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YouTube Is Purging Copyrighted Clips — Hitting the financial jackpot, it appears, may have created some headaches for YouTube, the wildly popular video-sharing Web site that has agreed to be bought by Google for $1.65 billion in stock. — The site late last week began purging copyrighted material …
Source: New York Times
Author: Noam Cohen
Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/30/technology…
Significant numbers of U.S. voters go online for political news and information, and they tend to be younger, educated and liberal, according to a recent AP-AOL poll.
Metacafe, one of the video-sharing sites lurking in YouTube's shadow, is launching an incentive program that rewards the content creators who upload the best clips. The race for eyeballs in online video is heating up. By Michael Calore.
In the massive fourth annual Google Code Jam competition that began in the beginning of September, Google managed to attract 21,000 registrants from 100 different countries. Google's Code Jam competition is not only a celebration of the best in engineering, but it is also a way that Google can help bring together a community of people who will be building next generation tools.
The initial participants all went through a qualification round, which was narrowed down to 1,000 registrants who then went on to compete in a two round competition. The top 100 scores from the second round took a trip to Google's New York offices to complete in the finals. The talented programmers went on a wild ride competing to see who was the best in engineering using Java, C++, C#, Python, and VB.NET. This year Petr Mitrichev from the Russian Federation pulled in first place, and a win of $10,000 in prize money. The second place prize went to Ying Wang of the US, who walked away with $5,000. Not to leave out the top 100 finalists, Google gave them each a cash prize. Its great to see Google bringing together such talent, and pushing to see what can be done with such a diverse group of programmers from all over the world.
Hundreds of active duty personnel have been weighing in on the Iraq war with personal posts on topics from basic training to military strategy. Now the brass is taking notice -- and they don't like what they see. By Xeni Jardin.
TechCrunch is co-hosting this year’s LeWeb3 in Paris, France December 11th and 12th, an event organized by Loic Le Meur of SixApart. It is a two days conference to discuss the next generation web and mobile services, virtual games/communties, old and new media and other topics. Last year the event gathered 450 web entrepreneurs, [...]
On Monday MySpace will announce a partnership with California startup Gracenote to help detect and block copyrighted music from being posted on MySpace member pages. This will allow them to be more proactive about copyright enforcement, in addition to complying with DMCA take-down notices. YouTube made a similar announcement earlier this year, although YouTube is [...]
Top10Media, parent company to Massachusetts based TopTenSources, a human edited blog aggregator, has raised $3.5 million in a venture round led by Highland Capital (see our previous coverage of TopTenSources here). They are also announcing their acquisition of Blogniscient, a TechMeme-style blog news aggregator. We compared Blogniscient to TechMeme and other competitors in October 2005 [...]
3D Weather Data Visualization in Second Life — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) with Aimee Weber Studio just unrolled a sneak preview of their educational project in Second Life (due to open in mid November). This appetizer of things to come features …
Source: Second Life Insider
Author: Aimee Weber
Link: http://www.secondlifeinsider.com/2006/10/28/3d…
YouTube removes Comedy Central clips over DMCA claims — BoingBoing reader Jeff says, … Link. — Reader comment: skott says, … [Another BB reader named] Jeff came up with a funny and spot-on list of practical reasons why comedycentral.com's video-viewing UI sucks way more ass than YouTube.
Source: Boing Boing
Author: Xeni Jardin
Link: http://www.boingboing.net/2006/10/27…
In Teens' Web World, MySpace Is So Last Year — Teen Web sensation MySpace became so big so fast, News Corp. spent $580 million last year to buy it. Then Google Inc. struck a $900 million deal, primarily to advertise with it. But now Jackie Birnbaum and her fellow English classmates …
Source: Washington Post
Author: Yuki Noguchi
Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article…
Blogger Paul Stamatiou details how to embed the default Flickr slideshows on your own web page or blog. All you need to do is embed the following on your page (minus the line breaks):
<iframe align=center src=
http://www.flickr.com/slideShow/index.gne?user_id=12345678@N00&tags=foo
frameBorder=0 width=500 scrolling=no height=500></iframe>Change user_id from 12345678@N00 to your Flickr id, which you can find out with this idGettr. Also replace foo with the tags of the photos you wish to display. Other parameters include "contacts=", "text=", "tag_mode=", "favorites=", "group_id=", "frifam=", "nsid=", "single=", "firstIndex=", "set_id" and "firstId=". If you want to use one of these extra parameters just add it after your user_id with a separating &.
If you're a fan of Flickr, you probably have jumped on some of the available tools for embedding Flickr slideshows on your blog or web page. But if you prefer their default slideshow, you can still get it on your own site with relative ease. Check out a sample slideshow from the LH Flickr page after the jump.
Nifty.
The 37 Signals book Getting Real has been released for free viewing on the company's web site. Previously, you had to pay $29 for the paperback or $19 for the e-book.
37 Signals is best known for popular web apps like Backpack, Basecamp, and Campfire (which Lifehacker editors use for online powwows). Getting Real offers insights, advice, and ideas for web developers and anyone interested in business, design, programming, and marketing.
Here's a little web browser quick tip that I stumbled onto from a reader email recently: Any time you're working in a text area, you can drag and drop text from various parts of your browser directly into the text area. Most of these work in any browser, but just as a heads up, the behavior isn't always the same; these are the results in Firefox. You can:
This tip may not be groundbreaking for everyone, but it is one of those potentially lesser known browser shortcuts that can certainly save some time. Thanks Rubens!
Why Ze Frank is Right and Wrong About Rocketboom — It turns out that Ze Frank is right in doubting Rocketboom's numbers. Rocketboom doesn't dish up 300,000 downloads a day. In October, it's averaging around 211,000 daily downloads. — But that also means that Ze is wrong in speculating …
Source: BusinessWeek Online - Blogspotting
Author: Heather Green
Link: http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/blogspotting…
In the gigantic world of blogs, there are so many important ones to keep up with, and sometimes the information they provide might not be what you want to read. You might want to search out blogs just to read one specific topic--how on earth can you keep up? Our friends at Google have come up with an answer, Google Blog Alerts. Its at the same address as their regular Google Alert application, and works the same way. Just choose your search term, and under the Type, choose Blog, and how often Google should check for your results. Simple as that. No more surfing aimlessl y looking for blog content.
Bookmarking and social sharing trends — The ability to save a URL has been around since Mosaic 0.2 but is currently experiencing a transformation as we learn more about the pages and content behind the pointers and share our findings with others through social networks.
Source: Niall Kennedy's Weblog
Author: Niall Kennedy
Link: http://www.niallkennedy.com/blog/archives/2006/10…
Why IBM's patent suit against Amazon could be bad news for the entire Web — For years, there have been a handful of companies trying to figure out how to erect a toll booth on the Web, if not the Internet altogether. In other words, they've been looking for some way to ensure that the Internet …
Source: Between the Lines
Author: David Berlind
Link: http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=3848
In this issue of Googleholic we cover:
We knew the advent of a Google AdSense audio version was coming down the pipes when Google acquired dMarc Broadcasting, a digital media solutions firm. Well, it looks as though AdSense for audio is slated for release this quarter. With podcasts being its main target, and streaming and audio on demand programming. This could potentially bring a whole new level of importance, and validity as somewhat of a business revenue model to the fine art of podcasting. There are also rumors that point to Google launching a music podcast product. Don't you just love Google potential product leaks?
Can't seem to get Google Video on your phone or mobile device? There's nothing like being able to search for a video, download it and watch it when you are bored. But what happens when you are on the road, and just have your phone? Well, as long as your mobile device has a XHTML browser, some nice storage space, a relatively fast connection, and an application that plays AVI or MP4 formats, you are in total luck. Srobbin mobile video search plugs into Google Video search and serves them up upon your request. Now remember, you should have a data plan, since many of t he videos are about 5MB, and your bill might get kind of yucky. To surf for videos, simply visit srobbin.com/mobilevideo from your mobile device and search! Simple! No more boredom! Just a giant bill if you don't have a data plan.
When you share something with another Facebook user, it shows up in their right sidebar, not in their News Feed, which w ill be a relief to those who were afraid of overzealous linkers (or those with dreams of "free" iPods) spamming things up. Like events, you can enter someone's e-mail address if they don't have a Facebook account, but they have to register for an account before they can see what you've shared. There is, naturally, a bookmarklet that you can use to share links from across the web, as well as MP3s and videos from YouTube and Google Video.
So far I haven't see any "Facebook Sharing is teh sux" or "OMG SHARING wut is this MySpace!!1?" groups pop up, but I suspect it's only a matter of time.
A while ago I wrote about Yahoo's initiative to archive the current state of the web with writings, photos, videos, audio, and drawing submitted by users to teach future generations. Enter another kooky idea, projecting the images in New Mexico. Yahoo is planning on projecting the images from its time capsule project on the Pyramid of the Sun in Mexico. Although permission was denied by the Teotihuacan archaeological site in fear that the projections could somehow damage the ruins, it looks like Yahoo will continue on rolling the 15 hours of materials. Dates for the projection are from October 25 to the 27th.
Madison, Wisconsin shopping search engine Jellyfish.com just announced the end of a $5 million round of funding from Kegonsa Capital Partners and Clyde Street Investments. It’s been a busy week of funding announcements for 2.0 style sites. Jellyfish searches for products across more than 1000 thousand stores that provide Cost-Per-Action compensation to Jellyfish [...]
Head over to YouTube right now and search for clips from The Daily Show, the Colbert Report, or South Park. You'll find your search discouraging, since clicking on most of those video links will get you naught but a big red "This video has been removed due to copyright infringement" or "This video has been removed due to terms of use violation." That's right, Comedy Central's lawyerbots are reportedly on a rampage and have asked that newl y Google-owned YouTube take down copyrighted clips from their shows. That sound you hear is the sound of a million buzzes being killed or, as Agent Smith would say, "That... is the sound of inevitability."
As I wrote recently, Viacom--Comedy Central's parent company--and other media companies in similar situations could easily rectify this situation by simply offering the best clips from their shows on their own web sites with their own branded player that users can embed in their blogs and MySpace pages. This would allow them to directly control their content while still allowing their shows' biggest fans to do all the free promotion they want, and they could stick ads at the end for their other properties. Warner Music recently got a clue and struck a deal with Brightcove to do this very thing. Personally, if I were Viacom I'd rather pay a few engineers to give fans a legitimate alternative to copyright infringement than pay a bunch of lawyers to sit around watching YouTube.
Still, Viacom is well within its rights and Google's only option--its only smart option, at least--is to comply with their requests. This, as I've said before, is the shape of things to come.
[Image via NewsCloud]
I got an email this afternoon notifying me that there was a new post on the official Google blog, but the blog was down. Now that it’s back up we can read that Google is expanding its popular Google Alerts service to include blog search. At the end of last week blog search [...]
Yahoo Bookmarks is like an upscale Del.icio.us, allowing you to store, share, tag, and organize your bookmarks within an attractive interface. Currently in beta, the new version of the online bookmark service offers drag-and-drop organization, three ways to view your bookmarks, and user-friendly tagging features.
As someone who has never been a fan of Del.icio.us (you call that an interface?), I'm very pleased with Yahoo Bookmarks. It imported my Firefox bookmarks without a hitch, and I was able to install its bookmarklet just by dragging it to my toolbar. (I'm really glad Yahoo didn't force me to install the Yahoo Toolbar; I'm more of a Google Toolbar man.) Interestingly, Yahoo acquired Del.icio.us about a year ago. Could this be a first step in migrating users away from that service?
Windows and Mac OS X only: Freeware program iPod -> Folder allows users a super-simple way to do a full backup of their iPod on any Mac or Windows computer.
We've actually posted a few methods for backing up your iPod in the past, but iPod -> Folder is a nice standout both for its simplicity and it's Windows and Mac versions. The downside is that iPod -> Folder doesn't allow you to selectively backup music, so it's an all-or-nothing affair. That said, this is a great little app to download and stick on your iPod so you can easily "back up" your music at any computer. Thanks Rory!
Previously-mentioned hosted blogging service Vox launched today and registrations are open to the public.
What I really like about Vox - besides its dead-simple interface and overall "fun place to be" feeling - is that you can easily pull in items from all over the interwebs into one personal page, like Flickr, iStockPhoto or Photobucket photos, YouTube videos, and Amazon items. Privacy levels allow you to blog about that thing you'd rather the whole world didn't know about to just your friends and famly, and the VoxWatch reader helps you keep up with the folks you care about. Plan to lose a couple of hours of your day wandering around Vox.
Google Book Search launches a "scary stories" section with classic fright novels and stories like Dracula, The Tell-Tale Heart and Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
Google's digitized the text of all 25 stories and made them searchable and, where copyright isn't an issue, browseable page by page online. The public domain works (like The Turn of the Screw) are also available as a free PDF download. Looks like a great way to gather around the flickering jack-o-lantern this weekend and brush up on a few classics.
Web Browser Faceoff — Written by Alex Iskold and edited by Richard MacManus. — The last few weeks have been packed with browser action and the two market leaders, Internet Explorer and Firefox, have launched major new versions. So to round out our recent browser coverage …
Source: Read/WriteWeb
Author: Richard MacManus
Link: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives…
Annecdotes from Jason Calacanis on Weblogs Inc. and blogging — Jason Calacanis, love him or hate him, is a poster boy for making money from blogs. Weblogs Inc, now owned by AOL-TimeWarner of course, is one of those storied parts of the blogosphere. I think (I hope) there is going to be …
Source: The Tucows Blog
Author: Tris Hussey
Link: http://tucowsblog.com/blog/_archives/2006/10/26…
Google's Internal Company Goals — A company paper* Google published internally earlier this year and which I got hold of outlined some of Google's big goals and directions for 2006. The list included several items, for example: — Google wants to have an improved infrastructure to make their engineers more productive.
Source: Google Blogoscoped
Link: http://blog.outer-court.com/archive/2006-10-26-n80…
This morning I saw a blog post on the CodeJam blog about a new update to MemoriesOnTV, but the big item in the post was that they were bringing back MemoriesOnWeb, a freeware slideshow creator application.
The application uses the same engine as MemoriesOnTV so you have lots of features and control. In the slideshow you can mix multiple audio tracks and sync up your photos to the audio. And with the pan/zoom effects on pictures you can give movement to still photos.
They do have some tips on their site for running it, which lists some codecs you should have for best user experience. And the projects created in this and MemoriesOnTV are compatible and can be loaded in each. Check out some screens after the jump.
Click each of these for larger versions.
The main window of MemoriesOnWeb.
SlideConfiguration
Publish Video
Google Blogoscoped has published a summary of an apparently-leaked internal Google memo that outlines the Big G's secret plans to breed evil radioactive mutant rats, er, take over the world, er, make a ton of money this year. To summarize the summary, this year Google planned to:
There's lots more in Google Blogscoped's report, so if you're a Googleholic like us I don't recommend missing it.
Seeing a bunch of lean code jockeys building the next generation of web browsers is a reality TV show I'd watch. Since that's probably not happening any time soon, I'll take the next best thing: Read/WriteWeb's Web Browser Faceoff, by Alex Iskold. Iskold reviews six of the latest crop of web bowsers: Firefox 2, Internet Explorer 7, Safari, Opera 9, Flock, and Maxthon. I highly recommend reading his entire round-up, but in case your attention span ain't what it used to be, here's what he concludes about our trusty browsers:
I know it is incredibly difficult to crack DRM in some cases. Now that DVD Jon has cracked the iPod, but it doesn't matter to me that much. Many times a poorly executed DRM system can be bypassed with almost no effort, but some of the well-coded ones can be hard (i.e. the iPod and iTunes "FairPlay" DRM). It is isn't that I don't appreciate the effort of it, but I really don't see the point of it. Is it really going to help the music sharing problem go away, is it going to stop all the lawsuits by the RIAA? I know that many iTunes fans will download the crack and use it, what are the chances that anyone will get caught using it right? I feel like this is just another trip ar ound the circus ring. I still maintain that the music problem (meaning DRM, sharing, digital rights) is not any better. I don't care who cracks what anymore. Call me obscenely critical, but come on, when is the bouncing-fairy dance going to end? The issue hasn't improved for either side in my not-so-humble opinion. What do you think? Are you sick of hearing about DRM, sick of having to do all kinds of dumb things, jumping through hoops to be to use your music, when clearly record companies are clinging to a dying business model with their dollar-clenched fists? I want problem resolution, I want results, and I want to see real change in the industry. Are there reasons why the cracking and repatching and recracking of DRM and its minions is a good thing that will drive change and usher in the new world of music downloading utopia? If you have a good reason that cracking is a good thing in this case, please let me know, but right now I just don't see it.
Disclosure: Read/WriteWeb will be going live shortly with a custom Eurekster search box.
One of the big pieces of news this week has been Google's new Custom Search Engine. It's noticeable not because it's an innovative product, but more because Google is most definitely a follower and not a leader when it comes to custom / social search. Not only are there a number of small startups already doing the same thing, but one of their direct competitors Yahoo! has been doing social search for quite some time. So it was a little humorous to see the Google Blog post trumpeting custom search as a "Eureka!" moment. Also my immediate thought upon seeing the post, entitled "Eureka! Your own search engine has landed!", was that they were taking a sly dig at Eurekster. Mike Arrington also picked up on this.
Read/WriteWeb profiled the social search space back in July, with a well-read post by Ebrahim Ezzy entitled Search 2.0 vs Traditional Search. It's worth doing a quick update on that post, to clarify exactly where Google fits in.
A reminder of Ebrahim's definition of what we termed "search 2.0". He defined it as a service that combines "the scalability of existing internet search engines with new and improved relevancy models; they bring into the equation user preferences, collaboration, collective intelligence, a rich user experience, and many other specialized capabilities that make information more productive."
As we noted, a number of small startups are doing custom and social search engines: Eurekster, Rollyo, Clusty, Lexxe to name only a few.
Now let's take a high level look at which of the small startups is leading this 'space' currently, via our old friend Alexa:
Source: Alexaholic
It's clear that Eurekster is the leading player right now, but of course both Google and Yahoo are extremely capable of taking a big share of the market.
I emailed Eurekster's Chief Scientist Dr Grant Ryan (who is a fellow kiwi) and asked what he thought of the Google Custom Search launch? As to be expected, he took an optimistic view of the situation:
"This Google launch has been great for our swicki creation rate - seems to have increased by a factor of about 10! The reason this is great is that we no longer have to explain why building your own search engine is a good thing to do and people seem keen to check out the company that has been doing it for the longest. It is a compliment that Google and Yahoo have chosen to follow us into the vertical social search space (how often is Google a follower when it comes to search....)."
Nice little dig back at Google in that last line ;-) But of course Eurekster and the others like Rollyo and Clusty know only too well that Google and Yahoo are big threats in this market. While right now the offerings of Google and Yahoo aren't as sophisticated as the startups they're emulating, they have the big advantage of resources and reach.
However Grant says Eurekster has "lots of cool new features coming out soon that [will take] the idea of publishing your own search engine to the next level." I'm sure Rollyo, Clusty, Lexxe and others will be planning similar upgrades. So as usual, it's the consumer who wins out in the end!
Written by Alex Iskold and edited by Richard MacManus.
The last few weeks have been packed with browser action and the two market leaders, Internet Explorer and Firefox, have launched major new versions. So to round out our recent browser coverage, we present the Web Browser Faceoff - looking at how all the main browsers compare with each other in terms of features and innovation. We are basically looking for what is unique, interesting - and missing - in each browser.
Right now Microsoft still holds onto its huge market lead, but Firefox is gaining more ground every month. Probably more importantly, there are other major innovators in the browser space - such as the social browser Flock (a Read/WriteWeb sponsor) and the perennial innovator Opera. The Mac browser Safari of course has many passionate supporters, while new kid Maxthon is one to watch.
Regardless of who will prevail in the 'browser 2.0 wars', the users will win. While fighting each other, the browser makers innovate and simplify. They increase our productivity by integrating into the browser web concepts such as search, RSS, OPML, microformats and more. The core browsers are getting slimmer and faster, while extensions that cover a wide range of services are being developed by external parties.
Internet Explorer 7.0 is a major release from Microsoft, after nearly 5 years of silence. We just recently profiled this browser and concluded that it is solid - and even an exciting release, at least compared to its predecessor. Clearly Microsoft felt great pressure from Firefox to come up with the upgrade.
This release is mostly good. There are major improvements like Tabbed Browsing, beefed up security, support for RSS, built in search engines and better interfaces for bookmarks and history. Oddly, there are still some leftovers from IE6 - the major one being the in-page search box, which is nearly impossible to use.
Pros: Big improvement over IE6, nice user interface, very good RSS support.
Cons: Leftovers from previous release, performance is not great, not fully compliant with standards.
Faceoff bottom line: Solid release, which is going to help Microsoft maintain the market leadership in the near future
Firefox just launched its 2.0 release. We covered the launch extensively with a Firefox 2.0 product review, an interview with Mozilla exec Chris Beard and a Firefox marketing discussion post. Firefox 2.0 impresses with its speed, stability and coolness. Mozilla has managed to create both a thriving community and strong extension ecosystem, that drives both improvements and market share. Firefox also has many great productivity features - like search engine integration, in-page search, simple RSS integration and tabs. It excels in overall usability, security and accessibility.
Pros: Great performance and feature set.
Cons: No built-in RSS reader, no hugely innovative features (like Flock) - so arguably not distinct enough from IE7.
Faceoff bottom line: We think that Firefox is going to continue narrowing IE's lead, but await with interest the next major version!
No browser faceoff would be complete without Safari, the browser for MacOS. Like all things Apple, Safari has cool features - but it still feels like a 'web 1.0' browser. The most impressive feature is RSS integration. For each page that contains an RSS feed, Safari presents a handy search bar which allows the user to find entries by date, category and many other criteria. It also has built-in spelling - a feature that was just recently added to Firefox. The bookmarks and history are nice, but unexciting. Tabs are not enabled by default and there are no integrations with web services.
Pros: Simple, relatively fast, good RSS support.
Cons: Lacks web service integrations and productivity features.
Faceoff bottom line: It's a clean and simple web 1.0 browser, but needs a major feature boost in order to be a contender even on the Mac.
Opera 9.0 is an interesting browser. It has a lot of good features, nice add-on infrastructure and a strong community. In terms of basic features it is not far off from Firefox. It is also fast and responsive, which makes us wonder why it is not used by more people. The answer, we think, is due to a couple of things. First the default skin and some UI elements are bit contrived. They look like a blend of future and past - and overall there is a lack of harmony.
The marketing of the browser has not been as strong, at least for desktop - since this browser has been focusing primarily on the mobile space lately. On a positive note, there is fairly complete RSS integration - including a built-in RSS reader. The URL toolbar and home buttons are done in a very clever and convenient way. Tabs are done well (and as a R/WW commenter noted recently, Opera had tabs even before Firefox). One other interesting thing about Opera are the desktop widgets. We found them to be cool, but somewhat unrelated to the browser since they run on the desktop.
Pros: Rich feature set, RSS integration, fast
Cons: Lacks coolness factor of Firefox, not as well known - but maybe an unfair comparison since Firefox is open source
Faceoff bottom line: We can see why fans like this browser, but a bigger future depends on spicing it up and poring in the marketing dollars.
Flock is the newest and perhaps the most exciting browser on the market today. This Firefox-based browser has taken the concept of browsing to the next level by radically integrating support for web services. For example, stock browser feature bookmarks have been replaced in Flock by integration with del.icio.us. Flock also features support for online photo sharing sites like Flickr and Photobucket.
Flock comes with a built-in Blog editor, which supports many blogging services including WordPress, Blogger and MovableType. There is also a built-in RSS reader, which is one of the best RSS readers on the market in our opinion. The innovation goes beyond the service integration, since Flock also includes interesting new UI elements like TopBar - which is an improved search box and scratch area for storing web snippets.
Pros: del.icio.us and Flickr integrations, built in blog editor, RSS reader, cool UI
Cons: Cloned Firefox code base, making it more work to make compatible add-ons.
Faceoff bottom line: Great productivity browser for web 2.0
We thought it would be worthwhile to profile the China-based Maxthon browser, which had over 55 million downloads by May 2006 - at which point it received an investment from Charles River Ventures. This browser is based on the IE engine and it claims to be 100% compatible with it. The first thing we noted is that the install was super fast, just a few seconds.
The Maxthon browser comes with many pre-installed plugins, mostly for integrating with web 2.0 services like del.icio.us, Digg and Technorati. The look and feel resembles Internet Explorer 6, with the addition of tabs and a sidebar for plugins. The UI is not great and we noticed a few hickups, but the integration with web 2.0 services is very impressive - at least from a purely features point of view. Consistency is achieved by placing all integrations into the sidebar and adding a vertical control for toggling between them. Besides these plugins there are many other features - perhaps too many, which could also be the cause of slow page loads.
Pros: Impressive integration with the latest web 2.0 services.
Cons: Too many features, lacks coolness factor, slow.
Faceoff bottom line: Need to apply Occam's Razor (i.e. make it simpler), but definitely could be a contender because of solid service integration.
In one of his recent posts on ZDNet, Richard published statistics on the current browser market share. According to his post, IE still maintains a strong lead but Firefox is gaining ground - particularly in US. Looking at the browsers reviewed in this post, we can be certain that a lot more innovation will come over the next few years. Each of these browsers brings a unique, interesting approach - which will fuel the competition between them.
Whatever happens, we as users are certain to see better browsers that are focused on productivity and web services. Even though IE and Firefox are far ahead today, we see that other browser like Flock and Maxthon are ramping up support for the latest web 2.0 services - making themselves stand out and attracting early adopters.
Faceoff bottom line: This round of browser competition is going to be at least as interesting as the Netscape vs. IE ten years ago. And hopefully less one-sided!
There's an interesting rumor doing the rounds about Google doing a re-org of their advertising business. Jeff Molander wrote:
"Three of my most credible resources, including DM News’s Giselle Abramovich, are indicating plans for a significant re-organization at Google (Nasdaq: GOOG). [...] On the re-org, says Ms. Abramovich,
“What this means is that there would be one global account director per account, that pulls in resources to sell as needed - PPC (pay-per-click), Print, Radio, Video, Display, etc.”
As of yet nobody can confirm with anyone at Google but the leaks are emanating from Google itself according to all three of my sources."
The significance of this is that it's similar to what Microsoft and IBM already do - extract maximum revenue for each customer (in this case, the larger advertisers on Google). This means Google will utilize different types of ads (CPC, CPM, CPA, etc) over all media channels - search, mobile, video, audio, etc.
The benefit for Google's customers is that it enables them to target certain leads across different types of media. They can do that from one 'console' and they will work with 1 Google salesperson/account manager on their account. Of course will the large advertising agencies be happy with this scenario of Google providing a one-stop shop? Of course not...
One interesting sub-plot here is that Google needs more "inventory" to sell the different flavors of advertising. Jeff mentions adsense for podcasting in his post - and that is certain to be one way Google will increase their inventory. Also this puts the likes of Feedburner, Meebo, edgeio and Commission Junction squarely in Google's sights as potential acquisitions. All of those 'web 2.0' startups have no shortage of inventory!
In terms of Google's overall goals, as summarised at Google Blogoscoped, this rumored re-org falls under the "push their ad system" category. It really makes sense for Google and shows not only that they are innovating in technology - but maturing and expanding as a media/advertising entity.
I've joined the cacophonous masses and created my very own page on the Great Mother MySpace. Join me in part two of my online odyssey as I embed random detritus from the net and annoy my web page visitors. Commentary by Lore Sjöberg.
Mashing maps and tagging data can transform American politics for the better. Web 2.0 wizards, America needs you! Commentary by Jennifer Granick.
A couple of the year's most-anticipated releases -- new versions of Internet Explorer and Firefox -- arrive within a week of one another. So which one is best? By Michael Calore.
Yahoo is unveiling an entirely new Bookmarks product this evening at new.bookmarks.yahoo.com - new interface, new back-end, the works. A screencast created by Yahoo developer Tom Chi is here which gives an excellent overview of the service (Chi also created the background music for the screencast). Compare that to the existing Bookmarks product (screenshot is [...]
I am a blogger with a lot of opinions, and because of that I’ve been involved in a number of heated discussions around journalistic integrity and ethics. Mainstream media defines journalistic integrity as a lack of financial interest in the subject matter of their reporting. I think integrity goes far beyond financial interests; in our [...]
Karel Baloun, one of the first engineers to join Facebook, recently wrote and self published a tell-all ebook on his experiences there called “Inside Facebook.” Early reviews are mixed, although I found the book to be an insightful look at a successful startup from a key insider. The language is rough and unpolished, but the [...]
Roll your own Google Search — Not a day passes by when someone or the other bemoans the fact that they cannot find anything on Google anymore. Well, they can stop complaining, because Google is doing something about it. The company has announced Google Custom Search tools …
Source: GigaOM
Author: Om Malik
Link: http://gigaom.com/2006/10/23/google-custom-search/
Edgeio gets $5 million to expand Web 2.0 classifieds site — Edgeio, a Menlo Park start-up trying to redefine the way people list classifieds, has raised $5 million in a first round of venture capital, and may raise more. Here is the release. — The round was led by Intel Capital and included an investment from Transcosmos.
Source: VentureBeat
Author: Matt Marshall
Link: http://venturebeat.com/2006/10/23/edgeio-gets-5…
Google Co-op Launches — Google just launched a customized search service called Google Co-op (screen shots below). Co-op allows a user to create and launch a search engine with just a few specific websites included. Searches will return results from only that website.
Source: TechCrunch
Author: Michael Arrington
Link: http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/10/23/google-custom…
Bush says he uses "the Google." — Watch it: — Digg It! — Transcript:
Source: Think Progress
Author: Judd
Link: http://thinkprogress.org/2006/10/23/bush-says-he-uses…
Google launched a customizable search engine today. This is a program where both individuals and organizations can build a search that will produce results that accommodate their audience requests better, in no time at all. Not only will the searches be tailored to website visitors with prioritized results and the ability to allow other user contribute to the search index, but the results can be monetized with Google AdSense. Thus displaying advertisements where site owners can make money. The customizable search engine will also be modifiable so that it is branded for users s pecific applications. Google built the Custom Search Engine to make it easy for anyone to create a search engine about their favorite topics.
In order to begin creating a search engine, users go to http://www.google.com/coop/cse/ and select the websites or pages they would like to include into their index under their Google Account username. Users can then have the opportunity to restrict or increasing ranking for results. And in order to better fit the engine into their website, users can customize the look and feel.
Some examples of the Custom Search Engine can be seen at JumpUp.com, and RealClimate.org.
In this issue of Googleholic we cover:
Using foam core and old fishing weights to craft a model of a new MP3 player five years ago, Apple engineers usher in the age of the iPod. By Steven Levy from Wired magazine.
Google just launched a customized search service called Google Co-op (screen shots below). Co-op allows a user to create and launch a search engine with just a few specific websites included. Searches will return results from only that website. Users have a number of options to customize the search engine: choosing which pages they want to [...]
The Zune mystery thickens. Our CrunchGear rumorists have discovered that when you share a song via Wi-Fi using Zune’s three day/three play system AND the other party purchases the song later in the iZunes Music Store (IZMS), you get a credit that you can later trade in for music and media. Very clever, Microsoft, very [...]
Long-running public radio show This American Life is now available as a free podcast. Each week on their program, of course, they choose a theme, then present a variety of stories on that theme. Previously, to hear the show, you had to tune into your local public-radio station at the right time, stream it from the show's web site, or pay to download it from Audible.com.
No more. iTunes users can subscribe to This American Life, but it's also accessible via any podcatching software (such as myPodder). This is a much more convenient way to catch an awesome hour of radio programming.
Mapping software Google Earth now has 2 new layers available: a U.S. Election Guide and Congressional Districts layer.
Enable the new layers within Google Earth (free to download, Mac or Windows), and see 436 Congressional districts outlined on the map throughout the U. S. of A., plus election information with candidate names, parties and links to register to vote. After the jump, check out a couple more detailed screenshots.
The 2006 U.S. Election Guide layers are not turned on by default. Check them off in the Layers area to enable 'em.
Click on the star placemark to get more info on that voting district, as shown. Useful! Now get out there and register to vote in the November 7th Congressional elections.
Unlocking the iPod — Jon Johansen became a geek hero by breaking the DVD code. Now he's liberating iTunes - whether Apple likes it or not. — (Fortune Magazine) — Growing up in a small town in southern Norway, Jon Lech Johansen loved to take things apart to figure out how they worked.
Source: Fortune
Author: Robert Levine
Link: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune…
Putting blogs to work for Wall Street — Collective Intellect has a goal: Make bloggers work for The Man. — The company has created a service that combs through thousands of blogs, news sites, chat rooms and other Web sites every day and then surfaces rumors and news reports that might …
Source: CNET News.com
Author: Michael Kanellos
Link: http://news.com.com/2100-1008_3-6128340.html
Found: 1 black 30 GB video iPod. Is it yours? — If this isn't a test for how the blogosphere can get things done, I'm not sure what is. As a part of this test, if you happen to read this blog entry and you have a blog, please spread the word and let's see if the viral nature of the blogosphere can help this iPod find its owner.
Source: Between the Lines
Author: David Berlind
Link: http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=3810
freenigma is a Firefox plug-in that offers e-mail encryption to a whole range of Web email systems - including Gmail, Yahoo!Mail and Hotmail/MSN. It is a product of Germany-based freiheit.com. freenigma came out of public beta at the end of September and is now open to all - but you still have to enter your name and email address to receive "an invitation" (which sounds quite 'beta' to me). Interestingly, freenigma has also just announced a Professional Edition for corporate customers as well as a Microsoft Outlook plug-in - both to be released by the end of the year. So looks like they're expanding beyond just web email and into the enterprise space.
It is a compelling product, as privacy and security are among the two biggest concerns related to using the Web as a platform. Although I am an avid user of Gmail, I wonder sometimes about sending private information across the ether on a web-based email service. I'm sure they're the usual slightly paranoid concerns of every single Web user, but a product like freenigma is positioned well to take advantage of those common concerns for privacy. See also my recent post on Web 2.0 security issues, from a report by Finjan.
The freenigma homepage makes no bones about playing on the privacy fears of Web users:
"Today, all your e-mails are stored and sent around the planet in plain text. And today you have no control over what happens to your private or business e-mail conversations and you can't prevent others from reading them. Get your privacy back! Encrypt your private and business e-mails to protect your freedom, privacy and your business secrets."
freenigma was built using Ajax and developers are invited to use an open programming interface (Open API) to extend freenigma and integrate it into their own applications. It is browser-based (Firefox), so it runs on all the main OS platforms - GNU/Linux, Apple Macintosh or Microsoft Windows XP. It is also based on "one of the most famous and most widely used cryptographic software packages in the world: the GNU Privacy Guard (GnuPG)." Werner Koch, developer of GnuPG, is a founding member of freenigma along with Stefan Richter.
freenigma works by encrypting e-mails before they are saved and sent; they are then decrypted on the other end by the recipient. As noted in the FAQ, even if web-based email providers offer their own encryption services, freenigma is a service that works across all the web email systems.
As for their business plan, it is a free service "for private individuals". The fact they're releasing an Outlook and corporate version soon suggests that the enterprise market is where they'll make their money. Indeed this is confirmed in the FAQ:
"We believe that many companies will outsource their e-mail in the near future. To do so, they will utilise the services of Google Mail, Hotmail or Yahoo! Mail. However, we believe that this change will only take place if companies are able to encrypt their business secrets independently of the provider. That’s where freenigma comes in. :-)"
Interesting service and I am curious to see how much take-up they get from businesses for the paid service. There have been enough security lapses recently by Google in particular to make a service like freenigma very viable. What do you think?
The Cult of Mac looks back across five years of iPod success to decode the success of the world's favorite family of digital media players. Hint: It isn't about white plastic or shiny metal. In Cult of Mac.
Google unveils 'custom' searches — Google will on Tuesday launch a customisable search engine that users can carry on their own blogs and other websites, a move that potentially opens up a big new market for its search listings and related advertising. — Marissa Mayer, vice-president …
Source: Financial Times
Author: Richard Waters
Link: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/a53ea278-62e9-11db-8faa…
Written by Bjorn Fant and edited by Richard MacManus
Sweden is a nation determined to be an international competitor in the IT arena. IT budgets in the private and public sector add up to 5% of Sweden's total National Growth Product; IT and entrepreneurship are a huge part of the cultural agenda; and Swedish success stories like Skype and The Pirate Bay get a lot of attention in international media and on blogs. Despite all of this, there are relatively few Swedish Web 2.0 apps that stand out from the crowd.
A point of interest for all of non-swedes is that Swedish web apps generally use two domain extensions. The .se extension is the most common and used by serious enterprises. The .nu means “now” in Swedish and is used in various concept sites and hip companies. The extension was purchased from the small island kingdom of Nieu in the Pacific ocean.
Digga.se is a dig clone with less features. Users submit links and they are graded by other users. The posts can be graded (“diggade”) by users and tagged, which generates top lists and a very Web 2.0 cloud (“Taggmoln” in swedish).
Bubblare.se is a YouTube clone, but with many fewer features. The amount of copyrighted material is about the same. The video clips are played in bubblare's own flash player - and like You tube, movie clips are supplied with an HTML string that lets any viewer paste the clip onto their own webpage.
Lunarstorm.se is the largest community for teens in Sweden. It has been active since 1999 and is still the most popular place to hang out for youths between 13 and 18. An account offers about the same number of features as MySpace. A cool feature is the page header banner with a live stream of messages. The messages are text messages, submitted from users' mobile phones. Users also get points for writing in each others guestbooks, or sending internal email - which encourages use of the service. The points are worth nothing but online status.
Podradio.nu is a community for people who listen to podcasts. The various podcasts are tagged and graded by the users and are presented in lists by tag, popularity and date. The users are also encouraged to create their own podcasts and are free to upload these to their podradio account.
kloudberry.se is a site that lets users create invitations for parties and events. The service includes graphical invitation cards and a discussion forum for the invited to chat before the event.
Hitta.se is a search service that lets users find phone numbers, addresses and other public information about Swedish citizens. It is complete with an Ajax generated map service which shows the address you searched for. The really cool, but also a little creepy, feature is that they can display a photo of almost any front door on every building in Sweden!
Knuff.se is one of Sweden's most popular blog farms. Blog authors ping the site nyligen.se and are added to the Knuff register. The manager of Knuff also manages other popular blog services like bloggkartan.se, intressant.se and bloggtips.se.
buzz.bazooka.se is not a new service, but qualifies for this post under the “user-created content” category. Buzz is a moderated news and link aggregator. Users submit links to the site. Selected links are posted on the front page, where they are graded by users. Due to the small amount of links that are posted on the frontpage, users are keen on submitting quality links and compete for the attention. A link posted on Buzz can get around 5000 page views the day it is posted.
googlecloud.com is not a stand alone web app, but a mashup between a new service and google. It contains a search field that uses google search, but the search also includes googlecloud statistics. The service displays the most common searches in a nice cloud.
Biblioteket.se is a national project to connect government libraries in Sweden (first Stockholm) and open an online service that let users browse library archives, download books, and leave user reviews on books and papers. The site is not yet operational but there is a clickable version at bibliotek.se.
Susning.nu is a wikipedia clone and quite successful. The wiki was temporary closed for editing in 2004, due to spam, but is now open to selected users.
Thank you Bjorn Fant for writing this post! If you are from Sweden or are familiar with the market, please add any other Swedish web apps or information to the comments.
This post is part of Read/WriteWeb's continuing coverage of international Web markets. Other countries profiled so far have been Germany, Holland, Poland, Korea, United Kingdom, Russia, Spain, China, Turkey, Italy, Brazil, France, Japan, India and Austria.
There's a lot of ways to get your Flickr photos onto a web page or blog post, but few are as clean and elegant as Flickr's own slideshow player. Wouldn't it be nice if you could embed that player in your blog? Ah, but of course you can! Paul Stamatiou shows you how, but since the HTML got a little mangled in his post I'll just repost it here. Here's the basics:
That's the basics, but the line breaks are only in there for presentation--make sure that long "src" URL doesn't have any spaces or line breaks when you use the code. You'll have to replace the user_id ("12345678@N00") with your own--in case you don't know what yours is, idGettr will tell you--and YOUR_TAGS with whatever tags you want in the slideshow. If you want to show a photoset instead of photos with a particular tag, replace tags=YOUR_TAG with photoset_id=PHOTOSET_ID, where photoset_ID is the string of numbers at the end of a photoset URL, e.g. the 1234567 in flickr.com/photos/username/sets/1234567/. There's a variety of other parameters you can use, including:
...but it's up to you to figure out what they do. Just make sure you have an & between each parameter/value pair. Once again, this is all the work of Paul Stamatiou, so if you find this useful head over to his web site and click on his ads.
[Via eclecticism, image via Stewart Butterfield]
Some time over the weekend Google put links to Google Blog Search on the front page of Google News and at the end of each news search results page. This minor change is just the kind of integration of services the company has said it was going to focus on; something Sergey Brin [...]
Reader Scott has written a Web application that lets you search for and play Google videos on your phone. Well, on some phones, anyway; requirements include an XHTML-compliant browser, enough storage space to hold large files, a fast connection, and support for AVI files. In other words, this is a smartphones-only app, and even then compatibility might be limited.
I don't have the right gear to test this out (maybe one of my fellow Lifehacker editors does), and Scott himself has tried it only on his Motorola Q. Here's hoping all you smartphone-wielding readers out there will try the app and report back!
In the meantime, keep these Google Video search tricks handy for finding exactly what you're after.
Web site Wallpapr plugs into the Flickr API and lets you search for desktop wallpapers from the Wallpapers group on Flickr.
Wallpapr's not bad, and it serves its purpose, but you can also just as easily cut out the middle man and search the Flickr Wallpapers Group directly on Flickr. Either way you slice it, you can find some really nice high res wallpaper images. And while you're looking for wallpaper on Flickr, you'll definitely want to check out the Wallpaper exchange group started here on Lifehacker, which continues to thrive with great images for your desktop delights.
Google Docs and Spreadsheets have a few very useful keyboard shortcuts you can use to make your projects even more streamlined. These include:
- Ctrl+Home to go to the top of the document
- Ctrl+M to Insert Comment
- Ctrl+Z to Undo
There's quite a few more; most of these shortcuts apply whether you're in Docs or Spreadsheets.
If you've got kids, they're eventually going to want to get online. How do you protect them from the baddies? The Cool Cat Teacher Blog has eleven different ideas, and basically, they boil down to basic common sense. My favorite quote:
Get over the "privacy" thing with looking at your child's myspace and other online accounts. If a predator down the street who has a thing for 12 year olds is looking at her page, you'd better believe that it is your business!
Personally, unless I'm sitting right next to them, my kids aren't online. What are you doing to make sure your kids are safe on the WWW? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
Recording engineer develops everlasting glass CD — A Japanese recording engineer has developed the world's first glass CD guaranteed not to warp, distort and of a beautiful design, according to its maker. — Music critics who have tried out the CD said that it's outstanding and virtually like listening to a live performance.
Source: MSN-Mainichi Daily News
Link: http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/entertainment/news…
'Click Fraud' Threatens Foundation of Web Ads — Google Faces Another Lawsuit by Businesses Claiming Overcharges — From her home surrounded by cornfields in Dow City, Iowa, Jackie Park spends hours each day on her computer, earning half a penny every time she clicks on an Internet advertisement.
Source: Washington Post
Author: Sara Kehaulani Goo
Link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article…
Financial announcements are usually pretty boring, but they do provide some insights into the strength and direction a company might be headed in as well as some interesting details about the financial status of the company.
On the point here, Google released their third quarter results Thursday, and no surprise here, Google is doing extremely well. The world's top search engine saw profits double from a year ago. The big jump was for the most part due to the huge, ever-growing list of advertisers, and partners that have teamed up with Google, such as Fox, eBay, and Intuit. Google's revenue's hit $2.69 billion in the third quarter, an increase of 70% from the third quarter of 2005, and a 10% increase from the second quarter of 2006.
Ever wonder how much Google needs to operate? Well the third quarter saw operating costs hit $931 million, which equals 35% of revenue.
Now, let's take a look at some of Google's revenue:
The impact of Google's new ownership of YouTube has revealed itself this week in a big way. According to Ars Technica, the video sharing site removed 29,549 Japanese videos from its database at the request of JSRAC, the Japan Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers, whose members identified the videos as containing unauthorized materials from Japanese movies, TV shows, and music videos. This is the first such large-scale removal of content from YouTube at the request of copyright holders, and is undoubtedly the shape of things to come. JSRAC says that they are considering petitioning YouTube to implement a better screenin g process for unauthorized uploads, but unless I'm mistaken Google has previously said they're already working on that. For a little perspective, according to a July report, over 65,000 videos are uploaded to YouTube every day. Still, I'm a little worried what this means for one of my favorite blogs, TV in Japan, but at the moment they don't seem any worse for wear.
In this issue of Googleholic we cover:
Looking to update your desktop wallpaper? Having trouble finding anything good. Ask Wallpapr to find something for you. It's a nice, simple Ajax app that will spit out a bunch of photo wallpapers from Flickr's Wallpapers pool on command. Just enter a tag (e.g. clouds, skyline, food, whatever you're into) and click on 20, 40, or 100 to get that many thumbnails, or leave the tag field blank and get a nice variety. Every photo in the pool is at least 1024x768, and clicking on a thumbnail will take you straight to the photo download page. Excellent!
[Via Joe's Blog]
Did Google buy SpaceshipOne? Michael Arrington has a scoop that Google has acquired the ship and is planning on storing it in building 43 at the Googleplex. The Ship is rumored to be still in the Smithsonian museum, since it won the $10 million X prize in 2004, but could be on the way to Mountain View California. We all know that Google can afford it with their sizable bank account, especially after the recent third quarter earnings released on Thursday. Larry Page is on the board of trustees of the X Prize fou ndation, so he does have some insides there if indeed it came onto the market. If you have a picture of SpaceShipOne taken on October 21st, Arrington wants it, and he's willing to give an iPod shuffle to the first person with evidence. This would be a great investment for Google, and then they could get back on track with their interplanetary operations. Stay tuned for further developments.
UPDATE: It looks like Google bought a full scale replica of SpaceShipOne. If you feel the desire, you too can get one from here.
I recently signed up to MyBlogLog, which is kind of instant social networking system for bloggers. It enables you to set up a community around your blog and - optionally - add statistics. More details of MyBlogLog can be found at Techcrunch and A VC.
I've added a 'Recent Readers' widget to R/WW (see sidebar) and I encourage you to add yourself to the Read/WriteWeb community - click here for more details. Let me know in the comments to this post what you think of the idea. Over the past couple of months there have been many active and enjoyable discussions on R/WW, so it'd be great to extend that community a little more using MyBlogLog. Let's see how it goes anyway.
I like the idea of an SNS attached to a blog or website - and that blog communities can mix together. For example Techcrunch and A VC readers may well enjoy Read/WriteWeb, and vice versa. I have to admit it takes a while to get used to your avatar showing up on other blogs when you visit their pages - so much for reader privacy! But looking at the big picture, it's very nice to know that people are visiting your blog - and from the visitor's perspective it can generate click-throughs to their own blogs/sites.
For example just this morning I visited Fred Wilson's blog to read his thoughts on whether startups need to be located in Silicon Valley, as suggested in a NY Times piece (which I saw via Techmeme btw). Fred saw that I had visited his site, via MyBlogLog, and so he joined the R/WW community and left this message:
"richard glad to see your icon on my page just now. i really like mybloglog. it tells me when people like you are visiting my blog. you should try putting the reader roll on your page. it's really great and my readers seem to like it a lot fred"
So I'm encouraged by this kind of blog community interaction and hope to see more of it. Kudos to MyBlogLog for building a system which enables social networking via blogs.
Here is the link again to the Read/WriteWeb community. I'm also interested in your thoughts if you don't like the idea of your face/avatar showing up on blogs.
See the custom code Wired News used to search through millions of internet records and track down convicted sex offenders on the world's most popular social network. By Kevin Poulsen.Plus: MySpace Predator Caught by Code
Kongregate is an alpha stage online gaming site that will let users upload games they have built, charge users for premium play or features with a one click payment system and share revenues with the site from premium payment and advertisements. The company aims to take the site live just after the holiday season. Co [...]
Google’s third quarter earnings announcement today came in strong, as expected given the company’s growing domination of search and momentum over the last several months. The other big players may be struggling, but Google has the numbers to show that they are not. Gross revenue rose 70% and quarterly profit rose 92% of [...]
MyBlogLog is a social networking system for blog readers to connect and learn about each other around their favorite blogs - and for blog publishers to access detailed information about their readers. Founded in March of 2005, the site relaunched this morning and took its social networking features out of beta stage. The [...]
Categorize this as another unsubstantiated Google rumor, but the word on the street is that Google has acquired SpaceShipOne and is putting it inside building 43 at Google headquarters in Mountain View, California. No word on the purchase price, or if this was a donation, or why the ship is not staying at the [...]
Touchscreen iPod Comes This December — Touchscreen iPod Comes This December — The iPod/iPhone rumour mill is something so clouded that as TR News Ed I made the executive decision to circumvent the vast majority of it a long time ago, but yesterday I had a conversation with an extremely well informed exec which I'm going to share.
Source: TrustedReviews
Link: http://www.trustedreviews.com/article.aspx?art=3567
Google will soon begin offering AdWords advertisers a simple but powerful tool to experiment with a variety of different landing page layouts in order determine which one gains the most conversions from site visitors. Google Analytics Senior Manager Brett Crosby unveiled the tool, called Google Website Optimizer, this morning at the eMetrics summit in [...]
Universal sues video-sharing websites — Universal Music, the world's largest record company, has launched the established media industry's first legal action against user-generated internet sites in the wake of its distribution deal last week with YouTube, the most popular video-sharing website.
Source: Financial Times
Author: Joshua Chaffin
Link: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/57d66d24-5e0f-11db-82d4…
Back in June I made it pretty clear that Google Sync, a plugin for Firefox that replicates your browser data across computers, wasn't my cup 'o tea. Well, I've since U-turned on Google Sync - for one specific purpose.
I work across two machines running Firefox on a daily basis, and I hate how my bookmarks toolbar became different on each computer over time. Sure, you can export your bookmarks and re-import them by hand, but I update my bookmarks toolbar more often than I want to go through that rigamarole. Here's where Google Sync comes in.
I don't need passwords or browsing history or cookies stored on Google's servers, thank you very much, but I don't mind sharing my bookmarks, and Google Sync does a great job of keeping my toolbar the same across computers. When you install it, choose Advanced Setup and uncheck everything except bookmarks to get it set up. See screenshots here on getting that done. The only irritating part of Google Sync is that both machines can't be connected to it at the same time - a small price for auto-synced bookmarks.
The Google Operating System blog points out a few interesting advanced search operators available at Microsoft's Live.com and Yahoo! Search that Google doesn't support, like:
* linkfromdomain restricts your search to sites that are linked from a certain domain. If you don't add keywords after this operator, you can find some of the pages / sites linked from all the pages available on that domain.
* linkdomain shows only the pages that link to a page from a certain domain. The link operator from Google shows all the pages that link to the homepage of a site or to a certain page, but you can't see these aggregated results. Linkdomain operator is also available in Yahoo Search.
Here's a list of pages we've linked to from lifehacker.com, and sites that have linked lifehacker.com courtesy of Live.com. Interestingly, Yahoo's take offers almost double the number of results. Pretty neat way to see two-way link love between sites.
PayPerPost tests your ethics, & Edelman's fake blog for Wal-Mart — PayPerPost is a Florida start-up that lets bloggers get paid for writing about products and other companies. — It has just got $3 million in funding from Silicon Valley venture firm Draper Fisher Jurveston and others.
Source: VentureBeat
Author: Matt Marshall
Link: http://venturebeat.com/2006/10/17/payperpost-tests…
In this issue of Googleholic we cover:
EasyVMX is one of those things that makes me sit back and say, "Huh... that's neat." It's a handy web app that will build a virtual machine for the free VMware Player based on your specifications. Just fill out a few drop-downs and checkboxes (or a lot, if you're more technically-inclined), download and run the small virtual machine file it generates, and then pop in your OS's install disc. EasyVMX will generate virtual machines for Windows, Linux, Solaris, BSD, and more. In case you're new to this virtualization thing like me, the EasyVMX tutorial is a good place to start.
[Via Rails Live CD Blog]
Going out to a store, and dropping up to $350 on a fresh new Apple iPod Video is supposed to be a happy moment. But what do you do when you discover that that precious iPod is carrying something deadly?
Apple has discovered that a small number of Video iPods that were available for purchase after September 12th 2006 could contain a virus. The virus called Windows RavMonE.exe only affects Windows computers. Only Video iPods are affected by this virus, and Apple has only had 25 reports to date. The good news is that any up to date anti-virus software will be able to remove it. Apple has also ni cely provided a list of things to do to remove the virus.
A palm-size video projector from Toshiba points to a time when you'll be able to turn any surface into a temporary viewing screen, making for a more compelling video iPod experience. In Listening Post.
This morning, I opened up Firefox as usual and was greeted to a new button on my Yahoo! Toolbar: "Upgrade Now!"
Hitting the button takes you to the Yahoo! Toolbar page and the download starts automatically. Before installing, I checked the Add-Ons dialog (in Firefox 2.0 RC3) and didn't see it listed as a possible upgrade - I'm guessing that Yahoo! hasn't hooked this version into the Mozilla upgrade process yet (Note to Devs: please do this - so that you work like all the other add-ons).
This version (now v1.3.0.20060829) doesn't have the integration with Symantec like it is with the IE toolbar and no new buttons were shown on the 'Add \ Edit Buttons' option. However, the Search field now uses Suggest functionality that's been on the Y! Search page for a while, and there are links on the Y! button to some of the newer Yahoo! properties (Yahoo! Current TV, Yodel Anecdotal)
If anyone has any insight as to other changes in this new version, I'd love to know.
If you don't have the Upgrade Now button, you can download the latest version from the Y! Toolbar site.
A new search engine for electronics geeks puts product reviews center stage while weeding out spam, ads and other distracting nonsense.
Try as you might, you really can't avoid MySpace. OK, you can, but if you must make yourself a page, at least have some fun. Commentary by Lore Sjöberg.
Google’s momentum was echoed publicly by both Microsoft and Yahoo today. Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, stated that Google is making it difficult for them to recruit top talent. Also, in a move to likely earmark more dollars towards acquisitions, Microsoft increased their research and development budget for 2007 to $7.5 billion, which is $1.3 [...]
Google is pushing full steam ahead with their office strategy, and their hope is to convince a lot of individuals and businesses to trust Google enough to store their documents on Google’s servers instead of their own computers, or servers under their control. The fact that unauthorized document access is a simple password guess or [...]
Sequoia Invests in Blog Network Sugar Publishing — Blog network Sugar Publishing (the most popular blog in the network is PopSugar) has raised "around $5 million" in a Series A round investment from Sequoia Capital. Michael Moritz will join the Team Sugar board of directors.
Source: TechCrunch
Author: Michael Arrington
Link: http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/10/16/sequoia-invests…
MySpace Predator Caught by Code — Yaphank, NY — The computer crimes unit of New York's Suffolk County Police Department sits in a gloomy government office canopied by water-stained ceiling tiles and stuffed with battered Dell desktops. A mix of file folders, notes, mug shots and printouts form …
Source: Wired News
Author: Kevin Poulsen
Link: http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,71948-0.html
Corporate solar is coming — Epic games of beach volleyball, urban indoor workspaces infused with natural light, enthusiasm for the outdoors - at Google, we've always taken advantage of the sun. And now we're ready to use the sun yet another way: to create clean electricity.
Source: Official Google Blog
Link: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/10/corporate…
Yahoo! is accepting photos, writings, video, audio, and drawings in order to teach future generations what the world was like in 2006. Yahoo is collecting the data from October 10th until November 8th for this "electronic anthropology" effort. Yahoo! has said that this is the first time that digital data has been gathered and preserved for historical purposes. Submitters to this time capsule get to choose how Yahoo! will donate $100,000 for the contributions made, to seven global charities. Way to go Yahoo! This is a nice way not to only get some nice PR, but a great way to preserve data, and share the wealth. Looking back at the data should be interesting. Let's just hope we are st ill able to view it with whatever machines we have in 100 years.
Microsoft's entry into the wonderful world of video sharing takes most of its cues from everybody's favorite clip joint, YouTube. And that's precisely the problem. Review by Michael Calore.
Serial child molester Andrew Lubrano was looking to hook up with underage boys on MySpace, when a computer search by Wired News picked him out of the site's million-plus user base, along with over 700 other registered sex offenders. MySpace says it can't do the same. By Kevin Poulsen.
The Homeland Security chief declares the internet a potential hotbed of terrorism, a place where radicals can go to train themselves to become terrorists.
The magical music player wasn't plucked from a stone by Steve Jobs. Here's the story of how a team of designers and engineers produced Apple's groundbreaking gadget. Commentary by Leander Kahney.
Blog network Sugar Publishing (the most popular blog in the network is PopSugar) has raised “around $5 million” in a Series A round investment from Sequoia Capital. Michael Moritz will join the Team Sugar board of directors. No word on the valuation, although I suspect it’s in the $12-15 million range pre-money. Like all good [...]
Google user Gene says he's increasingly dependent on a myriad of Google products - Gmail, Maps, search, Calendar, News and Reader - and he's got a new Google product he'd like built: Google Data Privacy.
GDP would allow me to review all of the information that Google retains on me across all services, from all devices, and from all sources. GDP would allow me to determine the maximum data retention period for each of my services. GDP would allow me to selectively opt out of cross-service data mining & correlation, even if it reduced the quality of the services I receive. GDP would allow me to correct any inaccurate data in my profile. And GDP would log and alert me when my data was queried by other services.
The idea sounds tongue-in-cheeky, but if Google is as serious about data privacy as they are about us all living "the Google lifestyle," they'd give their users more control - and GDP sounds like a great way to do that. Like Gene, I want my Google Data Privacy. How about you? If GDP existed, would you use it? Sign our informal "petition" below and let the big G know.
Designer John Hicks has put together what he's calling an "OS X skin" for Bloglines, meaning that he's used a few OS X graphics and generally prettied up the BL interface.
With the recent release of Google Reader, a lot of Bloglines die hards are jumping ship for Google Reader. One major complaint with Bloglines is its unusually high ugly factor (God knows Gina tried cleaning things up a bit); the OS X skin for Bloglines is definitely the nicest looking Bloglines skin I've seen, so if you still want to stick with BL but need a new look, give it a try. Installation is pretty easy, and the post details how to install the skin in Firefox, Camino, and Safari, among others.
Windows Live Search has made it extremely easy for you to roll your very own search engine.
All you need to do is go through the interactive Search Macro Wizard; enter in a few sites, customize the look of your page, and ka pow! You've got your own search engine. You can also search other people's search engines Windows Live Macros, create as many macros as you want, or go back in and edit what you've already done.
The always handy Quick Online Tips has come up with a great list of third-party YouTube tools that "enhance your YouTube experience." Here's three that I especially liked:
- Youtube Video Slideshow - insert a username or a video tag below and it starts a slideshow.
- YouTube badge maker - will show your viewers images of your 6 most recently uploaded videos.
- Capture Youtube and Google videos - save them as AVI files encoded in the MPEG4 format, using only one command.
See anything that should be on the list and isn't? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
Google is good for so many things, among which is searching for all sorts of files, including MP3's. Here's a quick primer:
- -inurl:(htm|html|php) intitle:"index of" +"last modified" +"parent directory" +description +size +(wma|mp3) "Nirvana"
Just substitute the term "Nirvana" for any band or singer you might be looking for, and your search will lead you to open indexes that contain downloadable music files.
You can easily integrate Google Reader feeds into your Gmail with this simple Greasemonkey script from Google blogger Mihai Parparita:
I've created a simple Greasemonkey script that adds a "Feeds" in Gmail. When clicked, Reader's list view is loaded on the right.
This is exceedingly easy to implement; it took me about five minutes before I started seeing Google Reader in my Gmail. We've blogged about Greasemonkey before here at the Lifehacker garage, and this is yet another handy addition.
by Wendy Boswell
In a recent poll Lifehacker readers voted Performancing for Firefox (Windows, Mac, Linux) and w.bloggar (Windows only) their favorite desktop blog editor. But which is best? In today's feature, we'll dive full-on into these two blog editors and put them through their paces. May the best editor win.
To keep it simple, I've divided the competition into three distinct areas: setup, ease of use, and special features. There's a LOT more that I could go into when comparing these two blog editors, but these are the points that really count.
Performancing: An easy download, restart your browser, hit F8 or right-click on the status bar icon, and Performancing pops up within your browser (which takes some getting used to, but proves useful once you do). Next, you'll want to add your blog(s), and Performancing makes this easy: just click on the Add Blog Wizard and go through the steps.
Pros: Simple to install and easy on the system resources.
Cons: Performancing couldn't find one of my blogs no matter what I did to tweak it, however, I suspect that's the fault of my customized WordPress template and not Performancing.
w.bloggar: Another easy download and install, and I didn't have to restart anything to get going. The first time you start w.bloggar (just right-click on the icon in your system tray), you'll go through the Add Account Wizard. Now, I had some problems with Wordpress set-up; w.bloggar is not very intuitive and asks you for your API endpoint and other mysteries that really should be auto-detected in order to make w.bloggar more attractive to those who, uh, don't actually know what that stuff IS. However, I was eventually able to get it to work with just a little bit of fuss.
Pros: Another simple install, gets you blogging to multiple blogs quickly.
Cons: Bogs down in the actual blog set-up; needs to be more simple.
Performancing: As mentioned before, all you need to do to get Performancing going is hit F8 and you can start blogging within your browser window. You can write your post within a WYSIWYG format or source code, whatever works for you, and instantly view a live preview just by switching between tabs. In order to easily upload images, you'll need to come up with your FTP settings or link to a hosted image; either way, it's pretty simple, but nowhere near the simplicity that beginning bloggers would need in order to insert images. You can post to multiple blogs just by selecting your targeted blog in the window to the right, AND you can even post to your MySpace blog by toggling the MySpace editor mode off/on (as far as I know, this is the only blog editor that is MySpace friendly). Overall, very easy.
Pros: A powerful WYSIWYG editor.
Cons: Images could be easier to configure for newbie bloggers.
w. bloggar: w.bloggar is a standalone blog editor so you'll need to get started by visiting your desktop. Standard WYSIWYG editing applies here, although the HTML markup shows up within your post integrated with the text regardless. You can instantly preview your post by switching between tabs, view your entire archive of posts from within the editor itself, and you can even post the same post to multiple blogs at once, something I haven't seen before. W.bloggar's standout feature is definitely offline editing; you can create as many posts as your little bloggin' heart desires and you don't have to be connected to the 'net at all, a great feature for when you want to blog about your vacation on the airplane trip home.
Pros: Easy to use and extra points for offline editing.
Cons: Could differentiate more between rich text and source code editing, just for the sake of simplicity.
Performancing: Performancing supports tagging in both Technorati and del.icio.us, but the tagging was hard to find (it's under Publishing Options). Couldn't there just be a easy "tag this" button? You can also instantly view Technorati information about any page you're viewing (remember, Performancing is an in-line blogging editor, so you can browse the web whilst blogging) to see what links are happenin', what people are saying, etc. Last but not least, I especially appreciated the free Performancing Metrics blog stats package that is built right into the blog editor; a quick registration and you'll be able to measure vital blog stats such as RSS signups, key visitor statistics, and general activity.
Pros: Integrated stats package.
Cons: Tags are there, but they're somewhat hard to find.
w.bloggar: The primary strength of w.bloggar is its simplicity. This is a very straightforward blog editor; yet it does have a few special features worth mentioning. I've already brought up the ability to save posts locally and post them later, in addition, w.bloggar has colorized HTML tags (anyone who uses Macromedia's Dreamweaver on a regular basis will appreciate this), a custom tags interface, and if you really feel ambitious, you can change your w.bloggar template.
Pros: Colorized HTML tags make w.bloggar easy to edit.
Cons: Tagging support is there, but blogging newbies will find it difficult to use.
Performancing for Firefox. I don't want a lot of fancy stuff in my blog editor - I just want it to work without me having to read a users manual in order to operate it successfully. Performancing from start to finish was a breeze to operate, and while I appreciated w.bloggar's strengths (offline editing is a huge plus), it was just too clunky for me to really get into. What's your favorite blog editor, and why? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
Wendy Boswell is Lifehacker's Weekend Editor.
55 Million Blogs, and Now a Service to Track Them — LONDON — Corporations are growing increasingly conscious of the power, and potential pitfalls, of blogging. A favorable review from an influential blogger can help generate the kind of buzz around a new product that traditional advertising struggles to achieve.
Source: New York Times
Author: Eric Pfanner
Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/16/technology/16blog…
YouTube vs. MySpace? — With millions of dollars in online ad revenue on the line, the two Net superstars could be headed for more conflict — Just a few months ago, News Corp. (NWS) landed a crucial deal with Internet leader Google (GOOG). News Corp. designated Google as the search engine for MySpace …
Source: Business Week
Author: Steve Rosenbush
Link: http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content…
Google Gains Pay For YouTube — Did the YouTube deal pay for itself? At least for one week it did. On Friday, October 6, 2006, Google shares closed at $420.50 a share. With roughly 304.36 million shares outstanding, that meant the company had a market capitalization of $127.983 billion.
Source: GigaOM
Author: Om Malik
Link: http://oms-stuff.gigaom.com/2006/10/16/google-gains…
The blogosphere is all a-gaga over the latest version of Google Reader, after its somewhat lackluster first stab. And for good reason; as many people have pointed out, Google's infrastructure makes for a very fast experience. The way that Google Reader prefetches content as you read makes it unlikely that you are ever slowed down by the reader, which is simply fantastic. It also solves the biggest knock against Bloglines, which is that clicking on a feed doesn't immediately mark every post in that feed as read - they're only marked read as you scroll past them. In many ways, these seemingly minor upgrades to how we use a feed reader as similar to the seemingly minor ways that Gma il improved the email experience.
Of course, given the obvious similarities between Gmail and Google Reader, many users have already been wondering why they have not been fully integrated. It turns out that the Google Reader team has considered this, but it's not a simple task. In the words of Mihai Parparita, who is a member of the Google Reader team, "The answer is that integrations are hard and generally require a lot of effort before you can even determine if they are worthwhile. Greasemonkey lets you experiment with UI concepts with minimal effort necessary from either team."
So, as it turns out, Mihai has actually written a greasemonkey script that will integrate your Google Reader into Gmail, by adding a menu option at the left under Inbox called Feeds, which will load your Google Reader interface right in Gmail. The script is supposed to load the list view, without th e feed list that you typically see on the left in Google Reader, to give you a quick way to check up on the latest feeds in your Google Reader account. For some reason, I'm getting the entire Google Reader screen replicated in the message area of my Gmail, which I'm sure is due to some other greasemonkey script I use with Gmail. In any event, it's very nice to have Google Reader content just a click away in my Gmail. Hopefully this becomes a full-blown integration sooner rather than later.
[Update] I figured out which Greasemonkey script wasn't playing nice - it turns out to be one called HTTP-to-HTTPS redirector script, which does exactly what you might think, redirects certain named sites to the secure version of their site. I had been using this to ensure that I was always using secure versions of both Gmail and Google Reader (bet you didn't know there was a secure version, eh?). Of course now that I've discovered the joys of having my Google Reader inside Gmai l, I've turned off the offending redirector script. Maybe Mihai can make it work on the secure versions?
Say what you will about Dave Winer, he's hard to ignore in the blogosphere. Recently Dave released YoMoBlog, a web-based blogging client for mobile devices like Blackberries, Treos and Pocket PCs. All you do is fill out a few fields on the start page (which we've linked to above), which include blog url, email address, username , and password, and if all goes well you should be able to post directly to your blog.
In my tests I found YoMoBlog to be extremely slow, but I'm sure that can be chalked up to weird internet inconsistencies. Otherwise it seemed to work fine. Note that your blog engine must support the Metaweblog API for this site to work.
Personally I'm not big on entering text into a mobile device, but this serv ice could be a godsend in the event you're in a situation where blogging in a timely fashion is critical. Of course, the fine print says, "This is experimental software. Please back up your data. We are not responsible for any loss in service or loss of data entered into the system. Will not use your personal information for any purpose other than to allow you to create and edit posts on your weblog. The security of the system is very simple, don't trust it for sensitive information. We make no guarantees about performance, uptime, and we may cancel the service at any time, for any reason, at our discretion.", so you certainly wouldn't want to build a business around this service, or rely on it as your only mobile blogging solution.
Text Link Ads is providing an interesting utility that will allow you to index your blog's importance in some specific categories versus other blogs in the same space, called the Blog Juice Calculator. You can also compare your site's relative importance to the top performers. For example, Download Squad gets a very respectable 8.4 in the Computers / Technology category, which puts us about tied with Robert Scoble's blog, and slightly trailing the likes of TechCrunch, LifeHacker, and of course Engadget.
Google Juice is currentl y calculated based on information from Technorati, Alexa, Bloglines and Links - it's not clear where the Links metric comes from. Of course, knowing that Alexa numbers can be very skewed considering that they're based on statistics gathered by an Internet Explorer toolbar, it's probably not reasonable to consider the Blog Juice Calculator to be the final word in terms of ranking blogs. In fact, Technorati is probably the most widely accepted authority in that regard. But it's fun to play with, and you get this cool little badge for your site, if you happen to get a ranking that you're not too embarrassed to publicize.
Ingredients:
WordPress (WP) is a piece of cake to install, but what if you need to move a WP install to another host, and you don't want to deal with your posts being all wonky and your links weird? You can try using the import function of WP, but I found it to be very hard to work 100% and give you exactly what you had before. Below is a way to get your exact blog back, almost exactly what you had at your old host. The only requirement is that your new hosting environment be somewhat similar (similar version of PHP and MySQL).
I suppose this would be a WP hack, and isn't the way WordPress says to do it, but in my experience, the WP way to import doesn't give you exactly identically what you had before (especially with templates). My way does. So you're ready to bake your first WP turnovers? Great. If you are sick of the old host you are now using, they don't have enough features, or you just plain got a better deal, here's how to move your WP install over to your new host.
Instructions:
Step 1: Use SQLyog or phpMyAdmin to backup your entire database. You should also go into WP and use the backup plug-in to make a copy of the site itself (preferably offline and somewhere safe).
Step 2: Next, use your favorite FTP client and connect to your old host, where your site currently lives. You'll need to copy your theme files, especially if you have made any custom hacks to them. If you don't copy them out, you'll not have them when you move your site. WP newbie tip: All theme files reside in www.yoursite.com/wp-content/themes/themename. That is the folder you want to copy. If you have multiple themes, copy all you want to end up on your new host. I would copy them to your hard-drive, then later we'll put them back. You can copy the whole themes folder if you want, no big deal.
Step 3: You must also copy any theme files you have that you want to keep. These live in www.yoursite.com/wp-content/plugins. Copy the whole plug-ins folder for later.
Step 4: FTP to your new server. If you don't already have the WP software in a zip file, you'll need to download it here. Once downloaded, unzip it, and upload it to your new server via FTP.
Step 5: Install WP like you are setting up a new site. Create a new database, or use an existing one but be sure that the tablenames (table prefix) is exactly what it was on your old host during WP install. Once the new WordPress install is complete, now comes the fun part.
Step 6: Export your WP tables (or the whole database) that pertains to your WP blog from your old host. I generally use SQLyog community edition and export just my WP tables into a "textfile.sql" file on my hard drive.
Step 7: Go to your new host's MySQL database (just created with the new WP install process), and delete the new tables from the database.
Step 8: Use SQLyog to import your textfile.sql file into the new host's MySQL database.
Step 9: Simply FTP all your theme files and plug-ins to your new host's folders. The locations are exactly the same as your previous host (besides the root directory).
Step 10: Lastly, be sure you manually go into your sidebar, header, and any other files in your template and change anything you may have hard-coded to the old host. Most WP users don't have that problem unless they have custom hacks in place.
Hot tip: If you use AJAX, lightbox, and some other special add-ons that are not plug-ins, it is a good idea to let them reside in your theme folder, so if you move that theme, all the cool effects and special hacks go with the theme you're using. Makes things easy.
As long as your old tablenames match the new tablenames (that were installed by WP), your new host will fool your blog into thinking that it still lives with all the same data at the old host, but everything will point to the new host. This is part of the underlying structure of WP, and this makes the blog act like nothing changed, though you are duplicating the files and moving the physical location somewhere else. This act of splicing your WP install into another one you have created give you the ability to get exactly what you had before. Beware that this may not work, I obviously don't have every configuration and system out there. All of the moves I have tried using this method have worked flawlessly, and I have highly hacked and modified installs, so it should work for almost everyone.
Always innovating, and recently told to focus on products that are already in development, the Googleplex has recently leaked a copy of the so-called Platypus client for Gdrive, its service for viewing and storing files on the web. Philipp Lenssen scored a copy, and reports that the product looks like it's intended for Google employees to share and store files. This tool encourages Google employees to use Platypus to store office documents, photos, and notes, virtually everything, except for sensitive data, most likely since the application is still in a testing phase, and not secure enough. Philipp could not get past the login screen, but was able to check out the Help, and the configuration files that were attached to the installer which he has published on his website. Only time will tell if this service will be released for public consumption by Google, and is additional evidence that Google is always innovating.
Do you think that Google purposely sets out to release small details about new and upcoming products, and updates when testing? Or do you think that they are just careless with their testing environment?
Looks like Google's new partners, Warner, Universal, and Sony, are pushing Google to develop a technology that allows copyright owners to search and locate their content and choose to whether they want remove it from YouTube. This new technology that is in development is said to be able to scan audio in mp3 or video and compare so-called electronic fingerprints. In order to make labels happy and avoid costly lawsuits, Google is going to have to implement this software, and prove to record labels that the YouTube service is going to make everyone happy.
Written by Sebastian Moser from Austria and edited by Richard MacManus
With 4.6 million internet users (a penetration rate of 56.8%) and a broadband penetration rate of 61.8%, Austria is a little bit above the average for the European Union in internet usage. Besides the Internet, 8 million people use a mobile phone - which means that just 200,000 people do not use a mobile phone. However even though there are a great number of people using the internet (or who own an internet-enabled mobile phone), there is no real Web 2.0 industry in Austria. Nevertheless, this will change in the years to come - primarily because of the immense potential of the mobile phone market in Austria.
Jajah provides a web-based telephony-service. You don't have to download any software to use it, it is browser based and you use your normal telephone or cell phone for the calls. Recently, they started to offer a mobile version of their software, making telephoning via cell phones much cheaper. Few people know that Jajah's founders are from Austria. After a Sequoia investment, their offices moved to Luxemburg, the United States and Israel.
TwoDay is the biggest Austrian blogging platform. The company is run by knallgrau, which sells its platform to many companies in Austria.
blogr is a new blogging platform, also run by knallgrau. It is ramping up with international versions - they've now launched Austrian, German, Swiss, Mexican, Spanish, English, Finish and French versions of the project.
Power Of Politics is an online game in which every player is a politician for one of Austria's communes. After every election, the parties have to find a coalition to create a government for each region, state and the nation. Based on their work and their election campaigns, the politicians try to get as many votes as possible during the weekly elections. The founders plan to offer the service to the whole European Union.
In Austria, there is a healthy market for social networks which are a little bit different from MySpace, orkut, Facebook and the other major Silicon Valley SNS. We concentrate a lot on event-photography, which means authorized photographers who take pictures when they go out. These pictures are then uploaded to the respective websites. Around this, social networks are built.
There are dozens of projects. I know of at least 7 projects, but 5 of them are active in my region. The two biggest projects are Szene1 and EventShooters.
[Editor's comment: I checked with Sebastian whether this is a mainstream or niche activity in Austria. Sebastian tells me it is mainstream - and also that he runs a small Event-Photography SNS which has 8000 members. However he said he is not affiliated with either of the Event-Photography SNS mentioned in this post.]
Szene1 is Austria's biggest event-photography social network. They have partnerships with many companies, for example a big Austrian bank. Currently, they have about 150,000 registered users.
EventShooters is the second-biggest network. Like Szene1, they provide everything from event-calendars to video- and picture-sharing. They have 174,600 members (at the time of writing), but less page views than Szene1.
MySpace and other multinational social networks will have a difficult job entering the Austrian market, because there are many local networks which are difficult to simulate or replace because of their regional character.
This isn't by any means an exhaustive look at the web market in Austria, so if you have more info to contribute - please add to the comments.
This post is part of Read/WriteWeb's continuing coverage of international Web markets. Other countries profiled so far have been Germany, Holland, Poland, Korea, United Kingdom, Russia, Spain, China, Turkey, Italy, Brazil, France, Japan and India.
Web security firm Finjan has just released a report outlining "sophisticated new threats that target Web 2.0 platforms and technologies." According to the report, this web security threat "centers on the use of Web 2.0 and AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) technologies for malicious activities."
Finjan acknowledges that Web 2.0 and AJAX technologies enable a rich user experience for Internet users, but they warn: "the technology also flings open the door to new malware propagation methods." How so? Because hackers are targeting high-traffic web sites and either embedding malicious code in hosted Web content, or using AJAX to query what Finjan calls "the hidden web".
Also the report shows that content of websites distributing malicious code is being duplicated on storage and caching servers used by ISPs, Enterprises and leading search engines. This means that malicious code is available and can be referenced by third party web pages to exploit an end user's machine - even if the original malicious website has been taken down.
I've asked Finjan to send me the full report, but I thought in the meantime it's worth throwing the question open: have you ever experienced a web security breach on a web 2.0 or ajax service? Particularly on a "high traffic site" - which I take to mean a MySpace or a YouTube. What hacking stories do you know of in the web 2.0 space?
The Product (RED) campaign is sweeping the world, thanks to some heavyweight backing from celebrities (Oprah, Bono) and brand names (Apple, American Express, Armani). It's a great cause, because for each (RED) branded product or service sold, a part of the profit goes to the fight against AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria in Africa.
Some prominent Web brands are getting behind it too - MySpace and AOL are the two media sponsors currently listed as "donating space on their various platforms".
Also the (RED) website itself is a great example of how the Web can contribute. For example the YOU page asks people to submit videos detailing what (RED) means to them:
"In the coming months, we will be launching a "video wall" that includes streaming video of people talking about what (RED)™ is. Some of the people featured will be world leaders, others will be people involved in creating some of the products, and others will be passionate people like you!"
There is also a (RED) blog, hosted on blogger.com. It's an interesting blog outlining the seemingly normal lives of RED's core team. Well, I say *seemingly*, because how many normal bloggers are able to write something like this...
"I heard news that the Oprah taping the day before was amazing, received a phone call from Bobby about the important encounter with President Bush at the airport (see previous post (RED) Force One), readied our servers for the influx of launch-day web traffic, sent newsletters announcing the U.S. launch of (RED) to everyone on our mailing list, and exceeded my tolerance for caffeine many times over – things were in order."
...you know, hum-drum blog stuff like being on the Oprah show and meeting the President.
So an excellent cause and very nicely done too with the website and blog.
Fans of the online video-sharing site aren't quite sure what to make of everything as they watch their quirkly little community go corporate. Some are upbeat but plenty are openly hostile to the $1.65 billion deal that delivered YouTube into Google's waiting arms.
We were contacted today by the founder of the soon to launch social network for gay men BigJock.com. It lead us to take a look around the gay male online social networking space and write the following overview of some of the current market leaders. Niche social networks are likely a viable business because they [...]
We wrote earlier about News Corp’s unease with the Google-YouTube acquisition. For the last few weeks News Corp has been engaging in a one-sided PR war with YouTube - from News Corp. COO Peter Chernin’s recent comments that 60-70% of YouTube traffic comes from MySpace (YouTube says this is incorrect and that MySpace only refers [...]
Google's merged their Spreadsheets product with Writely into the beginnings of an online office suite called Google Docs.
Google Docs is a collaboration tool. You can create, upload, and share documents with anyone, plus, each created spreadsheet can be up to 10,000 rows - which gives you quite a lot of breathing room. Your work can be stored on Google's servers if you elect that option, and you can also choose to share your documents with the world, however, the default is private.
You'll need to have a Google account in order to take advantage of this new service, just like any other Google app (excepting search), and if you have been using Writely, all your docs are now moved over to the new Google Docs service. I took Google Docs for a quick spin late last night and it's pretty powerful, well worth spending some time getting to know all the features.
Zoho Virtual Office Launching Tommorow; Racing Google to Market — Online productivity company Zoho is finally bringing all its various services together into one offering with the release of the Zoho Virtual Office at tomorrow's Office 2.0 conference. Google is rumored to be planning …
Source: TechCrunch
Author: Marshall Kirkpatrick
Link: http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/10/10/zoho-virtual…
Google "Docs & Spreadsheets" Launches — Google just launched Docs & Spreadsheets at docs.google.com. It integrates the previously separate Writely and Spreadsheet product silos into a single control panel and admin area (the previous sites for those products redirect to docs.google).
Source: TechCrunch
Author: Michael Arrington
Link: http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/10/10/google-docs…
2007 Will Be A Big Year For RSS — With Microsoft's IE7 just around the corner and the other big Internet companies upgrading key information management products, 2007 is going to be the 'make it or break it' year for RSS. Fergus Burns noted these 4 key platforms, which are all set to ramp …
Source: Read/WriteWeb
Author: Richard MacManus
Link: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/2007_rss.php
Yahoo Feels Breath on Neck — As Google whips out its fat wallet to buy the video site YouTube, it is making Yahoo look even more out of step with the fast-changing Internet advertising market. — Yahoo itself tried to buy YouTube just a few weeks ago and got as close as negotiating price and terms …
Source: New York Times
Author: Saul Hansell
Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/technology/11yahoo…
After YouTube: The beginning of the end? — Now that Google has snatched up the leading online video site, will rivals shell out big bucks, or will the competition dry up for smaller sites? — NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Has the online video shakeout only begun or is the bubble about to burst?
Source: CNNMoney.com
Author: Paul R. La Monica
Link: http://money.cnn.com/2006/10/10/technology…
Continue reading Tuesday's Googleholic... In this issue of Googleholic we cover:
Google's YouTube acquisition Google signs with Sony BMG and Warner Google News porn Eric Schmidt answers 3 questions Google library project hits Spain Gmail Mobile Gmail launches in India Google Code for hackers Integration of AdSense into YouTube Could South Korea be Google's next stop? Google Mac Google's stock rises slightly after YouTube deal
Google signs with Sony BMG and Warner Google News porn Eric Schmidt answers 3 questions Google library project hits Spain Gmail Mobile Gmail launches in India Google Code for hackers Integration of AdSense into YouTube Could South Korea be Google's next stop? Google Mac Google's stock is rising slightly after YouTube deal The past week in Google News Make sure to check in for Friday's Googleholic Google News report.
Google YouTube acquisition
The big news.. Google bought YouTube for some nice coin. $1.6 billion. We have been inundated with it, so here are some links from industry peeps on their views:
This could lead to some additional revenue for Google's new YouTube
Woops! A few x-rated images slipped into the entertainment news results from Barry Schwartz.
ZDNet spoke with Mr Schmidt at Zeitgeist fest about the status of their publicized initiatives.
This is the first library in non English speaking Europe that is joining Google's Book Search program.
Helping residents of India keep on top of their email, Google opened up Gmail to mobile devices.
Hackers are apparently taking advantage of Google's new Code Search
Looks like Google's next stop could be Korea. With plans to open a $10Million engineering R&D center.
Google launches a Mac blog, sharing insights into Google development for the Mac.
If you have any tips, tricks, or anything Google, you can always drop us a line!
Google is rumored to be preparing to release a new online service called Google Docs. The new service will integrate, and possibly merge, Google Spreadsheets and Writely. This move, which could be announced at the Office 2.0 conference tomorrow, slowly expands the online productivity suite that Google is working on. With this additional step, Google forges ahead in the online office space environment.
Another rumbling about a release at Office 2.0 is Zoho Virtual Office. In this latest release, Zoho packages all of its services together, which can include up to 10. The service is said to be free for individuals and $9.95 for business users.
Google has to get its suite of software organized and bundled, before Zoho takes the lead with its extremely promising online productivity software, just take a look at the demo. Stay tuned for what unfolds.
Google has merged Writely, now known as Docs, and Spreadsheets together to form one super online office application. Ok, so it's not super yet, and it still does have some catching up to do with Zoho Office, but it's on the way.
Google Account users now have the benefit of creating, and storing documents and spreadsheets together in the new Docs and Spreadsheets service. Google has listened to users suggestions, and made this into a combined list, that works with the same ideas as Gmail with stars, tags, and searches. Sharing documents and spreadsheets is a breeze, simply choose the individuals you would like to collaborate with, a nd invite them to view. Google has added another feature here, which allows collaborators the ability to share your spreadsheets.
It looks like a hit so far. One easy convenient location to store all online documents, all under a Google Account ID. The real virtual office is on the way, even though this has not been rolled out for Google Apps for domains....the users that could really benefit from this service. Check out the newly launched Google docs and Spreadsheets blog and a little online tour for more information.
Check out some screenshots after the jump.
Google is sometimes a little slow at releasing Mac compatible applications. They are getting better, and have hired on some additional Mac guys and girls to do the development work. So, now its time to show off the fact that they really do support Mac's.
Google has put together a nice little page for Mac users, which shows their collection of software downloads specifically for Mac users. This list of software includes:
Software might take a little longer to develop for the Mac, so we can only hope that Google, and other companies shorten the dev time, and realize that Mac users have been patient long enough.
Both Google and Zoho will be announcing new office product offerings at tomorrow's Office 2.0 conference. Steve Bryant from eWeek reports:
"Google will announce tomorrow at the Office 2.0 conference a new product called Google Docs, which will merge Writely and Google Spreadsheets into a collaboration and document management solution, according to sources."
Google Docs will be available at docs.google.com. Writely and Google Spreadsheets already offer export to blog and other formats - and have similar sharing functionality. So this seems like common sense to merge the two products together. But once again, it all seems a tad unimaginative and piecemeal from Google - as with Google Apps for Your Domain; which bundles together Gmail, Google Talk, Calendar and Page Creator. As always with Google, who knows what is around the corner. A full Web Office Suite must be in the works and it's probably just that all the pieces of the jigsaw aren't ready yet - they don't have online presentations and project management products yet.
Meanwhile a small company that does have all the pieces, Zoho, is going to push out a new version of Zoho Virtual Office. Techcrunch is reporting that it "will integrate most of the 10+ Zoho services already available and add several more like Webmail and calendaring." As of now, the product includes web-based collaboration groupware such as email, documents and calendar. So it appears it'll be upgraded to include the rest of the Zoho product range (spreadsheets, presentations, etc). If you want a quick tour of all these apps, check out my Image Gallery on ZDNet.
As I noted earlier this week, Zoho is planning a full Web Office Suite. But I'm a little confused by the branding here, as it's being called ZohoX as well. So is this a new brand, or an upgrade of the existing Zoho Virtual Office?
Zoho Projects, their online project management tool, also went out of Beta yesterday. There's no question then that Zoho has all the products required for a full web-based suite, so in that sense they are a step ahead of Google - and Microsoft. But the space is still fairly immature and so a lot of jostling for position is going on.
Related posts: Zoho Web Office Suite Image Gallery; Office 2.0 Podcast Jam Kicks Off; Zoho Moving Towards A Full Web Office Suite
Disclaimer: Zoho is a R/WW sponsor
UPDATE: Google Docs & Spreadsheets (another great name) is now live.
The new combined Writely (online word processing) and Google Spreadsheets interface has just gone live, under the name Google Docs & Spreadsheets. The Writely.com site now re-directs to http://docs.google.com and the Writely brand has been replaced by the usual no-frills Google brand. The homepage allows you to tag and sort your files. There are also common functions, like import and export. The new doc and spreadsheet pages now look almost identical, with similar tabs and layout. Here are some initial screenshots:
Docs (nee Writely)
Spreadsheets
CNET has an early review:
"Today's release of Google Docs and Spreadsheets is a step forward, and I trust that Google will continue to improve the feature set, usability, and integration of these two products. At a preview for bloggers earlier today, we heard about some future plans like integration with Gmail (when you get a word processing file or a spreadsheet as an attachment, you'll have the option to open the file in Docs and Spreadsheets). The team is also working on APIs, so other programmers can access the functionality of the applications. Also, Google is going to "take a shot" at a disconnected version, for users who want to access files when they are offline. And they're working on other applications, too."
Note to Google: next time please invite me to your blogger previews! What am I, chopped liver? Anyway, while I still think this is a piecemeal solution, it looks like Google is putting a lot of effort into their web-based office solutions. Kudos to them.
After years of breathless speculation about the upcoming Apple gadget du jour, some have developed acute cases of "iPod rumor fatigue" syndrome. In Listening Post.
The internet gives political campaigns more opportunities to dig up dirt on their opponents, but with the information comes new ethical and legal concerns. Commentary by Jennifer Granick.
Online productivity company Zoho is finally bringing all its various services together into one offering with the release of the Zoho Virtual Office at tomorrow’s Office 2.0 conference. Virtual Office, or ZohoX, will integrate most of the 10+ Zoho services already available and add several more like Webmail and calendaring. The whole [...]
Google just launched Docs & Spreadsheets at docs.google.com. It integrates the previously separate Writely and Spreadsheet product silos into a single control panel and admin area (the previous sites for those products redirect to docs.google). This is not a deep product integration, but it is another shot across the bow of Microsoft Office. I had [...]
Google Video has a neat list of keyboard shortcuts that allow you to do many useful things. Go ahead and test a couple of them on the video above:
- Space bar plays and pauses the movie
- Right arrow skips the video forward 5%
- Left arrow jumps back 5% in the video
- The "M" key toggles muting
- Clicking on the ">>" button skips the video forward 10%
One of the biggest drawbacks about playing videos online has been the lack of intuitive controls; but these shortcuts take care of that. Note: you must click into the playback window to activate these shortcuts.
by Wendy Boswell
This past year, we bought our first house (yay for us!) and surprisingly enough, the process was virtually pain-free. With the help of a little thing I like to call the Internet, we were able to figure out what we needed to do as first-time homebuyers, browse and tour virtual open houses, and map out our dream neighborhood: all from the comfort of our own home office.
Sure, there's plenty of things you're going to have to do away from the computer when buying or selling a house - actually look at the house for starters - but overall, you can really streamline the whole real estate process. Keep reading for this week's feature on how to make the web your own personal realtor.
The web is your best friend if you're a first-time homebuyer. We looked into many free classes around our area, but with three kids, who has time to put aside four hours every Wednesday night? Instead, we chose the go-at-your-own-pace of the Buying a Home online tutorial from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. All the basics that you'll need to know are here, including figuring out how much you can afford, how to shop for a loan, the inspection process, and homeowners insurance. It's a good way to see what you're about to get yourself into.
It's also a smart idea to familiarize yourself with Mortgage-calc.com, a simple, bare-bones approach to figuring out how much you should plan for, money-wise. Everything from simple mortgage calcs to complex amortization schedules can be found here.
We've posted about Zillow's free home valuation here before; it's a good tool to keep handy when you're in the midst of this whole buying and selling process. Oh, and there's also Bankrate.com, where you can find the latest rates for all kinds of home loans from fixed to jumbo.
Last but not least, we had learned the hard way from previous moves to always factor in the cost of moving BEFORE you move (duh). The Homestore's Moving Calculator can help you do that: it takes your information and gives you a detailed cost analysis, room by room and according to origin and destination.
Now, since we weren't moving out of our hometown, just a different area, this part wasn't that difficult because we already knew where we wanted to be. We've talked about finding a good neighborhood here before at Lifehacker, and here's a few ways to find what pretty much everyone agrees makes up a good 'hood :
Ah, to the fun part! While I tried out quite a few different real estate sites, only three really were of any use to me: many were horribly outdated, quite a few just rerouted me to a registration-only MLS portal, and others were so besotted with their bells and whistles that they were of no earthly good. Here's my top three:
Once you are this far in the process, the webernets have pretty much done all they can for you. Take advantage of these time-saving tips: we did all of our house-hunting completely on the web, narrowing our choices down to just one house that we subsequently ended up buying. If you have any other ways you've used the web to help in the home buying or selling process, please let us know in the comments.
Wendy Boswell is an associate editor at Lifehacker who still has boxes stacked in her living room after one year of home ownership. Her special feature Technophilia appears every Monday at Lifehacker. Subscribe to the Technophilia RSS feed to get new installments in your newsreader.
If you're into iPod hacks and you've got a 5G video iPod, you can create and enable a screensaver on your iPod in a few simple steps. Here's how:
- Create a new folder named Demo Mode on the iPod.
- In iTunes, rename any video file as Demo
- Don't play anything and keep the iPod on a charger. In 2 minutes the video you renamed as Demo will automatically play and repeat.
The screensaver (unfortunately) works only when your iPod isn't playing and is charging, but it is a neat Easter egg that I'd never seen. However, if you really want to supercharge your iPod, you should give iPodLinux a try.
Google acquired YouTube yesterday; and this quick video from the founders of YouTube tells us how things are going to go; what it means for the user community, a quick glimpse at how Google's going to improve the video search, and something about "two kings".....you'll have to watch it.
A few things are going to change that will make video search easier.
According to a USA Today feature article on the Google/YouTube merger, this is what's going to happen:
- Search Google for "plumbing toilet flusher" and you'll probably find a how-to video on YouTube. "For queries like that, a lot of times video is the best result," Google's Page says.
- "Google video doesn't go away ever -- I want to make that clear," Schmidt (Google CEO) says.
- Google did, in fact, promise to leave YouTube alone -- it will keep all its employees, separate headquarters, its own brand.
- Right now, for instance, a search on Google Video will not find a video that's on YouTube. That will change.
Basically, it looks like the good is going to get better. I'm especially looking forward to getting more video results integrated into regular web search results.
Yahoo! Time Capsule, the first and largest internet collection of historical digital data, launched today. Yahoo! execs say:
For the next month, we'll be asking users from around the world to submit expressions around love, anger, fun, sorrow, faith, beauty, past, now, hope and "you." They will create the first-ever electronic anthropology project, which we'll open up on Yahoo!'s 25th anniversary in 2020.
Later this month the best of the capsule will be projected onto one of the world's oldest existing time capsules, the Pyramid of the Sun in Teotihuacán, Mexico, and "beamed into deep space" and the event will be webcast. View the current capsule - an addictive view into people's lives - at the site now.
by Adam Pash
I love the internet. You love the internet. Neither of us likes life too much with absolutely no internet. To that end, we've posted about several tools for working with web pages offline, and while they're great for saving web content for research and annotation, they're not so great when you just want to do your daily reading on your laptop away from an internet connection.
Luckily, grabbing your favorite, must-have content for your offline viewing pleasure is a really simple process. This week, I'll show you how to automatically save your must-have web pages for offline viewing (including the pages they link to) on-the-go with previously-mentioned software Webaroo.
Webaroo is Windows-only (sorry Mac-sters), so if you're a Windows user, now's the time to download Webaroo. Once you've got it, setting up Webaroo is simple: Just go through the installation wizard and accept the defaults. When installation is finished, let the installer automatically launch Webaroo.
You should now see the Webaroo icon in your system tray and the Webaroo page in your browser. The address you're seeing (http://127.0.0.1:8008/...) is actually pointing toward your local computer, so what you're viewing is a page on your hard drive. This is basically how you'll browse all of your content once you add it to Webaroo; you add content, Webaroo downloads it, and you can browse it as though you're online.
So let's get some really good web content downloaded to your computer for offline viewing. I've heard Lifehacker is a good site (maybe you've heard of it? Geek to live, etc.?), so we'll start with that.
Click the Content tab, then follow the "add web sites" link. Enter the site URL (http://lifehacker.com/) and name (Lifehacker), then move to the Download options.
Next you need to set the link depth, which tells Webaroo how many links deep from a web page you want to download. For example, if we at Lifehacker link to another web page (as we're wont to do), a link depth of 1 means that Webaroo will follow that link and download that web page as well. If you set the link depth to 2, Webaroo will then follow all of the links on that page, as well, and so on.
Webaroo suggests that you set your link depth to no more than 3 (though you can choose up to 5), since, as you can imagine, the download size will grow exponentially with each additional level. When I set the the link depth for Lifehacker to 2 links deep, it filled about 173MB of space and took several hours to update all of the content. Alternately, setting the link depth to 1 resulted in 209 pages (plenty of browsing) and only 8.1MB; in all the 1 link depth content downl
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