Exclusive: JS-Kit to Launch New Widgets and Comment Updates

This evening I spoke with Khris Loux, JS-Kit CEO about some updates to the JS-Kit suite that will be launching in the coming days. I must say that I enjoyed my discussion with Khris because it seems we are both analytics nuts.

Badges/Widgets

They currently offer a "top" ratings widget and will be launching a "hot" ratings widget in the coming days. The way Khris describes the difference is that once a story makes the top list, it's hard to unseat it. But with hot, a story could be good or bad but as long as it has a number of ratings in a given time period, it will appear as hot. I think both are good complements to each other and the new hot widget can drive traffic to the stories people are discussing now.

GrabIt

The second major update is called GrabIt. GrabIt allows you to pick up a badge/widget and place it on your own blog or start page (netvibes/schmedley/etc.). If you read a blog that posts lots of content each day, it can become overwhelming. What this widget can do is cut through the clutter and show you just the posts that people think are worthy.

Comment Tool Updates

This is the area I am glad the JS-Kit team has been working on. One of my frustrations with using the comment tool on CN was around search engine optimization. For sites that have large numbers of comments, the SEO value from the comments can be immense. Khris noted that they have fixed the SEO issues and now all comments will provide optimization benefits to the site where the comments reside.

Other updates include:

• Pre/post moderation
• Visitor controls to allow site visitors to sort the comments in the way they wish (top, new, karma, etc.)
• RSS feeds

JS-Kit is an 8-person team and is located in Silicon Valley. I will be working with Khris on potential integration on CN in the coming week.