[SoftRatty] tag: pictures

Family-Mingle.com - Meet With Your Family

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 22:14:00 +0000

Some questions

What features could be added to give it an edge over the competition?

In their own words

“Family Mingle is a family meeting place, that enables you to easily build your family tree, invite your relatives to join, publish family messages, schedule family events and share photo albums.”

Why it might be a killer

Families always appreciate the chance to connect in a safe and secure environment.

What it does

Family-Mingle is one of these increasingly popular resources that create a community site which has a circumscribed appeal, namely only members of a specific family.

The basis of the site is the creation of a family tree, a process that is handled online in a streamlined fashion – you just upload the relevant pictures in the corresponding slots. You can then extend the tree by inviting relatives via e-mail. Your relatives will be able to extend the tree in turn, and the same is not limited by size.

On the other hand, once the tree has been created you can keep in touch with each other and post messages as well as scheduling events with ease.

Of course, features like the posting of photos and related contents are fully taken into account, along with the posting of stories marking family milestones and events.

At the end of the day, it is undeniable that families looking for a private and safe environment in which to interact are certain to take a liking to the many sites that are cropping to these ends. This one has all the necessary features, and it is a viable alternative. You can reach it at www.family-mingle.com.

Link: http://www.family-mingle.com
Our Review: http://www.killerstartups.com/Web20/family-mingle-com-meet-with-your-family

Michael Wolff: MySpace And Its Braindead Users Are Going To Zero

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 17:06:00 +0000

BusinessWeek's Jon Fine takes Rupert Murdoch tell-all author Michael Wolff out for dinner. Michael then reveals the secret he didn't put into the book: why Murdoch's News Corp (NWS) is trying so hard to ditch MySpace:

MW: What [MySpace] understand[s] is their $25 billion to $30 billion valuation.-

JF: But that's [expletive]. We both know that's [expletive].

MW: It doesn't make any difference. That's gonna go down. What they are looking at is the distinct possibility that it can go down to nothing.

JF: How do you find that plausible? It's not even a utility like--the anti-Google argument is this: If someone builds a better search engine tomorrow, I have zero switching costs. If I am on MySpace, I have 500 friends. I use it to communicate with people. You can't just move. It's a pain in the ass. All your stuff is there.

MW: But that's exactly what they said about AOL.

JF: You did not develop that relationship with AOL.

MW: You did. You exactly did.

JF: How?

MW: Your email was there, because your friends were there. I mean, AOL operated actually as the community of its day. There were all of those-

JF: But besides the email and, OK, the-

MW: There were the infinite number of chat rooms. Layer upon layer upon layer of sex chat rooms.

JF: Of course. And I give you credit for having pointed to that as the secret driver of its success. But, all you need is a different chat room. You don't have pictures up [on AOL]. You don't have your history up there. You don't have-

MW: It doesn't matter. What they saw at the time was that [users] were absolutely wedded to AOL. That was Time Warner's bet on that.

JF: AOL was monodimensional in a way that MySpace is not. I don't think that's particularly debatable.

MW: I don't think that's true. I think it is--if you're on MySpace now, you're a [expletive] cretin. And you're not only a [expletive] cretin, but you're poor. Nobody who has beyond an 8th grade level of education is on MySpace. It is for backwards people.

JF: [unsuccessfully stifling laughter] I don't mean to get all Murdoch's-kids on you [an obscure reference to an earlier part of the conversation], but if you are in a band, you are on MySpace. You have to be on MySpace. That's a powerful driver. And second of all-- if I am to accept your reasoning, even though I don't--as the success of [News Corp's British tabloid] The Sun will tell you, there are lot of cretins out there and you can make a lot of money off cretins. By appealing to their essential--

MW: No! That is the difference. And that is one of the interesting points of Murdoch. He wants to make money off of what he rightly saw as a rising lower class. He came to this country and he sees, that's just not really true. No one really identifies with being lower class [in the US]. As soon as it comes to you- I am lower class'--you run, and you have to rehabilitate all of your aspirational identifiers.

20+ Top Free Windows Mobile Applications

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 15:22:03 +0000

iPhone this, iPod Touch that, BlackBerry and Google Android apps galore, but where is the Windows Mobile love? Well, it is certainly not to be forgotten as the Samsung i770, HTC Touch Pro and Samsung Omnia are all being sold in stores this December, and all of them are powered by Windows Mobile. With those users in mind, here are over 20 top free apps to get the most out of the Windows Mobile operating system.

What are some of your favorite Windows Mobile applications? Let us know in the comments!

Games

Death Drive - Who doesn’t love a little vehicular combat? Death Drive brings Carmageddon like combat to your Windows Mobile powered device.

Kevtris - What is mobile gaming without at least one version of Tetris?

Pocket Heroes - Pocket Heroes is a Heroes of Might and Magic game clone for Pocket PC. It may be a bit simple for some, but still a lot of fun.

Realms - A space based shooting game that might remind you a bit of the old Asteroids arcade game, but only in concept. Multiple ships to choose from and numerous levels to explore.

Internet Tools

Fring - Fring brings their instant messaging services to more than just the iPhone and iPod Touch with a Windows Mobile version. Allows you to instant message with AIM, Google Talk, ICQ, MSN, SIP, Skype, Twitter and Yahoo.

Opera Mobile - The popular Opera browser comes to the mobile format with a full set of features.

Slick - Allows you to instant message with AIM, Google Talk, ICQ, Jabber, MSN and Yahoo. Also has text messaging, emoticons, message history and more.

TwitToday - A plugin for your Today screen that allows you to post to your Twitter account.

Web Viewer - Web Viewer is an expansion to the web browsing ability with a tabbed browser that allows you to save open tabs and more.

Media Players

MPlayer for Windows Mobile - Part of the MPlayer suite for Linux, MPlayer for Windows Mobile will let you play Flash videos as well as videos in the RV40, RV30, R20, sipro, cook and atrac codecs.

RealPlayer - An official mobile release for the famous Real One Player.

The Core Pocket Media Player - TCPMP, as it is known, supports a dizzying array of video and audio formats from DivX to Ogg Vorbis.

YouTubePlayer - Just as the name implies, YouTubePlayer lets you to search YouTube for videos and then plays them in their native FLV format.

Phone Applications

Call Firewall - Call Firewall does exactly what you would think it might in that it helps you create blacklists and whitelists for your Windows Mobile powered cell phone. One of the coolest features is that it will send an SMS to a blocked call telling them why they were blocked.

iDialer - iDialer, pictured above, gives you a new dialing interface that feels similar to another popular phone’s dialing system. It does offer compatibility with popular Internet phone services such as Grand Central and JaJah.

Skype - The well known Skype service is available for Windows Mobile, enabling you to make Skype calls from your mobile, saving you a lot of money on calls.

Utilities

CapSure - You can capture your screen in BMP, GIF, JPG or PNG and then add captions, obscure sensitive information and more.

Dashwire - Allows you to sync your phone at all times including pictures, files, contacts, messages and more. Cool feature that lets you see texts on your computer as they arrive at your phone.

GSync - As you can probably guess by the name, GSync allows you to synchronize your Google Calendar with your Windows Mobile powered phone. The app is available in Dutch, English and Italian.

iContact - iContact changes your contact interface to more of an iPhone style system that allows you to browse through your contacts with just a flick of your finger.

Pocket RAR - An official version of the RAR archive manager that you can use on your mobile device.

SoftKey Manager - This app allows you to edit the soft keys on your Today screen.

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

Google Search Now on Windows Mobiles, Too
Facebook Optimized for Windows Mobile
Plaxo Now Syncs With Windows Mobile
Adobe Photoshop Comes to Your (Windows) Mobile
7 Freeware Resources For Your Windows Mobile Device
Last.FM Available on Windows Mobile
Free iPhone Apps!

BAIK 3.0 (Default branch)

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 12:23:43 +0000

BAIK (Bahasa Anak Indonesia untuk Komputer) is a scripting language whose syntax is in Indonesian. It supports file operations, conditions, arrays, functions, MySQL databases, CGI, and TCP/IP networking.

License: Free To Use But Restricted

Changes:
By supporting GD graphics library, this version now can create pictures in the PNG file format. The basic drawing functions, such us creating lines, circles, and text, have been adopted. Some functions for basic statistic calculation were added and some minor bugs were fixed.

HyperWeek.com - Social Media Comes Alive

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 09:08:00 +0000

What it does

Hyperweek is a new initiative that aims to provide users such as Internet publishers and editors enhanced content distribution options when it comes to online groups and communities.

The features of such a service have been implemented with ease-of-use in mind, and these include a photo sharing application and a streamlined text editor which can accommodate images. There is also a microblogging feature for contacting other members right away.

Moreover, the site makes room for social bookmarking and instant subscription to sites of interest that can then be shared with those who make up your group. Incidentally, groups can have open access or be on-request only in the event you wish to keep your group private. People can also become editors once they have joined the group, and you decide to bestow that position upon them.

Some features that are being worked upon include premium accounts that dispense with advertisement, and an enhanced text editing tool that makes for adding videos as well as pictures. In any case, the site is already shaping up in a well-advised fashion and it will be interesting to see the contour it is given by forthcoming updates.

In their own words

“Groups and groupware have been one of the main contributors to the Social Media ecosystem and continue to drive the global online conversation. However, there are a number of identified issues with the current mix of social networking, content distribution and acquisition products and services. Unlike HyperWeek, none of these offer the end-user the versatility to fully customize and dynamically tailor their content and its overall appearance. A versatility that allows the content author(s) to create the most appealing and relevant group(s) possible and one that resonates with the widest audience.”

Why it might be a killer

It aims to make for a more realized and richer social experience by putting the emphasis on ease-of-use and practicality.

Some questions

How will the site advertise itself?

Link: http://www.hyperweek.com
Our Review: http://www.killerstartups.com/Social-Networking/hyperweek-com-social-media-comes-alive

Buzzbox.com - Instant Web Recommendations

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 07:05:00 +0000

What it does

Fast Forward can be described as a recommendation service that lets you know about sites you might like to visit based on the site you are currently visiting. This is implemented in a very concise way, too: all you have to do is add a button to your browser by clicking on the “Install It” link that is featured on the site, and once the process has been carried out you can start using the recommendation button next time you start your machine.

If you will, this service can be compared to a recommendation service like the one Amazon features, but focused on websites - instead of telling you about similar products, it tells you about related sites that were visited by others.

Fast Forward works on contents of every kind, too – videos, pictures and news are fully taken into consideration.

Another good point of this service is that it not only is provided free of charge, but you don’t have to register or fill in any form to become a user. All it takes is following the installation link and resetting your machine when prompted.

All in all, Fast Forward stands as a viable way of looking up contents and letting the computer do the hard work for you. Give it a try at www.buzzbox.com and see how it does for yourself.

In their own words

“You can use FastForward on any webpage on the Internet. We have over 200,000 people contributing and over 40,000 websites in our system. By grouping all the people that visited the page you are on, we take you to the top page these people went next. It's like Amazon shopping recommendations for webpages, just like 'People who bought this also bought these items'. We do 'People who viewed this page also viewed this page next'.”

Why it might be a killer

It makes web browsing suppler, and finding the right contents for you less demanding.

Some questions

What browsers are supported right now? Which ones will be supported later on?

Link: http://www.buzzbox.com
Our Review: http://www.killerstartups.com/Web20/buzzbox-com-instant-web-recommendations

Feeling-Lucky.appspot.com - Finding Random Images

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 06:44:00 +0000

In their own words

“Feeling Lucky is a small application created by Bonstio for Google App Engine which retrieves and displays random images. What could be simpler? We use the Flickr API to retrieve a random image from a specified public Flickr group.”

Why it might be a killer

Resources like this one come in more than handy when you need to boost up any project you are working on and don’t know where to resort.

Some questions

Are there other ways for refining a search besides the ones that were mentioned above?

What it does

Feeling Lucky is a portal that will enable you to come across random images you can add to you r webpage or work-in-progress application. Images themselves are retrieved at random from specified Flickr groups, and they are accessed using the existing Flickr API.

When accessing images, you can choose the size that suits you best by clicking on the refinement tags that are featured. These include “Small”, “Small Square”, “Medium” and “Huge”. The search itself will let you pick an image source from a drop down menu that touches upon aspects such as “Perfect Panoramas”, “High Resolution HQ” and “Interestingness Top 10”. In any case, the site will also enable you to key in a search term in order to find exactly what you want.

Moreover, whenever a picture is displayed you are given the option to visit the profile of that user and see if you find related images that you like.

As a conclusion, this website is a good resource that can come in very handy if you are looking for quality pictures to pump up any project that you are working on. You can try it out for yourself by following the link that is provided below and see if you come across something that fires you up.

Link: http://feeling-lucky.appspot.com
Our Review: http://www.killerstartups.com/Video-Music-Photo/feeling-lucky-appspot-com-finding-random-images

Around the World with Eric Lafforgues iPhone Screensavers

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 04:54:05 +0000

Just in case you don’t have such a great photographic eye, or perhaps are not completely satisfied with the images produced by your iPhone’s distinctive optics, there is help available.

More than 30,000 people have downloaded French photographer Eric Lafforgue’s free iPhone app Hervé Péroteau. He released version 2.1 on Sunday with more than 800 pictures available for use as screensavers for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Lafforgue’s work has been published in prestegious magazines worldwide, including Geo, National Geographic, CNN Traveler, The Times, Stampa and UNESCO magazine. His app will fill 25MB of space on your device, but it automatically lets you know when there are photo updates available and includes professional tips from one of the world’s most successful freelance photographers.

Check out some of his images in the gallery below and be sure also to visit his stunning website.

Gladinet Mounts Web Storage Apps as Virtual Drives

Mon, 01 Dec 2008 01:00:00 +0000

Windows only: Free utility Gladinet Cloud Desktop removes the web interfaces from Google Docs, Picasa Web Albums, Windows Live SkyDrive and Amazon S3 Storage, mounting them instead as folders you can add, remove, or open documents from. Gladinet hides most of the back-end technology that pulls it off, asking you only for a username and password. Once mounted, it's easy to, say, open a Google Docs file in your local copy of Microsoft Word, or directly add pictures to folders in your Picasa or SkyDrive accounts. Read on for a look at how Gladinet works, along with a 10-minute video that explains more of its features.

After grabbing the beta download, installing and launching Gladinet Cloud Desktop, you'll see a fairly simple "start page," which either opens Windows Explorer directly to your virtual webapp drives ("Explore My Gladinet Drive") or mounts a new one ("Mount Disk Storage or Web Storage As Virtual Directory").

Choose to mount a new drive, and you'll be asked to choose a service, provide login details and give it a name.

Once you mount a web service for the first time, you won't need to type in usernames and passwords again, as your credentials are stored in a "Safe Card," which you can manage and delete in a separate dialog. It might take a minute or more for Gladinet to make the connection and mount your virtual drive, and the app doesn't make it clear that it's gone through successfully.

If everything does go through, however, you can head to your "Computer" section, or hit the "Explore" choice on the Gladinet start page, and see your pictures, documents, and other files listed under a new shared drive, labeled "Z:" and named "resources." Opening a word document might fail at first—it did for me with Word 2007—but the files are otherwise there for you to move and manage. Some services, like Picasa, are finicky about what you can put where, but Gladinet shows an explanatory progress dialog that details what went wrong.

Uploading a picture to the Picasa drive, for example, doesn't fly, unless you create a new folder and leave it there—which makes sense, because Picasa Web Albums is organized by, well, albums. But creating a new "Just a Test" folder and dropping a screenshot there worked, as evidenced by the Picasa Web Albums screenshot to the left. SkyDrive and Google Docs worked similarly; I don't, unfortunately, have an S3 account to check out, but I'd presume it has fewer restrictions than any of the others, being a storage-based app.

Gladinet keeps itself in your system tray while running, and closing it un-mounts your "resources" drive with all your app connections. From its right-click system tray menu, you can add and delete app-drives and Safe Card credentials, and create logins that allow you to run Google Calendar, Gmail, the ThinkFree suite and other webapps in stand-alone windows—nothing you can't do with Prism or Google Gears, though.

All in all, Gladinet seems like a pretty handy utility for someone who trades a lot of files between their cloud and desktop spaces. I'd assume Gladinet intends to expand its coverage of webapps, though they could limit this free version to the four listed here and keep others for its "Standard" version, which adds remote desktop and file-grabbing tools.

For those looking for a more in-depth tour around Gladinet, the makers have released this 10-minute introductory tour video:

What do you think of Gladinet's spin on web-as-desktop? Share your take in the comments.

Concept: the iPod shuffle bracelet

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 16:00:00 +0000

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Audio, Odds and ends, Apple, ipod shuffle

This seems pointless and yet brilliant at the same time, somehow -- iPhone Savior has concept pictures of the iPod shuffle extended out into a bracelet. You can already find lots of straps and wristbands for the shuffle, and with that clip on it, it's designed to be jewelry anyway, so why not carry the premise out to its conclusion, right?

It's almost perfect, and yet weird enough that Apple would never go for it -- they'd much rather make the hardware, and leave the straps and hooks to third-party vendors, I think. Still, it's an interesting idea. What other kinds of jewelry could include the smallest version of "the world's most wearable" mp3 player? A shuffle necklace? Shuffle earrings?

Thanks, Rymon!

TUAW Concept: the iPod shuffle bracelet originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Sun, 30 Nov 2008 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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