks and no technical know-how. You can publish and serve an unlimited number of files of any type or size to anyone – all they need to receive, view or download these files is a web browser since each file published (searchable on www.izimi.com) gets its own URL. How cool is that?

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By the way, that izimi logo above is being served directly from my home PC!

If I turn my PC off by mistake, if I'm rebooting or if we've had a power cut, then it will simply say "This content is currently unavailable".

izimi - the world's first self-publishing site prepares for launch

izimi.com is just about to launch a neat way to self-publish photos, videos, documents, whatever - without the need to upload it anywhere and without the need for anyone to download any client software to see it. All they need is a web browser! This means you can show your friends and family your stuff in their full high-quality glory, directly from your own PC.

izimi.com is just about to launch a neat way to self-publish photos, videos, documents, whatever - without the need to upload it anywhere and without the need for anyone to download any client software to see it. All they need is a web browser! This means you can show your friends and family your stuff in their full high-quality glory, directly from your own PC. 

It actually turns your PC into a personal web server so your content (eg images, video, etc) gets served straight into any website, forum, blog, or in an email. It will also be searchable from within izimi.com. You can even serve an entire website from your own machine. You don't need any tech skills and you don't need to understand FTP or other upload techniques. It's as simple as Click and Save (or in this case - Click and Publish!)

How is izimi different from other social networking and user generated content sites like MySpace, YouTube, Bebo etc?
There are NO restrictions on the file type, size, quality and quantity of media you can publish.
How is Izimi different from other P2P file sharing sites?
P2P requires both people to have the downloaded client on their machines so others can't seethe files you publish unless they have downloaded and installed the P2P client.
How is izimi different from Pando and Dropsend?
These sites require your content to be uploaded to their servers where it is held so so your friends can retrieve it.

How is izimi different from Photobucket, Flickr etc?
Like the SN sites, they place restrictions on storage, file types, file size, etc. Izimi places no such restrictions.

This story first appeared on Mike Butcher's excellent blog - www.vecosys.com.

Also featured on Dave Ingram's blog here.

Disclosure: I am an izimi employee...