I recently downloaded Flock, which is the self-described “social web” browser. Flock seeks to integrate social networking, photo uploading, bookmarks, and other features into your web browser. It is based on the same open source code as Mozilla, and pretty much runs on top of Firefox.

Flock has received some good press, and seems set to be an up and coming software download for 2008. For those of us who use social networking sites on a daily basis, it offers a user friendly and simple solution to manage multiple accounts.

I haven’t had time to fully customize it to the level I would like (or to the ability and function it offers) but here is an outline of the tools I have encountered so far.

• Everything opens in a new tab, making it easier to manage your browsing.
• Easy to integrate Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr accounts. Gives you the option to have a “People” sidebar tab (as I have shown below) where you can receive real-time updates on status updates from Facebook and Tweets from your network.
• For Twitter, the only downside is it doesn’t appear to have pop-up status updates (like Snitter does), but it does provide options to search for people, sort by name, check your messages and update your status all within the window toolbar.
• Options for a media bar tab above your browser that feeds pictures from Flickr as well as video from YouTube and other designated sources (you can customize the location and feeds).
• The ability to integrate RSS feeds into one providing a central sidebar tab location. Also has a cool feature where a small pop-up within a browser window will appear to show you when you land on a website that features RSS-feed material, essentially asking if you want to follow that website.
• In addition to RSS feed sidebar, it has a favorite sites sidebar so you can access it through the normal drop down menu, or view on the side. Includes your own favorites, feeds, and media streams all in one location. It’s easy to favorite and bookmark links, also integrating with your current bookmarking site (del.icio.us).
• Accounts and services sidebar manages all of your accounts (Twitter, Flickr, Facebook, del.icio.us, Photobucket, Blogger, Wordpress) in one.
• Blog editor tool to manage and publish blog posts (I haven’t set that up yet since I use Windows LiveWriter, but will check it out).
• Web clipboard offers the option to drag and drop text, links, and images to save for later use.
• Photo uploader function that uploads pictures in batches to Flickr and/or Facebook accounts. Drag and drop from your computer. Ability to edit descriptions and much more.

A few screenshots that show the customizable “My World” homepage and other sidebar options. (Click on photos for full size image.)

Here is the “My World” homepage, where it gives you an overview of the function tabs I mentioned above. You can access all information on that tab or through the sidebar, which on this particular screenshot I have open to Facebook.

Here we have my Google homepage, which I imported over. When I open the browser it comes up with their “My World” homepage in one tab and my designated homepage in another.

The great thing about Flock is that you can make it as simple or as robust as you want it to be. Some people may find all of the options, tabs, and linking to sites a bit of a sensory overload; but for people who use these sites throughout the day, it’s a great way to keep it all in one place without having multiple browsers and/or tabs open.

Flock has already sold me on its functionality, ease of use, and customization options. As more and more people begin to use social media in their daily lives, sites like Flock are going to become more important for web browsing use.

What do you think?