A few weeks ago I mentioned that I would be testing out some new enough browsers. I should have really finished by now but I was lucky enough to get a new Mac in between then so I got thrown off the sent a tad. 
So what is Flock?
Flock is a “social web browser” which is based on Mozilla’s increasingly popular Firefox browser. So it’s a rip off then? Yes, but not really. It has a lot of the same features as Firefox such as tabbed browsing and extensions but that’s about it. What sets Flock apart from Firefox is the social aspect of the browser. Flock not only is a browser for searching about the web but it is also a portal for many social networks such as MySpace, Flickr, Photobucket, Del.icio.us, Stumbleupon and Technorati. It also contains an inbuilt RSS reader which I will mention further on in this post…
I know that you can get get extensions and plugins for Firefox which can provide you with tools for social networks such as MySpace, Flickr…and all the rest, but the great thing about Flock is that those features are built into the core of the browser and have been tested so it knocks out the need to use a plugin which may or may not be poorly written, thus causing your browsing to act in a unintended manner.
Interface
As Flock is based on the same open source engine as Firefox it behaves and looks kind of similar. In fact you can get a theme for Flock which makes it look like Firefox. If you’re happy with Firefox but would like to have it look like Flock then grab the reversal skin here.
The navigation bar on Flock is grey and more cartonish than its sister. I’m not 100% gone on the theme myself. There aren’t that many skins or themes available for Flock available on the net but the Flock Wiki gives some information on how to convert Firefox themes into Flock themes which is kind of handy.
Features of Flock
Flock loves blogs.
Last week I tested out Flock’s blog function. Flock lets you post a blog post to your Blogger, Drupal, LiveJournal, MoveableType, Typepad and WordPress blog.
A cute little interface pops up on the screen if you right click and select ‘Blog This’. You can also customise your toolbar to add a Blog button. The blog function is a god-send. It looks a lot nicer than the default admin panel of wordpress and it cuts out the time needed to log into your admin panel too. Flock also provides you with an option of saving a copy of your blog post on your local hard drive .
Flock loves photos.
It combines with Flickr and Photobucket via the browser in a similar way to the blog function. You can search thru your own pictures and the pictures of your friends effortlessly. You can also be notified of any new pictures which have added by your buddies. I haven’t looked too closely at this feature as I’m yet to setup a Flickr account…
Flock loves RSS.
Flock comes with an inbuilt RSS reader which, in my option, looks very similar to Netvibes. For those who haven never used Netvibes…what are you waiting for? It’s amazing. The Flock RSS reader works the way you would expect it to work. You grab an RSS feed and click on the add feed icon and hey presto the website’s content is syndicated via Flock. The reader displays embeded Youtube videos which is handy out. The screenshot below is the channel menu which displays the feeds that you are subscribed to, if you click on the image you will navigate to a screenshot of what the main RSS page looks like.
Flock loves Extensions
Flock is extensible in the same exact way as Firefox. One of my favourite extensions is Forcastfox. It probvides a three day weather predication and displays it in the status bar of flock.
You can check out some more features of flock on the download page.
The Flock Community
It wouldn’t make much sense if the “social browser” wasn’t very community friendly!
Firefox has always being touted as being very community driven. But I don’t really see it that often. I know they rely heavily on their user’s feedback and beta testing, and of course the enxtensions and all that make it more approachable than….oh..lets see…. IE for example, but besides from that there isn’t any real sense of community.
You can’t help but feel part of the community with Flock. Maybe it’s because it has more of an exclusive user base or maybe it’s the blogs, the badges, the hosted forums, the wallpapers, the t-shirts and hats, the artwork, the availability of the source code, the flockstars, their myspace page, their profile pages on flock.com with pictures of their key contributers….which include a dog named Stella, the flock wiki and their general help page…mmm.. that’s a lot of community…
Availability
Flock is available for Windows, Mac and Linux. I have used the Windows and Mac versions and there is no difference whatsoever between the two. I haven’t had a chance to play around with the Linux version yet.
You can check out Flock’s co-founder, Geoffary Arone, giving a demo of some of the features of flock in this video interview. The video features an older release of Flock and some of the footage is dated but it gives an insight into some more of the features of Flock.
I highly recommend Flock as a browser. It is currently my default browser on my Mac and I’m loving my expierence so far with it.
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thank you for visiting! Cormac
6 responses so far ↓
1 Myspace Codes » Blog Archive » Introducing the Flock Browser for Mac/Windows/Linux, it’s like …
// Feb 16, 2007 at 1:36 am
[...] Original post by cormacmoylan and software by Elliott Back [...]
2 Evan Hamilton
// Feb 20, 2007 at 11:01 pm
Thanks for all the love! We’re stoked that you like the browser.
Hope to see you ‘around the community,
Evan Hamilton
Flock Community Ambassador
evan at flock dot com
3 cormacmoylan
// Feb 21, 2007 at 10:12 pm
Thanks for dropping by Evan.
Flock is a great browser. Love it! I’m going to buy one of those coffee cups from cafepress!
I’m going to fire you off an email about testing out the beta releases of Flock on the Mac if you don’t mind
4 Evan Hamilton
// Feb 23, 2007 at 12:42 am
Definitely, we’re having a bug day soon and we’d love to have your help! Shoot me a line to evan at flock dot com.
Evan Hamilton
Flock Community Ambassador.
5 Mason
// Mar 17, 2008 at 11:56 am
Firefox just plain out sucks! Very unstable, bookmarks disappear, so damned frustrating. I use Flock now and am extremely happy with it. Bye Bye Firefox!!!
6 Flock is a joke
// May 13, 2008 at 12:01 am
Flock is rather a dis-appointment since it IS firefox. If only moz was not open source the makers of Flock would be sued for copyright infringement. All they did was fine tuned some of the firefox plugins and changed the skin and name from firefox to flock. And to think for a moment I was almost exited to see a new browser in the game. As for the complaints of ff in the comments well the same goes for both browsers. It has nothing to do with the browser that is making it suck, it is all the junk plugins you are loading. Keep in mind you do not need a plugin for everything. I dont know maybeI am over reacting but I am willing to bet if you look at the code there is less than a 25% difference between the two.
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