Click here to visit bubbl.us

bubbl.us turns a browser into a brainstorming canvas that you can share with your friends and colleagues. With this free and fun tool, you can create "bubble maps" to brainstorm new ideas, plan out projects, or outline meetings. You start with a main topic bubble and add connected bubbles from there. The idea is to let your mind go where it will, as each new subtopic spawns its own subtopics. This sort of free-form brainstorming is also possible with many Windows- and Mac-based mind-mapping software packages, but bringing brainstorming to the Web opens up exciting new collaboration options—imagine crossing mind mapping with wiki-like shared editing features. At this stage, bubbl.us is still very raw—enough so that I won't substitute it for my dedicated mind-mapping applications, but with continued inspiration and some hard work from its creators, I can soon see it becoming an invaluable brainstorming and collaboration tool.

I do a lot of brainstorming and have used pretty much every piece of software known to man to help the process. Back in the late 1980s, the first piece of software I actually purchased was a product called GrandView that I used to outline a Yellowstone vacation with my girlfriend (now my wife). Most recently, I've been using a product called MindJet MindManager when I want to brainstorm on my own, and wikis when I want to involve others. bubbl.us is the first product that conceptually does what I've always wanted—collaborate with others over the Web using mind-mapping tools.

The program is another intriguing example of how productivity applications are increasingly moving to the Web. It runs in both Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox, using the Macromedia Flash player behind the scenes. The overall user experience was engaging and reminiscent of two Google applications. Using the mouse with a bubble map, for example, feels similar to using Google Maps. Clicking on the background and dragging the mouse in any direction drags the entire map in that direction, and spinning the mouse wheel zooms in and out on the map. Every time you reposition a bubble, the map centers that bubble, which I found a bit distracting. But you don't need to use the mouse; the product is designed so you can brainstorm ideas using only the keyboard. You can enter an idea in a bubble and hit the Tab key to create a new "sibling" bubble, or the Enter key to create a "child" bubble. Each bubble has icons that you can use to move, unpin, or delete the bubble, and two anchors you can click on to add a sibling (in lieu of Tab) or a child (in lieu of Enter).

Saving, loading, and sharing files reminded me of Google Docs & Spreadsheets, but without the polish. After going through a simple sign-up process, you can store your maps—meaning you can save them online, load from a list of previous maps, or share them with friends and colleagues. The interface here still needs some work. For example, I expect to be able to click on a bubble map to open it. And right now, the bubble map icons look a little too much like folders.

Currently, sharing options are a bit limited. You hand off your map to a friend, granting either read-only or full-edit access, but right now, only one of you at a time can edit a map. Although you can search for a friend by name or e-mail address, there is no way to invite a friend to join up from within the interface. Real-time collaboration would turn bubbl.us into an everyday tool for me.

bubbl.us says that upcoming features include the ability to publish maps externally, to a Web page or a blog, for example. Also, the company plans to add some bubble formatting options and an "undo" feature. Currently, the product uses a 3-second deleting animation that gives you a chance to stop an unintentional delete, but once the 3 seconds are up, there's no turning back. I'd also like to see customizable keyboard shortcuts. I'd personally prefer that Enter not create a new child bubble.

Even with bubbl.us's current immaturity, it shows great promise as an online brainstorming tool. With the rate at which its creators are adding new features and improving old ones, bubbl.us has the potential to become something great in the very near future.

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