What is Share2me?
Share2me is a free browser plug-in that allows you to share your favorite stuff on the Web with your friends across a variety of platforms with just one click.
What does that mean, exactly? Here's an example: say you found a really funny video on YouTube that you're just dying to share with all your Web friends. Instead of going to your email, or to your MySpace page, or to your Instant Messenger client, you can simply click the Share2me button and share from one central location.
How does Share2me work?
Once you sign up for Share2me, you'll be taken to a page with six different accounts: Gmail, MySpace, Yahoo Mail, AIM, AOL, and Hotmail. Click on any of the services that you'd like to add to your Share2me button, and you'll be asked for your username and password (this is similar in process to Upscoop).Once you enter in your username and password, Share2me imports your contact list; well, kind of. It wouldn't touch my Hotmail list (about 300 contacts there, and it couldn't find any), but did take care of the MySpace account.
That's pretty much it as far as effort on your part - you'll then be asked to actually download the Share2me browser plugin (at the time of this writing, Share2me is only available for Firefox). It's simple enough to use, and you can start sharing your favorite Web sites, videos, pictures, etc. as soon as you restart your browser by just choosing which service you want to share; for example: do you have a video you'd like to share with your Yahoo contacts? click the Yahoo button, and so on. Anything you share will get the tagline "this was shared via Share2me"; a creative way to advertise.
Share2me User Experience
I installed the Share2me button with no problem, and it's now sitting on top of my browser. At the time that I initially tried it out (January 31), the service was still in beta and thus was a leetle buggy. For example, although it said all my MySpace contacts were in there, I couldn't access them; only a few baked in folks from (I assume) the parent company of Share2me, Nextumi.I picked a video clip to share, and I had the option of also posting it to my MySpace profile, a nice touch. For some reason, the Share2me pop-up window was actually sliding behind the video I was trying to share; again, just some bugginess that I'm sure will be ironed out.
I clicked "Share" and voila! Instantaneous deluge of whatever I wanted to share, in this case, a Family Guy vid. Easy to use, and potentially extremely addictive (what ELSE can I find to share now?).
Share2me Pros
- Easy to set-up:: As long as you've got your passwords and usernames handy, set-up is a snap.
- Simple to share favorites: Nice idea to implement even more ways to share content across platforms and networks.
- One button to rule them all: Whoo hoo! This is certainly easier than logging in one service at a time, that's for sure.
Share2me Cons
- Always read the privacy policy: I'm a bit wary of how Share2me is planning on using contact information and information that I share with others while using the service; as far as I can tell they do say that they will share this information with third-party services. (read the Share2me privacy policy).
- Your shares are not private. Perhaps you want to share a cute picture of your Aunt Betty winning the pie eating contest; well, that image won't necessarily be private between you and your Share2me contacts according to the Share2me Terms of Use: "We do not claim ownership in any content or materials that you may post or submit through the Service; however, by using the Service, you grant us the right to use, copy, display, perform, distribute, adapt and promote any materials or content that you post or share in public areas of the Service."
- Just too many red flags: I am a pretty trusting girl, but reading these two legalese documents that I've noted above made me a little nervous about installing Share2me on my computer. These privacy concerns, not to mention content sharing boundaries (again, read the Terms of Use), are concerning - and that's a difficult call, because I'm a big fan of the underlying concept behind Share2me.
