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Firefox 3.5 Portable

Martin — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 07:27:04 GMT

The long awaited new version of the Firefox web browser has been released in the last days. Users who have been using version 3.0x of the web browser are now facing the decision if they should upgrade to that new version or wait until they are sure that all their add-ons, websites and settings are working under Firefox 3.5 as well. Probably the easiest way of finding out if they can upgrade to Firefox 3.5 is by testing the Firefox 3.5 portable release.

Portable in this case means that it will not interfere with the Firefox installation on the computer system. It is possible to migrate add-ons and settings to the portable version by using Firefox add-ons like the Firefox Environment Backup Extension (FEBE).

This turns the portable version of Firefox into a 1:1 copy of the installed version; Ideal for testing and analyzing the new web browser. Firefox 3.5 portable has been published at the portable apps website from where it can be downloaded. The portable version is only compatible with the Windows operating system although it has been reported that it will work in Wine on the Linux operating system as well.

The portable version can simply be extracted to a folder on the local computer system from where it can be started afterwards. Everything else in the portable version of Firefox works like in the installed version including the installation of add-ons.

Bloggers celebrate breaching Green Dam

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 02:00:00 GMT

A garden party in eastern Beijing planned as a protest turned into a celebration yesterday after the Chinese government postponed its plan to fit all computers in the...

Voice Comments Are Open, Call in and Share Your Thoughts on Social Media

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:50:00 GMT

I promised you when the site lanched that we would use it as a place to experiment with new formats and concepts in co-created content. Here's one. Maybe it will fail miserably, we'll see.

If you click on the box below, powered by Google Voice, you can leave me a voicemail message. I will curate the best of these and post them to the site in a follow-up as MP3s. I am open on topics, but specifically would like to hear your thoughts on where you see social media going in the next year.

I got the idea from Arik Hesseldahl at BusinessWeek. Note that phone numbers won't be shared (you can keep it private if you want) and not all comments will make it on to the site - only the more interesting or, dare I say, entertaining ones. Also, please keep these brief if you can. Ideally, 60 seconds or less in length is best. Finally, note that by leaving a message you are giving me permission to pubish it here.

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Hulu to work with British ISPs on imminent UK launch (Emma Barnett/Telegraph)

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 19:35:07 GMT

Emma Barnett / Telegraph:
Hulu to work with British ISPs on imminent UK launch — Hulu, the US video-on-demand web service, has publicly called its imminent UK launch a top priority and revealed it is open to working with British internet service providers. — Johannes Larcher, senior vice president, International …

DON’T TWEET YOUR RAGE

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 12:48:56 GMT

Twitter etiquette is proving rather difficult to master, especially for corporate Tweeters trying to up their sales.

By now, most of us are familiar with some of the bigger faux pas. Habitat making a hash of their hash tags – marking promotional Tweets with traffic boosters like #Iranelection and #iPhone – is a pertinent example.

Another trend that’s emerging, however, is people venting their rage on Twitter. While bemoaning customer service can achieve great results, threatening and downright abusive Tweets could end in PR disaster.

Recently, an entrepreneur and writer enraged the blogosphere – first by sending out unsolicited and provocative Tweets, and then responding angrily to those who rejected them.

Similarly, novelist Alice Hoffman has come to regret her Twitter tirade. After calling a reviewer (who gave her latest novel a luke-warm reception) a “moron”, she has been pilloried and forced to delete her account.

In Hoffman’s defence, she may have been consumed by her literary labour of love. But it's crucial to remember the following:

Twitter is a public forum. Are you happy for everyone to be able to see your rant?
Expressing anger requires eloquence. Can you articulate your argument in 140 characters?
Social networks are for building relationships – not for knocking them down.

One lucky blogger will get to write from Antarctica

Andy Merrett — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 20:08:35 GMT

Antarctica: Another natural wonder is about to be blogged.

Following on from the lucky Brit who gets to blog about the Great Barrier Reef comes a new dream blogging job.

Quark Expeditions will be sending one couple on a $20,000 cruise to Antarctica in February next year, where they’ll blog about the experience for all to read.

There are currently 191 bloggers registered, and there’s still time to join in.

Alternatively, you can vote for the person you’d most like to send. Visitors only get one vote but can change it as many times as they like during the course of the competition, which closes on September 30. Over 5,000 votes have already been cast.

I wonder where bloggers will be sent next?

Possibly Related Posts

The iPhone 3GS: Should You Get It?

MG Siegler — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 10:29:19 GMT

Disclosure: I have not bought an iPhone 3GS — I’m still unsure if I will. Apple gave me a review unit to play with for 60 days.

I’ve had the new iPhone 3GS for a little over a week now. Using it day-to-day over the course of that time, I have a pretty good feel for it. A good enough feel to answer the question that every single person seems to be asking: “Should I get it?”

The answer to that is not so simple. And so I’m going to break it down a bunch of different ways based mainly on the device’s functionality and who I think is considering buying it. I’ll lay out what someone may be interested in the device for, and then give a “yes” or “no” (or a couple “maybes”) answer on if I think it’s worth it. I’ll follow that up with an explanation.

Here we go:

If you have an original iPhone from 2 years ago? Yes.

Yesterday marked the two-year anniversary for the people who bought the original iPhone on day one in 2007. That also means it marks the official end of those people’s contracts with AT&T (though many are eligible to end them, or get upgrades much earlier). If you’ve had your original iPhone this long, chances are that you’re a fan of it. And if you’re a fan of that version, you’re going to love the iPhone 3GS. Not only will its computing speed blow away that version, but since you skipped the iPhone 3G, you haven’t experienced the big increase in data speed that 3G offers over EDGE.

I’ve talked to a few people who upgraded from the original iPhone to the iPhone 3GS, and all of them cannot believe how much better then device is in its third iteration.

If you have the iPhone 3G? Maybe.

There are simply too many variables at play here to answer this with a simple “yes” or “no.” I’ll address many of them below. But the biggest one for many users right now will be if you’re eligible to get the full $199 and $299 subsidy on the device. Even after AT&T’s relaxing of the rules a bit, most iPhone 3G owners still are not able to get the subsidy yet. If you cannot, I say wait until you can. If you can get the cheaper price now, the iPhone 3GS is probably worth it — if you don’t mind signing your soul over to AT&T for another 2 years. Which leads me to…

If you have never had an iPhone? Yes.

It’s an easy call if you want an iPhone and have never owned one, as this is the best one yet. Definitely get one, unless you have a strong dislike of AT&T. If so, skip to the next question.

If you hate AT&T? No.

This is a big “no.” If you really dislike AT&T, the iPhone 3GS only gives you more reasons to dislike them. MMS still isn’t working. Tethering still isn’t working. The iPhone 3GS has a chip that can handle data transfer speeds of 7.2 Mbps, but AT&T’s network isn’t ready for that, so that data speed is the same as with the iPhone 3G. And that faster AT&T network won’t fully be ready until 2011 — obviously, there will be at least one, and probably two more iterations of the iPhone by then.

And there will likely a version of the iPhone that is not exclusive to AT&T by then as well. That possibility alone should be reason for a lot of people not to sign up for a new two year contract with AT&T. And unfortunately, that means no iPhone 3GS.

If you love video? Yes.

This is a big, emphatic “yes.” I truly believe the iPhone 3GS should have been called the iPhone 3GV, for “Video.” The device is simply great at shooting quick videos and giving you one-button publish capabilities to services like YouTube. While there were some video applications that worked on older jailbroken iPhones, like Qik, the quality of the video with the 3GS is leaps and bounds better. And the trimming capabilities on the phone are very simple to use. And playback looks great on the device. I could go on, but as I said already, if you’re really into video and want a great mobile device for doing it, the iPhone 3GS will be worth it for you. The Flip cam should definitely be scared.

If general speed is your only reason? No.

The iPhone 3GS is noticeably faster than the iPhone 3G, but in my opinion, that speed alone is not worth the upgrade price. One problem is that while apps do load faster, you still have to wait for AT&T’s often shoddy network to connect for many of the apps to work. As I noted above, the iPhone 3GS can handle faster wireless data speeds too, but AT&T’s network isn’t yet up to the same task, so it renders that advantage moot.

I have found myself getting frustrated with using the iPhone 3G after using the 3GS for a while due to the speed difference, but that’s only because I have a point of reference. If you haven’t used a 3GS yet, or don’t use it extensively, you shouldn’t have too much of an issue staying with your iPhone 3G (or buying a new one for $99) and still taking advantage of the new features in the 3.0 software upgrade.

If you’re really into iPhone games? Yes.

Having said all of that about speed, if you’re really into gaming on the device, the faster processor and better graphics chip will undoubtedly be worth it for you. I’ve been playing a bunch of games on the 3GS, including some larger ones like Tiger Woods PGA Tour, and the iPhone 3GS performs much, much better than the iPhone 3G does.

If you’re a developer? Yes.

Likewise with the gaming, if you’re a developer making apps on the iPhone, you’ll undoubtedly love the faster speeds the 3GS offers. Plenty of developers, such as Facebook’s Joe Hewitt, are already raving about this.

If battery life is your main reason? No.

The battery life on the 3GS does seem to be better, but it’s hard to know if that’s just due to the fact that this is a fresher battery compared to the one in the year-old iPhone 3G. Apple has stated that the battery in the 3GS does boost times for certain things (like browsing the web on WiFi), but it also apparently is leading to some overheating.

I’ve also noticed that the auto-brightness setting on the iPhone 3GS is much dimmer than on the iPhone 3G. I’ve done a number of tests to make sure I wasn’t just seeing things, or it wasn’t a one-time fluke. For whatever reason, the iPhone 3GS is much dimmer when auto-brightness is turned on, and this undoubtedly saves some battery life too. The dimmer setting doesn’t bother me at all until I look at it side-by-side with the the iPhone 3G.

The iPhone 3GS also has a feature that allows you to tell you the percentage of your battery has left. This is a pretty nice feature, but it does get a bit nerve-racking.

If you have very oily hands? Yes.

This may sound like a joke, but the iPhone 3GS’s new oleophobic (anti-oil) screen coating really is making a noticeable difference on my iPhone’s screen. While you may assume that my iPhone 3G has a dirtier screen simply because it’s older, I had a protective covering on the screen up until the day before I got the iPhone 3GS, so basically the screens were in the same condition a week ago. Now, one is constantly much more dirty.

If you’re excited about voice control? No.

The voice control feature would seem to be a nice touch, but it’s pretty wonky in my experience with it. More than a few times I’ve tried to tell the device to play music by a certain band, and it will end up calling someone — and without fail it is usually someone I really don’t want to be calling.

The “play more songs like this” which kicks in the iTunes Genius features is by far the best part of the whole thing. Otherwise, it’s just a system that is too slow to activate, and too inaccurate.

If you want a better cameraphone? Yes.

While I’ve already raved about the video capabilities, the camera itself is so much nicer than the iPhone 3G’s. This camera is 3.2 megapixels compared to the old version’s 2 megapixels. But the real difference is with the auto-focus, which turns crap pictures, good.

The camera isn’t as nice as some of the ones found in phones by Nokia, but it’s definitely good enough for your average point-and-shooting in good light.

If you want more storage? Yes.

There’s no denying that having 32 GB (on the more expensive model) versus 16 GB is nice. I remember buying my first iPod five years ago — it was a hard-drive based model with 40 GB of storage. The thing was a brick. Now the iPhone has just about as much storage, which is pretty crazy.

And considering you can now not only shoot movies on this device, but can download them from iTunes with the 3.0 software, you might need that extra space.

For the compass? No.

Don’t get me wrong, the compass is interesting, but aside from Google Maps and maybe the GPS apps, I really don’t see the point of it. And for the first few days I had no idea how to activate the compass features in Google Maps — you have to tap the location button (in the lower left corner) twice. I hope some applications arise that do cool things with it, but I certainly wouldn’t buy the device for this.

Overall? Maybe (See Above).

As I said, there’s really no clear-cut answer as to if you should get the device. You really need to look at the functionality and use cases above, and determine where you reside with regards to those things. If you think a bunch of stuff is missing from the list, you’re probably thinking about features that are a part of the iPhone 3.0 software. Most of those work on the older iPhones as well. If something like cut, copy & paste is most important to you, that works on the iPhone 3G, so it probably makes sense to stick with that device. Or if you don’t have one, consider paying $99 to get one — that seems like a hell of a deal.

If you’re a really big fan of the iPhone, you probably already bought this new model. But it’s the fence-sitters that this post is meant to help. Both those who are unsure if the time is right to get their first iPhone, or if it’s worth it to upgrade.

It’s a tough call — but simplified: If video is the feature you most care about, then get it. If not, consider the iPhone 3G for $99. If you’re worried about AT&T, don’t get either — wait to see if Apple renews its exclusive deal with AT&T next year. Even if it does, you can be sure another phone, more advanced than the iPhone 3GS, will be on the verge of being revealed.

CrunchBase Information

iPhone 3GS

AT&T

Apple

Information provided by CrunchBase

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Recommend Your Favorite iPhone Apps With AppsFire

MG Siegler — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 15:00:32 GMT

A couple weeks ago, we wrote a post detailing why there needs to be some sort of iPhone app recommendation system. Just like iTunes has its “Genius” feature for music and movies, with over 50,000 apps now in the App Store, there needs to be a way to filter out what you don’t want and find what you do. If you have a lot of friends with iPhones or iPod touches, AppsFire may offer just that.

The service, launching in private beta today, allows you to share your favorite apps with anyone. Now, to be clear, I don’t mean actually share the apps themselves, but rather share the names of the ones you like and give others one-click access to download them also, from the App Store. So, say I have 100 apps on my machine, but I only really would recommend 15 or so, I would select those 15, and could send them out to friends on the various social networks.

AppsFire is actually an application that you install on you machine. Right now, it only works on Macs, but it’s coming for PCs soon. And there will event be an iPhone app, we’re told. Once the software is on your machine, it scans your iTunes folder to find your apps. It then opens a personal webpage on the AppsFire site and places the icons for your apps in front of you, asking you to choose your favorites. Once you do that, you can share them using the social networks, via email, in a widget, or simply get a link back to your AppsFire page. For example, here’s the link a co-founder of AppsFire, Ouriel Ohayon’s page.

It’s hardly a perfect system. First of all, the sharing mechanisms are a little clunky. And this isn’t a way to get personally tailored app recommendations based on what apps you already have an like. But it is a way to potentially find some new and interesting applications based on what people you know enjoy using.

The model for this is straight-forward: Affiliate links (through LinkShare and Tradedoubler), though Ohayon promises a “surprise” in that regard soon.

The limited private beta will be open to about 1,000 users at first, we’re told. You can sign up here.

Disclosure: AppsFire co-founder Ouriel Ohayon is a former member of the TechCrunch family, and still contributes from time to time.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Twitter Rolls Out UI Changes To Simplify Your Social Connections

MG Siegler — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 22:49:59 GMT

Twitter has just quietly rolled out a set of changes to its user interface on the “Following” and “Followers” sections of its website. These changes will clearly make it easier to manage who you follow as well as take actions, such as @replying someone or direct messaging them, directly from the page.

There are two new views for looking at these areas. “List” is a compact list of the followers, while “Expanded” offers more details including that user’s last tweet and their real name and location. On the Followers page, there is also a button that allows for one-click following of users who already follow you.

What’s interesting about these icons is that they appear to look exactly like icons that Apple uses for OS X — including some of the ones on the iPhone. Could this mean that we’re about to see a revamped mobile version of the Twitter site? Who knows, but it could sure use an overhaul.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Twitter Grows “Uncomfortable” With The Use Of The Word Tweet In Applications (Updated)

Robin Wauters — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 08:43:57 GMT

We were just forwarded an e-mail conversation between a Twitter API team member and a third-party developer because the latter was using a UI for its web-based service that was admittedly very similar to Twitter’s web application.

The startup of course has the right to protect its assets and do its utmost to avoid confusion with users who might think they’re using a Twitter product rather than that of a developer making use of its API.

But something else caught our attention in the thread:

Hi,

Twitter, Inc is uncomfortable with the use of the word Tweet (our trademark) and the similarity in your UI and our own. How can we go about having you change your UI to better differentiate your offering from our own?

Thanks,

First of all, I had no idea that the word ‘tweet’ was trademarked by Twitter, and after browsing its Terms of Service and API documentation I couldn’t find any reference on their website about this either. (update: a commenter links to the US trademark application, which was filed April 16, 2009 and another one claims a trademark application has been filed in Europe in June as well)

Second, I’m assuming that the note about the company being ‘uncomfortable’ with the use of the term was in reference to the combination of that with the closely resembling UI of the web application. If I’m wrong and this signals that Twitter wants to move forward with actively barring third-party apps from using the word ‘tweet’ in their names in the same way that it refrains them from using the word ‘twitter’, then this could have consequences for a plethora of developers.

Should TweetDeck, TweetMeme, Tweetie, BackTweets, Tweetboard etc. start worrying?

We’ve asked Twitter management for clarification.

Update: Twitter co-founder Biz Stone’s response (emphasis ours):

“The ecosystem growing around Twitter is something we very much believe in nourishing and supporting. As part of this support, we encourage developers of new applications and services built using Twitter APIs to invent original branding for their projects rather than use our marks, logos, or look and feel. This approach leaves room for applications to evolve as they grow and it avoids potential confusion down the line.

As we build our platform team, we will be adding more guidelines and best practices to help developers get the most out of our growing set of open APIs. We have healthy relationships with existing developers who sometimes include Twitter logos, marks, or look and feel in their applications and services. We’ll continue to work together in a fair and flexible way to ensure success for Twitter, developers, and everyone who uses these services.”

It’s a rather vague statement that doesn’t really make it clear whether the use of the word ‘tweet’ is now frowned upon or not. We’ll see when the API team puts forward clear guidelines on this in the future.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Big Websites Start Running Bigger Display Ads. Big Mistake.

Robin Wauters — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 13:15:10 GMT

According to MediaPost, The Online Publishers Association yesterday announced that 37 of its members, including juggernauts like The New York Times, Forbes, ESPN, CNN and MSNBC.com are (or are soon going to start) running the new, larger ad units the organization introduced last March. Since the members who are running these campaigns for brands like Bank of America and Mercedes-Benz reach about 68% of the total U.S. Internet audience, there’s a good chance you will soon see them, too.

There’s also a good chance you’ll hate them.

The three new ad units are named and sized as follows:

- The Fixed Panel (336×700) - remains in view as a user scrolls up or down the page
- The XXL Box (468×648), the extra wide side-of-page ad that expands to 936 x 648 and includes page-turn and video capability
- The Pushdown (970×418), which opens big to display the ad and then after seven seconds rolls up to the top of the page (collapsing to 970 x 66).

The first one was actually supposed to be 860 pixels in height, but they reconsidered it and brought it down to 700, reportedly after feedback from publishers.

In order to visualize how big these ads are in their most expanded state, I overlayed the TechCrunch homepage with boxes of the same size:

Here’s how OPA President Pam Horan justified the introduction of the new ad units:

“The real motivation was to provide marketers and agencies with the opportunity to deliver a branded experience directly on the pages of these very rich content sites.”

But what about the ~~children~~ website visitors?

Nobody seems to really care, apart from the fact that OPA recommends their members that the frequency of the pushdown ad be capped at once per day per page. Horan says it passed that recommendation on because they “want to stay close to consumers”. I puked in my mouth a little.

Is it just me or does anyone else think that display advertising units on websites should become more relevant to them instead of just bigger? What’s next, 1200×600 ads?

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Senior journalists jump ship for new careers in the PR industry

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:35:00 GMT

Increasing numbers of senior journalists are said to be planning an escape route into PR, but they are likely to find their options limited as agencies prioritise genuine industry experience.

Put Eyes Behind Your Back: Monitor Your URLs on Twitter

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:56:00 GMT

I talk to a lot of people in PR about conversation monitoring. Everyone, it seems, recognizes the importance of monitoring Twitter for mentions of their brand (be it a corporate/product brand or personal one). However very few people bother to track their URLs.

This is critical - especially on Twitter since we don't get a lot of space. It's more efficient to say "this is awesome" and link to it rather than mention someone or something by name.

The gallery below shows a sampling what I learned on Twitter by tracking links to my lifestream site using BackTweets. (Other similar tools include TBuzz and Topsy. But BackType seems to work the best.) Unsurprisingly, I found a nice mix of snark, helpful information and praise. None of these mention my name or my site.

Do you have eyes behind your back? If not get some.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Stephen Brook on how gossip site TMZ.com has become a media giant

Stephen Brook — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 23:01:00 GMT

It had the celebrity scoop of the decade when it broke the news of Michael Jackson's death. Now Harvey Levin's tiny gossip site TMZ.com has become a media giant

TMZ.com is now the hottest Hollywood celebrity gossip website on the planet. So hot, in fact, that when it broke the news of Michael Jackson's death last week, its world exclusive popped up online six minutes before the singer actually died.

For its many critics this was confirmation that the website, which, amid endless surveillance videos of minor celebs parking their cars and walking to their front doors, brought you exclusives on Mel Gibson's antisemitic ravings at a traffic cop, Alec Baldwin's brutal mobile phone rant at his 11-year-old daughter and the contents of Anna Nicole Smith's bedside table the night she died (Slim Fast and chewing gum), plays fast and loose with the truth.

But for TMZ, the explanation was simple. By the time Jackson was officially declared dead, at 2.26pm Los Angeles time last Thursday, one of the site's sources within the corridors of the UCLA Medical Centre (it has a vast network that blankets the city) had already tipped it off.

Michael Jackson dead was the scoop of a lifetime for any media outlet, and the apogee of the four-year-old celebrity-obsessed site that boasts its snippets are "even more fascinating than the hype". In that time, TMZ (the name stands for thirty-mile zone, the area of central LA thickly populated with stars), which is as voyeristic as it is speedy, has become one of the world's most quoted sources of entertainment news, with rival sites, TV channels and traditional gossip columns, such as the New York Post's infamous Page Six, quoting it regularly.

And for all that, we have Harvey Levin to thank. The well-built, 57-year-old former lawyer turned TV journalist is now something of a celebrity himself, popping up on Larry King Live, and a bunch of other news magazine shows that dip into celebrity content. When Natasha Richardson hit her head while skiing and suffered fatal brain swelling, Levin, who founded TMZ, was all over the news channels and appeared to have been in touch with paramedics who tended to her. The guy is that good.

A polite way to put it is that Levin is a man who polarises opinion. I'm A Celebrity contestant Janice Dickinson called him the lowest form of pond scum, Radar magazine's profile on him was titled Sultan of Sleeze, while blogging site Gawker said he was a "schlocky managing editor of a thieving celebrity news conglomerate" and accused him of filching stories from the website Courthouse News Service and passing them off as their own.

For his part, Baldwin said that Levin "seemed to be that breed of tabloid creature that realised an almost sexual level of pleasure from ruining other people's lives".

Some rival media outlets so dislike and distrust TMZ that they didn't report Jackson was dead until it had been confirmed by the Los Angeles Times and Associated Press. "That's typical," Levin told the Los Angeles Times. "No matter what they say, people know we broke the story. That's how competitors handle it. There's no issue about our credibility," he added. "Today, I made 100 phone calls, and everyone else made 100 calls," Levin said of TMZ's reporters the day it broke the Jackson story. "Everyone blanketed the city." That seems to be true. The website has sources everywhere: its first reports about Jackson variously quoted a cardiologist at UCLA, another source inside the hospital where the stricken star was taken, a Jackson family member and Jackson's father, Joe.

Kevin Smith, co-founder of independent news and picture agency Splash News, says that while many newspapers and magazines rely on celebrity content to get sales, but fill their pages with everything from crosswords to horoscopes, TMZ has just cut down to the bone - celebrity is all it supplies. "It is very raw, it is very crude, it's not polished, but it works. A lot of people look at them with envy and think, 'Why didn't we do that?'"

Levin, who gossip sites love to point out is happily partnered to his bodybuilder-turned-chiropractor boyfriend, trained as a lawyer, but found the lure of TV irresistible. He passed his bar exam in 1975 and taught law before becoming a legal reporter for KCBS-TV in LA, where he covered the OJ Simpson trial. He later became a legal analyst on The People's Court TV show, before dreaming up his own TV concept, Celebrity Justice. But the show didn't last; a victim of poor time slots, it was axed after three years.

Undeterred, Levin launched TMZ.com modestly in December 2005 as "a Hollywood and entertainment-centric news site". It was a joint venture between AOL and Telepictures Productions, a division of Warner Bros, which produces the Ellen DeGeneres Show and the Tyra Banks Show. Both companies are divisions of Time Warner. The site is said to cost about $8m a year to run, but some have estimated that it could be worth up to $400m.

The site was profitable after the first year, according to Alan Citron, general manager of TMZ.com from just after it launched until late last year. "TMZ was one of the first sites to redefine celebrity coverage. When people were setting their web bookmarks, TMZ was there. I am a big believer in first mover advantage."

According to Citron, Levin was a hard taskmaster who would work all hours. "At the end of the day, he's a really good reporter. When he focuses on the story he is likely to beat the competition."

The site, which attracts about 10 million unique users a month, created waves at Warner Bros in the early days with some of its scoops, according to Citron, now president of Buzznet. "I think that there was some nervousness about that and there were times when people would go, 'Can't you move a bit to the middle?' but to their credit they never shut us down."

There are two opposing schools of thought about its success. One, that TMZ is founded on good old-fashioned reporting, wearing out shoe leather in the finest tradition of Hollywood tip sheets. Two, it gets scoops because it pays people.

"If you have a story and you want to get paid then you call TMZ," says Kevin Smith, whose agency is a major supplier to TMZ.

While this is a practice that half of Fleet Street would not bat an eyelid over, most traditional US media newspapers find this deeply troubling and refuse to pay for stories. Levin admits that the site pays for pictures and he also admitted to the New York Times that he will pay for story tips, but will not pay for unverified stories. "There are times when you have to pay," says Smith. "What if Deep Throat had wanted money and not been acting out of political motivations? Richard Nixon would have remained president."

Citron is quick to defend their use of chequebook journalism. "As long as information is accurate I don't have a problem with that.

It is clear that even before the events of last week, TMZ had changed Hollywood and is starting to change the way the world's media works. In times past other outlets would attempt to confirm a story themselves before running big on it. But with TMZ's scoop last week, Sky News gave it blanket coverage very quickly, even though for nearly one hour TMZ was the only media organisation claiming the superstar was dead. News companies that waited for confirmation, such as CNN and BBC, were roundly criticised. The old rules of double sourcing stories appeared to be being rewritten before our eyes.

"In many ways, publicists ran Hollywood before we came along," Levin told Television Week. "They would set the topics, they would set the agenda, they would tell these magazine shows what they could or couldn't do. The power they had would be to say, 'We won't give you the interviews you really want, you play ball with us'."

But who needs sit-down interviews with celebrities when you can run a harrowing image of pop star Rihanna's face after she was beaten up, for which TMZ reportedly paid $62,000. Keith Kelly, the Media Ink columnist at the New York Post, is stumped to think of a major story the site has blown. "It's not a massive profit-maker," says Kelly. "They focus on one thing: breaking news, that's it - and seem to do it fairly accurately. They have definitely had an impact. I don't think that Hollywood agents and the power structure particularly care for them. In some ways, it's a blessing, you don't have to go and suck up to agents and swap favours for access."

When TMZ broke the news of Jackson's heart attack, but before it reported his death, UK news networks had no problem going big on the story, even though TMZ was virtually the only source. But US network CNN refused to report TMZ's claim that Jackson was dead, even though both news outlets are part of the same company.

Levin is certainly hardworking. He works website hours, arriving at the office sometimes as early as 6am, and has often hit the gym before that. He wears several hats, cofounder and editor-in-chief of TMZ.com, executive producer and host of TMZ on TV, the successful TV show spawned by the site. The offices of TMZ off Sunset Boulevard double as the set of TMZ on TV. "If you went in there you wouldn't find it run by journalists, it is run by young guys who know how to put stuff on the internet. But they have broken some very important stories," says Smith, whose company is a major supplier to the site.

TMZ on TV is just like the site. In fact, it is like putting Heat magazine on television. The format is part squawk box, part bull ring. Levin stands in front of his staff, slurps from a drink bottle, wields a large marker pen and asks his troops in turn, "What have you got?' Just like a real news conference in any news outlet anywhere. But here the stories are different. Staff report on the latest celebrity sitings, often with video. "We caught Twilight star Robert Pattinson's butt cleavage!!" "Sam Ronson denies Lindsay Lohan pregnancy rumours, 'if she is, it ain't mine'". It is a lot of shooting the breeze, interspersed with about eight minutes of content. It is also popular. So much so that the Fox TV network, where it airs every weeknight, is now planning a second TV show. TMZ on TV will expand with a trial run of a new series called Beyond Twisted that starts next Monday. It is billed as an "irreverent and funny take on jaw-dropping moments from around the world".

It is possible to see the legacy of Walter Winchell, the newspaper gossipmonger who dominated radio and TV from the 1930s to the 1950s, in what TMZ does. Winchell's quick-fire radio and TV shows, where he delivered news and gossip, accompanied by clattering telexes, gave him enormous power, and he perfected the use of slang to avoid legal disputes, promising his listeners each week the lowdown on celebrity and politics, "the very very low low down down". But Winchell wasn't really into camera-up-skirt content. In some ways, TMZ is the National Enquirer for the internet age.

It is clear that the site now has the power that Winchell once had. Smith waits to see if TMZ can build on its Jackson success. "The problem is, it's hard to maintain it. The large majority of their stuff is just fluff. I don't have a problem with that because we are supplying most of that fluff," he says.

Keith Kelly sees it as on a mission to expose news that publicists want to keep a lid on. "So in a sense they are outsiders, which in a sense is what journalists should be - they shouldn't be part of the power structure".

TMZ's top scoops

July 2006
A police report obtained by TMZ reveals that Mel Gibson launched an antisemitic and sexist tirade at traffic cops when arrested in Malibu for drink-driving

November 2006
TMZ shows mobile phone footage of former Seinfeld star Michael Richards on stage in a comedy club launching a bizarre racist rant at a heckler

April 2007
TMZ broadcasts an abusive answering-machine message that Alec Baldwin leaves his daughter, 11, during a custody battle

February 2009
TMZ releases audiotape of Christian Bale going berserk at a crew member on the set of Terminator Salvation. Bale gets through 39 "fucks" in four minutes

February 2009
TMZ posts shocking photograph of pop singer Rihanna with deep bruises and black eyes after she was allegedly assaulted by her boyfriend on the morning of the Grammys

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

New kit 'boosts mobile signal'

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 14:23:16 GMT

New technology's been released to help people who don't get good mobile phone reception at home.

Secure Google Accounts With Cell Phone Numbers

Martin — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 22:03:12 GMT

A Google account offers access to numerous popular and often times important services. This includes access to the popular Gmail email service, Google Docs for storing documents but also access to Google Adsense or Adwords for webmasters. Losing an account, either by forgetting the password or email address associated with it or by a successful hacking attempt can be devastating.

The common security options to avoid this horror scenario are a secondary email and a security question that can be used to recover a Google account. Google users from the United States have another option at their disposal which has been added recently to Google: The ability to recover an account password by a SMS that is send to a cell phone.

The option is currently only visible to US visitors. The Googlesystem blog suggested to use a US proxy server so that the option would become visible to users from other countries as well. I personally would not be using a proxy server to log into important web account. The possibility is there however and you can check out their blog post for some pointers. It is apparently possible to select another country from the list which makes it strange why they are not enabling the option for all users.

Users from the US or those using a US based proxy can open the Google Accounts page to enter a cell phone number as an additional method of restoring a Google account. It is likely that Google will roll out the feature soon for other countries as well.

Tags: gmail, gmail password, Google, google account, google account password, google password, restore google account

Trap Spammers with Project Honey Pot

Melanie — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 11:30:54 GMT

Junk mail is always a pain to deal with. Some junk mail may be stuff you actually sign up for and lost interest in. Spam, however, is stuff that you never signed up for and is often sent to you after some bot saw your email address on some site. Nobody like spam. The guy that had the bot harvest your email address probably even hates getting spam. Spam is actually illegal and there are actually people out there who track spammers and try to make sure they see their day in court.

Project Honey Pot is a system designed with those who receive spam in mind. What this system basically does is sit on a site and watch for email harvesters. When it finds an email harvester, the honey pot logs information about the harvester into the Project Honey Pot system. This information is then built up into various sets of statistics that are used in court to prosecute spammers. One of the things that makes Project Honey Pot cool is that it shows all this data on their website for the world to see. This allows those curious about their own IPs to check and see if they are considered a spammer. It also offers information on various IPs and statistics such as the average amount of emails sent to the honey pot.

Website owners can do one of three things to help Project Honey Pot catch spammers. A honey pot can be added to any website which will watch for and log any suspicious data on that site. This is for those who have a web host and are willing to install the honey pot script onto their site. Those who don’t have their website hosted or don’t want to install a honey pot can install a QuickLink. When a bot visits a site, they likely visit other sites that the original site is linked to in order to find as many email addresses as possible. A QuickLink is a hidden, secret link that only bots can see and visit. The QuickLink will take the bot to a site that does have a honey pot installed. Another thing that webmasters can do is donate an MX record to the project. What this does is give Project Honey Pot an email address to receive spam. Project Honey Pot will use this email address to see what kind of spam the harvesters are sending among many other statistics. This option is for webmasters who have their own domain name.

Project Honey Pot is a completely free service that survives on donations and tshirt sales through CafePress. They also offer various other services such as a directory where users can look up information about various IPs, including IPs that are known to belong to dictionary attackers.

Tags: Email, email spam, project honey pot, spam, spammers

The iPhone 3GS: Should You Get It?

MG Siegler — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 10:29:19 GMT

Disclosure: I have not bought an iPhone 3GS — I’m still unsure if I will. Apple gave me a review unit to play with for 60 days.

Here we go:

If you have an original iPhone from 2 years ago? Yes.

I’ve talked to a few people who upgraded from the original iPhone to the iPhone 3GS, and all of them cannot believe how much better then device is in its third iteration.

If you have the iPhone 3G? Maybe.

If you have never had an iPhone? Yes.

It’s an easy call if you want an iPhone and have never owned one, as this is the best one yet. Definitely get one, unless you have a strong dislike of AT&T. If so, skip to the next question.

If you hate AT&T? No.

If you love video? Yes.

If general speed is your only reason? No.

If you’re really into iPhone games? Yes.

If you’re a developer? Yes.

If battery life is your main reason? No.

If you’re excited about voice control? No.

If you want a better cameraphone? Yes.

The camera isn’t as nice as some of the ones found in phones by Nokia, but it’s definitely good enough for your average point-and-shooting in good light.

If you want more storage? Yes.

And considering you can now not only shoot movies on this device, but can download them from iTunes with the 3.0 software, you might need that extra space.

For the compass? No.

Overall? Maybe (See Above).

CrunchBase Information

iPhone 3GS

AT&T

Apple

Information provided by CrunchBase

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

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