Gadgetopia

Ektron.com :: Web Image Editor : Ektron WebImageFX: I haven’t seen an embedded, Web-based image editor before. Have I just not been looking hard enough? Are there others I’m not aware of?

If not for the IE-only problem, this seems like a good one. There are some Flash demos here. There’s an online demo here, but you’ll need to install the whole client-side Ektron system (it rides on top of their flagship product: eWebEditPro).

Whenever I come across Ektron, I get a little nostalgic as I think we were one of their very first customers. Seriously — we used it on the a project in 2000, and whenever we called for tech support, I think the guy’s Mom answered the phone. We used to joke that we were calling some 16-year-old in his parents’ basement.

Speaking of that project, here’s an old Internet Week article that talks about how Ektron was used:

But the Vikings still needed outside help, so the sports team turned to BankFirst e-Business, the South Dakota Web development and consulting division of BankFirst Corp. The firm integrated Ektron Inc.’s eWebEditPro into a new Vikings.com administrative interface. The new software lets the team update its content quickly, without any intervention from a Web developer and without any knowledge of HTML.

Gosh, those developers must have been amazingly good. I bet they’re all rich now, living on some island in the Pacific. (Especially the lead developer. I bet he was pretty good-looking too.)