Jaanix lets you discover and share things that matter to people like you.
You can "tune in" with clicks, sliders, ratings, tags, saves, comments, and new posts. Based on this feedback jaanix shows what is relevant to you right now.
Sliders let you quickly change your current mood or interest. Each topic channel has "volume" shown as a green bar that you can adjust with a knob.
Your click on a story link indicates an interest in the topic of the post. When you jaa or nix a post with arrows on the left, it tells the system how much you liked the story, and it affects how the story will be ranked for like-minded users. For users who do not share your interests your approval might actually mean that the post will be scored lower for them.
Tagging the post directly affects how your interests are understood by the system. If you do not like how others have tagged something, re-tag it yourself. Or you can save and edit the post the way you like it.
Saving and posting stories impacts your preferences even more. You can join to get a personal subdomain on Jaanix that will automatically store all of your posts.
Feeds with personalized recommendations are also available from every page so you can enjoy jaanix from your favorite feed reader.
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It might be helpful if the home page warned you that the rating buttons don't do anything unless you're logged in. It's obvious once you think about it, but I didn't think about it until after feeling a little frustrated, which may not be a good way to start out with a potential new user.
The first site to do preferences right could really take off. I think the keys will be good AI, a good interface, allowing the user to control his data, and the ability to interface with the rest of the web without disclosing the user data to third parties. These last two items are crucial and often overlooked. What users like me really want might be thought of as Prefpal, a sort of Paypal for preference data, so we don't have to trust the cloud with our preference data, just as Paypal, for all its faults, keeps you from having to trust the cloud with your credit card numbers.
Prefpal idea is cool, but unfortunately any site will need only ~30 bits of information to be able to identify who you are. Anonymity is not of much protection when all your actions are tracked and correlated.