Nope, I needed to send some ID and utility bills. The process was fairly simple, I took a photo of my phone bill, my AmEx report and both sides of my National ID. In the Paypal documentation they say a phone bill is not ok, but since my apartment is not on my name I don’t pay bills per se. Nevertheless, I sent these all off.

After some mucking about (the form was not the best), Paypal accepted these documents and this, as a lot of government and verification processes puzzles me a bit. I mean I could’ve Photoshopped all that right? Unless they actually checked with my government and bank and carrier service, which I’m sure they didn’t, they replied in like 2 days, they can’t be really sure.

My reasoning is that someone like me would have to go to more trouble to prove his identity and location truthfully, than a money launderer would have to go to to forge this stuff. If I didn’t have a camera I would’ve had to spend about $30 to photocopy, print, scan and so on. A money launderer may have to pay $1,000 for a good forgery, but hey, he has a printing press right, money comes easily.

The point is, that all I proved is that I have an internet connection and probably an ID. Is this a process that is supposed to deter people on the wrong side of the law? I doubt if it does, it did deter me though, my account was even frozen for a while!

Paypal anti-laundering safety regulations

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Presently is a hosted micro-update platform that allows members of a team to update others about their work and activities. Users can add text attachments, broadcast message to a group or account, share photos and other attachments. The homepage contains a textbox at the right side and below that you can see your following, your followers and the groups you have joined. On the left side you will be able to see the latest updates. You can also check out the questions asked by other in the Question section. Other than this you can create tags on update in order to categorize information, customize the color of application and receive updates through text and instant message.

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Related Articles at Startup Meme:

Company Name

Dailymile

20-Word Description

Dailymile is a social training site for runners, triathletes, and cyclists.

CEO’s Pitch

That race was great, but how do I stay in-touch with the people I just met? And how can I find people to train with in a new city? Providing an answer for these questions drove us to begin dailymile. We wanted to find a better way for athletes to sign-up for races, share workouts, and meet participants. Participating in a race doesn’t end after you submit payment. It’s the daily journey of training, learning, and sharing. As athletes, each day for us is an adventure filled with lessons learned and friends made. We share these experiences with one another through dailymile.

Mashable’s Take

Currently in private beta, Dailymile is a site for keeping track of your workouts, finding athletic events you can participate in, and sending motivation to others. The design is very slick and the features are well-organized, and while the event section dedicated to 10Ks and triathlons can be intimidating, there are tools that can be useful to just about any level of athlete – even if you’re just the type trying to stay in shape by going to the gym.

Once logged in, the homepage of Dailymile is very Twitter-esque, allowing you post a short update about your most recent workout (which can range from running, to swimming, to weightlifting, etc.), as well as multimedia content like photos and videos. There is also a “You and Your Friends” timeline, an “Everyone” timeline, and a “My Training” log – essentially the same views offered on Twitter. Speaking of Twitter, your updates can be auto-posted to the service if you sync your accounts.

Dailymile takes it a step further than other would-be Twitter clones though with some features very specific to the fitness niche. For one, there is the “Motivation” feature, which allows you to message other people on the site with a pre-set message like “Great Performance” or “You’re an Inspiration.”

There are also discussion groups you can join like “40+ and proud of it” and “My first marathon,” so you can find people pursuing a similar fitness goal as yourself. The aforementioned event section is already seeded with lots of running, trialthon, and cycling events you can participate in, though most seem to be on the West coast (not surprising given the time of year).

Ultimately, Dailymile has adopted a lot of popular features of other sites for the fitness niche and done a nice job with them. I think it’s more likely to be successful with serious workout nuts than weekend warriors, but there is certainly something for anyone that wants to put the time in - both in the gym and on the site. As mentioned, Dailymile is currently in private beta, but you can try it out using the invite code ‘mashable’.

Editor’s Note: This post is part of an ongoing series at Mashable - The Startup Review, Sponsored by Sun Microsystems Startup Essentials. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here.

Sponsored By: Sun Startup Essentials

A new application called AddressBookSync lets you match Facebook user photos and birthdays with your Mac OS X address book and your iPhone, simplifying your offline life just a little bit. AddressBookSync does his by matching names from your Facebook friends list to those in your address book. There is an option for “Last Name Only” matching, as well as the ability to select which friends you would and would not like to be synchronized for this application. From then on, future updates for user photos and birthdays will be automated.

AddressBookSync seems pretty basic in its offerings, especially as other applications such as Plaxo have been synchronizing aspects of your social network with offline applications and address books for some time now. But if you’re a Mac user and you’d like to have your address book updated with the ever-changing user photos of your friends, be sure to check this app out. Download it here.

It’s a long road to a victory in the browser wars. Just ask Firefox. The open source browser which launched in 2004 just cracked the 20 percent threshold of the market share for November, according to Net Applications, pushing it a step closer but still miles away from IE.

Recently a few new players have also thrown their hats in the ring, including Google with its much-hyped Chrome and the lesser known, Mozilla-based social web browser Flock, which released its 2.0 version this past October. But do these newcomers even stand a chance?

The Basics

Firefox is gaining ground for good reason: it’s simple, reliable and secure. Its tabbed browsing led to a similar remodel in IE and it has a slew of add-ons that give it a leg up over the competition. It’s slowly becoming the new standard with a steady audience, and that will be hard to beat anytime soon. And its open source platform leaves room for alternatives and experimental niche browsers like Flock.

Flock 2.0 is basically a Firefox with a lot of perks and pre-installed add-ons for those heavy into social networking.  Think of it as a FriendFeed of the browser world, which brings all of your friends from 23 various networks together in a sidebar. It is also one of the first browsers to incorporate media feeds for photos and videos.  Flock is all about sharing what you find on the web as you surf, and it allows you to accomplish this pretty easily by dragging and dropping them either into an email or onto a friend.

Chrome is the polar opposite of Flock, and its big advantage is that it’s even simpler than Firefox, or any other browser out there right now.  The search bar is also integrated into the address bar, which seems to be the wave of the future, at least for those who swear by Google search and don’t need any bells and whistles. Unfortunately, Chrome’s only available for PCs at the moment.

Usability

Chrome wins hands down on getting the job done.  It’s quick and painless with a clear focus of searching for information using Google’s engine.  Dynamic tabbed browsing is a staple now, and if anything crashes, only that tab will go down, not your entire session, which is nice. But if you want a richer web browsing experience stick with Firefox or Flock.  There’s also no easy way to subscribe to RSS feeds from the search bar as there is with Firefox.

Flock can feel a bit overwhelming at times with all of the sidebars of information, but once you get everything set up and get the hang of it, it’s pretty convenient and preferable to keeping a million tabs open for sites like Twitter and Facebook. The drag and drop interface is great.  When you just want to email a YouTube video or picture it’s much easier than copying any URLs, although it does also seem a bit too easy to share something that you might not want shared.

The only other problem with the social networks is that you can’t really fit all of that functionality into a sidebar.  It’s a good way of consolidating friends, but it’s more like a giant address book than anything else. Simple things like posting tweets are a bit confusing, with no clear box for entering in text. When a friend adds content, however, it will open up the profile in the main browser in full view, so you still need to go back to the source.

Speed

Despite the extra features, Flock is surprisingly just as fast as Chrome or Firefox, at least on a medium grade PC.  Looks like they’ve improved upon this concern in the latest release. And Chrome seems to have Firefox beat in this category but the difference isn’t anything drastic.

Privacy

Incognito — aka “porn mode” –  is the new way to surf, as every browser is picking up on this private surfing option that Safari first initiated.

Chrome has faced some privacy concerns at launch with its Omnibox monitoring and recording too much information, but this can all be prevented by changing the default settings and going Incognito.

Expandability

Chrome doesn’t support any extensions or add-ons yet, so Firefox still dominates in this area.  But if you are looking for simple, you probably don’t want much more than Chrome already offers.

Final Thoughts

Firefox is here to stay, but there will always be a long tail of niche alternatives like Chrome and Flock.  When Chrome moves into Mac realm it could pick up some market share from Safari.  Flock will be there for social network junkies who want to try something new, but the first step to making Flock mainstream will be for more of the social networks themselves to go mainstream. Twitter is on track, but still has a long way to go before it’s a household name. If you’re only on Facebook or MySpace, you probably don’t need to worry about the extra sidebars and features.

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Related Articles at Mashable | All That's New on the Web:

Flock Gets a New Boss, Flock 1.0 Coming
Flock Public Beta Now Live
How Can Flock’s Social Browser Play Into the “Open” Movement?
Flock’s Social Browser 1.0 Has Finally Arrived
More is More: Flock 2.0
Flock CEO Jumps Ship
Anxious About Private Browsing in Firefox? Try the Latest Build

Sigur Ros by richjm

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again now: the iPhone camera is technically rubbish, but I’m endlessly impressed by the ingenuity and creativity people show with it.

This morning I browsed around Flickr for images of gigs and concerts taken with iPhones; there are some really atmospheric shots to be found.

Still, I’d stay away from the mosh pit if I were you. Or keep your iPhone in a zip-up pocket.

A Tribe Called Quest by Mat Honan

Lostprophets by Shiny Things

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club by CosmoPolitician

(All photos used under Creative Commons license. Thanks to the photographers.)

Adds features to the Twitter Web interface including displaying Flickr photo and YouTube videos. TinyURL links are also unwound to show the destination page title. Finally, any additional social information (blogs, photos, etc.) that match for the Twitter user are displayed in a news feed in the side bar of the Twitter page.

Psst, did you find this tool useful? If so, please subscribe by email or RSS for future social web 2.0 tool updates.

Power Twitter :: Firefox Add-ons via kwout

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Both companies have kept very quiet about the reason for the delay. Short supply is one theory. But rumors still persist that buggy software -- one of the reasons the Times' David Pogue thrashed the gadget last week -- is responsible for the delays. One reader sent us the following unconfirmed tip:

I know for a fact that VZW has 123,000+ Storms in their warehouse right at this very moment. I saw it on the computer screen with my own eyes in the VZW system. I was told none of them are shipping anywhere until they are flashed with new code. No matter how much RIM and VZW deny it, there is new software on the horizon.

Neither Verizon (VZ) nor RIM (RIMM) reps replied to our request for comment on that report.

But there's new evidence that RIM is working on a Storm update: Mobile blog Boy Genius Report has gotten ahold of a leaked version of new Storm software. Among its improvements: Faster switching between screens when you tilt the phone, better battery life, improvements to the Web browser, and faster browsing through music and photos.

Is this what's holding up the Storm? We don't know. But whatever it is, Verizon and RIM need to figure it out quickly. The Storm's bugs are one problem. Shipment delays are another. And neither is good news as they go up this month against the iPhone.

See Also:
RIM's BlackBerry Storm Is No iPhone, But Should Sell Well
BlackBerry Fan Longs For A Better Curve
Seven Reasons Pogue Hates The BlackBerry Storm
RIM To Blow Q3, Says Citi