We now have a Minti latest activity widget.

Note: the reason I haven’t uploaded it to this blog is because this wordpress blog doesn’t seem to accept widgets (or we haven’t set it up to accept widgets).

We have increased our RSS feeds on Minti! Just look for the little RSS icon
Here is a list of some of the new RSS feeds…

1. Minti Latest Activity List
2. Minti Latest Questions
3. A Minti Member’s Latest Comments (eg: here is mine)
4. A Minti Member’s Latest Activity (eg: here is mine)

What can you do with these RSS feeds?

• Subscribe to them in your RSS feed reader.
• Make them into a widget (using Grazr) and add them to your blog or webpage.

The Minti member rank algorithm had a major tweak today.

Can’t disclose what was changed though…

There is a lot of commotion going on in the comments of TechCrunch’s latest blog post about Minti. It’s mommies v techies.

Duncan Riley was kind enough to review Minti in a TechCrunch blog post a few days ago. He briefly mentioned the technology behind Minti, singling out the Member and Article Rank algorithm, and also touched on the social benefits of Minti without going in to too much detail.

Well TechCrunch’s commenters had obviously had enough of hearing about a “parenting site” and started expressing themselves in the comments. Little did they know the passion contained in Minti moms. As soon as they heard their was a blog post about Minti they went across and had a look themselves. They were shocked into action by the comments and let the TechCrunch Techies have it.

After a few days there are now over 40 comments on the blog post. If you are interested in the battle and also up for a chuckle, go check out the blog post and comments here.

PS: Sorry Mike, we didn’t ask them to go over, stir things up and comment on the blog post. These ladies are very passionate about Minti and obviously took offence at some of the comments :)

In related news to our sector, Maya’s Mom (one of Minti’s closest competitor’s, although not an ‘advice site’ as such) has been acquired by BabyCenter for a reported USD$7M (according to TechCrunch).

BabyCenter plans to leave Maya’s Mom as a stand alone site, however use it’s technology across all the existing BabyCenter websites (ie: BabyCenter Germany etc).

Here is a blog post from the Founder of Maya’s Mom.

So we finally got round to creating a blog for Vibe Capital today.
Here it is. Specific “Vibe Capital news” will be posted there.

This “Minti blog” will be just for Minti related news.

Minti was just announced as runner up to Yahoo! Answers in the Web 2.0 awards for 2007.

See here for all the details.

It looks like Hitwise (a traffic stats company) has been monitoring our growth!

Below is a quote from their blog post here…

My second example is Minti, a social networking website for parents. Minti incorporates a number of web 2.0 properties designed to attract and engage users such as shared user parenting advice. If managed correctly, seeding content topics such as products around the home designed for children could establish web 2.0 retailing on Minti.

Dubbed as the “Myspace-for-parents”, Minti has had steady growth since its launch in March 2006 and in December more than doubled its market share from 2.2% to 4.5% between weeks ending 2 December 2006 and 16 December 2006. Minti ranked at #14 amongst local websites in Lifestyle - Family for the week ending 13 January 2007.

Help seriously ill children this Christmas…

(It costs you nothing - sign-up now and Minti will donate US$1 on your behalf)

How can you help?

It’s really, really simple. Minti is aiming to raise $20,000 for The Starlight Starbright Children’s Foundation this Christmas. For every confirmed member who signs up we (not you) will be donating US$1 to help seriously ill children. All you have to do is:

• Sign up to Minti through this page (it’s a free community and advice site for parents) and we’ll donate US$1 more towards our $20,000 goal

OR IF YOU’RE ALREADY A MEMBER THEN

• Refer some of your parent friends to Minti and we’ll also donate US$1 when they sign-up.

Do your bit and we’ll do ours after all that’s what being a community is all about.

—————

What is Minti?

Minti is about advice, friendship and community for parents. Parents can join for free, get their own family page, keep a blog and make friends with other parents. Advance through the Minti ranks by contributing advice, rating articles and writing comments.

Who are the Starlight Starbright Foundation?

Starlight Starbright softens the hard edges of what a family experiences when a child has a serious illness. They create a sense of community between families who are having similar experiences by providing opportunities for them to escape the hospital, doctors, nurses, needles and treatments and doing something fun where they get to join others and just feel “normal” again–perhaps even forgetting that anyone is sick for a short while.

Starlight Starbright softens the hard edges of what a family experiences when a child has a serious illness.