WidSets upgrading from Beta to the real, real service!

Hi friends.

You may have been wondering why we have not been bringing up so many new features into WidSets for a few months. The reason is simple - we have been redoing the whole thing: database, software, web pages, mobile client, hairdos - those of us who still have some hair left…, you name it. And next week we will be bringing it all alive for you!

There will be major enhancements for you as a user. Creating your own widgets will be a lot easier, finding content on the web page is more fun than ever with our new spidery Explore, and you can now rank widgets on the mobile - and see rankings by others. And this is only the beginning! Come in next week and take a look for yourself. Or take a sneak peak at:

http://mashable.com/2007/10/16/widsets-relaunch/

What has changed even more are the things under the hood: The cluster of servers bringing you the great service has now grown to a large farm, and there are a lot of enhancements to support the new millions and millions of new users who are signing up. Our labs in their dungeon have done a great job, and now that the work is almost done, we will be allowing for some fresh air and daylight down there! Maybe even some pizzas.

But as they say: content is king. We have added a lot of exciting new widgets over the last weeks, and even enhanced the language coding, to make it easier to find local and non-english-language content. Widsets is now a truly global service, but with more and more user-generated local content! Someone has even added Chinese widgets with Chinese characters. Cool - even if I thought that was a new Mahhjong - game...

Anyway - next week will be the most exciting week of our lives. A big migration, everything changes, how will it go - anxiety, eating fingernails, migraines, cubic tons of coffee… On Tuesday, we will close the old system, and start cranking up the new one.  The migration of all user data, widgets and contents will take some time, but if all goes well, we will be back online late Tuesday, Samoa and Midway Islands timezone…

You will get an upgrade of your WidSets client on your phone when you log in the first time. Sorry, no backward compatibility this time :( But your username, cool personal widgets etc will naturally remain.

If you then have problems, please tune into our Forum, where we will be posting helpful hints and advice. If all goes really, really badly, we will even post the phone number of the guy responsible for the migration! Only joking, only joking :=)

For now, thumbs up, and all the best to the guys in the lab doing the real work!

WidSets goes Finland!

Check out our latest developments in Finland and take our new useful widgets to a test drive. Don’t worry, we are continuously developing new widgets in other countries too but we are so proud of these  widgets that we want to introduce them to you.

YTV journey planner will show you the easiest way to find your destination with public transportation in the capital area of Finland. Simply save time and enjoy its easiness! Just in case you get bored on the way, why don’t you create a chat circle with your friends and send messages as well as images. Time flies when you are having fun! :-)

Driving to the cottage over the weekend? Get up-to-date traffic reports and traffic cameras directly to your phone and ensure that you will have a fast and safe journey to your destination. Foreca widget shows you the latest weather reports and forecasts to make sure you have packed your rubber boots in case it will rain.

WidSets will now bring TV in your pocket too. Download YLE uutiset and text-tv in your phone and check out the latest news on the go. Sit down and relax and Telkku.com shows you what is on TV today. If there is nothing interesting on TV, you can always go to the movies. Finnkino widget will give you information about day´s shows and seating availability.

But as you know, this is just a tiny view on our growing library, so remember to check it out frequently!

Enjoy Finns!