We’ve recently been working hard to make it easier to add images to the Zistle Library. Last week, we launched a new feature so you can add images by url, making it easy to add images from photo-sharing sites like Photobucket or even your own blog.

Now you can just drag images from your computer onto the Zistle site and it will instantly upload the image to Zistle.  It is so slick, I made a quick video demo to show you how it works.

Sorry for the weird watermark. We are cheap and didn’t buy the software – although we would definitely recommend screenflow to anyone. Very easy to use!

P.S. Right now this only works in the latest versions of Chrome and Firefox, when IE10 is released it should be able compatible but until then you should try out something more modern.

Where do the days go? Sorry for the delay on the stats everyone – the weekend got away from us. This week totally blew last week out of the water in terms of additions to the Zistle Library. Here is the round-up of what happened on Zistle this past week:

• Total Cards Added: 18,479
• Cards Added to Collections: 48,834
• Card Images Added :2,514
• Sets Added: 3,256
• Subsets Added: 3,648

And without further ado… drumroll.. this week’s leaderboard! Captain Canuck came out on top this week adding over 7,000 cards to the library. Thanks to everyone who contributed this week!

• Captain_Canuck – 475,899 points
• jmurph8081 – 394,625 points
• hofmichael – 219,063 points
• jimmybajax – 120,500 points
• mrbadness – 115,336 points
• DaClyde – 95,000 points
• mdaubrey – 77,754 points
• beadedsports – 64,646 points
• Ringo73 – 64,013 points
• legtesta – 55,958 points

Thanks again and to all of our US members have a Happy 4th everyone!

We just pushed out a few changes as a result of feedback from you guys.

First, we added international support to the trading system.  You can now specify your country, use international zipcodes and enter your state/province/etc. (if relevant) in the edit account screen as well as in your trade proposal mailing info.  We have defaulted current users to the US for now so if you have address information already entered you may need to update it next time you finish a trade if you are international (sorry Canadians…).

Second, we have added the ability to add images to cards via URL.  We have been asked for this on and off for a while and we finally came up with a solution that we like.  In both the new card as well as the card flag form you will see  an area to enter a URL:

You can use this to enter urls from your blog, photobucket, or wherever else you keep images.  You can’t simultaneously upload an image and specify a URL for obvious reasons, if you do we will use the uploaded image.  PLEASE RESPECT OTHER WEBSITES’ IMAGES.  Make sure that you are linking to images that are freely available or that you have permission to use (for example your own).  When you specify a URL Zistle’s servers need to go retrieve that image and we want to make sure that we are playing nice with the other sites out there.

Finally we updated a bunch of minor things that people were encountering, including some odd sorting behaviors.  All of these things were a result of feedback from Zistlers so if you have suggestions let us know!  As always if you run into any issues get in touch either via our feedback tool or in chat!

Our deployment went off without a hitch and the newest addition to Zistle is up and running!

Those of you who have been with us for a while might remember that we used to have a chat room where Zistlers could talk about collecting, how to use the site, or whatever was on their minds.  When we redid the site, that was one of the first things that fell by the wayside.  It was not worth the work (we had a lot of bigger problems with Zistle at that point), but more importantly half of the posts were “Is anyone here?”.  Well now that we have grown and people are almost always online we have brought chat back.  Hopefully some of our more experienced members can help new people get started or people can use it as a starting point for trades.  Ashley and I will try to be online when we can and in chat so you can reach us there when we’re online.

To get started with Zistle Chat you will need a modern web browser (e.g. Chrome, Firefox, Safari) or Flash 10.0 or greater installed (you probably already have that).  You will see a chat link in the header of the app

Just click that link and you will be logged in to Zistle chat.  If you use Zistle Chat in a new tab and then browse the site in another, you will see the number of users in chat in that tab title and it will blink when there are messages that you haven’t  read yet.

As always, let us know if you have any questions or problems with it.  Talk to you soon!

Zistle will be down for maintenance tonight at around 11pm CT as we roll out a new feature!  It should only take 15-20 minutes and then we will be back up.

It has been another amazing week at Zistle. Here are some of the awesome things that happened this week:

• Total Cards Cards Added 12,140
• Cards Added to Collections 37,753
• Images Added 2,685
• Sets Added 1,085
• Subsets Added 1,319

The big winner this week is DaClyde with 168,025 points. A big thank you to DaClyde and all of the other Zistle members this week who helped contribute to the Zistle Library this week.

• DaClyde – 168,025 points
• mrbadness – 152,561 points
• BlessYouBoys – 122,627 points
• jimmybajax – 106,181 points
• Ringo73 – 79,314 points
• dogfacedgremlin – 76,733 points
• mkruger743 – 46,788 points
• Captain_Canuck – 41,886 points
• hofmichael – 26,112 points
• legtesta – 24,831 points

Thanks everyone for an awesome week!

Zistle is currently down and will be for about 15 minutes while we do a little maintenance.

Update:

And we’re back.  Happy Zistlin’.

It was inevitable. Zistle has a Facebook page – all the cool kids are doing it so we thought we should as well. For the most part, it will be a way for Zistle members to get updated on Facebook if they like Zistle. However, it is also a really easy way to vote on new feature ideas and suggest ideas. We have integrated our feedback application with Facebook so you can easily see new feature ideas and vote for your favorites – all within Facebook.

If you LIKE Zistle in real life, it would be fantastic if you also LIKE Zistle in your Facebook life. Help get the word out and use your social media muscles to help us grow.

Since we relaunched the new site there has been a flurry of activity on Zistle. New and veteran members have been adding a ton of content to Zistle.

Just check out all the content that has been added the last 7 days on Zistle:

• Cards Added 137,281
• Custom Collections Added 83
• Images Added 54,334
• Sets Added 2,994
• Subsets Added 3,150

And it is all thanks to our members. Here are the top ten contributors this week:

• mdaubrey – 256,627 points
• BlessYouBoys – 187,926 points
• Ringo73 – 132,794 points
• mrbadness – 120,923 points
• jabruce – 81,216 points
• mkruger743 – 81,039 points
• legtesta – 76,075 points
• mattr – 69,150 points
• Captain_Canuck – 38,882 points
• DaClyde – 36,325 points

Mark Aubrey of Mark’s Ephemera has been tearing it up!

We’ll be doing this round-up every Saturday. Thanks to all of our members who continue to be a part of the continued growth of Zistle. Keep Zistlin’.

One of the features that we had to delay releasing in the most recent launch was our library feature. We’re excited to be bringing it back today. This release focused on restoring the original functionality of library – with a few improvements of course. Similar to the rest of the site, you can see library activity on the library homepage as well as each sport page.

You will also be able to see recently added and recently updated sets for those of you who like to see the new images and cards on Zistle. To find sets on Zistle, simply select the sport and search for the sets you are interested in.

Each set page will have a set image, set description and release date. As always, if the information is not included you can add this information. We’ll be adding more fields soon but we’d love to hear from you what information you’d like to see added to the library set and subset pages. What would be helpful to you? What information are you missing?

We are still working on improving the Library – it is far from a finished product. Next up is getting set experts up and running.  Thanks for your patience set experts.