News Bites

« Previous Entries

britster: The New MySpace For The UK?

Tuesday, June 26th, 2007 britster I came across a post over at Paul Enderson's blog 'Reflections' today that caught my interest; he is working to set up a new social network that will be aimed primarily at the British. Sounds good to me, seeing as I am British. At the moment he is preparing it for a private Beta and looking for some help in geting the bugs out, so if you have any experience with the inner workings of a social networking site and would like to lend a hand let him know over at his site, Reflections. If all goes well, those of us who are not as technically minded can sign on for a public beta of the network which should go live in August. With the continued growth of social networks on the web with sites like MySpace and Facebook this could be a great success. Also, as sites like YouTube are see the need to allow each country to set up their own community there is obviously an increasing need for more niche social networking sites. It will also be nice to be on a site where all the features are available to me, unlike the 'other' sites with their "currently only available in the US" applications. Wishing you well with this one, Paul, let's hope it all comes together. :-)
clipped from paulenderson.com

Britster Beta Testing
I’ve been working on Britster now for a number of months now, and the project is finally nearing completion! Everything’s in place to make this the biggest thing to happen to Social Networking in England for a long time - and I for one can’t wait to see this baby fly! ;)
During the first week of July the site will enter a ‘Private Beta’ phase, during which all of the little niggles will be resolved. Once this is done, the site will move to a ‘Public Beta’ a month later - which will see the doors open to members of the public.
So… Do you think you’ve got what it takes to help me? I’m looking for technically-minded people, who understand how social networking sites work, and who can help me to take this project to the next level. There won’t be any payment for your time at this stage, but you will get your name and a link to your website placed in a prominent position once the site goes live.


Increasing Productivity With iGoogle

Thursday, June 7th, 2007

iGoogle with iReader

In the Official Google Reader Blog today there was an interesting post that mentioned that Michael Bolin had created 'Your Page Here', a gadget for iGoogle that allows you to embed the Google Reader, Calendar or just about any web page on its own tab in iGoogle. This seemed like a pretty nifty idea to me so I thought I would give it a whirl, and it seems to work very well. You can only have six tabs on the iGoogle homepage (though there is a hack . . .) so if you are already at maximum you may have to have a bit of a sort out, you can't really have anything else running in the same tab. I now have my Google Reader and Calendar along with Docs and Spreadsheets running in their own tabs, as well as a tab with this blog in it which allows me to run this site without ever leaving iGoogle. There were a few problems getting Gmail to work in its own tab, but that may just have been me, feel free to give it a whirl yourself and let me know how you got on. With the Remember The Milk now working offline via the Google Gears application I thought I would see how well that worked too, so I added that into a tab as well and it synchronizes fine when you go back online. All in all I think that the addition of Michael Bolin's'Your Page Here' gadget will go a long way to helping me be more productive, especially if I can work out how to get Gmail to work! What uses do you think you can make of it? Do you think this will increase your productivity? Let me know in the comments.

Virtual Conference at “Thoughts & Philosophies”

Friday, May 11th, 2007 Productivity Goal Carolyn Manning of Productivity Goal.com has announced that she is hosting a virtual conference at her "Thoughts & Philosophies" blog, this will begin later today, 11th May, and carry on tomorrow, 12th May, to coincide with the SOB Con in Chicago. It will give those of us who are unable to attend an alternative venue. It looks like there will be plenty of good tips on how to make our lives more productive so make sure you check it out. For a full list of topics and times click through to her post.

Joost- The Next Step In TV Evolution?

Thursday, May 10th, 2007 Joost TV Have you heard of Joost? It has had quite a lot of publicity of late and it looks like it may well be the next step in the evolution of on-line entertainment. If you are not sure what Joost is, here is a description from their website:
Joost is a new way of watching TV on the internet. With Joost, you get all the things you love about TV, including a high-quality full-screen picture, hundreds of full-length shows and easy channel-flipping. You get great internet features too, such as search, chat and instant messaging, built right into the program - so you find shows quickly and talk to your friends while you watch. And with no schedules to worry about, you can watch whatever you want, whenever you like - as often as you want. Joost is completely free, and works with most modern PCs and Intel Mac-based computers with a broadband connection.
It is the brain-child of created by Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis, the founders of founders of Skype and Kazaa, so these guys have some experience in the development of web technology. The original financing for the development of Joost was from the sale of Skype to eBay, but more recently they have also raised an additional $45m in funding from five backers (Index Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Li Ka Shing Foundation, CBS and Viacom) in exchange for a minority share in the company. The application works as a P2P TV client, which if you are a bit of a technology dummy like me doesn't mean much, so here is the explanation from Wikipedia:
As opposed to streaming technology in which all clients get the feed from the server, P2P TV technology differs in the sense that the servers serve only a handful of clients; each of the clients in turn propagate the stream to more downstream clients and so on. This moves the distribution costs from the channel owner to the user.
Which means, as far as I can tell, the more people that use it the better the service is, as there is less strain on the original file. To download the application itself you need to receive an invitation from someone who already has it, similar to the way Gmail used to work. The invites were limited to only 3 per participant but as of the beginning of this month invitations to join Joost have been made unlimited, though it is still in Beta. I have been using it for the last month or so and it seems to work pretty well, and with more and more channels being added it seems to have something for everyone. If you would like to try this out you can receive an invite from me by letting me know in the comments below. With a reasonably fast connection the download only takes a couple of minutes and the set-up takes even less time. Listed below are the channels available and the areas they are available in as of the 10th May 2007.
  • 88HipHop: Worldwide
  • Aardman Animation: Worldwide
  • Adult Swim: United States
  • Alliance Atlantis Sci-Fi: Worldwide excluding Canada
  • Atlantic Street: United States
  • AXN: United States
  • Bad Boy Records Presents: United States
  • Beauty TV: Worldwide
  • Best of National Geographic: United States, Canada
  • Beyond the Pit: United States
  • Bite TV: Worldwide
  • BoomChicago: Worldwide
  • Braindead: Worldwide
  • Brazilian Music Channel: Worldwide
  • Bridezillas: Worldwide excluding United States
  • Bugeye Music: Worldwide
  • Channel Frederator: Worldwide
  • Chat the Planet: Worldwide
  • Classica Channel: Worldwide excluding Austria, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland
  • Comedy Central: United States
  • Critical Shorts: Worldwide
  • DR: Worldwide
  • Explora Channel: Worldwide
  • Fabchannel Concerts: Worldwide
  • Fifth Gear: United States
  • Fifth Gear Shortcuts: Worldwide
  • Fight Network: Worldwide
  • Floating Worlds: Worldwide
  • Fueled by Ramen: United States
  • Funny Bone: United States
  • G.I. Joe: United States
  • GameStar: Worldwide
  • Gametrailers: United States
  • GONG: North America, Europe
  • Guinness World Records TV: Worldwide
  • Havoc Action Sports TV: Worldwide excluding Japan
  • Havoc Music TV: Worldwide excluding Japan
  • HealthiNation: Worldwide
  • Heavy Animation: United States
  • Hollyoaks: United States
  • Hot & Wet Worldwide
  • i-concerts: United Kingdom
  • IMF Asia: Worldwide
  • IMF Australia: Worldwide
  • IMF France: Worldwide
  • IMF Germany: Worldwide
  • IMF Hip Hop Society: Worldwide
  • IMF Italy: Worldwide
  • IMF Journey to the Centre of the Rock: Worldwide
  • IMF Mexico: Worldwide
  • IMF One World: Worldwide
  • IMF Passage To India: Worldwide
  • IMF Puerto Rico: Worldwide
  • IMF Scandinavia: Worldwide
  • IMF Spain: Worldwide
  • IMF The Bridge- Latin America: Worldwide
  • IMF The World's Best Music: Worldwide
  • IMF UK: Worldwide
  • IndieFlix Premier Hits: Worldwide
  • Indy 500 Films: Worldwide
  • IndyCar Series: Worldwide
  • Intimate & Interactive: Worldwide
  • Joost Suggests Worldwide
  • Jump Off TV: Worldwide
  • Jump TV Arabia: Worldwide excluding Middle East
  • Jump TV Latino: Worldwide excluding Latin America, Canada
  • Lassie: United States
  • Lazy TV: United States
  • Lazy TV UK: Worldwide
  • Lime: Worldwide
  • Live @ Much: Worldwide
  • Logo: United States
  • LXTV: Worldwide
  • Ministry of Sound TV- Access All Areas: Worldwide
  • Ministry of Sound TV- Music Videos: Worldwide
  • MTV: United States
  • MTV (International): Selected countries in Europe, South America, US and Japan
  • MTV Staying Alive: Worldwide excluding United Kingdom, Ireland
  • Much Does Wakestock: Worldwide
  • MuchAdrenaline: Worldwide
  • MuchMusic Video Awards: Worldwide
  • MuchNews Weekly: Worldwide
  • MuchOnDemand: Worldwide
  • Music Nation: Worldwide
  • Nardwuar: Worldwide
  • National Geographic History and Exploration: United States, Canada
  • National Geographic People and Places: United States, Canada
  • National Geographic Wild: United States, Canada
  • National Geographic Animals and Nature: United States, Canada
  • Nettwerk: Worldwide
  • New Atlantis: Worldwide
  • Off the Fence Docs: Worldwide
  • OnSet: Worldwide
  • PokerHeaven TV: Worldwide
  • Red Bull: Worldwide
  • Rehearsals.com: Worldwide
  • Ren and Stimpy: United States
  • Reuters: Worldwide
  • Rhino Records: United States
  • Roadrunner Records: United States
  • Saavn: Worldwide
  • Saturday Morning TV: Worldwide
  • SecondsOut.tv: Worldwide
  • SHORTSTV: Worldwide
  • SHORTSTV Corto: Worldwide
  • SHORTSTV France: Worldwide
  • Snowvision: Worldwide
  • Spike TV: United States
  • Sports Illustrated Swimsuit on Demand: Worldwide
  • Terra: Worldwide
  • The Circus Channel: Worldwide excluding Italy
  • The Fit Show: Worldwide
  • The Hobby Channel: Worldwide
  • The Horror Channel: Worldwide
  • The New Music: Worldwide
  • The Recipe Channel: Worldwide excluding Spain, Portugal
  • The Roger Sisters: Worldwide
  • The Silent Movies Channel: Worldwide
  • The Soccer Channel: Europe, United States, Middle East
  • The Trance Channel: Worldwide
  • The Westside Eclectic: Worldwide
  • Transformers: United States
  • Travelistic: Worldwide
  • U.S. Soccer: Worldwide
  • VH1: United States
  • Virgin Fest 2006: Worldwide
  • VOY TV: Worldwide
  • Wall to Wall Documentary: Worldwide
  • Wall to Wall Lifestyle: Worldwide
  • Warner Bros. Records: United States
  • Watchmojo.com: Worldwide
  • Whereitast.tv: Worldwide
  • WildLight: Worldwide
  • Witness: Worldwide
  • World Championship Sports Network: United States
  • World Poker Tour: Worldwide excluding United States
  • World's Strongest Man: Worldwide
  • XL Recordings Channel: Worldwide
Take it for a test run and be part of the next step in TV evolution.

Nathan Fillion Wins Best Actor Award

Thursday, May 10th, 2007 According to the Fox Searchlight website Nathan Fillion has won the Audience Award for his role in"Waitress" at the Newport Beach Film Festival. The film itself also won the Audience Award for Best Feature. Congratulations to Nathan, a well deserved win, I am sure there are many more awards in your future.  :grin:  Click through for the complete list of winners.
clipped from content.foxsearchlight.com

Foxsearchlight
Congratulations to WAITRESS on winning two awards at the Newport Beach Film Festival! It won the Audience Award for Best Feature. Nathan Fillion won in the Best Acting category as the awkward but lovable Dr. Pomatter.



Sharing The Link Love

Thursday, May 3rd, 2007 Do Follow A topic I have been following recently is that of whether to use the “rel=nofollow” command, which by default most blogging software adds to all links in comments. Undoubtedly the intentions behind this are good - to prevent spammers benefiting from the link juice they could gain from commenting on your blog. But with the arrival of such anti-spam plugins as Akismet and Bad Behavior is there any real need to keep using this command? Many feel that it is time to move on, that it is time to allow those that comment on our blogs the opportunity to share some of the SEO benefits that Google can give through those links. Having read the article over at MiLienzo calling for more bloggers to join the "revolution" I have decided to try out the plugin from Semilogic that should override the default setting. That's if I have installed it right, anyways. If you notice a problem with this plugin please let me know and I will do what I can to correct it. I have added the U COMMENT I FOLLOW badge to my sidebar to let people know that this is now a "Do Follow" blog, it was originally created by Randa Clay and she has made it available in several colours to suit your blogs design. If you are not sure about whether to change your blog over, take a look at the 13 reasons given to do so by Loren Baker on his blog Search Engine Journal.

Blogger and Podcaster Magazine: Worth The Price Of Free Admission?

Saturday, April 21st, 2007 As Seen in Blogger & Podcaster I don't know whether you caught the news or not, but there is now a magazine available from Larstan Publishing for those who are interested in the blogging and podcasting world. The "Blogger & Podcaster" is a monthly magazine that is available for free as an online digital edition (though it can be cached to be read offline) and as a podcast. If you want to have a "real" magazine delivered then you can, though this will cost you $79 if you are in the US, $99 if you aren't. I got a chance to read the digital first issue yesterday, lots of good stuff to try and absorb in its 48 pages, though obviously a fair chunk of the content was advertisement. Robert Scoble and Leo Laporte were interviewed this time out, but there are plenty of other great articles to peruse too. Overall, I thought that it was worth the price. :wink: Have you tried this magazine yet? If so, what did you enjoy most, what would you like to see in future editions? Let us know in the comments.

Twitter While You “Drive”

Sunday, April 15th, 2007 TwitterI had been resisting the urge to sign up for the latest web phenomenon, "Twitter", but no longer! Tonight Greg Yaitanes, the Director and executive producer of the new TV series "Drive", will be Twittering during the premiere of the show, basically a live commentary, and as I am a big fan of the star of this series, Nathan Fillion, and of the co-creator Tim Minear, I could no longer resist! This seems to me to be by far one of the best ways this new service has been utilized so far, and I wonder what other new uses people will find for this. For more information about "Drive" check out my Joss Whedon blog. Do you Twitter? What is the best use you have found for this service so far?

« Previous Entries