I have only realized that the skiing industry has really been on ball with emerging web technologies and has gone all out on web design, podcasts, blogs, and even wikis. I think that it is great for skiers to take advantage of information technology and spread the joy of the sport. Ultitizing these kinds of information services makes the sharing of information very fast and concentrated. Every month I wait for all of the skiing podcasts that I subscribe too come out, so I can find out what the Pros are up too, how the season is going in various places, how big the parks are out west, and how much pow was dumped out in AK in the most recent snow storm. This makes it really easy for skiers like me who can’t get out all the time to know what is going on in the skiing world.

And now some good stuff…if you skip over this entire blog at least watch this video. This is a twelve-year old kid out in Mt. Hood Washington last summer:

Freeskier, a popular independant skiing magazine, has recently “2.0ed” their website.

The site already featured articles written by Freeskier staff or personal entries by Pros. Registered users on their site can post their own videos and photos and have their own profiles. There is are two new section for reviews of all things related to skiing and daily podcasts. Freeskier’s website interface makes it easy to find popular and recently added videos and photos for visitors to look at. Member profiles are cited in the picture or video so it is easy to backtrack and find out more information about the author. There are four kind of memberships: Companies, Pros, Resorts, and Members. By giving members labels, Freeskier has effectively categorized its members into classifications. Pros (and Freeskier employees) are the most active member of the site. They create most of the content on the site. Resorts and Companies can get a lot of publicity by utilizing their membership profiles to promote their brand. Regular site members still have all of the same features as the Pros, Resorts, and Companies, but just not status advantage of the label.

The Freeskier website has some of the same characteristics as a blog and social network, but doesn’t neatly fit in under either of the two:

Tagging
User Profiles
Comments
Posting
Avatars
RSS feeds

Communication between members on their profiles; however, is somewhat limited. The interface for viewing posts lacks in functionality as well. Freeskier places high emphasis on the featured articles by their staff writers and high-profile members. The only way to view a complete list of member posts is on the Stories page. The Featured articles and posts take up about three-quarters of the page. Freeskier doesn’t all of the other posts in any system beyond tagging and chronological order on the Stories page.

And now some of the good stuff:

http://freeskier.com

This is the 2006-2007 teaser for the the Armada pro ski team.

Armada is a ski company created by a group of pro skiers who wanted to revolutionize freestyle skiing. They officially tied the knot in 2002 as a business and have been leading the ski industry in design and innovation ever since. Unlike other ski companies, Armada is athlete owned and driven.

They have a whole entire of skis especially developed for certain skiing environments and conditions. Whether you like surfing on pow in the backcountry or stomping rails in the park, Armada has a ski for you.

If anyone skis or would like to ski in the future, go Armada.

Armada uses information technology to promote their products and generate interest and hype in their skiing team. They have a very well-designed flash site that includes an online store and pro, amateur, and regional rider biographies. The interesting thing; the founding members of the company design and code the website. They serve as their own internal IT department.