Private Beta Round 1
We wrapped up our first round of private beta testing, and Luke and I would like to thank everyone that participated in helping us test and provide feedback. We received a good amount of feedback and we’ll be incorporating your input as we continuously develop Tenporium. Some of the requests will be implemented in the next round of private beta testing.
In the upcoming weeks, our next steps will be to invite more people to create accounts and get a peek at Tenporium. We will be releasing the next version with new and upgraded features.
So, be on the lookout for Private Beta Round 2!
Tenporium Private Beta Begins
Finally! We sent out our first wave of private beta invitations today, which means we finally let a few people catch a first glimpse of Tenporium and test out the site. Welcome to all of you who have joined so far! It’s awesome to see some initial activity and we appreciate the feedback, so keep it coming.
To those who have already signed up, but haven’t received an invitation yet, we’ll be sending out more invites over time as we widen the beta. We’ll probably send out the second batch of invites sometime this week, so be on the lookout! Also please check your spam and junk folders in case your email provider ‘accidentally’ places our invitation there.
If you are interested and haven’t signed up for our private beta yet, head on over to Tenporium and enter your info. It’s quick and easy. You’ll be added to the invite list and we’ll send you an invitation soon!
P.S. What is private beta and the purpose behind it?
Still Building Our Monster
The Tenporium project is still alive and so are Luke and I, but that’s not important. We’ve come a long way since, and it’s almost been 2 years in the making of Tenporium – we’re only approaching the beta phase! But, we wanted to release a private beta phase version that we were comfortable with and we feel that we are finally ready to reveal it real soon.
Free T-Shirt for Beta Testers!
Tenporium is entering into private beta and opening its doors to a limited number of people. We’ll need users to test-drive the site and help us iron out the kinks. If you’re interested in participating and want to make a difference, you can sign up as a beta tester. We’ll e-mail you the info when the fun begins.
Purpose of the Beta Test:
The purpose of the beta test is to receive feedback and see how people respond to what we currently have in place. We want to see if things are working the way they’re supposed to and fix anything that isn’t. We also want to hear what features you guys like, what sucks, what you’d like to see, and any other suggestions you may have. Ok that’s great, so what’s in it for you?
Benefits of Becoming a Beta Tester:
- Cool Prizes: Limited edition Tenporium t-shirts, giftcards, and other cool stuff for active beta testers!
- Make a Difference: Help improve and shape the experience with your feedback.
- Exclusive Opportunity: Be among the first to participate and contribute to the site. Get a head start on earning member level points before we open the site up to the public.
- It’s FREE
What is Tenporium?
Tenporium is a product reviews site built around collectively determining the top 10 products in various categories.
Brand
So with our name and concept solidified, we had finally established our identity. It was now time to put a face to it all. We needed a logo to represent our site.
It had to be fun and fresh, but most importantly unique and recognizable. We engaged the services of a logo designer and went through numerous logo concepts. Here are some that were proposed:
This is a WPSimpleViewerGallery
All were rejected.
The revolving shopping doors in the shape of a Roman numeral X was clever conceptually, but aesthetically, the style was not what we had in mind. It simply looked like two intersecting planes. We wanted something with more curves and charm.
Not completely satisfied with any of these, we asked the designer to craft one more. He had saved the best for last and delivered his coup de grace. None of the earlier concepts were a hit for us, until he debuted this little guy:
This is a WPSimpleViewerGallery
The Tenporium monster. Courtesy of Nido.
The inspiration behind this was to represent “consume” for consumer products and the “monster consumes all” concept came to mind. It was a brilliant angle, and the connection to our site was subtle and thought-provoking. Visually, it was simple, clean, and charming. Its air of simplicity and purity made the logo identifiable and memorable.
To stay in tune with the logo, our tagline was just as simple: Consumer Driven. Feed the Beast.
It was short, sweet, and captured the essence of the site. The double entendre was slick too.
Identity
What’s in a name? We knew what to call our website, but what exactly was our website?
As a start, we had the original concept for a blog about top 10 things in general. And after all, it was this initial concept that drove us to our name, but we weren’t sure if it was one we wanted to run with.
Why should only our opinions be expressed as opposed to that of anyone else? Doing so would be bias and limiting, selling ourselves short as well as everyone else. We wanted to provide a platform upon which anyone could provide their input and decide what the top ten things are.
With that thought, we decided to ride the “web 2.0″ wave. The site was going to be driven by user-generated content and collective intelligence. But instead of doing top ten things in general for anything and everything, we wanted to narrow the scope. We weren’t sure what top ten “things” we were going to focus on, so we turned to our name to help us define our niche.
We played the game of word association again, but in reverse. In choosing our name, we tried to see what words our idea brought to mind. This time we wanted to see what ideas our name elicited. From the word emporium, the thoughts that naturally came to mind were shopping and consumer products. The scope of our site became apparent: Top Ten Consumer Products. We would enable users to collectively determine the top ten consumer products in various categories and also provide product reviews while they were at it.
With that, our concept was solidified and Tenporium’s purpose was established.
Check out the About section for a more detailed explanation.
Name
Ironically, we came up with our name before we even established what our site was going to be about. We had a name with no real identity. But the name actually gave us direction and helped us define the purpose of our site. So although we did things a little backwards, it really helped us move forward.
The initial concept was to just write a blog about top 10 things in general. It was going to be about anything top 10 with no particular focus. Playing a game of word association, the words that came to mind to represent these ideas were:
| Idea | Word |
|---|---|
| Top 10 | Ten |
| Anything, Everything, Variety, Miscellaneous Stuff |
Emporium |
Enter words into the Name Generator:
Ten + Emporium = Tenporium
Ok, we didn’t need a name generator for that.
