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Later this month, Flock Inc.-a startup running from a garage across the street from Stanford University-will release the Flock web browser.

Are those yawns I hear? Another browser? Firefox rocks, Microsoft is beta testing IE7 to some pretty glowing reviews, Opera still commands a loyal following...is there really room for yet another web browser?

Well, yes, particularly since all of the browsers currently on the market do pretty much the same thing. The differences-tabbed browsing, integrated RSS capabilities, better or worse degrees of security-are simply refinements of the decade-old notion of rendering web pages on your computer monitor. Flock is the first browser built with the rapidly expanding world of social media and consumer-generated content in mind.

Writing in BusinessWeek's "Tech Beat," Steve Hamm explains what makes Flock a "social browser:"

It offers features designed to make it easier to blog, tag content, and share photographs. When a user lands on a Web page that she or he finds interesting, and wants to post about it on their blog, they simply right click on their mouse, which pulls up a blogging wizard. In the process, the software automatically adds citations and links. The browser also has an RSS feed built in. Other handy features: an open-source search engine that automatically indexes every Web site a user visits for easy rediscovery, and the ability to easily share bookmarks with friends.

I've signed up to give it a try. With luck, I'll get onto the beta list and report on how well it works.

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Shel Holtz is principal of Holtz Communication + Technology which focuses on helping organizations apply online communication capabilities to their strategic organizational communications.

As a professional communicator, Shel also writes the blog a shel of my former self.