That’s right! There are so many things going on around here that we just couldn’t keep it all in one blog—so we’ve started two more:

Mixx Picks: It’s been getting more difficult to narrow our Mixx Picks down to the two or three we usually send out—particularly because so many people have something cool they want to add. So there’s just been too much to confine to the occasional email update. But we’ve got it covered: Every day a member of your Mixx Team will post the stuff they’ve found to be interesting, inspiring, hilarious, strange, witty, strange—well not too strange; we do have our TOU to think about, after all! . . . but you get the idea.

Mixx’s Engine Room: Get your geek on! Anyone who ever wanted to know what was going on in the mind of the Mixx Masters can check out the Engine Room and the Master Mixxologists themselves will let you know. They’ll let you in on a few dev secrets, as well as talk about what it takes to launch new products in a start-up environment. It’s tech to the Nth—you up for it?

And don’t worry about our regular Mixx Blog—it will still be here, updated whenever we have something new and exciting to share. Go check them out, and as always, let us know what you think!

The Mixx Team

Hello, awesome Mixx Community!

You may have noticed that we’ve been a little quiet lately. Besides our release of Mixx Communities, we haven’t given you too many goodies in quite some time. We’re changing that.

Right now, our engineers are hard at work doing some re-factoring of Mixx’s code in our never-ending quest of making Mixx faster, more stable and more reliable. Although Joe (aka DonutEyeJoe), Jason, Bill, Raghu and Mike love Babies (& Lemons), they don’t like to see many of them around Mixx! We’ll hopefully be putting the finishing touches on this phase of work in the next couple of weeks.

After that, we’re moving on to other items, as usual, requested by our Mixxers!

Holy Spam, Batman!
Things like blogspam, blind voting and other sketchy behavior can be annoying. We’ve got some creative ideas to continue getting the cream of the crop to float to the top. In the meantime, if you see something dicey, hit that “Report This” button—KoriHill loves nuking bad guys. SuperMixxers can now send in unlimited reports, so start hunting.

Communities For All
Mixxers have taken to Communities like a pig to, well, you get the idea. With that have come some great suggestions for improvements that we’ll be taking to heart and pushing out. We’re also making it easier for you to find the best Communities out there.

But I Have a Name!
Annoyed when “CNNReader” or “YouTubeViewer” beats you to the punch submitting that awesome content from our partners? Well, soon we will let you claim that anonymous submission if you are the first Mixxer to find it. You’ll get a small slice o’ karma and the ability to edit the tags, categories and locations.

We’re Serious, Really
Long promised, but soon to be delivered, we’re really going to launch nested comments. We promise. We even have a cool layout from our designer, Alex! We’re just waiting for Doug to get back from Thailand to get started.

Not Like Everyone Else
Finally, we’ve got some killer ideas to further differentiate ourselves from the rest of the crowd. No, we’re not going to tell them to you just yet. Well, if you come up with a new pair of pants for Will, then maybe we’ll give you some hints.

As always, we welcome feedback and would love to hear from you. Together, we’re building a great Community and want to continue that partnership!

~The Mixx Team

It’s not like we’re ready for a walker yet, but we have to admit that parts of Mixx are starting to show their age. Well, OK, one part: the Mixx Tour was cobbled together just before we launched and because we’ve had a few changes and added a lot of new features, the Tour needs an overhaul. Or, to put it plainly, with more than 2 million people visiting Mixx each month, it needs to be tossed out and replaced. We put this little project on the pile for several Mixx Team members but got the hairy eyeball from one too many of them—something about being busy building other cool features for you. So that’s where you come in, dear Mixxers!

We want you to create the new Mixx Tour for us! After all, who knows the site better than you? All you have to do is create a video tour that highlights Mixx features and tools—the idea is to make it easy for a newbie to get acquainted with the site and be able to feel at home right away. Share how you Mixx, how you found the Groups and Communities that mattered most to you (Note: you don’t have to share which Groups and Communities if you’d rather not!); suggest places to look for help (Feedback, The Mixxing Bowl, etc.). And please, be sure to explain what social media is all about—many new users really aren’t sure.

Other things that must be included in the Tour (even if they’re just being pointed out):

• YourMixx: Customization!
• Categories
• Tags: How to use them
• Groups: Public and private
• Communities
• Site Mail

You’ll have three weeks to come up with your perfect version of the Mixx Tour and then the entire Mixx Community will get a chance to vote for their favorite. The top five will go to Chris who will then choose the winning Tours. Before you ask: Yes, you can submit more than one Tour; no you may not vote more than once.

Now this is a contest so there are some ground rules:

• Tours may not be longer than four minutes, with an ideal running time of two to three minutes.
• You cannot break any of the Mixx Terms of Use
• Entries must be submitted to the Mixx Group Mixx Tour Contest
• No entries will be accepted after Friday, August 1st, 2008
• Keep all source files of your video
• Anything submitted becomes property of Mixx

Oh, and did we mention that there are prizes? It is a contest, after all!

• 1st Prize: Apple 3G iPhone, a badge on your profile and the possibility of your Tour being featured on Mixx*
• 2nd Prize: A Flip Mino camera
• 3rd Prize: An American Express Gift Card for $100

As an added bonus, everyone who submits a Tour will get some free Mixx schwag!

We hope this is enough to get you started; be sure to take a look at the current Mixx Tour and then let us know if you have any questions! Now get to work—we need to get this off of the To Do list!

Your Mixx Team

* Mixx will retain ultimate editorial control over placement and promotion of its tour.