| Skype To Go Brings Brings Internet Calling to Landlines Today Skype is touting the relaunch of its "Skype to Go" service as a new way to make international calls from any phone - even landlines. The service itself has been around for years, but today's launch brings new features, specifically direct dial numbers for your Skype contacts. Previously, Skype to Go users had one access number that would send them to a voice menu which provided a speed dial list of pre-saved phone numbers. Today, Skype to Go users won't have an access number, but rather a direct dial number for individual contacts that acts, for the most part, as any regular phone number would. This number can be saved in a phone, mobile or otherwise, and dialed directly without any additional prompts from a voice system.
Continue reading »
 
Google Announces "Big Algorithmic Improvement" to Search Google has been under increasing pressure in recent months to improve its search results. From accusations of SEO gaming by big sites to a search results page dominated by the likes of Demand Media and other content farms, the search engine has repeatedly heard the cry that it was becoming less and less relevant. Most recently, the company launched an extension to allow users to block results from certain domains. Today, Google announced that it had made a "big algorithmic improvement" that, unlike other changes, could be noticeable to its users.
Continue reading »
Meet the 13 Companies that Came Out on Top at Launch Nearly 50 companies have presented over the past two days at Jason Calcanis' LAUNCH conference. We've seen everything from well-established companies like StackOverflow launch a job-finder service for its existing members to companies sign $100,000 deals on stage. Now, it has come to an end and, like most things, a winner (or 13) has to be declared. Here's who came out on top.
Continue reading »
Google Toolbar Explains Toolbar as Identity Tool, Not "Google +1" Last week, a new toolbar began appearing on Google for user and some took it as evidence of the ever-elusive "Google +1" or "Google Me" social network. Today, Google explained the appearance of this part of the bar as a simple method for users to keep track of what identity they're using as they browse online and use Google services. In a blog post entitled "The freedom to be who you want to be..." the company explains that the toolbar help ensure users "know exactly what mode they're in when using Google's services."
Continue reading »
NeuAer Could Crack Open a New World of Smartphone Location Potential When NeuAer finished its stage presentation at the LAUNCH conference today, Joyent CEO David Young had just one thing to say: "It puts the smart in smartphone." We, and many in the crowd it seemed, were equally impressed. Imagine if your phone could tell you when your friend walked by so you could call them, or when your ex arrived so you could duck beneath the table. Imagine if you could automatically drop a pin on Google Maps every time you turned off your car. Just think about a phone that could perform all sorts of functions just based on who or what is near you and where you are - that's NeuAer.
Continue reading »
Computers Double the Number of Americans Involved in the Arts A new National Endowment of the Arts study has looked back into the data from the 2008 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts. Expanding the definition from "benchmark" activities (like going to the opera) to the creation and viewing of art or art-related content digitally has yielded a radically different picture of American's relationship to the arts. The new definition shows a three-fold increase in the number of Americans taking part in art: from one in four to three in four.
Continue reading »
Syrian Bloggers Arrested: This Week in Online Tyranny Syria cracks down on bloggers. As the Jasmine Uprisings go on in Libya, Bahrain, Yemen and elsewhere, Syria has gone in the other direction, arresting bloggers. In the last month, Ahmad Abu Al-Kheir and Firaz Akram Mahmoud have been arrested and Tal Al-Mallouhi was sentenced to five years for her imaginary spying. A host of other Syrian bloggers remain jailed. Although Syria recently loosened up its Internet filtering, this is clearly just a PR move. Remember, as awful as one death is and despite how violent the deaths of more than 500 Libyans may seem, the father of Syria's leader killed between 20,000 and 40,000 people in Hama in 1982. These people are monsters.
Continue reading »
Designer of Google Images Launches Search Engine for Hotel Rooms Not all hotel rooms are created equal. Room77 is a new hotel room search engine unveiled to rave reviews at the Launch conference today. It shows you floor maps, a photo of each room's view and when available, a photo of the room itself. That way when you make a reservation, you can request exactly the room you know you want to stay in. The company's lead engineer is Calvin Yang, a former Googler who designed Google Images years ago. It was founded by Brad Gerstner, a serial entrepreneur, investor and veteran of the travel tech world. The service uses some math and Google Street View to estimate what the view is like out a room's window until someone goes and uploads a photo. The service then advises users how to call a hotel to request a specific room - for example, call 48 hours before your reservation, not 2 weeks ahead. It's an impressive service and won over almost all the judges at Launch.
Continue reading »
Anyone For Squirrel Fishing? Stomp.io is Your Social Networked Bucket List I don't know about you, but when I hear the words "Wanna go squirrel fishing?" I think "Heck yeah!" The same would go for a hot air balloon ride, a ride in a wind tunnel or tracking down some bison in Golden Gate park. But how could I get all these ideas? Stomp.io, explained the company on stage at the LAUNCH conference, is "a social adventure network that lets us find fun things to do wherever we are." As someone who has a penchant for lists, mobile apps, sharing my adventures with friends and the idea of activities like "squirrel fishing" (I really can't leave that one behind) Stomp.io is an app I can get behind.
Continue reading »
NPR's Andy Carvin Shows How to Retweet Globally (Map) There's no better way to see Tweets about the Middle East than by following NPR Senior Strategist Andy Carvin. He's curating, verifying when possible and reporting on Tweets from the contentious region day and night. How diverse are the Tweets Carvin is curating? We used the handy web app Needlebase to scrape, analyze and map the Twitter community Carvin is bringing into the streams of his own community of followers and found some interesting data points. He's retweeted 186 distinct Twitter accounts over the last four days alone.
Continue reading »
| 
No comments:
Post a Comment