myJambi Blog

Babysitters and Apple Pie: Part of the American Fabric

2009-08-06T13:34:00.000-07:00

I just came across this interview in the New Yorker of Miriam Forman-Brunell, the author of “Babysitter: An American History” which I thought you would all enjoy:

"The expansion of suburban communities, the influence of feminist ideals, and a rising divorce rate that drew more women into the formal economy also played a role. Unlike house cleaners, grandparents, and others who had historically provided childcare, teen-age girls became more readily available. While the rise of a commodity-based youth culture provided girls with a financial incentive to babysit, the expectation that, as females, girls are naturally maternal diminished parent-employers’ apprehensions about hiring teen-age girls."

Also, since I know we talked about the role of male babysitters in light of Lisa Belkin's comments, I thought this point was worth highlighting:

"I was surprised to learn of the number of boy babysitters before the nineteen-sixties, and that they were depicted as more competent, reliable, and responsible than girls at babysitting. From the Great Depression to the New Millennium, Henry Aldrich, Donald Duck, Archie Andrews, Tom & Jerry, Carl the Dog, and numerous other males who babysat on radio and TV shows, in cartoons, and in children’s books, were unfailingly portrayed as helpful heroes. As such, they bolstered the more unfavorable view of teen-age girls as irresponsible, irrational, and unreliable, despite the fact that, in reality, teen-age girls are the least likely to perpetrate crimes against children in their care."

Enjoy the rest of the article here!

Or go ahead and buy a copy of her book:
Babysitter: An American History

What texting while driving can teach us? Get some help!

2009-07-28T23:51:00.000-07:00

We know that many of our users fit into the category of people who are just trying to fit a little too much into their every day schedule. And if you're like me, you end having to continuously multitask--which often includes the popular technique of texting while driving.

Well, our friends at the New York Times just put out a a little game so we can all better understand just how bad a driver we become when we start trying to get those text messages sent off while we're still behind the wheel. If you haven't seen it yet, you should definitely check it out.

Once you have, if you're like me (and apparently like the average user having tried it out before me), you'll be feeling as though their point was made pretty clearly... Maybe we should all take the hint and get some help.

So before you get in your car again with a million things on your mind that you just have to get done, hire one of our great personal assistants and get him/her to take a few things off your plate so you can at least wait until you get out of the car to start texting again.

Going abroad? Don't let food allergies stop you

2009-07-28T09:47:00.000-07:00

For those of you planning on going abroad in the next few months, we hope you'll take advantage of one of our great language tutors. Whether you want to learn the basics or you need a quick refresher, nothing better than a few one-on-one sessions to get you prepared before your trip.

For those of you learning the basics, we know it's not easy. And we definitely know how stressful it can be if you have a food allergy and you're still not quite confident in your skills (or at least confident enough to always get the wording exactly right). So we thought you'd be interested in maybe getting some help from the people at selectwisely.com. They can get you a food card in more than few languages so you can let anyone know what it is that you can or can't eat and that way you can focus on more important vocabulary with your tutor.

Happy travels to all!

Modern day babysitting (it's for everyone)

2009-07-27T08:42:00.000-07:00

So we're back after having spent the last few months putting together some new plans for myJambi that we will be releasing over the next 8 weeks. We are incredibly excited about them and hope you will enjoy them too!

In the meantime, we'll be sure to highlight items we come across that we hope will help you more easily and efficiently buy and sell services. As always, please keep the feedback coming and don't hesitate to let us know if you'd be interested in contributing a piece or if there is something you think we should be talking about.

To get things started again, I thought you'd enjoy Lisa Belkin's piece from last week on her recent adventures in childcare (hopefully next time Lisa needs some childcare help, she'll check out our NY babysitter booker:)). The new economy definitely seems to be leading more and more people to consider part-time work--we hear it every day from our users.

Men Answering My Childcare Ad
By LISA BELKIN

I posted an ad on Craigslist this week and found myself in the new economy.

With my older son leaving for college soon, I need to hire afternoon help, someone to drive my younger son from school and to activities, and to do cleaning and shopping and errands to round out the job. It has been more than a year since I last looked to hire for a position like this, and I expected many of the changes out there — more people answering the ad, willing to work for less money, bringing experience that far exceeds the job requirements.

What I didn’t expect was the number of men who’ve applied.

See the rest of the article

Guest blog: Anita S. interviews myJambi user Jennifer

2009-02-02T10:00:00.000-08:00

Things have been crazy in a good way around here. From a plane landing in the Hudson River here in NYC, to the estimated 2+ million people who attended the inauguration of President Barack Obama (we get to call him that now!) there certainly is a special feeling in the air. Not a single person was arrested during the entire procession. I am still amazed and so proud of the message that people are sending across the world.

As we move forward as a nation, I'm reminded that we all need to stay active to make a small difference to help our country and our people. Jennifer, a myJambi user from my hometown of Milwaukee, WI is an ambitious spirit. She is our featured user of the month. For more information, check out her profile.

So Jennifer, tell us a bit about yourself.
I am 24 years old, currently living in Milwaukee, WI. I am a single mom to a 9 month old girl. I am going back to school for nursing. I
eventually want to get into medical school. I have a variety of skills and interests from music to art to photography.

How did you find out about myJambi?
I had been trying to find jobs in where I can work at home and during my own hours because of my newborn. While on Facebook, I
stumbled onto a link for myJambi and the rest was history.

What inspired you to join?
Seeing how unique and inventive it was compared to other sites. I've seen sites like Craiglist, etc.. but I never heard replies from people
and I never found something I could do. myJambi was a great place to connect with others as well as to help one another out.
I have a variety of services. Why did I chose so many? I honestly love helping people. I love meeting new people. All the
services that I have chosen meets both of those. I love being a part of something important to someone else. Make someones life a little bit easier.

Have you hired myJambi users in the past?
No, I haven't yet. It seems like a lot of people using myJambi are around the New York area. So that makes things a bit difficult. I would love to see myJambi more nationwide. I think others will highly benefit from the services from the site.

What other sites besides myJambi do frequent?
Well I am frequently on facebook. I also use gonannies.com. I just recently got into blogger.com. I just love blogging.

Anything else you'd like us to know?
I am still looking to help anyone who doesn't mind a long distance service. I've done CDs and made a cheese list for people in New York. I am willing to work something out and I am very creative.

In the spirit of change and giving, I'm curious to hear what activities you are up to. How do you plan to stay active and involved in 2009? Comment below!

Want to be featured on the myJambi blog? Got a cool service you want to promote? Talk to use below in the comments! You can also just say hello. We love to hear from you.

-Anita

Searching for myJambi

2009-01-28T06:00:00.000-08:00

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can make a big difference to the success of a young site like ours. We've been looking for ways to increase our own search engine performance, but like many start-ups, we wanted to find an affordable way to do it. Of course, we could always buy help ourselves out by buying key words on Google searches via AdWords, but that can get pricey, particularly as you go for highly competitive keywords, such as "babysitters New York" or "SAT Tutoring." We also didn't want to go the Black Hat SEO route and engage in any frowned-upon search engine tactics: that doesn't seem like an effective long-term solution.

So what can a start-up like myJambi with limited resources do? We identified a few steps to take.

First, at a tech networking event here in New York, we met John Murch of SEODrop. The site is still in stealth mode, but John was kind enough to come to our office and run us through what he does. That initial presentation was very helpful and John has continued to be a valuable resource for the myJambi marketing team along the way. We've also integrated the SEODrop reporting into our weekly metrics update.

As an easy second step, we signed up to Google Webmaster. This allowed us to get a better idea of how Google viewed us and gave us the opportunity to submit a site map. That definitely seems like an easy and obvious step in the quest for search engine domination (yeah, right –- but hey! We're trying).

Inbound links from other websites to ours can be incredibly valuable in improving PageRank and search engine standing, so we've been working on getting listed on various directories. Here, our rookie mistake was to (wrongly) assume that commenting on blogs and forums would count in terms of boosting the number of inbound links Google would recognize. We soon learned that this was not the case - these are known as "no follow" links, and they do not help you page ranking. An apology is in order here to our spectacular intern Daphne for wasting her precious work hours.

We started paying attention to the keywords we use in the meta data section of the major pages on myJambi. Not only did we take a good look at the keywords we're choosing for own site, but we also did a rudimentary analysis of other interesting sites in our space. Simply by clicking View and then View Page Source, we identified keyword patterns, such as whether there was an average number of keywords we should aim for, whether we should worry about misspellings, which words to emphasize. We found that there are no rules -- we saw a whole variety of approaches. Some had many keywords, some were more restricted. Some anticipated visitors typing in the wrong name, some did not. We decided to go for a middle ground - we would include some misspellings in the future and increase the number of keywords.

Another trick we picked up on is that the first keywords always have the most value and that their value diminishes the more keywords you add. So if you have 10 keywords, the first is much more powerful than the last. That means that we tried to figure out ways to move the most important or relevant words for that page to the top of the list. This would involve some restructuring, some of which is still to come, but we think it's probably worth it.

There's some controversy over the extent to which relevant key words in your meta tags influence your search engine standings. (In general, there is a wealth of literature out there on search engine optimization and not seldom does one renowned author contradict another, leaving newcomers somewhat bewildered.) However, it's also pretty widely acknowledged that spending some time on your meta tag keywords won't ever hurt your site and can only help. Yahoo, for instance, is reported to still pay attention to key words.

This is particularly true if key words featured in the meta tags are repeated on the actual web page, which brings us to what we think is going to be our most important SEO initiative by far: relevant landing pages. Currently, myJambi does not have many landing pages that are focused by location and service category – rather, most of our search and browse pages to date are general results pages that are then filtered down by our users according to what they are specifically looking for. However, in the future we will be introducing a number of targeted landing pages for people looking for child care in New York or language tutoring in the Bay Area. It's going to be a good chunk of work, but we think this will help us a lot when it comes to optimizing our site for search engines.

In sum, there is a ton to learn in this field and we have only scratched the surface. However, the golden rules seem to be to have relevant content, choose your keywords carefully, and try and get inbound links from trusted, relevant sites. If you follow these, even broadly, you'll be on the right track. We're not SEO experts, but we know a lot more now than we did when we started.

Explore myJambi in a new way: See what's out there and get inspired

2009-01-17T15:28:00.000-08:00

As the year gets started, we're offering our users a new way to explore myJambi.

Click on the explore link in the top nav and you'll get taken to the new standard view of all our listings. This new view will provide you with the basic information (price, location and BIGGER photos which seem to be a #1 request) so you can get an easy feel for all the different opportunities in your area and in your network in a simple and structured way.

Once you've narrowed things down a bit you can then hop over to the advanced view and find the perfect match by taking advantage of the advanced filters; maybe you're looking for a specific price, a user with a certain rating, or you just need to make sure that the person you want to work with can make it on a specific day.

We've also tried to help you out a bit by creating some pages that we hope will inspire you as you try to make the most of myJambi. Are you a parent looking to get some help around the house? Take a look at our 'For parents' page. Need to get a gift for a loved one? Visit our 'Gift Ideas' page. Need a break? Treat yourself to the one of the services on the 'Just for me' page.

As you know, we try to make changes to the myJambi site every week or two to build the site that fits your needs but we can only stick to that promise by getting your honest feedback on a regular basis so be sure to keep it coming.

Happy exploring and happy new year from the entire myJambi team!

Finding help you can trust

2009-01-15T12:24:00.000-08:00

As you probably know by now, myJambi helps you tap into your trusted network of friends and colleagues to buy and sell services. We understand that it's hard to find reliable people. If you're like us, you've probably tried using other sites and had some weird experiences. Sometimes that doesn't matter too much - if you're buying a hat from a myJambi service provider and it comes in a slightly different color than you ask for, it's annoying but nobody got hurt. If you hire a babysitter to look after your kids and they don't show up at the right time, it probably will matter quite a lot.

Every week, more of our users get rated by other users. You can read those ratings and see who you can trust. We at the myJambi team also like to keep an eye out to make sure that our users are matched up with each other. If you have something in mind that you'd like to get done or a service you'd like to offer but you haven't found someone appropriate, let us know - we're happy to help you by reaching out on your behalf. You can email us at kristina@myjambi.com.

JAMBI 2009!

2008-12-31T11:53:00.000-08:00

Holiday Joy from Ai

2008-12-29T12:34:00.000-08:00

We got a holiday card from our favorite dev team! How cute are they?

Interviewing Susan

2008-12-29T08:56:00.000-08:00

Hey myJambi Readers!

Yes, yes! Slush season in NYC has actually turned into winter over the past weeks and we couldn't be more grateful. The holiday spirit is in the air, the trains are half empty and the office seems a little lonely. It almost makes us want to savor this pace of life in New York City…almost. We are headed off on a bit of vacation and you probably are too so kick back and check out our latest interview with myJambi user Susan.

So tell us, how did you find out about myJambi?

Through exploring the "inter-webs" on downtime from schoolwork. It may have been been through an article I read online (possibly TechCrunch) that mentioned it.

What inspired you to join?

The concept behind myjambi was so intriguing, how conveniently it was set up (the aesthetic appeal of the user interface was also a definite plus). It was mostly out of curiosity and wanting to play an active role in building a professional network and gaining experience. The whole package was just so neat! :)

Tell us a bit about yourself.

I'm working on a 3D animation/VFX degree in San Francisco. I like that it merges technology with traditional art. I also enjoy piano. Moved here from Alaska a few years ago (big change) where I grew up. Miss the snow, but not enough to live with it 6 months out of the year, lol. It's certainly a more pleasant experience not worrying about falling on sidewalks layered with ice. Other random information: I've had moose jump in the backyard and eat my plants; currently live in a seedy apartment in the Tenderloin surrounded by the "living out of a cardboard box" community (along with other eccentric personalities). It makes for interesting dinner conversation, lol.

I noticed you currently a mixed bag of different services. Why did you chose these services?

I wanted to broaden the spectrum of skills offered. I didn't want to have limitations because of the single-track emphasis of my major. I have a variety of hobbies, and wanted to pursue those interests outside of school. I also wanted to gain as much professional experience as possible before going out into the working world.

Have or would you hire others on myJambi?

It was a great experience working with fellow myJambi . Based on such a personable and friendly environment the myJambi community is, I would definitely hire a provider from the site!

What other sites besides myJambi are you frequenting these days?

Let's see- Craigslist, Lifehacker, thesixtyone, and SF0 are a few.

What do you think of the myJambi mascot?

It's quite whimsical :)

Anything else you want to include or let us know about?

Please don't hesitate to check out my website if you have the time(a W.I.P.) susatron.com

P.S.- We don't all have Palin's accent (it's just her) :)

Success with myJambi

2008-12-26T06:28:00.000-08:00

Sometimes we hear about how myJambi has changed our user's lives for the better. Whether they're the thirsty show presenter parched-no-more due to a nifty coffee delivery, or the formerly cold-headed urbanite now warmed up from a hat knitted by a myJambi user, we love finding out about how the site has made a difference to you.

We were particularly excited to hear back from Elisa V., a myJambi user based out in Los Angeles, CA. A few months ago, Elisa had posted a few wants on myJambi. She was looking for multiple talents – a personal chef to rustle up tasty meals for her family, a nanny to help take care of her kids, and some help around the house. The myJambi Team decided to play matchmaker and reached out to myJambi users and other friends to find someone who could help Elisa. But we couldn't choose just anyone. The person had to be reliable enough to be trusted with her kids, and talented enough to make enticing meals, not to mention the helping around the house part. One of the people we reached out to was Hailey Messina. Hailey had listed her services on the site and there was an overlap – she had posted an offer as a personal chef and was great with kids.

Hailey went along to meet Elisa and they got on famously. Hailey was delighted to be able to leave her job at Starbucks to help out Elisa and her family. They've been working together for over 6-months and everything has worked out great.

This was just one of many success stories from myJambi. If you have had a positive experience on the site, let us know. We'd love to hear about it and maybe even share it with the world.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY FOUNDER KRISTINA!

2008-12-11T13:31:00.001-08:00

How to plan a (holiday) party

2008-12-08T15:13:00.000-08:00

Holiday season is upon us and many of you might be wondering how you're going to celebrate, particularly when costs are being cut left, right, and center. If you're in the mood for a party but your office has decided not to throw one, or you'd like to plan one but don't want all the effort, think again. myJambi has put together a step-by-step guide on how to throw a great party...for cheap. We haven't perfected the art but we think we do a pretty good job.

Step 1. What do you want to achieve?

Write down your goals. Is this a get together and you just want people to have fun? Are you trying to market a product? If so, how will throwing a party help you? Do you want to find a great place where your friends can dance, or you want some karaoke and mingling? Deciding what you want to achieve will help you to plan the rest of your event.

Step 2. Establish a budget

Attempting to budget is money, particularly for larger parties. It's a good idea to set yourself targets. You should sub-categorize food & drink, entertainment, transport (if applicable) and any other relevant categories or costs you might incur. You're likely to find that things pop up out of nowhere, so if you're concerned about keeping the budget on truck, make sure to project your expenses conservatively.

Step 3. Choose a date

It's hard to plan anything unless you have a date. Think about the kind of event you want vis-a-vis a night of the week. If you're doing a work networking event, you might not want to drag your co-workers out on a Saturday or Sunday night. They probably have better things to do (even if you don't). Likewise, you probably don't want to have a boozefest or a late night gig in the middle of the week or on an uncool night like Monday or Wednesday (Thursday is great, Tuesday is second best). It never hurts to reach out to one or two of the people you would like to invite and get their feedback.

Step 4. Choose a venue

Price and availability will likely be the two main factors in determining your venue (tell me some more and we might send some kind of award). Book early to ensure you get the right choice. If you're serving drinks somewhere other than a bar, make sure that's ok with the owner. You also need to check that you can have enough set-up and clean up time before and after the event. Try and visit at least three venues so you can get some perspective about the costs involved. Once you have settled on one place, why not see if you can move the price in your favor? It's always worth asking. Any money knockedd off can either be saved or re-allocated towards other costs.

Step 5. The details

As you have probably figured out by now, there are many details that need to be arranged for any party, and these will vary widely depending on what type of event you organize. You can hire a planner, like one of those listed on myJambi or do everything yourself. If you can, visit the venue and mentally map out where everything will be. Thank about how much help you'll need before, during, and after the event. Write a list of everything and work backwards from the event date in order to establish deadlines of what needs to be done when. Some elements of planning need longer lead-time than others. The more planning done in advance, the less stressful everything will be on the day of the event. You might decide to order food. We used a great chef named Paul Chisholm. Then there's the music - you can use itunes and make your own list, try Pandora if you have a laptop around, or even try hiring a music expert to make the mixtape for you. Do you need waiters?

Step 6. The guests

Try and get invites out early. One month is a necessary timeline for many busy people. If you can, send out both email and mail invitations. An experienced organizer from the conference industry once told me that the average no-show rate is 10% on the day, so you should invite at least 10% more people than you have capacity for. If you know your guests (and the weather isn't terrible on the day) you can follow that rule, but if you don't know them, expect the "attending" rate to be a lot lower and you should consider inviting up to 30% more people than capacity allows. Follow up as often as is necessary and make sure to set the RSVP date to give you enough time to plan.

Step 7. The day of the event

Try and have a plan of action for set-up, taking into account how much help you have. If you're having anything delivered to the venue, make sure someone is on-site to receive the deliveries. It's good to try and arrive at the venue as soon as you are allowed to in order to check out everything is as agreed. If you have people helping you, make sure you communicate clearly what you need them to achieve so that everyone is used efficiently.

Step 8. The party

Have fun. Assign someone to keep an eye on everything (or do it yourself): are there enough drinks? Plentiful food? etc

Step 9. The cleanup

At the end of the night, when every one has gone home, the last thing you're going to want to do is clean up. If you've rented out a bar or some other venues, you probably can join your guests and slip away. If you're not that lucky, you're going to have to de-trash the venue. You can get assistance from hired help. You can minimize after the party by being strategic throughout the night with bin placement and keeping everything neat and tidy.

Step 10. Follow-up

If your event was in any way business related, it's always great to follow up afterwards. Thank everyone for coming via email.

4 ways to bring costs down:

1. Negotiate everything: the venue, any vendor costs. Do your research, compare costs, then fight for a great price
2. Get sponsors. Don't pay for alcohol/food/music when some companies will provide you with free materials in order to demo their product
3. Create a good budget - look at where your spending ahead of time and make sure your priorities are right
4. Do things ahead of time. The later you leave everything, the more expensive it gets.

Friday Serenade for Daphne

2008-12-05T12:44:00.000-08:00

We had quite the Friday afternoon. We celebrated Daphne, our unbelievable intern, every way we knew how. First, there was Tiffin Wallah, then there was cupcakes, and then there was this:

myJambi Song from Nellwyn Thomas on Vimeo.

Ethan, a songwriter (among many other things), wrote this lovely myJambi song. Can you match his style? Send us a video with your rendition of Ethan's lyrics. The best video wins $50 and a spot in our heart (or at least Nell's Vimeo account). Hop to it!

myJambi is for scrubbing floors and busting rhymes
myJambi is for fixing kitchen sinks on time
myJambi is for witty ads with puns or guided tours
Learning French or math or harpsichord
So much help for you to find

If the rat race is sucking the life out of you
Sign up here to show the world what you can do
myJambi connects freelancers with people who expect
To pay for help with all types of projects
And you'll work on your own time

If you're worried that business here might be unsound
Don't be worried since cheaters here don't stick around
myJambi ensures buyer get at least what they paid for
It's a place that you should not ignore
myJambi dot com online

Congratulations to our iPod Winner!

2008-12-02T11:43:00.000-08:00

myJambi congratulates Jillian on winning a brand new iPod Nano as part of our Fall promotion. Here's a picture of Jillian enjoying her prize. Sign up today and you could win $250 worth of JetBlue Gift Cards to jet off somewhere sunny this winter.

Army of Darkness

2008-11-24T14:24:00.001-08:00

Last month, Josh Cain was featured as the Xbox Expert in residence at our launch party. He was so happy with the poster we made for him, he decided to frame it. Here it is alongside one of his proudest possessions, a signed Bruce Campbell photograph from cult movie Army of Darkness.

myJambi is very proud to be featured alongside a true cinematic classic.

"This holiday season, give the gift of"... learning!

2008-11-19T11:37:00.000-08:00

Subsequent to my previous post, our eagle-eye colleague Nell spotted another interesting post in this week's New York Magazine. Turns out that out of 182 random people interviewed on their choice of holiday gift, 13 wanted to be given lessons as a present for Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa... or just because. I quote:

"They asked for classes in: modeling, Spanish, dance, surfing, cooking, tap-dancing, kayaking, photography, computers, Web design, driving, yoga, Pilates, printmaking, sculpture, and painting."

Well, for all of you starting to think about gifts right now, myJambi can sure help out on this one. We have Spanish tutors, dance instructors, cooking instructors, surfing coaches, photography teachers, yoga instructors, web design gurus, computer tutors and art instructors ... and many more. So, if you're looking to surprise someone with a creative and useful present, look no further than the myJambi lessons section!

myJambi gets a mention in NY Mag...

2008-11-19T11:27:00.000-08:00

...it's a very, very tiny note indeed, but we're still thrilled, as NY Mag just happens to be several of our staffers' favorite magazine. Sorry for the blurry picture -- iPhone cameras aren't the greatest.

xoxo,

the myJambi team

PS: by popular demand: here is the link to the original post, which talks about to keep up a New York lifestyle on a budget (hint: personal trainers, cleaners, babysitters on myJambi charge very reasonable rates), and here to the comment mentioning myJambi, posted by a NY Mag reader.

Guest post: Blogger Anita interviews...herself!

2008-11-17T21:31:00.000-08:00

Hey myJambi blog readers! This week's post is a bit of a departure from our usual user interviews. I am sort of going to interview myself, which is a bit odd I realize. It's more of a long overdue introduction, but better late than never! Thanks to Kristina for suggesting I do a post from my perspective. So here it goes...

Hello. My name is Anita and this is a little bit about me.

How did you find out about myJambi?

I had been searching for job postings on Facebook, a section I have never been able to find since. (Does anyone know if they still have this feature?) During my search, myJambi popped up so I hopped over to their site to see what they were about.

What inspired you to join?

When I got to the myJambi site, I liked the visual appeal and also how easy to was to sign up. From there I keep surfing around, checking out other service providers and I learned a bit more about the company. I updated my profile with things I love to do and figured why not offer them as a service. Since I was career shifting, I figured it could help me make a little extra money.

Tell us a bit about yourself.

Let's see. My life has been exciting in the twenty some years I've been around – well to me at least and I feel there is so much more to go! I grew up in the Midwest, went to college and majored in Biology. I didn't really like it much, so I tacked on a Sociology major, which I loved. I got an undergraduate job that really opened my eyes to the social issues on my campus and inspired me to join Teach for America. I moved out to New York City and taught Biology for the last few years. It gave me an appreciation for the sciences and for kids that I didn't have before. My post college identity has been pretty much been defined by my career as a teacher. Now that I am not in the classroom, I am trying to find a new way.

I am currently working in new media and mobile marketing. I love that it matches up with my passion for technology. All this transitioning has given me some real time to think about the future and make some long term goals. I even started a bike culture site, Brooklyn By Bike that I hope to grow into more of a collaborative bike touring site over time.

I noticed you currently offer different services. Why did you choose these services?

I have a lot of different hobbies and passions and I feel like I want to do hundreds of things with my life. MyJambi is great because I picked a few things that I love to do and offered them as services on the site - dog walking because I have a shelter dog that I've been working really hard to train and I am actually seeing progress - food guru because I love to cook and learn more about local ingredients.

You could list your services on other website, why choose myJambi?

I love myJambi because the people who run the site really care. They are so excited about you joining and about making sure you have a great experience. Like I mentioned in a previous post, one of the first things I do when I learn about a new site is find out about the people who run it. It's important for me to have some type of relationship with the people I interact with online and I feel like myJambi provides just that.

Have or would you hire others on myJambi?

Well, I have obviously worked for the folks at myJambi and I definitely will use other providers on the site as needs arise.

What do you think of the myJambi mascot?

I put this question in here because the mascot is possible the cutest ever.

So that's me, Anita, in a snapshot, the person who might interview you in the future. Nice to meet you.

Want to be featured on the myJambi blog? Got a cool service you want to promote? Talk to use below in the comments! You can also just say hello. We love to hear from you. Until next time….

-Anita

A few Awesome features for Autumn

2008-11-11T13:23:00.000-08:00

Over the last couple weeks we've been making changes to give you the ability to more easily create offers and wants and to more easily find content on myJambi. This is just a first step--in the coming weeks we will be retooling your home and profile and providing a more user-friendly browse view. But enough with what's coming down the road, let's tell you a bit about some of the changes that you can already take full advantage of...

We heard you asking for easier ways to see all the services people are offering or wanting in any given location and took a first step in that direction by adding "ALL OFFERS" and "ALL WANTS" links to the main browse pages.

So you now can see all those talented providers who are near you or scroll through all the jobs that are currently being sought on myJambi.

In addition to providing you with easier ways to find content, we also wanted to help you create content. With the new create widget (which is at the top of all your offers and wants, as well as your profile and home), you can just start typing the name of the service you want to list and an auto-complete list will pop down to help you appropriately categorize the service.

Need some inspiration? You can now try out our new "All Categories" page and see all the possible categories that one can choose from on myJambi. After we launched the widget and this new page, I randomly stumbled upon the wine instructor category browsing through all the categories. I had completely forgotten about it and am looking forward to posting a want for an instructor in the near future.

And before I conclude and give you a chance to try out some of these tools (if you haven't already), the other thing we added to the create widget and that I want to be sure to highlight is the "Availability" tab. As its name suggests, this will make it even easier for you to update your calendar on myJambi to more efficiently tell potential clients when you might be free any given week.

Enjoy and, as always, don't hesitate to let us know if you have any questions, feature requests, or feedback!

myJambi Party, Part Deux – Parte Due – Parte Dos – Parte Dois

2008-11-09T22:36:00.000-08:00

As you’ve already heard, myJambi threw a party a little while ago, and while we don’t like tooting our own horn too much, we think the event was pretty fun. Thanks to the crowd that turned out despite the ugly NYC autumn weather. The invite-only shindig took place in a fabulous Union Square loft. A shout-out to Kelly K. and Janine D., the owners, is in order here. They were fabulous to work with and endured our many recurring pre-event visits to ideate, envision, measure, allocate, … -- thanks!

I just received the party photos from our event photographer, Sarah B., who did a wonderful job capturing the spirit of the evening. The event truly showcased what myJambi is all about – what’s gotten us excited and thrilled to work here for the last two years, and what still gets us up every morning.

A number of incredibly talented, friendly and professional service providers showed off their skills in a variety of different workshops that were offered throughout the evening. We made funky jewelry with Galina K. and learned how to knit mittens with Loretta M., just in time for winter.

Mari an ne L. and Samuel A. co-taught us how to stay out of trouble in Italian, French, Spanish and Portuguese. Adrienne O’Keefe, yoga instructor, instructed us in the art of the downward dog (although my personal favorite remains the corpse pose -- lying flat). The two Joshes taught us how to whip up delicious lychee martinis and look “super-cool” doing it and started us on our quest to become true guitar heroes.

With all of this activity, we sure worked up an appetite, but fortunately, master personal chef Paul C. was on hand displaying his crepe-making skills and supplying us with the delicious by-products of his demonstration. The caramelized apple and whipped creme fraiche crepe was our personal favorite! Last not but least, Barbara U., babysitter extraordinaire with an Italian accent to die for, took care of any little ones in attendance.

All night long, our “matchmaker wall” matched up service buyers looking for trustworthy help and talented service providers looking to share and sell their skills. Among our attendees, matches were made in Photoshop tutoring, handyman services, office assistance, love letter writing and guided bike tours.

In short, it was a very fun evening. We re-connected with good friends and made new ones in the talented and interesting people who attended.

A special thanks to our sponsor, Christiania Vodka – and an extra, extra special thanks to the great team who made it all happen.

Kristina

Guest post: Anita S. interviews Jasmine L., woman of many hats

2008-11-08T14:41:00.000-08:00

Hey myJambi blog readers! Between the nice weather and the leaves changing in Prospect Park here in NYC, I forgot all about my computer screen for the last few days. I encourage all of you to do a bit of the same, but not before you read our latest user interview!

We are back this week with an interview from myJambi user Jasmine Lovelstzy, a myJambi user with many interesting service offers and wants. She's a filmmaker, a designer, and a chef. She's also looking for someone to help her with her expense reports and with the video game she's developing. Talk about wearing many hats! Jasmine commented on our last interview piece with such enthusiasm that we just had to know more.

So tell us, how did you find out about myJambi?

Being an extremely visual person, I love clicking on interesting and innovative ads that catch my eye. When the myJambi ad popped up on Facebook, I was diving into all the different pages myJambi had to offer.

What inspired you to join?

I would say two main things – one, myJambi account was very easy and fast to set up. And two, I can see photos of friends and people that I may be doing business with instead of the usual dry information.

Tell us a bit about yourself.

Actually, this is why I adore myJambi. As a multi-dimensional person, I love doing many different things - something my former education never supported. I realized this when I was nine years old. I came home from my last day of school and told my mother I did not want to go to school anymore. I wanted to be an artist who designed and made films. But being born into a family of engineers, lawyers and professors, I received zero support. Eventually, though, I made a commitment to revolutionize education by creating a university for visual people. That’s what I’m working on right now. You can check the pre-alpha site at www.LightSourceUniversity.org. In any case, myJambi supports my desire to showcase the multiple dimensions of who I am and what I can do.

I noticed you currently a mixed bag of different services. Why did you choose these services?

Right now I have lots of different things that I have done. It is a great way to share services and to meet different people. Later I will narrow it down and focus it more on film, design, publishing and my signature smoothie.

You could list your services on other website, why choose myJambi?

It feels like a family here. I've had the pleasure of meeting the founders, who are very down to earth, and they all have open hearts and are willing to help. It makes a difference to me. I like the sense of a community and I can easily see using myJambi as my daily/weekly calendar so people can see what I am currently doing.

Have or would you hire others on myJambi?

I have, and it was of great help. Robin Wyllie came and took care of some office tasks I had sitting in the corner for months. I love that it's no longer occupying my mind. I'm looking forward to finding more ways we can all help each other with our projects and can keep things moving forward.

What do you think of the myJambi mascot?

Awww, so cute… wanna fly?

Big thanks to Jasmine for her time and enthusiasm! Want to be featured on the myJambi blog? Got a cool service you want to promote? Talk to use below in the comments! You can just say hello as well! Until next time….

-Anita

myJambi's Halloween Pumpkin

2008-11-03T11:37:00.000-08:00

Hope you all had a great Halloween weekend!
(thanks vidugiris for this pumpkin carving tool--I apparently need to work on my carving skills)

myJambi Celebrates Halloween & Mourns the Loss of One of Our Own

2008-11-01T09:04:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was Halloween. It was also Evan's last day in the office.

This is a sad day for myJambi: We are losing one of the best developers, and people, we know. There isn't a part of the site that Evan hasn't touched and improved, and there isn't a YouTube video he hasn't sent us. He leaves myJambi a better website, and for that, we thank him.

So, yesterday, we sent him out the only way we could -- in style.

We wish Evan all the best on his new path. Good luck on Tuesday, Mrs. Palin, and beyond.

We'll miss you Evan.

myJambi Party!

2008-10-29T08:05:00.000-07:00

The marketing team put together a fantastic party last night, and we have the photos to prove it. Well, only one right now. But there are more to come! Stay tuned...

Meghan Asha, Red Mango in the Office

2008-10-17T10:32:00.000-07:00

Meghan Asha and Matt Dragstrem of Nonsociety stopped by our office today. They were awesome, and they both wielded some fancy technology.

David & I met Meghan at TC50, and she was kind enough to come interview the team and see our newly-expanded office space. She brought along her videographer (and singer-songwriter) Matt, to record for internet eternity our awkward/brilliant insights into myJambi. We chatted, we ate some Red Mango, Simon showed off our socks. It was fantastic.

Look out for a little video about us in the next week or so, in the meantime, check out the team.

Happy Friday!

Nell

Guest post: Anita S., writer, interviews Marina L., personal organizer

2008-10-10T15:11:00.000-07:00

Hey myJambi readers! Anita here - a fellow myJambi user and latest addition the Jambi blog. Like many of you I submitted a proposal over myJambi, which was accepted, and now here I am chatting with all of you. (Chat back in the comments section!)

If you are anything like me, one of the first things you do when you stumble upon a new site or blog is click the "about me" section. Maybe it's just me but in this age of digital isolation, I think we try to seek out bits of human connection in our digital space. That was basically the inspiration behind my proposal – to get to know you the users a little better.

So, get ready for a brand new blog series featuring myJambi users like you. Our first interview features Marina L., a lawyer by day who was referred to me by the good folks at myJambi.

So tell us, how did you find out about myJambi and what inspired you to join?

I first learned about MJ on Facebook. I was excited about the opportunity to seek clients online so easily and keep a public record of client reviews and endorsements. Unlike Craigslist, which I value because I met my husband on CL, you don't have to relist your service every week or watch it get buried each day among other postings. More importantly, MJ allows your clients to promote you.

I noticed you currently offer personal organizer, food guru and jewelry maker services. Why did you choose these services?

I love practicing law and am committed to my legal career. At the same time, I am not one-dimensional; I have other interests and skills that I don't get to use at the office daily. Stew Friedman's Total Leadership (totalleadership.org) really helped me figure out how to balance the many facets of my life. I design and make jewelry, I am a major foodie, and I love to help others organize their lives. I'm constantly on the lookout for opportunities to engage in these activities and I know that I do these very well because I've successfully helped friends, family, and even strangers with all of the above in the past. Most people have many marketable and useful skills and will have to decide which ones they want to focus on. I'd love to offer ten other services but I've chosen the ones that best balance my life.

David and Kristina mentioned that you have a unique story. Are you at liberty to elaborate on it a bit? If so... we'd love to hear it!

My sister and I were born in Moscow. Our parents wanted us to have more opportunities than they had, so they aimed to bring us to the US. We finally got to the US after many trials and tribulations with the help of distant cousins that we found in Michigan (thank you Gene and Gail!). Maybe that's why I am so grateful for every opportunity that allows me to be myself. I've worked in neuropsychology, web design, software, and now in the legal field. I am constantly pushing myself to take advantage of the opportunities my parents made possible for me.

Have you hired others on myJambi?

I plan to but haven't yet. I have sent some job offers to friends who would be perfect for the job but haven't joined MJ yet.

What other websites besides myJambi do you frequent?

I spend a lot of my time online being creative. I love Snapfish.com -- most recently I created a flipbook for each special dinner we've held at our home, highlighting the special menu and our wonderful friends. I make photobooks for my friends and family for special occasions ranging from my grandmothers' 80-yr birthdays to my friends' weddings. Personally, my favorite is Snapfish's new collage feature. I also check out what's new in design on Etsy.com, love to design and code websites on whatever topic I'm into that month, and build my performing arts schedule for the month using SFCV.org. I also spend a lot of time online managing my life -- everything from ordering groceries online, to keeping a log of restaurants and business I like by reviewing them on Yelp, to online bill-pay. I have found ways to do everything in my life more efficiently.

What do you think of the myJambi mascot? Cute right?

I hadn't noticed the mascot so after you asked me, I went to the site to check it out. It is adorable.

A big thanks to Marina for her time and participation! Check out her profile if you need some organization, jewelry or food guru services in your life.

Want to be featured on the myJambi blog? Got a cool service you want to advertise? Leave a comment below. We'd love to hear from you!

Three weeks later: A final post

2008-10-03T13:19:00.000-07:00

It's been three weeks since we set up shop in the TC50 DemoPit at the San Francisco Design Center, and we're finally ready to wrap up our blogging. A short summary of the things we loved below:

For presenters, Nell favored Birdpost and Swype. Birdpost, a site for bird-watchers to map their sightings and share photos, lives up to her belief in all things clean, specific and simple. Swype, a new text input technology, is just plain cool. David, meanwhile, liked Fotonauts and GoodGuide. Fotonauts provides its users with a smart, creative, and sophisticated way to organize and share photos, while GoodGuide makes it actually possible to be a knowledgeable buyer without spending all your time trying to acquire that knowledge.

It's tough to choose favorites among our DemoPit friends -- we loved so many whether they pertained to music, politics, or provided us with some new search or e-mail solutions! We'll cite a couple here: Vlytics, Grooveshark, and BriteClick all stood out from the pack.

Overall, it was a fantastic experience. We met smart, friendly, fun people, collected some leads for potential partnerships, and even made some money. We loved showing off the site and hearing all the fantastic feedback, though we both wish we could have spent just as much time wandering the aisles, hearing the presentations, and chatting with the attendees. Maybe next time :)

Nell & David

myJambi comes to Facebook!

2008-10-02T15:00:00.000-07:00

If you are like me, you might be bummed out about this whole new Facebook business. How can you improve upon an old classic? Well to answer that and to add a little sunshine to your day, myJambi would like to introduce their latest feature: the myJambi Facebook application.

Maybe you feel inundated by Facebook applications. Most of them are utterly useless, I mean who really NEEDS to pretend to be a vampire or a werewolf. Other applications, like Facebook Mobile, actually make the site so much more useful. And myJambi's app definitely fits this latter description.

Simply put, the application will link your Facebook and myJambi accounts. Your offers and wants will be prominently displayed on your Facebook profile. You can also choose to send it out into your friends' feeds--so whenever you're looking for that Spanish Tutor and want to tell all your friends, you can create your Want on myJambi and it will be sent out to your Facebook friends.

In addition to getting the word out about your offers and wants, you have the option to display the most popular categories on myJambi in the application and you can also add a myJambi search function to it.

After you add the application, you can invite your friends to add it as well. When you do that, you can share an offer or want with your friend. Maybe you're looking for a cooking instructor, you can invite all your foodie friends on Facebook to add the application along with your want, enticing them to join.

Adding the application is easy. If you get an invite from a friend (or you search the available applications) click on the link that allows the application to be added to your profile. You will then have the option to link to your myJambi profile by addint your login information. Once that is complete you will be asked where you want to place your application-under the Information portion of your profile or in the Boxes section. I'd say you should put it right under your Information. It will end up under your friend's list and will stand out to whomever might be scoping your profile. Here is what mine looks like:

Why add the myJambi application to your Facebook? Simple, you want everyone in your network to know about your offers and wants. Getting the word out on Facebook is just tapping into a wider network of friends. Wider network of friends means more appointments booked, and that means happy myJambi members.

TC50 for the Politically Inclined

2008-09-30T17:01:00.000-07:00

Just as Nell highlighted a few music sites that caught her eye at TechCrunch50, I thought I would highlight a couple politically-related sites that I'm particularly excited about.

Politics4all provides a new means for the political crowd to come together. Whether you're running a campaign, supporting a campaign, or trying to get involved in a campaign, this site is the place to go to get connected. I am most interested in how this helps local campaigns build relationships and find ways to support one another in the most efficient way and look forward to seeing how they will help their users make the most of their existing social networks.

Another site that caught my attention was Vlytics and its founder Scott Tranter. Scott has put together a fantastic, and user-friendly, application that allows campaigns to aggregate data and have a much more thorough understanding of the people they are trying to reach and the cost that is going into acquiring each one of those voters. Needless to say, a tool like Vlytics gives a campaign such great means of understanding how to use its limited resources and, once again, I think this is particularly interesting when thinking about how it applies to local campaigns.

So that's my quick take on a couple political sites--definitely check them out when you get a chance!

We'll be posting our last account from TC50 soon so be sure to check back and see which companies Nell and I liked most from the top 50.

Until then,

David

CollegeFest!

2008-09-29T14:23:00.000-07:00

This past weekend, we braved the Boston rain for CollegeFest. Over the course of two days, we gave away $500 to some lucky college students in this crazy cash-grab-booth. It was, as our fans told us, "exactly like it looks like on TV". Poorly photographed proof below.

Progress, and the debut of the Orange Pole

2008-09-24T11:05:00.000-07:00

Office Space

2008-09-23T08:55:00.001-07:00

Our little office is going to be not-so-little very soon: We're breaking down walls and expanding next door! In the interim, we're scattered about the city (and the country for that matter). We think the new space will be worth the wait. Stay tuned for the "after" shots.

We love OtherInbox & OtherInbox loves you!

2008-09-19T07:20:00.000-07:00

OtherInbox has generously shared a limited number of beta invites with us. We only have 25 to share, so hurry up and sign up here.

Enjoy!

TC50 Email Solutions

2008-09-17T12:14:00.001-07:00

As I wade through the backlog of emails that accumulated during last week's frenzy, I thought I'd take a minute to reflect on some of the email solutions we saw at TechCrunch.

OtherInbox is a neat little site designed to solve your "accessory" email problem. That is, all those newsletters, updates, and alerts that you don't read everyday -- and maybe don't even have in your main inbox. It's a destination site designed to house and organize all that mail. It allows you to create unique email addresses and then categorizes mail based on those addresses to help you break your less-important email intake into a more digestible format. I get my own domain name -- nellwyn.otherinbox.com -- and I can add different prefixes to to create addresses. For example, I can change my Gilt & ShopBop contacts to shop@nellwyn.otherinbox.com and my Facebook & LinkedIn contacts to socialnet@nellwyn.otherinbox.com. The interface -- clean and intuitive -- then sorts and categorizes incoming mail based on address, so my shopping mail goes into one folder and my social networking goes into another.

I'm a big fan of Gmail's + trick, so this is right up my alley. The most appealing feature is that you can see what mailing lists are responsible for unwanted mail. If I sign up to Joe's Event List with joes@nellwyn.otherinbox.com and find that I'm getting 10 emails a day from Joe's affiliates, I can block that one email address and eliminate all the unwanted mail. As Evan, who met a couple of the OI devs at Lone Star Ruby, said, "Props to OtherInbox for doing something that's already been done, email, and making it better."

NutshellMail provides a different take on the issue of the ever-increasing partitioning of inboxes. Nutshell, a web-based service, aggregates mail from your various messaging accounts -- whether it be that personal Hotmail account, Facebook, or your "accessory" Gmail account -- and delivers the mail to a main account of your choosing on a schedule of your choosing in a streamlined update email. Not only does this allow you to check all your email in one place, it also allows you to see messages from sites that might not be accessible from your workplace. While OtherInbox creates a separate, very well-organized, home for your less-important email, Nutshell brings that email to your main account in a systematized way. Both seem like creative solutions to an old, pesky problem.

Postbox tackles another problem: The photos, links and docs that get lost in your inbox. It's a desktop email application that offers advanced labeling and searching functionality, allowing you to more easily find and share everything -- not just the text -- that's in your inbox. I was really impressed by the demo and the team behind it, including Scott MacGregor, one of the original developers of Thunderbird. It looks to me like it's a better email application, and I couldn't be more thrilled: I think I've outgrown the Gmail interface. I can't wait to download Postbox and start trying it out.

That's all for now -- I've avoided my inbox for long enough today.

Happy emailing,
Nell

nextNY community gathering @ shakeshack

2008-09-16T13:30:00.001-07:00

myJambi is co-sponsoring tonight's community event @shakeshack, organized by nextNY and Charlie O' Donnell. Who doesn't love free burgers and beers and catching up with the NYC tech community? The event is sold out, but there's a spillover event right across the street for anyone who didn't RSVP in time. Come one, come all!

David: Coffee Delivery Pro, Start-Up Founder

2008-09-16T07:35:00.001-07:00

It looks like all our TechCrunch50 work -- and David's coffee-fetching -- paid off. We're on the front page right now! Go over to TechCrunch and check it out.

myJambi video # 2: Need a ride?

2008-09-15T21:20:00.000-07:00

Hot off the excitement of TechCrunch50, comes the premiere of the second myJambi video/commercial titled "Need a ride?"

This video features the amazing acting work of Evan Zelnick, Kai Romero (her profile) was our lovely Boom Operator and stunt driver. myJambi co-founder David also helped out on set. Car was provided by ZipCar (found here) a great place to rent a car for a few hours without paying through the nose. The music was another song by Jonah Dempcy called "Too Cool for Home School" procured from Archive.org (found here)

So feel free to forward at will. Spread the doctrine of myJambi.

Stay tuned, on Thursday myJambi has a special surprise in store!

TC50 Nostalgia, Part One

2008-09-12T13:53:00.001-07:00

Hello there,

One harrowing redeye JetBlue flight later, I'm back in NYC, and already nostalgic about the sweet myJambi times at TechCrunch50. We'll be rehashing the conference on the blog over the next week, but I thought I'd jump-start things with a short review of a couple music sites I'm excited about.

Now, I love my music sites. There are already a couple great tools in the space: Hype Machine, Pandora, Indaba, and OhMyRockness, among others. After seeing their demos at TC50, I'm optimistic about three new additions: Grooveshark Lite, BlueHaze, and BoJam.

GrooveShark Lite might just fill the whole left in my heart by the premature departure of Muxtape. While it isn't quite as clean and simple as my old favorite, it does offer a lot of functionality. Like Pandora, it allows me to steam full-length songs, and has an "autoplay" feature that will populate my music queue with other songs I'll like. Unlike Pandora, it also allows me to add entire albums of my choosing to that queue as well, so I can mix my favorites with surprise suggestions. It looks like there are a few bugs--duplication of songs in particular--but I'm excited to use it and excited to see what else the team rolls out.

If you love concerts as much as I do, please go check out BlueHaze. It provides full concert support services--notifications about upcoming shows, updates about what shows your friends are attending, a place to upload concert photos and reviews, and a home for your personal concert history. Even better, their iPhone application let's you do it in real-time. Even better than that, the founder is incredibly nice and he managed to sneak a musician into the demo pit to play live and he collected demopit chips in a guitar case. Awesome? Yes.

BoJam, one of the 52 finalists, is a wholly different kind of music site. For those of you who are more musically gifted than I am, you are in luck: BoJam has created a place for musicians to mix, record, and collaborate on songs over the internet. Their demo, set to Toto's Africa, did a cute job of explicating what exactly this means. It has the potential to be a great rehearsal tool for artists, even if the recording functionality doesn't work out. Take a look and let me know if you agree.

Happy musical Friday,
Nell

TechCrunch Day Two

2008-09-10T09:36:00.000-07:00

Hi!

Another quick update from Nell & David over at TC50. Yesterday we were back in the demopit, but tried to sneak a few walks around the room and peeks at the panels. We'll provide more detail once the dust from this crazy conference settles, but a few highlights from yesterday:

David was hired through the site to get some coffee at Starbucks for Suggestion Box.

We spoke with Mark Boslet over at UberPulse.

We demo-ed the site to Mark Cuban. He provided some interesting insights and responded really positively to the site.

We talked to more smart people with great sites: BriteClick, Politics4All, Jibidee, Expensify, and BlueHaze.

We got to sneak a peek at a few of the 52. iCharts impressed with its simple, clean idea. PostBox, a desktop email application, showed off some cool features. Finally, Swype certainly took the day, if not the conference.

We saw the Jabbawokeez at the Symantec-sponsored party tonight.

We got a slightly blurry photo with Jason Calacanis and Don Dodge at Temple.

Today, we get to actually attend the conference. Rich Media, Games, Vertical Social Networking and Research & Recommendations: here we come!

Over and out,
Nell & David

The FIRST myJambi Commercial!

2008-09-08T10:00:00.000-07:00

After nearly a month of hype, we've finally finished the mythical myJambi YouTube commercials. Yaye! The villagers rejoice. Check back every week for the premiere of a new commercial. Forward to your friends & frenemies and feel free to embed the video on your blog, myspace or facebook page.

The commercial was shot on location in lovely Brooklyn, NY and features the acting talent of Susan Ross & Pam Lyman, who are really mother and daughter. The song used was "Filtered Breakbeat With Clav Solo" by Jonah Dempcy procured from www.archive.org , an amazing site to find public domain music. The camera work & editing was done by Marisol Romero (her myJambi page) and yours truly wrote and directed the spots (my myJambi page)

Enjoy!

--lili

myJambi exhibit @ TechCrunch50

2008-09-08T08:10:00.000-07:00

Here's what just came in from the Demopit @ TechCrunch50, where our valiant product team started setting up at 6:30am...

Exciting!

Kristina & the rest of the team (back in NYC and admittedly a bit jealous!)

Back to School Shopping

2008-09-05T11:36:00.000-07:00

David & I just received these awesome myJambi tee shirts (courtesy of Kristina's always impeccable taste) and we are so excited to show them off. Don't lie, we know you're jealous.

At the moment, these are only available by special order. If you're interested in purchasing your own piece of myJambi, send us an email at nellwyn [at] myjambi [dot] com with the subject 'AWESOME TEE SHIRT REQUEST' (or something like that).

Happy Friday,

Nell

New features, new photos

2008-09-04T08:05:00.000-07:00

In the ongoing effort to make sure myJambi serves you better, the team has rolled out a new set of features that you may or may not have noticed, but will certainly appreciate.

The first feature is an aesthetic one. You've always had the option to upload a photo when posting an offer or a want. And if you had a profile photo, it would simply default to that one. If you didn't have a profile photo, it would default to a generic silhouette. Now don't get me wrong, I love that silhouette with its gray and orange blocks of color as much as the next person, but it doesn't really say much about your want or offer. Now in this same situation, one of myJambi's snazzy default photos will show up. From a pair of clasped hand representing child & elderly care to colorful paint jars representing creative pursuits, the pictures are a great way to spice up your want or offer and let people know immediately what category your want/offer is in. It's just one more way we help give you a professional looking page without you having to do all that much.

The next two features have to do with the invite your friends & Get Endorsed functions. You may have noticed that when you invited a friend, you had to add them as a friend after they joined myJambi. Now when you invite someone, when they sign up, they are automatically added to your friend list. This saves valuable time that you could be spending looking for work on myJambi. Also, your invitation will from now on include a list of your offers and wants. Ensuring that your friends will know what you can do and what you need done immediately upon receiving the invite.

That's it for this week's new features. Check back for more in the next few weeks. Also, remember to keep the myJambi team posted on any problems or suggestions you have by clicking on the Jambi icon on the lower right-hand side of your screen. Your suggestions fuel the new features and make sure the site runs smoothly.

--Lili

How to be your own CSI team...

2008-08-28T10:09:00.000-07:00

I'm obsessed with CSI. No seriously. It's a bad addiction. Something about the scenery chewing Wolfgang Peterson on the original CSI to the ham-handed technique effused by David Caruso on CSI: Miami just gets my motor running. No one on those shows looks like highly trained sophisticated scientists charged with the care of collection evidence on criminals. Maybe that's why people love the show, because it simplifies and dumbs down the process of criminal investigation. Which is the perfect segue into this cool website Nell found called Criminal Searches (http://criminalsearches.com/default.aspx)

Before you scratch your heads in wonder as to why anyone on myJambi would ever need such a site, hear me out. So the whole point of myJambi is to work within a network of trusted friends. And that should give you peace enough to commission custom-made jewelery or stationary. But what about people that would have access to the things you hold most valuable: family members & pets. Well here is where Criminal searches comes in.

You just type in the first and last name of the person you are investigating and a list of people with that name will show up. Next to their name you will see a date of birth and next to that the number of offenses they have on their record. The criminal offenses are color coded by violation: Behavioral, Business, Drug & Alcohol, Sex Related, Theft/Robbery, Violent, Traffic/Other. When you click on the details button you can see the details of each offense. You can see how they pled and wether or not they were convicted. Don't be alarmed if you put your own name in and that speeding ticket you got shows up.

Now I'm not saying that you should go all CSI on everyone on myJambi, but if you are trusting someone to walk Fido or giving them the keys to your house to clean it, you may want to know just a little bit more about them. You can never be too safe.

My Reputation

2008-08-26T10:18:00.000-07:00

Your reputation-a hard earned public perception cultivated from years of hard work easily thrown into limbo by one or two negative comments. It's important to protect your reputation. Just like in middle school, you can't go around having people trash your credibility by saying you've done something you didn't do (like for example: saying you made out with Josh when you so did not!) In the world of myJambi, its easy to keep track of your reputation using the brand new feature-the reputation module.

The reputation module can be found at the bottom page of any of your offers, under your nifty new calender, making it very convenient to buyers in your network. The module itself is split into three parts. Under the orange title bar (Reputation as a Provider) there is a line that says "Who's Talking About Me" and to the right of it, there are two buttons: Find Friends & Get Endorsed. My favorite is the Find Friends button. You click on that guy and you can find out which of your buddies is on myJambi using your email. If a buddy isn't on myJambi, you can also invite them. Its a fast and easy way to grow your network and get more buyers and providers. The Get Endorsed function works similarly, but you can send your whole Gmail address book an invite to come endorse you on myJambi. Under the "Who's Talking About me" title bar, you'll find a line with the number of friends you have on myJambi, the number of endorsements you have and the number of reviews you have. For example, I have 34 friends 5 endorsers 1 review. Under that tally, the lovely smiling photos of some of my friends can be found.

In the second part of the reputation module, titled: "What They Are Saying" all the reviews for my services can be found. Viewers can choose to see all reviews for all services or just the reviews for the service they are currently viewing. In the last part of the module, there is a section for endorsements-personalized testimonials from your friends on your abilities.

Ok, so here's a big question I've grappled with myself. What the heck is the difference between a review and an endorsement? I had to ask David out for help with this and once he told me, it seems so simple. A review can only be posted by someone who has purchased your services. Every time a buyer buys your service, they are asked to review you. These reviews affect your overall rating, reflected by the stars found at the top of your offer page. Endorsements are notes that any of your friends can post about the services you offer. These are designed to help buyers get an understanding of your abilities as it relates to your network of friends.

The reputation module isn't just for providers, its also for buyers. In the orange title bar next to where it says "Reputation As Provider" you can click on "see reputation as buyer" where all the features are exactly the same but pertain to your buying history. Keeping up you rep is hard thing to do, but with this new myJambi feature, it just got a little bit easier.

--Lili Jambi

Monday myJambi Morning

2008-08-25T09:01:00.001-07:00

I work from home for two days, and look what I miss! This awesome myJambi office-wall-pseudo-quilt-party-decoration made me smile this morning. I hope it makes you smile too.

Happy Monday,

Nell

Fab party last night!

2008-08-22T08:25:00.001-07:00

We had a wonderful get-together for myJambi users and friends last night. Just want to say thanks to everyone who came. The food, prepared by chef Amanda Cardinale was absolutely delicious and looked stunning, and the music played by guitarist Michael Wolfsohn was delightful. Our little office was bursting at the seams -- it was a great crowd and many, many interesting conversations were struck. A fantastic evening.

-Kristina

We can all use some new features...

2008-08-19T13:58:00.000-07:00

We hope you enjoy some of the new changes we just made to our offers and wants. Lili Jambi will soon be writing about them in more detail (particularly the new reputation module) but in the meantime we thought we'd send along a little overview from the product team. As always, we love to hear what you think--so let us know what you like, what you don't like, or what you'd like to see more of by e-mailing us at feedback@myjambi.com

A new reputation module: Give people a good reason to work with you by growing your community and your reputation on myJambi. Add Friends! Get Endorsed! Work more jobs and get reviewed!

A beautifully (and slightly smaller) redesigned calendar: Add the times you generally prefer to work and edit your weekly availability. These selected times will show up in yellow and green respectively on a nice white background to give other users a clear idea when you want to work.

A new right-hand rail: Any additional info you want to share about the services you offer and want will show up in the right-hand rail along with your profile content. Now other users will have an even better idea as to who you are before deciding to work with you.

Enjoy!

The Product Team

A Tuesday in New York

2008-08-19T08:17:00.000-07:00

Simon, Nell and I were peacefully working this morning when all of sudden we heard some music--so we looked outside only to find that a band had set up shop outside our window. It seems like it's that time of year.

This is after three weeks of drilling so things are getting better; as one would say, "just as the sounds of the drill subsided, sounds of drums sounded."

UPDATE!: Turns out this is quite the news story. This isn't just some August street fair; it's the WGA American Idol Truth Tour.

In other office news, Kristina and I hung up our newest piece of art. Exciting times over here at 28th and Park :)
-David

New Feature Friday!

2008-08-06T13:18:00.000-07:00

So I know it's not Friday, but it's nonetheless a day ending in "y", and heck the services were launched last Friday, so I'm sticking with my title.

The big feature change this week is visible on your profile below your personal/professional information under an orange title box named PROVIDERS IN MY COMMUNITY. Under that orange box you'll see Providers I've Reviewed Positively , Providers I've Endorsed and Providers In My Community. Here's an example of what I'm talking about from my friend David's profile:

The first two sections, as you can see, are pretty self explanatory. Every time you review someone you've worked with positively, that section is updated. Same goes for providers/friends you endorse. The last section is for services that your friends offer. This section is updated as your friends add new services. The point of the PROVIDERS IN MY COMMUNITY section is to keep you up to date on what your friends are doing, so you can help them get new gigs and visa versa. And you, of course, have the option to hide the reviews that you've written, on the off chance that you want to keep that glowing praise to yourself.

The other big feature rolled out last Friday, is a time-saving device you may have noticed if you made a proposal this week. When you click on the Book Now option on a Want that you don't have a tab created for, we automatically create one for you, saving you the step of having to do it yourself before going to the next step. So say you want to send a proposal for a Spanish Tutor, but you haven't gotten around to adding that service to your profile. No problem. Click on Book Now and send your proposal immediately. myJambi will create the Spanish Tutor tab for you and it will show up instantly on your profile.

Stay tuned for more exciting new features in the coming weeks and the debut of a series of myJambi commercials that will make you chuckle whilst perusing the Wants on myJambi.com

--Lili Jambi

Picnic by myJambi

2008-08-05T09:30:00.000-07:00

Things have been pretty exciting in myJambi-land. So much going on with the site and getting the word out about it. In addition to the bevy of new features released last Friday, we have a series of commercials debuting this week on youtube and last Thursday we had the very first myJambi-sponsored party on the Great Lawn in Central Park. All of the party planning and execution was carried out through the website by the myJambi team. No less than six actual myJambi users were employed to make this picnic happen, proving once again that you can tailor the site to your specific needs.

The unique, custom-designed invitation was designed by Joseph Chico:

You can find the link to his cartoonist profile on myJambi here:
http://www.myjambi.com/users/1780/cartoonists/2687-cartoonist

As the sun set over the park, we chatted with our fellow Jambi enthusiasts while listening to two very different mixes of music created masterfully by Robin: http://www.myjambi.com/users/3633/music-gurus/2704-music-guru-here
and Jennifer: http://www.myjambi.com/users/1444/music-gurus/898-music-guru

As the music got the party started we sipped a little Sangria and sampled the extensive and varied cheese selection provided by Anita:
http://www.myjambi.com/users/3464/food-gurus/3063-food-lover

The cheeses were easy to spot thanks to the custom, hand-lettered cheese labels and menu designed by Marisol: http://www.myjambi.com/users/23/designers/3115-card-maker

Delivery Pro Jackie O provided a delicious assortment of mini-cupcakes from Red Hen Bakery that were gone in no time.

And while the main reason I was at the party was to score some delicious cheese, the most important thing I took away from the whole experience was that you really could plan and throw a party using your network of friends and have it come off without a hitch or having to hire a professional party planner that you need to sell your plasma to afford. I encourage all of you to check out the website, there are many food, beverage, music and design gurus that can help make your next party a truly classy affair.

--Lili Jambi

From Little Things Big Things Grow

2008-07-25T11:36:00.000-07:00

Hope you enjoy the video that one of our users, Robin Wyllie, put together while flyering yesterday.
It has been a real pleasure getting to know Robin and his contributions have been tremendous!

Robin has definitely captured the spirit of myJambi in this video--we all have something to offer, and we are all the answer to another person's need; it is just a question of getting the word out to that person and being able to find them when they need you.

Thanks Robin!

Love,

The myJambi Team

Take Mr. Miyagi's Advice: Log-on, Log-off (& Log-on)

2008-07-21T15:40:00.000-07:00

Last week I talked about the awesome new features myJambi has to offer. But what good are these features if you aren't taking advantage of the basic function of the website: finding trustworthy people to do stuff for you? Or the flip side of that, doing stuff for other people and getting paid.

First things first. You should log on to the site every day. New offers and wants are posted on a constant basis. You don't want to miss that opportunity to sell your custom-made Mariah Carey mixes or find someone to knit your dog a pair of monogrammed booties. myJambi is the place to go to buy and sell a diverse range of services and you don't want to be missing out.

So maybe you're just confused about the process and that's what's keeping you from making some money by answering all those proposals in your inbox. Easy as pie. Someone bids on your service, an email gets sent to you asking you to approve it. All you have to do is login to myJambi and approve the bid and you are charged a minimal fee (5% of your rate +$1) to book the appointment. For each subsequent appointment booked on myJambi with that buyer, you will only be charged $1. Keeping your payment info current on myJambi will make this process easier in the future. That said, if you aren't comfortable with the SSL encryption technology on the site used to protect your credit card information, you can delete or modify it after every transaction. You'll always get an invoice whenever you have been charged, and should you feel you've been charged in error, myJambi will take care of the issue quickly.

Ok so maybe you just don't want to pay the myJambi transaction fee. Why don't you just include it into the hourly rate you charge your buyer? You'll still come out ahead. And if you have a cash back or frequent flyer program on your credit card, you'll actually gain something for paying that small fee, in addition to the money you make selling your services. It really is a small price to pay to have access to a network of buyers that grows on a daily basis and to build up a real reputation thanks to those buyers' reviews. And don't forget that every time you work with one person, that person's entire network is going to be finding out about it as well.

So take the advice of Mr. Miyagi, tailored to the Jambi lifestyle: log-on and log-off, often.

--Lili

My Fellow Jambies & Jambettes

2008-07-17T16:36:00.000-07:00

I'd like to introduce myself, I'm Lili Jambi, the newest voice of the Official myJambi Blog. My qualifications for this job include knowing all the words to Katy Perry's "I Kissed A Girl" (David's requirement), how to use the spell-check function and a love of all things myJambi. All kidding aside, I got this job by perusing the Wants on myJambi and sending a proposal in. Next thing you know, I have the much coveted position of Jambi Blogger. See kids, dreams do come true on myJambi!

Longtime fans of the site may have noticed a few changes since the site launched its beta version on July 2nd. All of a sudden, there are bidding and booking functions, reviews and ratings and scheduling-oh my! I'll admit, I was intimidated for about five minutes before diving into the scheduling and calendar features, my personal favorites. You can update your preferred work schedule, so people wanting to book a time with you will not make an appointment for 7 AM if you are ahem, not a morning person.

After the beta launch three weeks ago, the myJambi team has been adding new features and functions on a weekly basis. One feature added today can be found in the bottom right-hand corner of every page. The small rectangular button features Jambi, our little mascot, and says "Having trouble? Tell us now so we can help!" Click on that little buddy and a feedback popup emerges. You have the option to categorize your issue via a dropdown menu and a box below that allows you to go into detail about your issue. This function is important because you can't fix what you don't know is broken.

Another cool function is that now when you are creating an offer, if you leave the price area blank, it defaults to "price negotiable" which sounds a whole lot classier than "i'll take what I can get" or "i'll do it for free."

For someone who has watched this site grow from a crazy idea in a mad scientist's lab to a functioning website, the new features are exciting. I'll keep you updated on these new features as they're released, in addition to blogging about the process of creating the first myJambi commercials, throwing the first myJambi picnic and following the myJambi street team around the five boroughs. Stay tuned kids, the best is yet to come.

--Lili Jambi

2008-07-11T11:57:00.001-07:00

Hi all,

My name is Daphne, and I am an intern at myJambi. Like many other college students, I am a frequent user of internet sites to find good deals in town and opportunities to provide services.

I recently went apartment hunting in New York City… which spurred some thoughts about anonymity online that I wanted to quickly share. When looking for new digs in Manhattan, where are you going to go but online classifieds sites? So that’s what I did, too. As I searched through the classified ads, I encountered numerous brokers claiming to be homeowners, and one interesting fellow in particular. All I knew was his email, address and what his apartment looked like. I fell in love with it immediately. The price was intoxicating, and so was the location (right in the heart of the East Village!) The “owner” suggested that if I wanted the apartment, I should immediately transfer the deposit into his Western Union account, since he was “abroad.”

I showed my roommate the correspondence. “It’s a scam” she said. “Don’t do it.”

Anyway … the point of my story is that there’s a big, big problem with anonymity, right? On classifieds sites, you just don’t know whether the person at the other end is trustworthy or a total fraud. I did some quick research, and apparently up to half of the listings for old couches, gigs, and summer sublets are shady hoaxes. The anonymity offered at these sites doesn’t really work for people who want to offer and buy services. You never know what the job entails, whether the service provider (or the buyer, for that matter) is actually going to show up, or what the working conditions are like.

To keep it short and sweet: myJambi solves the anonymity problem by allowing our users to get to know each other. You can check out profiles and detailed service posts, read reviews and endorsements, and provide feedback in turn. You can also search for people by degree of separation from you. That’s because you’re much more likely to trust someone that comes with a recommendation from a friend. This way, you really know what you’re gonna get!

Be safe!

Daphne and the myJambi team

Fun Site for a Cloudy Day

2008-07-08T10:34:00.000-07:00

During our pre-Beta QA blitz, we needed a little distraction every now and then. Jess over at Alexander Interactive kindly pointed us to this awesome little word cloud site. This is us -- or at least, our blog -- as a word cloud.

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's myJambi Beta!

2008-07-01T11:29:00.001-07:00

T-0. Launch. Our little mascot Jambi just flew by to drop our Beta release in our lap. Well, hello there. Nice to meet you, myJambi Beta. Would you like to say a few words to introduce yourself to our users?

Banter aside, myJambi Beta is our core product and we're mighty proud of it. We think you'll find it pretty cool, too! We'll be sure to walk you through exciting new features in the coming days, but for now, here's a short & sweet summary of what you're gonna get on myJambi 2.0:

* Bidding and booking. Bid on services offered and wanted on myJambi. Negotiate a price and time and you're good to go.

* Easy, convenient scheduling. Schedule your initial service appointments as well as follow-up appointments right there on the site. Keep track of your service engagements all in one place.

* Trustworthy reviews and rankings. Get the inside scoop on service providers and buyers based on feedback from other users.

* Advanced search. Search for providers or buyers based on their availability, requested deadlines, project costs, myJambi ratings and social connections.

Pretty exciting, huh?

Well, that's it for tonight. The troops are going home, exhausted, but ecstatic... like we just delivered a baby. And we did. Welcome to the world, myJambi Beta.

Over and out,

The myJambi Team

Beta minus 1...

2008-06-30T20:51:00.000-07:00

Here's to a creative mess the night (or so) before myJambi Beta! And a huge (and I mean huge) shout-out to our fabulous QA, err, product dev rock stars David and Nell. May Cartman be with us!

-Kristina

Sites We Love

2008-06-10T12:20:00.000-07:00

Over here in myJambi-land, we spend a lot of time on the internet.

We while away a good part of that time playing around on our own site, but we also spend many, many hours checking out other sites. It seems like everywhere we go, we stumble across things that inspire us, things that surprise us, and things we really want to avoid. Inevitably, along our web travels, we each adopt favorite sites. Some are old; some are new. They are all pretty great. Here's a glimpse of the sites we love right now:

David, our transcontinental city-hopper, adores his travel search aggregators. We've learned that sometimes a search feature is only as good as the filters in place, and no one does filters like Sidestep. We love how the site seamlessly combines functionality and clarity, all while sorting hundreds of results and helping users more cheaply and easily organize their travels. They've also added that new flying airplane animation which never ceases to entertain us while we wait for our results.

Kristina leans toward Gilt Groupe, a site that proves that sometimes an idea is just so good, even gold italic text won't scare users away. Plus, we can't help but admire the marketing: their invite feature is clever in both its conception and execution. Inviters get a $25 credit for each invitee that purchases from the site; they also let you track how effective your sent invites are.

Recently, Evan and I are fighting over who loves Muxtape more. It's clean and clear and so simple it almost hurts. It's one of those sites that proves that there is sense in providing just one feature, especially when you do it perfectly. Who wins the muxtape love debate? All I'm saying: only one of us actually has a muxtape.

Then there's Rio. His favorite site? None other than our own super-secret password-protected Beta testing site. We're not quite ready to share this wonderland of features, but we promise if you stop by our little office, you'll get a personal tour from Willy Wonka himself. And even better, pretty soon all you'll have to do is stop back here to see it all for yourself. In the meantime, we'll keep browsing, and we hope you do too.

Happy Tuesday,
Nell

Happy Birthday, Tony!

2008-06-06T14:11:00.000-07:00

Happy birthday to Tony, one of our very favorite developers!

How myJambi gets built...

2008-05-21T21:10:00.000-07:00

Come on.
Admit it.

You've been dying to know more about our development process. Yea, we know. We like to maintain some degree of mystique around our top secret plans for how we are going to make the site even more amazing than it already is. So, to quell your curiosity this blog post will offer a behind-the-scenes glimpse at how we operate here at myJambi (only a "glimpse" because we want to hammer out some more cool features before we give you the whole picture. You know, just so there isn't suddenly a "myJimbi" site that magically appears out of nowhere. That would kinda ruin our whole plan.).

Well, first what happens is that the head honchos—Kristina, Rio and David—all get together and brainstorm over large scale objectives of what they want to get done on the site. For instance, do we want to have video? Or, should we give our users the ability to upload mp3s? From there, they get into the nitty gritty details about which of these things are actually feasible and if the new feature will help us reach our business objectives. Once they've determined which features have made the cut, they then make some rough sketches of what those features might look like.

They start by mocking up something on paper with cool little drawings (sometimes phantom stick figures find their way into the pages, and we haven't quite figured out how they got there and what their purpose is). Truth be told, Rio and David share the task of mapping out these new features in drawings, but of course, they differ on exactly how they approach it. Rio prefers the simple pleasures of printer paper and the occasional yellow legal pad, while David is a devotee of his special black notebook (known to some as "moleskin," supposedly pronounced "molehskin," although he's French so he could be lying about that). Once they have the basic idea down of what they want to try and achieve, they make up a nifty PowerPoint that fleshes out more concretely the feature and the main templates associated with integrating that feature into the current site designs. David then meets with our trusty designer Tasha at a Starbucks (we won't disclose the location, as we have been having a problem with rabid fans as of late) and goes through the PowerPoint with her over Chai Lattes, as they try to ignore the mind-numbing sound of Starbucks' mix blasting the same songs over and over and over and over and over again.

Days of toil ensue as the designs are drafted, redrafted, brought back to the team for a round table discussion, which mostly occurs at an oval shaped table in our office. We debate back and forth the placement of copy, buttons, and images on each page, as we try to determine how to create the best experience for our users—whether they be our friends who spend all day in front of their computer screens or some of our parents who get flustered every time they open a browser window.

Want an example? Sure you do!
We just launched the address book import feature, which we are really excited about. It started kind of as a 'hopeful' feature, like The Little Engine That Could, which we threw into a design with the thought that it would be great to immediately contact all your friends and so you could automatically expand your myJambi network without a lot of effort. There was a time when we were pretty much sure that the feature was shelved because we just had too many other fixes and fun features that we needed to have built. But then, lo and behold, a little angel called Evan fell from the sky, and we didn't question his fortuitous arrival, but merely presented him our plans for an address book import with the saddest faces we could muster and pleaded with him to save the poor little feature from months of neglect. He looked at us quizzically, laughed at our entreaties, and disappeared into a black development hole with our plans. Evan did some stuff with code, he bought a new monitor, and suspended his pretty Mac on stilts so we couldn't see his face. He typed. A lot. And missed numerous group lunches. He chose not to indulge in our 3pm giggle fests, and then one day he announced that the feature was complete and ready for testing. At that point, Nell, our trusty Director of Product Operations, kicked into high gear and tested the importer in every browser and for every email client imaginable until her head began to spin.

We almost lost it when it went live. Almost. We won't fill you in on the gory details, but suffice it to say that some of us needed more than one Diet Coke and a prayer to get through.

And, voila! There you have it, your beautiful, glossy, well-designed address book importer is now available. You can now see who you already know on myJambi and invite every person you have ever known in your life to join—so that when you need something or want to offer your services, you can literally spread the word to everyone with just a click.

One day, you too will be more than our friend +1

2008-05-08T13:30:00.000-07:00

And the word spreads...

2008-04-30T11:33:00.000-07:00

This is the time we’ve all been waiting for. Real service connections are being made on myJambi and users are eagerly sharing it with their friends and family. And the word is spreading. Like the BLOB. Except not.

At the myJambi headquarters, we are continually surprised by the number of effusive e-mails from users about their successful service exchanges. In addition to massaging our itty bitty egos, these messages let us know that myJambi is making a real difference and changing the way people go about buying and selling services. You can now save yourself some breath at the next family dinner by letting everyone know through myJambi that you are trying to make some extra cash. Like, say, as a French Tutor.

Yes, we know you will miss that lovely drone of your aunt screaming across the table:
“Marty!! Did you hear? Greg is French Tutoring after work!! How much are you making, Greg? Marty, wasn’t that guy you were working with saying something about getting his son French lessons?... Marty, ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME??”
Of course, we are working on building that sound bite into our broadcast feature, but until we do, feel free to use the “Share” link on your offer or want and spare yourself that inevitable conversation about what exactly you plan on doing with your life. (Oh, and don’t worry, we fully intend to make the sound bite optional.)

And if, for some reason, that conversation still does come up, well, you can give your Uncle Marty this rundown of myJambi’s latest stats, as proof that this is indeed a worthwhile place to spend your free time.

Number of Friendships: 1,984
Number of Services Offered: 250 (262 to be exact)
Number of Services Requested: 109 (109 to be exact)

Sweetest Service Offering: LOVE LETTER WRITER
Top Service Requests: WEB DEVELOPERS, FRENCH TUTORS, SPORTS INSTRUCTORS
Top Service Offerings: WRITERS, SPORTS INSTRUCTORS, WEB DEVELOPERS
Number of “Well-connected” Families: 47
Number of Laudatory E-mails: More than enough to make us smile! :)

With all of this activity, suddenly strangers aren’t so strange anymore. So when you get a message from someone inquiring about your writing skills, don’t think twice about sneaking a quick peek at their profile and friend list and see who you know in common. There’s no shame in being well-informed—that’s what profiles are there for!

If you haven’t already started posting what you offer or what you want, then START NOW! And if you have already flexed your service and service request posting skills, then consider sending it along to everyone you know and start spreading the word. Better yet, have them join the site so that next time you need something or want to offer your services, your entire network will be automatically notified and only just one click away!

Nice, huh? We think so too. :)

As always, we welcome your constructive feedback, so please write to us at feedback@myjambi.com.

Over and out,
The myJambi Team

Two weeks and counting…

2008-03-13T15:38:00.000-07:00

We crossed our fingers (and our toes—the more limber ones among us) that Alpha launch would take off without any enormous glitches, and luckily it seems to have gone pretty gosh darn well. As far as we can tell, there have yet to be any huge screen meltdowns or system failures, and people are getting the hang of how to use profiles and post services and service requests. We couldn’t be more thrilled at the way Alpha has gone, and we thought we’d share some vital statistics on myJambi so far:

Major Breakdowns: Zero (at least technically speaking)
Cups of coffee consumed by myJambi Team: Approximately 144, give or take 100
New service categories suggested: 17
Fan mail received: Not enough. Parents and friends do not count, as much as we love you. That is called “biased fan mail.” We’re talking bona fide fan mail here.

There’s nothing quite like that first moment when the community activity feed on My Home starts magically populating with content (‘magical’ for some of us, but we know it was really more like ‘headache’ and ‘pass me that liter of caffeine’ for certain heroic developers). We can now look back on all those late nights and cocktails of diet coke and corner store cappuccinos (not to mention the odd cupcake for an afternoon pick-me-up) with sentimental sighs at bygone days. We like to refer to them fondly as “B.M.A” or “Before myJambi Alpha.” But we have set our sights even further into the future, to even grander eras to come, namely the more enlightened days of “M.B” or “myJambi Beta,” which promises even greater rewards. Cheesy? Yes, but let’s face it, our lives now revolve around release schedules so reevaluating our relationship to time is not so far-fetched…

We’ve seen the site take shape in a way that we could only dream about when we were lost in the thick shuffle of page designs, use cases, functional requirements (if you don’t know what any of those documents are, then consider yourself lucky; unless you are also launching a start-up company, in which case you have a lot to look forward to. Really. We mean it. A LOT.)

In all sincerity, our hearts did collectively flutter when we got the first stories of connections that were made on myJambi. It’s one thing to say, “Now, imagine you were a French major in college and you want to make some extra cash on the side by tutoring, but you don’t know where to start?” and it’s another to see your friend’s friend post a French Tutor service, and then suggest that service to another friend who is about to move to Paris for the summer and needs a crash course in the language.

And that’s just one story of so many. There’s the practical: A student in med school finds a babysitter from her classmate’s sister’s friend. And the whimsical: A user hires a friend of a friend to paint a map as a gift. These are just a few examples of how myJambi is quickly making people’s lives easier by connecting talented providers with buyers.

Now, on to more important things, like for instance…WHO WILL GET US FROZEN YOGURT?!?! Ruthy posted a service request for a Delivery Pro to fetch frozen yogurt for everyone at the office, and we haven’t had any serious responses yet. Come on! Where is the love, guys? Let’s negotiate…send Ruthy an e-mail and we’ll see if we can’t work something out.

And keep those comments coming! We love to hear from you…whether it is good or bad or you are just plain bored. As always, you can e-mail us at feedback@myjambi.com

The myJambi Team

Welcome to myJambi!

2008-02-26T23:28:00.000-08:00

Welcome to myJambi, the social marketplace for services! You have been handpicked to be one of the first users to experience the remarkable world of myJambi. Perhaps you are a close friend or family member who has been mercilessly pestered to visit the site, or you happen to have impeccable taste in Internet entrepreneurs. Regardless of what brought you here, we are thrilled to finally introduce you to myJambi. Our site is built on the fundamental belief that buying and selling services is a social experience and so we're offering you a first glimpse at the newest kind of social networking—one that actually pays.

What is myJambi and how did we get here?

myJambi began as just an idea tossed around by a group of friends who met in college where they were surrounded by incredibly talented young people who had many marketable skills, but no easy way to promote them. They wanted to bring together these talented individuals and people looking to hire providers they could count on.

After a few months talking about this issue, they took matters into their own hands. They quit their stable jobs (causing some degree of parental hand-wringing) to devote themselves entirely to the risky but rewarding life of Internet entrepreneurship. It was a life of long days in coffee shops, relying on the kindness of neighborhood baristas to keep them going, and resigning themselves to the fact that, for now at least, the glow of computer screens would have to serve as a poor substitute for real sunlight.

They teamed up with a few other dedicated and adventurous souls and began working. Our mission was simple: We wanted to build a site that was a pleasure to look at and even more of a pleasure to use, by offering a way to quickly and efficiently conduct business in the service industry in a professional, but friendly environment. We envisioned a space online where users could market their many skills to make some extra cash on the side or even to jumpstart a freelance career. More importantly, it had to be understandable to all levels of Internet users, whether it be our grandparents looking for someone to fetch them groceries or our best friend who was looking to become a part-time French tutor. myJambi would serve as a home away from home, the place where we could go when we wanted to ask all our friends for their service recommendations. It would be a site where users could network with their community of friends, co-workers, and acquaintances, where they could easily receive and give referrals for service providers and even post their own services for others in their community to purchase—a win/win situation for all!

What's next?

Today we are releasing the alpha version of this site. When you get a chance, take a spin on it (www.myjambi.com), create an account, and let us know what you think. We are constantly releasing new features and putting together new tools to help you find, buy and sell services. With your help, we can create a positive, fun and efficient place on the web to help you get things done.

So, here it is. myJambi's alpha site, the product of a many late nights, sweat, tears, toil, and a whole lot of coffee. We hope you find that the tools we built make your life easier.

It is with a great deal of pleasure that we welcome you into the myJambi comunity. Please direct fan mail to our respective profiles: David, Rio, Kristina, Nellwyn, or Ruthy.

Enjoy!

The myJambi Team

Launch!

2008-02-26T19:25:00.000-08:00