NEWS ABOUT: Web 2.0
Web 2.0 stories: 52 news briefs
VideoBay streams content, without that pesky copyright stuff
Wired Jun 30, 09 8:32 AM CDT
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If YouTube's limits on copyrighted material have exhausted you, the Swedish hackers who call themselves Pirate Bay have a solution: VideoBay, a new streaming video site that's utterly indifferent to intellectual property laws. The new service, rolled out just as Pirate Bay was sold to a Swedish software company that says it plans to take the site legit by paying for content, is built exclusively with open-source technology. But the programmers say VideoBay is still in "beta extreme" and caution: "Don’t expect anything to work at all."
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Washington Post Jun 15, 09 5:31 PM CDT
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Traditional media are having a tough time covering the Iranian election fallout, but fear not: Web 2.0 is up to the task. The Washington Post runs down the best destinations for those hoping to stay on top of the situation: PicFog.com: Current, unedited photos containing "a level of gore or manipulation not found on traditional news sites."
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A new word emerges every 98 minutes
Daily Telegraph (UK) Jun 10, 09 3:48 PM CDT
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The millionth word to enter the English lexicon is pure geek-speak, the Telegraph reports: Web 2.0 was entered this morning by Global Language Monitor, which recognizes words once they’ve appeared 25,000 times in the media, blogs, and social websites. The linguistic cataloger estimates that a new word is generated every 98 minutes.
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OPINION
Mossberg and Swisher: it's an iPhone revolution
All Things Digital May 27, 09 11:54 AM CDT
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Web 2.0’s a thing of the past, write Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher for All Things D. "Something major is happening at the intersection of tech and media, and we think it deserves its own new hyped-up name,” they announce. Web 3.0 is the era of “the thin client, running clean, simple software, against cloud-based data and services”—and the leaders of the revolution are the iPhone and iPod Touch.
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San Francisco Chronicle Apr 29, 09 1:16 PM CDT
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A California winery has a tempting offer for tech-savvy oenophiles, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. The Murphy-Goode Winery will set up the right candidate with a $10,000-a-month job at its Sonoma County HQ blogging and Twittering about, well, wine. The 6-month gig includes room and board; the 2-month hiring process is expected to draw 10,000 applicants and is already yielding good PR.
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Mashable Apr 7, 09 5:14 PM CDT
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How much is your digital self worth to you? At least one new website is betting it’s enough that you might want to pass on that value after you die, Mashable reports. Legacy Locker, which launches today, allows you to designate caretakers to take control of your YouTube videos, Flickr photos, email and other stuff stored on social-networking and other sites once you're gone. Think of it as virtual estate planning.
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Guardian says will stop the presses after 188 years
Guardian (UK) Apr 1, 09 6:46 AM CDT
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After 188 years in print, the celebrated UK newspaper the Guardian is switching to a Twitter-only format, it said in today's April 1 edition. All news, the paper said, will appear in 140-character “tweets,” which “experts say” is enough for any story. “In the new media environment, readers want short and punchy coverage, while the interactive possibilities of Twitter promise to transform th,” wrote a media expert before reaching his character limit.
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Wall Street Journal Mar 28, 09 5:39 PM CDT
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The concept of Twitter, widely copied in the US and abroad, has found a home at a mommy-centric website, the Wall Street Journal reports. The site Today’s Mama hosts a new microblog called “Connect," which, unlike Twitter, allows users to join groups by region or topic. But it still hews to the basic format; mothers who want to write more than 140 words need not apply.
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It's all the rage, but does the fuzzy term really mean anything?
Wall Street Journal Mar 26, 09 8:40 AM CDT
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Today's hottest tech term is "cloud computing": Google, Amazon, Yahoo, and Intel have all begun projects with such nebulous names as OpenCirrus and Elastic Compute Cloud. But while the projects behind the names all have something in common—storing data on far-off computers—nobody can agree on what cloud computing really is, writes the Wall Street Journal . "I have no idea what anyone is talking about. When is this idiocy going to stop?" said the CEO of Oracle.
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Prez to answer most popular at 11:30am
CNN Mar 26, 09 6:04 AM CDT
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President Obama launches his online “fireside chat” today at 11:30am EST, answering questions from among the tens of thousands posted directly to the White House website, CNN reports. Some 70,000 questions had been posted by early this morning, the AP reports. More than a million votes have been cast as to which questions the president should address; Obama will answer the most popular ones via live streaming video.
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Rove, McCaskill, others make microblogging look useful
Politico Feb 23, 09 11:48 AM CST
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To the unconverted, Twitter seems about as useful as a Snuggie, writes Patrick Gavin in Politico, but some DC movers and shakers are making the microblogging site work for them. Here’s his top 10: Karl Rove: More than 11,000 have signed up for quick glimpses into Bush’s Brain. Claire McCaskill: Personal, off the cuff, and open, she’s Congress’s best tweeter. David Gregory: Questions pols and interacts with fans.
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tech review
Unigo allows students to post multimedia reviews of universities
Wall Street Journal Feb 19, 09 11:45 AM CST
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A new online college guide “built for the age of YouTube and Facebook” employs user-generated content to give applicants a student's-eye-view of hundreds of schools, and Walter S. Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal likes what he sees. Unigo.com is free and ad-supported; professional editors help present reviews, videos, and photos largely submitted by students.
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New York Times Feb 5, 09 1:32 PM CST
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A craze sweeping the web resembles nothing so much as a creative-writing exercise, the New York Times reports. “25 Random Things About Me” propagates through chain-letter style email, or on Facebook as a note, with recipients forwarding their lists to 25 others. “Photos or news stories have spread rapidly and widely,” a Facebook rep said. “This is the first time I’ve noticed a note gain such distribution.”
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Wants info of 150M members to be market research gold mine
Daily Telegraph (UK) Feb 1, 09 1:36 PM CST
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Facebook will create one of the world’s largest market research databases in an attempt to profit from the personal information it collects from its 150 million members, the Telegraph reports. The social networking site’s new instant polling tool, which will enable companies to target specially selected users, was introduced last week at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
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Web site tracks 100K women's menstrual cycles
Australia's News Network Jan 29, 09 10:37 AM CST
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Some 100,000 men bewildered and berated by wives and girlfriends with pre-menstrual syndrome have visited PMSbuddy.com, which sends out reminders when partners may be touchy, Australia’s News Network reports. Messages like “She’s on yellow—tread carefully, fella” keep men up to date on the cycles of the women in their lives. And it’s not just personal: The site also offers a national “overall threat index.”
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Weekly installments end with a choice
NPR Jan 5, 09 3:03 PM CST
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Fantasy fans who’d like a role in the action can turn to literature’s latest incarnation: the online Web-novel, or wovel, NPR reports. Readers can click and read a chapter each week. Then, “at the end of every installment, there's a binary plot branch point with a vote button,” says the founder of online and traditional publisher Underland Press.
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Access will be limited to site's adult users
San Jose Mercury News Dec 4, 08 2:31 PM CST
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YouTube has announced new rules on sexually suggestive content, restricting it to registered members who claim to be adults and removing it from the video-sharing site’s most popular pages, the San Jose Mercury News reports. “Our goal is to help ensure that you’re viewing content that’s relevant to you, and not inadvertently coming across content that isn’t,” a company blog post says.
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Micro-blogging pioneer with plenty of buzz but no revenue swaps execs
CNET Oct 17, 08 6:05 AM CDT
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Twitter has shunted CEO Jack Dorsey into the chairman's role and given his job to current chairman and co-founder Evan Williams, CNET reports. The micro-blogging site has grown fast since launching last year and has been surrounded by plenty of buzz—but while managers say things are right on track, it still lacks a working revenue model.
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YouTube videos spoof Nazi leader
Guardian (UK) Sep 28, 08 12:03 PM CDT
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Hitler wants his Xbox back, at least in one of many YouTube spoofs. Using clips from a 2004 German film about the Nazi’s demise, users have also rewritten subtitles to show Hitler ranting about Hillary Clinton and Adam Sandler movies. The spoofs are the latest Web 2.0 spawn, the Guardian observes, enabling armchair impresarios to create and broadcast their own content.
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Experts compare it to physical closeness
New York Times Sep 6, 08 7:08 PM CDT
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The mini-missives that friends post on websites like Twitter create what experts call "ambient awareness"—a form of contact akin to picking up a friend's body language or stray remarks. Alone they add up to little, "but taken together, over time, the little snippets coalesce into a surprisingly sophisticated portrait of your friends’ and family members’ lives, like thousands of dots making a pointillist painting," Clive Thompson writes in the New York Times .
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