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Note-taking platform Springpad shutting down on June 25th
Springpad, the online and app-based platform for saving and sharing web content, managing notes and collaborating on projects with others, has announced that it'll be shutting up shop come June 25th. Despite ongoing development of the service, it's evidently struggled to compete with the likes of Evernote and others, despite attracting over 5 million users during its six-year lifespan. Come the tail end of June, you'll need to find a new home for anything that lives on Springpad, and the company's said it's working on an export tool that'll allow you to save your data and/or move it elsewhere, although we don't currently know which similar services the tool will support. Little consolation to Springpad loyalists, no doubt, but at least moving over to a more successful alternative means it'll probably be the last time you have to.
Springpad note-taking service gets interface overhaul, now an even worthier rival to Evernote
Springpad may lack Evernote's commercial clout, but it makes up for it in a number of ways -- not least with free-of-charge features like offline access from its mobile apps (which certain rivals charge for) and Pinterest-style sharing options. The interface hasn't been a particular strong point, but that could be about to change as version 4.0 has just gone live for at least some users of the web interface. The new UI centers everything on three key buttons along the top: Springs -- which gives you immediate access to your latest notes, regardless of which device you made them on Notebooks -- for organizing your notes into projects Search & Do -- which, needless to say, lets you search your notes, but also suggests activities based to-do tasks you've created. The same, simplified philosophy is due to hit Springpad's iOS and Android apps soon, although there's no sign of that happening just yet. In meantime, check out the web interface for yourself at the source link. Update: The iOS and Android apps were just up'd to version 4.0, with same approach to creating and viewing recent Springs without worrying about which notebooks they're assigned to. With both apps, we'd say this is a definite improvement.
Mozilla Marketplace is live, lets you run web apps like desktop programs
An early version of the Mozilla Marketplace is currently live, offering users with the Firefox 16 Nightly build some 100-plus apps to install, including Evernote, Jolicloud and Springpad. Apps from the store can run on Mac or Windows machines, and it looks like Linux support is here, too. As Liliputing reports, rather than just providing web apps and extensions à la the Chrome Web Store, the Mozilla Marketplace offers apps that act more like desktop programs once installed: they'll show up in your list of installed programs, for instance, and they can be launched from the Windows Start Menu.
TUAW Best of 2011: Vote for the best iPhone productivity app
The nominations are in, and the poll is ready to go! The TUAW Best of 2011 awards are all about you -- the readers -- and what you think is the cream of the crop of Apple or third-party products and software. To vote, select one entry from the top nominations made by readers. We'll be announcing the winner in just a few days. Vote early and often! TUAW is asking for your votes for the best iPhone productivity app of 2011. Our readers provided a plethora of nominations in this category, but five apps really stood out. Springpad (free) captured the lion's share of the nominations for its easy to use interface, customizable notebooks, and ability to sync across platforms. A dark horse was ISMEStorage (US$4.99) a comprehensive cloud and local file manager that supports cloud services from Amazon S3 to Zimbra Briefcase and just about everything in between. The big guns weren't left out of the voting, though -- both Dropbox (free) and Evernote (free) were popular nominations for iPhone productivity apps. It was good to see OmniFocus for iPhone ($19.99) in the nominations, as it is a consistently popular and highly-rated productivity app. And now, let the voting begin! The results will be announced on Christmas Day, December 25. %Poll-72239%
