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2006-09-03T00:46:00.000-07:00

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Crazy Egg Launched - Visitor Clicks Visualized Now

2006-08-21T23:04:00.000-07:00

Crazy Egg, the highly anticipated click tracking service from ACS, launched today. With Crazy Egg, users install a code on their website to track every click a visitor makes on links, forms, advertisements, and flash documents. Results can be displayed in either an overlay or heatmap form giving the user a visual on click activity around the website. This kind of data is very useful for website owners as it can help them learn how their visitors navigate their website and how they can improve and optimize its usability.

Before we get started, let me explain how Crazy Egg works. Crazy Egg can be setup on any website, whether it be a static or dynamic site (blogs included), and is to be used as a tool to test your websites click activity. When setting up a site, you set a length of time for your test session and Crazy Egg will then provide you with a code to insert in your sites body. The next time someone visits your site and clicks on a link, input to a form, advertisment, or flash document, Crazy Egg will record its position. You then can view the click reports during and after the testing session.

The first page you will see when logging in is the Dashboard (Note: numbers blurred in the above screenshot are from a master Crazy Egg test account and are not all in relation to my site). This is where you get an overview of all your pages that you are watching with Crazy Egg. It is also where you go to add a page to your account for testing. Each page listed provides you with details on when the page was last tested, how many tests you have ran, and its current status (actively running or not). Selecting a page from the list will make a new area slide down providing you with a screenshot of the site and basic statistics including number of visits and clicks during the testing duration. To get to the more detailed reports showing the overlay and heatmap, click on the “View Results” button of any page listed.

Viewing a pages report will bring you to a new section of Crazy Egg with a toolbar at the top and your site right below. At default, the overlay reporting method will be shown and if clicks have already been recorded, you will see colored markers around the site. These markers point out where the clicks have been made and will be colored based on the percentage of clicks (blue for low percentage, red for high percentage). Selecting a marker will border the clicked object and pop open a little percentage bar showing the amount of clicks made on that object. You can also open all markers at once by selecting the gear icon on the toolbar and clicking, “open all.”

The next reporting method is, List. Selecting the list button on the toolbar will have a box slide down that will show a table listing all objects that have been clicked. Sorted by the amount of clicks, each row will show the element clicked, what type of element it is (a, strong, span, etc.), the amount of clicks, and the percentage of clicks. Viewing results in the list format makes it very easy for you to quickly grab the names of the most clicked elements, or least clicked, and makes for a quick overview, which at times is easier to view then markers around the site.

The last method, and my favorite method, for viewing results is using the heatmap option. Heatmaps are commonly seen in usability tests and eye tracking tests where the site is overlayed with a grey layer showing high concentrated areas in bright colors ranging from blue to red. Crazy Egg decided to use the same technique to show what elements are most clicked. Blue colored areas have a low percentage of clicks, while red colored areas have a high percentage of clicks. Using the heatmap makes it very easy for you to see what elements around your site receives the most attention and what areas of your site may need some improvement.

Now, let’s say that based on the results from the reports, you made some changes to your website and you want to start another test. This is no problem and Crazy Egg makes this very easy for you. Head over to the Dashboard and select your page. You will see a link below the page name that says, “test a new version.” Clicking this will bring you to a form where you can enter the amount of time you want your new test to run and click save. You will then be directed back to the dashboard where you will see that your page has multiple tests. On the right, after selecting the page, you will see the most recent test on top with the older ones following below allowing you to easily view results for any test you have had under that page.

Crazy Egg offers four plans to choose from when signing up ranging from Free to $99/month. For some, the free plan is all that will be needed as it allows for tracking 5,000 visits/month with 2 pages, which I feel is plently for basic website testing. One downside with the free account is that statistics wont be shown in real-time (live reporting). On the other hand, it may get a little pricy but offering 25,000-250,000 monthly visitors and unlimited pages with live reporting.

All in all, Crazy Egg is a great product providing helpful data to any website owner. I’ve been anticipating its launch since I first learned about it on TechCrunch and Mashable back in March, and I must say, it was well worth the wait. I’m impressed with how simple Crazy Egg makes it for website owners to visualize visitor click activity. You can use Crazy Egg for testing new designs, structure changes, ad placement, page content, and more. Based on results, website owners can learn how visitors see their site and how they should improve it. I will definitely be using this for all future usability tests.

Crazy Egg
Source: Solutionwatch

Tags: Web2.0, Crazyegg, Techonlogy

Windows Live Contacts Beta Launched

2006-08-20T23:39:00.000-07:00

Today George Moore, GM of Windows Live, announced the Windows Live Contacts Gadget beta at the Microsoft TechEd 2006 conference, in Auckland New Zealand (I'm here at the conference courtesy of Microsoft NZ). Live Contacts provides programmatic access to a user's contact list, providing secure access to 400+ M active users with 12B contact records. The user is in full control over their personal data, George said.

Here's the official word:

"Learn how, with nothing more than a little JavaScript, you can allow customers to use their Windows Live Contacts (Hotmail/Windows Live Mail and Messenger contacts) directly from your Web site."

For more, check out the developer info and two working samples. MS developer Danny Thorpe notes:

"The contacts gadget is client-side JavaScript that enables end users to use their Windows Live contacts (from Windows Live Mail/Hotmail and Messenger) with third party (non-Microsoft) web sites, conveniently and securely. The gadget works with any web server, most browsers, and doesn't require reams of license or partnership paperwork with Microsoft. You don't have to assimilate your web server into the Microsoft collective in order to play with Windows Live contact data."

You can also show your contacts on a map using MS Virtual Earth, as per below:

Windows Live Stats

George Moore also told the conference attendees some stats of the current MS active audience - 240M Hotmail users, 230M Messenger, 72M Spaces, 8M mobile subscribers. He tells the mostly developer crowd at TechEd that "this is the audience that can be reached by Windows Live services." He goes on to say that at any one moment, 20M people are simultaneously connected on Messenger and 5.7 Billion messages are sent per day. Also there are 300M F2F video conversations on Messenger every month. George said Spaces is "now the largest blogging service on the planet" (RM: so it's bigger than blogger.com?) - it grew to 30M accounts in its first 6 months.

Source: Readwriteweb

Google developing social and interactive television applications for 'mass personalization'

2006-08-20T23:35:00.000-07:00

Google Research has proudly announced it won “Best Paper” award for its Interactive TV work presented at the Euro Interactive Television Conference held in Greece recently. The Google research, “Social and Interactive Television Applications Based on Real-Time Ambient Audio Identification,” is:

focused on using broadcast viewing to automatically present relevant information on a web browser…how to sample the ambient sound emitted from a TV and automatically determine what is being watched from a small signature of the sound…The system could keep up with users while they channel surf, presenting them with a real-time forum about a live political debate one minute and an ad-hoc chat room for a sporting event in the next. And, all of this would be done without users ever having to type or to even know the name of the program or channel being viewed.

Taking this further, we could collect snippets from the web describing the actors appearing in a movie or present maps of locales within the movie as it takes place (no matter if users are watching it as a live broadcast or as a recoded broadcast).

The Google research, produced by Michele Covell and Shumeet Baluja, of Google, in collaboration with Michael Fink, of Hebrew University, presents four applications for personalizing broadcast content and making it more interactive and social:

Personalized content layers
Ad hoc social peer communities
Real-time popularity ratings
Virtual media library services, or TV-based bookmarks

The proposed framework for combining mass media with a highly personalized Web-based experience “listens” to ambient audio and connects the viewer with services and related content on the Web via three-components:

a client-side interface
an audio-database server
a social-application Web server

Will we soon see Google ITV? Join the conversation: "Talk Back" below to share your thoughts.

Source: ZDNET

Blogger New Features

2006-08-17T01:10:00.001-07:00

Customize your template

Create the blog you’ve always wanted with new page elements and font and color options.
Drag and drop page elements to customize your blog’s design in a snap.

Create a private blog

Want to share your thoughts with just family and friends, not the whole world? The new Permissions tab in Settings makes it easy to control who can view and contribute to your blog.

Add authors so multiple people can post to your blog.
Choose who can view your blog just by adding their email address.

Fresh new templates

We’ve added a bunch of new templates created by some of the web’s most talented designers.

More feed options

We’ve added some additional feed options for our more advanced users. Now you can have a feed for all the comments on your blog, and even individual feeds for all the comments on each separate post. We’ve also added support for the RSS 2.0 and Atom 1.0 standards.

Updated Dashboard

The new Dashboard makes it easier to check your blog’s activity and gives you one-click access to the most common blog management tasks.

Instant publishing

Say goodbye to the dreaded “Publishing…” spinner. Now, when you make a new post or change any of your settings, your blog is updated and changes go live immediately; you don’t have to remember to republish.

YouTube and Google - monetize music

2006-08-17T00:31:00.000-07:00

Music was the impetus for the MySpace explosion and now YouTube and Google are both getting ready to leverage music as well. YouTube says it’s aiming to put every music video ever made on its site, a move that would take it further from both its genesis as a site for home made clips and a magnet for copyrighted works. EMI and Warner have confirmed that they are discussing the prospect with YouTube, acording to Gigaom.

Presumably a stockpile of legal content would raise the price YouTube could command for advertisements on the site, but licensing the content could be an expensive gamble for a company already spending an estimated $1 million each month on bandwidth. The company says it wants to provide every music video ever made within one to two years. That could be very expensive.

YouTube has raised at least $11.5 million from Sequoia Capital. CEO Chad Hurley said yesterday that the site is already making “significant revenue,” and is more interested in brand driven advertising and mobile extensions than in search driven ads or combining ads and video clips.

I question whether music videos will have the driving power that viral video has for YouTube; staged, familiar footage seems likely to be watched once and unlikely to be passed on to others.

Meanwhile Google unveiled today their own music play, focused on analytics. Google Labs has launched Google Music Trends, a section of Google Trends tracking music listened to by users of Google Talk in iTunes, Winamp, Windows Media Player or Yahoo Music Engine. It’s an opt-in system that tracks both individually and in aggregate. The listings and search results are all accompanied by opportunities to purchase music. Google Trends was launched in May, along with the other projects like the Google Notebook and Google Co-op.

Recommendations seem likely in the future and I wouldn’t be surprised to see Google take Music Trends beyond Google Talk and challenge the business models of companies like Pandora, Last.fm, MyStrands and others. . Users cannot currently listen to music directly through Google Music Trends.

To me the Google Labs experiment seems smart, while the YouTube music video strategy seems risky. It’s also not a sealed deal, or series of deals, by any means.

Google, YouTube

Tags: Web2.0, , video, music, Techonlogy

Google acquires Neven Vision

2006-08-17T00:25:00.000-07:00

Google acquires biometric company Neven Vision

Google announced today that they have brought biometric and photo recognition company Neven Vision into the Google fold. Neven Vision has patents on technology ranging from photo analysis to face recognition in video files to several patents for facial capture for avatar animation. Sounds like a fascinating partnership. The company is heavily focused on mobile phones and also offers a product to deliver coupons to mobile devices, something I was hoping would be included with today’s Google Maps coupon announcement.

Google was previously interested in aquiring photo recognition company Riya, but in the end did not. Riya has since expanded its focus beyond facial recognition.

Google says that it will use the newly acquired technology to extract information from photos, though it says that facial recognition in particular may be available “some day.” Gigaom’s Lizz Gannes points out that the LAPD already uses Neven Vision’s technology to recognize gang members. Investors in the company include Anthem Venture Partners and Zone Ventures. The price of the acquisition was not disclosed.

Interesting update: as of midnight PST almost all the links on the Neven Vision site are now bringing up Google 404s.
Google

Tags: Web2.0 , Google, NevenVision, Technology

Google Talk Birthday comes with an Music Trends

2006-08-16T23:35:00.000-07:00

Google Talk, which is celebrating its first birthday with an upgrade, will let people easily transfer files and leave other people voice mail beginning Wednesday.

Now people who use the instant messaging and voice chat service will be able to click a "send file" button, choose which document, photo or other file to send, and transmit it through a chat window as a thumbnail that can be displayed in full size.

People also can leave each other voice mail by either initiating a call that is then unanswered or without initiating a call and going straight into voice mail. Users of Gmail, Google's e-mail service, can play the voice mail without having to download anything. But people who use other e-mail software will have to download the MP3 voice mail attachment to hear it.

Another new feature allows Google Talk users to indicate to their friends what music they are listening to via their status message. The new features will initially be available only in the English language version.

Google Talk is a key piece of the search giant's strategy to make it easy for people not only to search for any kind of information in any location, but also to communicate with each other in various ways online.

"We are investing in a real-time communications platform. Google Talk is the first instance of that," said Mike Jazayeri, a Google Talk product manager.

Google Talk competes with popular chat applications from AOL, Yahoo and Microsoft. Last month, Yahoo opened its latest Yahoo Messenger with Voice, with nearly 200 plug-ins, to the public. Microsoft publicly launched its new Windows Live Messenger in June and added drag-and-drop file sharing and automatic contact updating.

As part of a $1 billion Google investment for a 5 percent stake in AOL, Google and AOL will make their chat services interoperate. Jazayeri said he could not provide a time line for when that might happen. Google is already interoperable with services that use the open XMPP, or "Jabber," chat standard, he said.

Meanwhile, Yahoo and Microsoft made their chat services interoperable last month.

Hooray! The new Google Talk features (file sharing, voicemail, and music status) have completed testing and are now available to everyone. Just use Google Talk normally, and it will auto-update to the new version over the next few days. If you just can't wait, you can download the new version directly. Each of the new features will be discussed here shortly, but I'm going to cover file transfer.

File and photo sharing (file transfer) in Google Talk works like you'd expect: Simple, fast, and fun. Simplicity means that you can drag and drop one or more files directly onto a chat window. As soon as your friend clicks 'Accept', the bits will start flowing. When the transfer completes, the recipient can open the file or find it on disk with a single click.

File transfer is fast. Google Talk makes a direct connection to your friend's computer whenever possible, enabling the fastest speed available. And even if your super-secure firewall won't allow a direct connection, we'll still get it there at a decent speed, because we're nice like that.

Photo sharing is fun! When you drop up to 10 photos on Google Talk, smaller previews automatically appear right inside the chat window, so you can chat about them right away. The previews adjust to the size of your chat window, so just enlarge the window when you want to see more detail. To view the images at full size, or to save them for later, click the 'Download Originals' link.

Google Music Trends

Google just added a new entry into their robots.txt file — "Disallow: /trends/music?". Well, that would naturally get me wondering what they are trying to hide. It turns out they have a new labs project — Google Music Trends.

Where does the data come from? Remember the new feature in Google Talk that lets users display what they are listening to in their status message? The new labs project proudly displays the text: "See what Google Talk users are listening to".

There is also a link that says "Participate in Music Trends" that doesn't have any content yet — but I'm guessing it will take you to a Google Talk download page eventually.

Update:

Google just released a new version of the testers version of Google Talk which explicitly asks your permission to share information with this new labs project. See screenshot below.

Google, Google Talk, Talk, File sharing, Voice Mail, Google Music Trends, File transfer, Photo sharing

Webshots relaunch

2006-08-10T13:59:00.000-07:00

There won’t be tagging, but CNet’s photosharing site Webshots is adding a number of features reminiscent of Flickr and getting a whole new look. The relaunch will occur some time in late August, but an alpha site is up here. The site currently looks straight out of the 90’s, it will be interesting to see how established users react to the redesign.

The Webshots team told Premium users in an email today that at relaunch Webshots users will be able to comment on each other’s photos. Premium users will have their accounts increased from 5,000 images total, with the limit being bumped up 500 images each month in the future future. Photo quality will be improved, information about the type of camera used for each photo will be included and advertising space will be decreased. Users will also be able to see aggregate stats and comments on their personal Webshots pages.

Webshots was purchased by CNet from Twofold Photos, Inc. in 2004 for approximately $70 million dollars. Webshots reports having 26 million registered users posting 85,000 images a day in online photo albums. For comparison, Yahoo! Photos is reported to have 30 million users, Photobucket reports having 19 million users and Flickr approximately 2.5 million. It’s clear who’s the trendsetter here, though, and that’s liable to continue with innovations like Flickr’s rumored drag and drop geotagging in the works.

Webshots

Tags: TechCrunch, Web2.0, , Webshots, Flickr, photos, photosharing

Google calls click fraud estimates overblown

2006-08-09T13:53:00.000-07:00

SAN JOSE, Calif.--Google is fighting back against what it says are exaggerations in industry estimates of click fraud in its bread-and-butter pay-per-click advertising system.

In a report released Tuesday, the search giant disputes claims made by third-party companies that sell services designed to combat fraudulent clicks--clicks that aren't from legitimate Web surfers seeking information from a given ad. Those companies have estimated that the proportion of advertisers paying for fraudulent clicks is as high as 35 percent.

But in a report titled "How Fictitious Clicks Occur in Third-Party Click Fraud Audit Reports," Google says the figures are often inflated because the companies are counting clicks that were never made on Google AdWords advertisements. (Google's 17-page report can be accessed on the company's Inside AdWords Blog.)

For example, a single AdWords click may appear as five clicks in some reports, leading to the reporting of five fraudulent clicks, according to Shuman Ghosemajumder, business product manager for trust and safety at Google. Ghosemajumder referenced the Google report during a panel on click fraud at the Search Engine Strategies conference here.

Counting of fictitious clicks can happen when a Web surfer browses more deeply into an advertiser's site and then hits the back button, presses the browser reload button on the landing page or opens a new browser window, causing a reload of the landing page, Ghosemajumder said.

In addition, Google said it found evidence that the third-party reports were inaccurately "counting one advertiser's traffic in another advertiser's report, even if the advertisers span different ad networks," from, say, Google and Yahoo.

The Google report also criticized the third-party reports for using small sample sizes in their analysis, which Ghosemajumder said prohibits advertisers from being able to cross-check the data.

Part of the problem with determining an accurate click fraud rate is that auditors need to see both the traffic conversion data at the Web site and at the search engine company, which Google doesn't provide. Not having both sets of data "makes it difficult for us to marry it all together," said Tom Cuthbert, chief executive of Click Forensics, one of the auditing companies mentioned in the Google report.

"I will stand behind our methodology," Cuthbert said in response to his company's data being criticized in the Google report. "You are Goliath and we are just David down here trying to do what we can...You and I are never going to agree on the methodology."

Google's Ghosemajumder replied that the report does not dispute the methodologies used but concludes that the third-party reports are overcounting clicks, which results in unrealistic estimates of click fraud.

Like the representatives from the other anti-click fraud companies, Jessie Stricchiola, founder of Alchemist Media, said she had not seen Google's report. She pointed out that it took several class-action lawsuits to spur cooperation from Google. "The gloves appear to be off at this point," she said, referring to the contentiousness of the session.

A judge has given final approval to a $90 million settlement of a click fraud lawsuit filed against Google, and a settlement between Yahoo and advertisers is pending.

Stricchiola asked Google what percentage of its AdWords customers it gets data from on advertiser conversion data, a measurement of how many people who click on an ad take a particular action, such as make a purchase. Ghosemajumder said Google does not publicize that information but provides free conversion tracking tools that enable customers to provide that data to Google.

Ghosemajumder and John Slade, senior director of global product management at Yahoo Search Marketing, said the search giants would commit to abiding by third-party independent audits after standards for defining click fraud are enacted.

Google, Yahoo and others announced last week that they are working with the Interactive Advertising Bureau and the Media Rating Council on standards for defining and measuring click fraud.

Abhilash Patel, director of Internet Operations at substance abuse treatment center Passages in Malibu, Calif., complained that he sees a "significant amount" of traffic coming to his site from "garbage Web sites" that are created merely to drive traffic to ads or to accomplish other fraudulent purposes, using a practice called "arbitrage."

Patel estimated that 15 percent of the clicks on his organization's ads are fraudulent.

The Google and Yahoo representatives said they kick Web sites off their ad networks if they violate the ethics policies.

Lori Weiman, director of KeywordMax, said that of a small group of customers, her firm found estimates of click fraud in the 8 percent to 10 percent range, but rates as high as 28 percent existed on the extreme end. KeywordMax data was not included in the Google report.

FBI calls for hacker help

2006-08-09T13:19:00.000-07:00

LAS VEGAS--The FBI needs help from hackers to fight cybercrime, an agency official said Wednesday.

"We need your expertise and input as we develop strategies to battle cybercrime in the 21st century," Daniel Larkin, a unit chief in the FBI's cybercrime division, said in his opening address at the annual Black Hat security conference here.

As cybercrime has continued to become more sophisticated and organized, federal agencies have increasingly sought to partner with the private sector. Earlier this year, FBI Director Robert Mueller used the RSA Conference to send out a similar message.

"The people we're going after are not just the script kiddies anymore. These people are making a lot of money," Larkin told the Black Hat audience of hackers and security professionals. "I am a recovering technophobe; I used to be really afraid of you all. But I realize that you all are really important."

Black Hat draws an increasing number of attendees from law enforcement agencies. This year, Larkin estimated, one in 10 attendees might represent federal agencies, he said. "Be nice to them. They are here to help you; they are here to team up," he said.

Although the government is trying to be nimble, others might know about potential threats before federal agents do, he said. "Critical information on terrorism and cybercrimes could be in your hands and might be in your hands before they reach ours," he said.

The FBI's call for help confirms that it is not equipped to deal with cybercrime, said Tom Thomas, a security consultant from California who is attending Black Hat.

"It is not reassuring," Thomas said. "It confirms what we already suspect. There is great technical inadequacy, if not downright ineptness, at the FBI. Therefore they are, perhaps desperately, seeking help from almost anyone."

To make cooperating with law enforcement worthwhile, the FBI is offering to share information in exchange for help. The FBI has been criticized in the past for going completely silent after a report was filed. "We realize that we need to give back information," Larkin said.

As examples of information sharing, Larkin said that the FBI is working on identity theft with Internet service providers and with merchants on shipping fraud. That way, all players get a better picture of the actual threat, and the FBI can cross-reference data and build better case data, he said.

Google, Yahoo! agree to independent click fraud audits

2006-08-09T12:54:00.000-07:00

As the outcry by advertisers grows louder than the assurances from Google that click fraud is not a substantial problem, representatives from Google and Yahoo! publicly stated today that they would accept independent click fraud audits. Of course the true independence of any audit will need to be closely watched. The pay per click advertising business is a monster - with billions of dollars exchanged annually. Yahoo! has made more than $9 billion since 2004 from all of its online advertising, Google more than $13 billion since 2001.

The day began with Google releasing a controversial 17 page report on click fraud, alleging that many outside observers were over estimating the extent of the problem because of browser behavior. Earlier this week Ask.com, Google, LookSmart, Microsoft and Yahoo! publicly formed a working group with the Interactive Advertising Bureau to establish a set of Click Measurement Guidelines.

At today’s session at the Search Engine Strategies conference in San Jose titled “Auditing Paid Listings & Click Fraud Issues,” ZDNet’s Donna Bogatin asked point blank whether the search engines would agree to independent audits of the click fraud inside their systems.

Bogatin reports that both John Slade from Yahoo and Shuman Ghosemajumder from Google committed to independent audits in the future. When pressed on a timeline, Slade said such an audit would follow the creation of the Click Measurement Guidelines. Update: If that’s supposed to mean that the industry group that these search engines are participating in is both drawing up the guidlines and providing the independent auditing - that’s obviously not acceptable. I can’t imagine that these companies would be so cynical as to think that anyone would accept that - I can’t imagine that some other party won’t be doing the auditing.

Both Google and Yahoo! are currently dealing with legal action from buyers of advertising that allege they paid for fraudulent clicks on ads. Google has offered to pay $90 million to settle a class action suit. Yahoo! may provide refunds to thousands of customers and pay almost $5 million in attorney fees.

Today’s public acceptance of independent audits shouldn’t come as a surprise given the pressure building, but it may go down as an important turning point in this industry.

MySpace Will Use Google For Search

2006-08-09T12:51:00.000-07:00

News Corporation and Google have reached an agreement in which Google is the exclusive provider of search and text ads for Fox Interactive Media's sites, that include MySpace. "The agreement calls for Google to power web, vertical and site specific search for MySpace.com and the majority of Fox Interactive Media properties. Google will be the exclusive provider of text-based advertising and keyword targeted ads through its AdSense program, for inventory on Fox Interactive Media's network," informs MarketWatch. The pearl of the crown, MySpace, has more pageviews than Google in the US, according to a Hitwise study.

"MySpace.com is a widely acknowledged leader in user-generated content and incorporating search and advertising furthers our mission of making the world's information universally accessible and useful," says Google's Eric Schmidt.

Well, sometimes the quantity is more important than quality.

Google Webmaster tools

2006-08-06T04:06:00.000-07:00

Vanessa Fox have published the last post of Inside Google Sitemaps...

We're surrounded by moving boxes and construction dust. To better reflect our goal to provide tools and information to keep you, the webmasters, informed and help you increase your crawl coverage and visibility on Google, we're renaming Google Sitemaps to Google webmaster tools. The Sitemaps protocol remains unchanged and Sitemaps submission mechanisms and reporting is still available from the Sitemaps tab. We're also renaming our blog and Google Group to be more broadly focused on webmaster topics.

You can find handy links to all the tools, the new blog, Google Group, help center and more from our newly launched Google webmaster central. Join us at the blog's new location at googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com where you'll learn about all the exciting things we're planning. Oh, and please don't forget to update your bookmarks and feed!

So, what's new ?

new name
new design
new RSS feed that you have to add to your RSS reader
... and that's all.

Other features are expected, but for the moment nothing new. And http://www.google.com/webmasters/ does work only in English at this time. I have discovered a kind of "AOL issue" with a tool extract from Sitemaps called "site status wizard" : an example with this blog. But nothing really disturbing.

EDIT : Sorry, I was too fast, or ~~Sitemaps~~ Webmaster tools team too slow. So there is new feature with this update : "preferred domain", downloading query stats, seeing revamped crawl errors, "manage site verification".

Google Webmaster tools

Update on CrunchBoard

2006-08-06T03:46:00.000-07:00

Om Malik has an insightful post about CrunchBoard called “Niche Job Boards Rising” today where he talks about how niche job sites can be successful, and cites Indeed.com stats on demand in the job market - there are 121 job listings per 1000 people in San Jose, and 74 job listings per 1000 in San Francisco, for example.

CrunchBoard has been live for about a day and a half, and so far traffic and postings are very strong. About 60,000 people have visited the site and 43 jobs have been posted.

We’ve also run into some bugs, almost entirely around taking paypal payments (I also have a hilarious email string with paypal customer service that I might post). People are occasionally getting error messages when they complete a payment, although from our end the payment is received and the job posts normally.

After we have a week under our belt I’ll do a full report on the status of the site. And as soon as it is 100% stable we’ll reveal some additional plans we have for the product.

CrunchBoard
Om Malik

Lycos Redesign, and Mail service Updated: 3GB FREE

2006-08-03T09:11:00.000-07:00

Eight years ago, we was reading news like this one

"Separately, Lycos also announced Monday that it began a preview of a new design of Lycos.com which the company said will give users quicker access to the information they want. For the next three weeks, every fifth user visiting the site will see the redesign. Lycos will incorporate user feedback that will be launched after testing is complete.
The redesign offers a reorganized hierarchy that aids in reducing download times. Features include "Smart" Navigation relevant links; triple the number of Web guides; a new look for the Lycos Shopping Center; "drag and drop" personal pages and a simplified layout for its message boards and chat areas."

Now, Techcrunch is spotted that the "New Lycos email tops Gmail in storage, attachment size", i can say more, lycos is trying to catch up, google, yahoo, msn are launching almost twice a month new product or services. We are seeng that Lycos with this update have made a big step forward, in the catch of email supremacy. I`m shure this comeback will be appreciated by old an new lycos mebmers, and i`m shure that the number of vizitators will grow very soon. Currentlyon alexa the traffic Rank for lycos.com: 246

"Lycos announced today that their beta email service now offers 3 GB fre storage and allow attachments of “essentially unlimited” size to be sent and received. Gmail is currently topping out at 2.75 gigs of storage, Hotmail at 250 MB and both limit attachments to 10 MB. For $20 per year, Lycos will up the limit to 5 GB of storage.

Whether Lycos can offer search and spam filtering as good as Gmail’s remains to be seen. It also stands at a disadvantage via Gmail’s integration with the rest of Google’s offerings. Gmail’s tabbed conversations and ability to view a wide variety of file types as HTML are also features Lycos mail lacks. Links clicked in emails at Lycos can be viewed inline, without leaving your email interface - that’s nice. One way or the other, the email wars continue. "

Lycos
Lycos Mail

Meebome Launched.

2006-08-02T11:18:00.000-07:00

Sandy posted today an article about the new launched product meebome.com from Meebo on blog.meebo.com. I consider this tool usefull for some webmasters, maybe for you to. Here is the article:

Since the launch of meebo, we’ve primarily focused on making the experience inside meebo.com a really great one. We’ve taken thousands of emails, hundreds of requests, and even shelled out a few dollars on real, live usability data.

Over the last few months however, we’ve been thinking “outside the box” and exploring ways to expand past traditional IM. Today, you’ll finally see meebo spread beyond meebo.com.

What if you could take IM functionality and put it on any personal web page? (ooh!)

Do you have a MySpace profile? Wanna see who’s visting your page, at that very moment? (yes!)

Are you an up and coming blogger? Would you like to chat with your readers, in real time? (nod nod)

meebo’s really excited to announce the release of “meebo me”, an embeddable IM widget that you can put almost anywhere on the web! It’s a lightweight, simple widget that enables you (in meebo.com) to see the people who are visiting your web page and chat with them if you’d like. It’s pretty easy:

1. Create a widget at meebome.com.
2. Embed the widget on your personal page.
3. Log into meebo.com, watch for visitors (they’ll show up on your buddylist), and chat! For you power users out there (with popular, chatty web sites), we recommend you use FireFox — it’s a bit faster.

It’s a bit experimental (we did some crazy things to get this to work) and probably a bit buggy (please be gentle =p) but we think it’s really cool. It’s the first endeavor meebo has done outside of meebo.com — we’ve had to solve quite a few tricky technical challenges (my oh my) but it’s been a blast.

The team has worked really hard (a high energy bonanza of candy and Coca Cola) and we’re excited to push it live. Simon and I are on the edge our seats, watching for any signs of trouble with the servers and the rest of the team is anxious to hear feedback.

Users have always played a tremendous role in helping tighten the product and we trust that you’ll do the same with meebo me. Please do let us know what bugs you spot and which features you’d like added in the new meebo me section of our forum. With that, I leave you to try out the widget and let us know what you think!

The New Yahoo! Search Crawler (Slurp) Is Online

2006-07-31T09:50:00.000-07:00

David Simpson on yahoo search blog:

We launched a new Yahoo! Search Crawler, Yahoo! Slurp earlier this week. In addition to crawling the Internet faster, our new crawler is more efficient at visiting websites. As a result, site owners will notice as much as a 25% reduction in the number of requests and bandwidth consumed by the crawler.

While transitioning to the new crawler over the past few weeks, we had been running both crawlers in tandem. In some cases, this increased the frequency of Yahoo Search requests to websites. Now, with the new crawler in full production, we have turned off the old crawler and site owners should see a much lower crawl load without a loss in content coverage.

With this change of behavior in the crawler, you may see some shuffling of the pages that are included in the index and some changes in ranking as well.

The Technology of War

2006-07-31T09:47:00.000-07:00

In their current conflict, both Israel and Hizbullah have employed a surprising array of weapons. Israel has fought Lebanese guerrillas of one stripe or another for decades, but the latest war has allowed both sides to showcase weapons not usually seen on this battlefield.

CLUSTER MUNITIONS

Human Rights Watch photographed piles of cluster artillery shells on the border with Lebanon this week after NEWSWEEK reported that an Israeli reservist said artillery units had begun using the controversial armaments to destroy Hizbullah rocket launchers.

(Human Rights Watch field workers crawled through a meadow and used long-range lenses to photograph an artillery position in northern Israel from where the munitions were being fired. Israel won’t comment on the weapons it is using in Lebanon.)

Cluster shells are large munitions that explode in the air, scattering hundreds of small bomblets across a wide radius.

Military analysts say Israel has added the weapon to its arsenal because militants who launch rockets at the Jewish state are constantly moving, making them hard to target with a pinpoint strike.

“Clusters munitions happen to be fairly good at getting people who use rocket launchers,” says David Isby, a Washington-based defense and foreign-policy consultant. “They cover a large area, and it’s hard to hide from them.”

But because of their wide dispersal, cluster munitions tend to cause more civilian casualties than other armaments. And they have a high dud rate, which means civilians might set off the unexploded bomblets months or years after the end of fighting. Israel, under pressure from the United States, had not used cluster munitions in Lebanon since 1982. But the United States itself has made wide use of clusters in Kosovo and Iraq, setting back efforts to impose an international ban. “We came to the conclusion that the use of cluster munitions caused more civilian casualties than any other weapons system in Iraq during the three weeks of major fighting,” says Steve Goose, who directs the arms division of Human Rights Watch.

GUIDED MISSILES

For military analysts, the biggest surprise of the war has been Hizbullah’s July 15 missile strike on an Israeli warship off Lebanon’s coast that killed four sailors. Israeli officials said the attack marked the first time Hizbullah had used a guided missile, and they speculated that the Lebanese Army had provided the group with radar data on the location of the warship. So unanticipated was the attack that the Israeli ship had not activated its missile-defense system.

The weapon was identified as a C-802, a missile made in China and imported by Iran during the 1990s. The missile carries its own internal-guidance system, which kicks in during the last stage of flight and helps the missile hone in on its target. Steve Zaloga, a defense analyst with the Virginia-based Teal Group, said he was surprised the missile did not destroy the entire ship. “It has a large warhead, and it also has fuel that gets sprayed on the engine of the ship and can cause a very large fire,” he said. “It may be that the missile failed.” Zaloga said firing the C-802 is a complicated task that requires extensive training. “It’s not something you just give to the boy scouts. It takes several months of training and an awful lot of prep work.”

OTHER MUNITIONS

Lebanon has accused Israel of firing white-phosphorous artillery shells at towns in the south. Phosphorous shells are usually used for illuminating the battlefield. When shot directly at a target, they can cause deadly fires. Israel has not responded to the allegation, and rights group say they cannot determine yet if the shells are being used. The United States was heavily criticized for using white phosphorous in its Fallujah battle of November 2004. “There was a big scandal with the use of phosphorous shells against civilians,” says Goose of Human Rights Watch. “If you’re using it against a human target, you’re going to incinerate the person.”

Israel says Hizbullah has at least one unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that can be packed with explosives and crashed on a military or civilian site. Analysts say a UAV could find targets much more accurately than the rockets Hizbullah has been firing and could reach deeper into Israeli territory. The weapon, if it exists, so far remains unused.

Google Talk Update

2006-07-28T06:10:00.000-07:00

There’s lots of instant messaging news today. Google isn’t letting the fact that it has less than 1% market share and only 44,000 people used its Google Talk client last month get it down. Tonight they’ve released three significant new features to the product - file transfers, voicemail and music status. Information on all of these features is here.

File Transfers

Files and folders can be sent to Google Talk friends by clicking the “send file” button. There are no limits on file sizes or type, and the recipient will see a preview of the image within the chat session. Both users must be using the actual Google Talk client, however, for this feature to work. See left image below.

Voicemail

Voicemails can now be left for friends who do not answer calls through Google Talk. Unlike File Transfers above, this feature does not require that the friend use the Google Talk client. In that case, they’ll receive an email with the message attached as an audio file. Voicemails can be up to 10 minutes long, and messages can be left for people online without calling them directly by clicking the down arrrow from any profile card or chat window. Voicemail will also automatically kick in after 4 rings. See middle image below.

Music Status

If you are listening to music while logged in to Google Talk, you can show your contacts what you are listening to by selecting “show current music track” from your status drop down menu. This is only for “supported music players” but they do not say what players are supported. See far right image below.

Note that the Google Chat client is, ridiculously, available only for Windows machines.

Google, Google Talk

Netvibes Updates digg module, and introduces Meebo and Alexa modules

2006-07-27T01:10:00.000-07:00

Digg Module Update

Netvibes have upgraded the digg module to better support digg v3. Also, it will now auto refresh, allow you to browse more stories. And it loads faster.

Finally, they also provide some bugfixes for these parts of netvibes:

module closing;
keyboard navigation (make sure it is turned on in Settings);
http://del.icio.us;
module subscription;
mini API;
tab reordering.

Alexa module

Alexa is a website tracking service, based on statistics sent by an Internet Explorer browser toolbar installed on a sampling of Internet users.

You've been a lot to ask for this module and here it is : you will be able to display some colorful Alexa graph trends for up to five sites. To configure the module, just edit it, enter the url of one or more sites you want to see then click on Ok. You can also set a custom title, adjust the size and the range of the line graph.

You can easily switch between three types of traffic information:

Daily traffic rank trend;
Daily page views (per millions);
Daily reach (per millions).

Learn more about traffic on Alexa.

For even more information about the pages, click on the chart to be taken to Alexa.com.

Meebo module

Netvibes and meebo have been working tightly to bring you instant messaging. You will now be able to chat with people on most popular networks: AIM, ICQ, Jabber, Google Talk, MSN Messenger and Yahoo! Messenger.By adding the meebo module will automatically create a new tab so you have enough room for chatting with everybody.

All you have to do then is fill the form with your accounts information. If you have a Meebo account, you will be able to log in multiple networks automatically

You are now ready to chat !

You can safely switch between tabs, your meebo will blink when someone is talking to you on IM

Netvibes
Digg
Alexa
Meebo

Top 5 Strangest Pens

2006-07-26T12:02:00.000-07:00

Top 5 Strangest Pens

Our editors have compiled a list of the “Top 5 Strangest (or Coolest) Pens” for your enjoyment. Which ones are your favorites?

5. Wi-Fi Pen

Made by Informatica, this Wi-Fi pen allows users to detect wireless hot spots within a 50-foot radius — priced at $19.

It also includes a state of the art “writing” feature, allowing you to jot down notes and ideas on pieces of paper, no keyboard or printer required

[Source]

4. USB MP3 Pen

This nifty device not only functions as a pen, but is also a USB flash drive and MP3 player. It boasts 512MB of memory, an FM tuner, built-in microphone, LED indicator, and a shockproof case. Available now for $48 through Brando.

See, you use the voice recorder to record your CFO and CTO in the bathroom talking about embezzling funds—you were hiding in a stall, using the FM radio to pass the time

[Source]

3. Pen Scanner

At $300, the RC800 is a pen-sized scanner with 8MB of internal memory — good for use on magazine articles, newspaper clippings, small photos, and more. There’s also a built-in microSD card slot for memory expansion. Files are easily transferred via USB.

2. Baller Cheating Pen

For those who’ve always wanted a multi-function pen, check out this “Baller Pen”. It features a retractable 6.5″ sheet which can be written on. On the UV coated front side, you’re able to use fine tip markers/sticks while the back side is erasable — perfect for writing on with pencils.

[Source]

1. Pen Calculator

Not the most practical pen calculator, but quite interesting none the less.

A more reasonable application of this technology would be for one to be able to simply write out the problem 65 x 32 = (etc.) and have the calculator voice then answer the question

Motorola MOTO K1 KRZR: Officially Released

2006-07-26T05:32:00.000-07:00

The KRZR, the 1-centimeter narrower and KRAZIER successor to the RAZR we all know and are bored to death of, has been released.

-GSM 850/900/1800/1900 plus EDGE (or CDMA with EVDO)

-2-Megapixel camera
-A screen with the pixel count of 176 by 220 with support for 260K colors
-A MicroSD slot
-Stereo Bluetooth audio, with MP3, and AAC playback
-A new address book that can hold bdays, AIM address info, and hopefully doesn't suck
-Dimensions of 42 × 103 × 16 mm
-Purdy like your cousin's mouth

-Available the second half of 2006, worldwide.

– Brian Lam

Motorola

101 Fabulous Freebies

2006-07-25T14:29:00.000-07:00

Tune Up: Utilities and system tools
FoxIt Reader	For viewing PDF files, FoxIt Reader beats Adobe Reader hands-down--and it's got some tools Adobe lacks.
System Information for Windows	This utility will tell you everything you need to know about your computer's hardware, operating system, installed programs, and more.
PDF Creator	This printer driver lets you create Adobe Acrobat files from within almost any application.
CCleaner	Finds and zaps useless files--including cache files and old Registry entries--that may be slowing down your PC.
Microsoft Tweak UI	Take control of hidden Windows XP settings, from determining what appears on your Start menu to specifying how users log on to your computer, with this extra set of tools created by Microsoft developers.
7-Zip	Create ZIP compressed archives for free with this handy utility.
PuTTY	This free utility allows you to create an SSH, Telnet, or Rlogin connection.
OmniFormat	Convert BMPs to JPEGs, GIFs to PDFs, Word documents to TIF image files, and more with this free document conversion utility.
Find It: Online search and reference services
Google Desktop	Google Desktop extends the power of the Web's most popular search engine to your desktop by indexing nearly every document on your hard drive.
MSN Search Toolbar With Windows Desktop Search	This search tool indexes your hard drive and provides search results through a Windows application, rather than a browser.
Copernic Desktop Search	Copernic lets you search local files as well as Outlook and Outlook Express e-mail.
Free Download Manager	This companion to Internet Explorer can speed up single-file downloads, resume interrupted downloads, manage bandwidth usage, or schedule multiple file downloads for specific times.
FlashGot	This Firefox plug-in simplifies downloading, allowing you to grab every page from a Web site or download multiple files efficiently.
Project Gutenberg	Browse electronic versions of more than 17,000 books at this online library.
Wikipedia	This online encyclopedia is a convenient way to find general information on almost anything.
Wapedia	For accessing Wikipedia from a PDA or smart phone, try Wapedia.
Bartleby	This online reference library offers a host of features, including a dictionary, thesaurus, and various books of quotations.
WordWeb	This handy utility provides a dictionary and a thesaurus that work in any application on your computer.
podAmigo	podAmigo works with the Podomatic Web service to organize and download your podcasts.
Hyperwords	This Firefox browser plug-in makes any text on any Web page clickable.
Roam Free: Collaboration and remote-access tools
LogMeIn	This remote access service lets you control your PC from afar, via a Web browser.
Backpack	Create Web pages--with to-do lists, notes, pictures, and more--that you can share with a group.
WriteBoard	This service lets you create, edit, and share documents with others right in your browser.
FreeConference.com	Set up and host conference calls with this free Web service.
GetByMail	Don't pay for a pricey remote-access app--GetByMail offers access to your office computer through your e-mail account.
iTeamwork	This Web-based project management service helps groups keep track of complicated projects.
PBwiki	Create a free, password-protected wiki--a collaborative Web site--with PBwiki.
Groove Virtual Office	Bring your far-flung coworkers together with this file-sharing and collaboration tool.
Netomat	This social networking service allows you to create, access, and share content on the Web or a phone.
Get to Work: Business and productivity tools
Firefox	Still using Internet Explorer? It's time you made the switch to Firefox--a more secure, faster, and more flexible Web browser.
OpenOffice.org	This full-fledged, Microsoft Office-compatible office suite offers a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation package, and database--and it doesn't cost one thin dime.
ThinkFree Online Beta	This software runs in your browser and lets you edit Microsoft Office-compatible documents, spreadsheets, and presentations.
AbiWord	This lightweight, full-featured word processor is compatible with Microsoft Word documents and also runs on Linux and Macs.
Pegasus Mail	A longtime favorite of power users, this e-mail client provides a huge amount of control over your mail, with support for mail merges and flexible filtering options.
Thunderbird	The tighter security and robust stability of this e-mail client make it the top choice for managing e-mail on your PC.
Steganos LockNote	Password-protect text files with LockNote, a simple notepad with strong encryption.
Alleycode	A simple HTML editor for people who are comfortable with code and need to do some quick editing.
Nvu	This sophisticated Web page editor doesn't require any understanding of the underlying tags.
SeaMonkey	This suite of Internet tools includes the Mozilla browser, an enhanced version of the netscape Messenger e-mail client, the ChatZilla IRC chat program, and an HTML editor.
Keep in Touch: Communications tools and services
Trillian Basic	This universal IM client lets you keep in contact with your friends whether they use IRC, AOL, ICQ, MSN Messenger, or Yahoo Messenger.
eFax Messenger	You can receive faxes on your PC with eFax, viewing or printing them via the eFax Messenger software.
QNext	This universal instant messenger service includes robust music-sharing and photo-sharing features.
SightSpeed	This video calling service is simple to set up, synchronizes lip movements and audio neatly, and offers easy in-call controls.
Skype	Skype offers free PC-to-PC voice calls with text chat and file transfer capabilities.
Festoon Beta	This add-on for Skype and Google Talk lets users of these two services make calls to each other, and brings video chat capabilities to Google Talk.
Nail It Down: Calendars and organizers
Yahoo Calendar	This ad-supported calendar is one of the best available online.
Ta-Da List	Stay organized with this straightforward to-do list manager.
Palm Desktop	This remarkably well-designed calendar and address book application will appeal to users who don't even have a PDA.
Yahoo Widgets	This application puts "widgets" on your desktop that provide useful information, such as news updates, weather reports, stock tickers, or photos, or provide handy little services, like performing search engine queries, storing your notes, and more.
Del.icio.us	Forget bookmarks--this service keeps track of your favorite sites, and much more, from any Internet-connected PC.
EssentialPIM Free	EssentialPIM combines a calendar, contact manager, to-do list, and notes manager in a single program.
SyncNotes	This sticky-note application runs on your computer, but allows you to view and edit your notes from any Web or WAP browser.
FreeMind	FreeMind allows you to compile your notes in a "mind map"--a free-form tree structure that mimics the way your brain works.
Furl	Save your favorite Web pages in an online account that you can access from any computer.
Share It: File sharing and storage services
FolderSync	Keep your USB drive and your hard drive on the same page with this synchronization utility.
BeInSync	Make sure you have access to your critical files and folders with this remote-access tool.
FolderShare (Windows)	Automatically sync files and folders between multiple computers and easily share data with colleagues and friends.
FolderShare (Mac)
Flickr	Easily upload, share, and post pictures with this popular service.
Kodak EasyShare Gallery	This site's usability, mobile-phone access options, and lack of upload restrictions make it our top pick for photo sharing.
Yahoo Briefcase	Yahoo Briefcase is one of the easiest ways we know of to store and share files online.
BitTorrent	BitTorrent is useful for downloading legitimate content quickly or for sharing your own files.
Avvenu	This free remote-access and file-sharing service lets you and your colleagues get to files on an Avvenu-enabled computer from another computer, Web-enabled phone, or PDA.
Lock It Up: Security/antispam tools, system-stabilizing utilities
Spybot Search & Destroy	Spybot is a powerful antidote in the battle against spyware.
Lavasoft Ad-Aware SE Personal	Ad-Aware scans your PC for spyware, making sure that no digital snoops are lurking in memory or on your hard drive.
Microsoft Windows Defender (formerly AntiSpyware Beta)	Microsoft's antispyware app catches spyware that other programs don't--including the dangerous "rootkit" Trojan horse that some Sony music CDs carry.
All-in-One Secretmaker	All-in-One Secretmaker blocks banner ads and pop-ups, filters spam, and offers an array of utilities for cleaning up and securing your system.
ZoneAlarm	Zone Alarm's free firewall keeps watch over inbound and outbound Internet connections, helping avert malicious attacks by hackers and spyware.
Anonymizer	This anonymous browsing service will display Web pages without revealing any information to the sites you visit.
GRC Shields Up	This browser-based tool checks your PC for common vulnerabilities, such as open ports.
Trend Micro HouseCall	This Web site runs software in your browser to scan for and eliminate malware on your PC.
AirDefense Personal Lite	This simple program alerts you whenever you connect to an insecure network or to a hotspot you haven't previously marked as safe.
Avast Home Edition	This antivirus scanner can do a boot-time virus scan (which can catch more viruses than scanning once Windows is running) and will continually monitor your system for threats.
Kick Back: Entertainment software and services (9)
Google Picasa	Picasa offers a simple--and free--way to organize, touch up, and share your photos.
Irfanview	This lean, mean graphics utility offers basic image editing and file format conversions.
The GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program)	This freely distributed app includes tools for photo retouching, image composition, and image authoring.
Pandora	Enter the name of an artist or song that you like and Pandora creates a custom "radio station" for you--and makes surprisingly good choices.
iTunes	Apple's media player is a joy to use even if you never buy a 99-cent song.
Kristal Audio Engine	This sophisticated audio mixing and sequencing platform offers features found in much pricier apps.
Audacity	All-purpose audio editor lets you record, play, and edit digital files.
Google Earth	Spin the earth, tilt it, and zoom in to objects as tiny as one building.
Celestia	Zoom through the solar system with Celestia, which offers real-time views of planets, moons, comets, stars, and more.
Roundup: Web-based e-mail
Gmail	Google's e-mail service feels more like a Windows application than a Web mail service.
Yahoo Mail	With a traditional, forms-based Web interface, Yahoo mail is quick and easy to use.
Yahoo Mail Beta	Beta, not yet public.
MSN Hotmail	MSN Hotmail offers a respectable 250MB of storage and a familiar, Windows-like look.
Windows Live Mail	This Ajax-based service is still in beta, but you can put your name on a waiting list.
AIM Mail	AIM mail offers 2GB of storage and integration with AOL Instant Messenger.
Netscape Webmail	Netscape Webmail offers 250MB of storage and features large, easy-to-click buttons.
Roundup: Blogging tools
Blogger	This blogging service remains incredibly simple to use, but offers a rich complement of features.
WordPress.com	This hosted blogging service offers a clean, fast interface.
LiveJournal	LiveJournal offers plenty of customizable options for your blog, and carries no advertising.
MySpace	MySpace lets you store an unlimited number of small images, and makes uploading music and images easy.
Xanga Classic	Xanga offers 200MB of image storage and features plenty of blog-formatting templates.
Roundup: RSS readers
Abilon	This powerful, speedy RSS reader offers a choice of views, and features a built-in tabbed browser.
RssReader	RssReader displays your news feeds simply and cleanly.
Feedreader	This free Windows utility displays your news feeds, and includes flexible keyboard shortcuts.
Bloglines	This Web-based RSS reader lets you access your news from multiple PCs.
NewsGator	NewsGator displays your RSS feeds in a clean, readable display.
Roundup: Video sharing services
Revver	This service--our Best Bet--is a video sharing site from which you can actually make money.
Putfile	This basic video sharing service works reliably and well.
Vimeo	Of the video sharing services we tested, Vimeo is perhaps the easiest to use.
Streamload Mediamax	Streamload Mediamax is great for users who want to share lots of big files in addition to videos.
Google Video	Google's service is well suited for commercially oriented video producers looking for a large audience for their work.

Dabble Launched Today

2006-07-25T03:15:00.000-07:00

Mary Hodder says that after a year of work, and both an Alpha and invited Beta period, Dabble launches!

He invite you to come check out our site, which is now fully open for people to search, browse and view media or requests. For people who were part of the invited Beta, we have a few changes. First and most obvious at a glance is the site looks a little different. Emily Chang and Max Kiesler of Ideacodes helped with the new design. We’ve added a bit of color that brightens things up.

The new Dabble has more sophisticated searching. Dabble now uses the many different social gestures people make to express how they feel about media, to find better matches in our search results. If people play with media in playlists or by sharing their collections with others, and tell us how it’s useful to them, we can take that kind of information and show better lists of media. These results change over time, because value changes as people shift their attention.

Popular media and recent media both help people serendipitously discover things that are bubbling up, or the very latest things added to Dabble. Tagging allows people to both describe media in ways that matter to them, as well as find media with tags that others have described it.

You will need to login to Dabble to “write” anything to the site. This includes being able to collect media, make subcollections or playlists, tag media or request something (if you are trying to find a clip or music, some help on editing or to find a listing of video festivals). Check out my Star Trek Mashups playlist for an example of one.We expect that our first public launch will mean lots of folks will want to give us feedback and we’d like to hear everything you have to say about the service and what we can improve. We plan to spend a lot of time integrating feedback and suggestions, so please share with us!

Dabble