For anyone who uses multiple calendars, you know that one of the big issues that's being addressed by numerous applications is getting your calendars to sync up with each other. We've covered some solutions to this problem before, but we had not seen a truly integrated offering that allowed you to sync up a work calendar in desktop software with an onlne calendar without need of a third-party app of some sort...that is, until yesterday. It seems that Microsoft has finally given the people what they want and have provided a calendar sync tool that actually makes all of Microsoft's calendaring programs work together.
Sometimes you just want to blow up your Flickr images. There's nothing better than a fullscreen display of your latest photographed memories. While Flickr's slideshow is great, you won't be able to stretch your images to fullscreen while viewing them. Well now that's about to change with Blow Up a Flickr web app.
Video services are really taking off this year! If you're a fan of lifecasting or the Seesmic video service, then you're going to love 12seconds.tv. 12seconds.tv is a cool new way to send out video message to your friends. Here's a look at the service and some great suggestions to get started.
According to a comment made at Microsoft's Analyst Day today, Microsoft and Facebook are preparing a search and advertising deal that would lead to the integration of Microsoft's Live Search and search advertising into Facebook. Microsoft already provides ads on Facebook as part of a 'strategic alliance' and Microsoft holds a $240 million equity stake in the company. No information about the financial specifics of the deal were mentioned so far and it is not clear if this deal would be exclusive.
A new nonprofit organization called the Open Web Foundation is launching this morning with backing from some of the biggest companies on the web and the involvement of some of the web's most innovative individuals. Organized in as a decentralized community of developers, in the fashion of the Apache Software Foundation, the OWF will serve as a placeholder for all the legal dirty work that needs to happen in order for data portability to become a reality.
Specifically, the Foundation will work with all the vendors in this space to secure Creative Commons copyrights and promises not to sue each other over the use of data protocols. Think OpenID, OAuth, OEmbed and lots more still in the works. In some ways this dreadfully unsexy work, but in other ways it's just the opposite.
Today, the mobile advertising marketplace AdMob released a new, global marketplace for iPhone ads. The most interesting aspect of this is that these ads will be specifically tailored to the iPhone and will also be highly interactive. To promote this launch and the new platform, AdMob is giving away a total of $1 million to iPhone developers to promote their applications through AdMob.
Digital Rights Management technology is dying, it's becoming understood that hobbling tunes to enforce scarcity isn't the best way to monetize the music business online. What about all the suckers who bought DRM laden music in recent years, though? When the Yahoo! Music Store closes its doors this fall, the company announced today, past customers dependent on their music "phoning home" to get license approval before playing are out of luck. They'll be able to continue playing purchased tracks on a single computer, until they make any changes to their operating system.
Twitter Anti-Spam Bot Punishes Community Managers and Causes Follower Counts to Drop
Did you notice a big drop in your Twitter follower numbers yesterday? It seems that the Twitter team recently decided to step up their Twitter spammer detection, and, in typical Twitter fashion, their algorithm sent the service haywire, leading to yet another sighting of the Fail Whale while the issue was resolved. Meanwhile, Twitterers everywhere were in an uproar over their lost follower counts.
Much has been written lately about the rise of the API.
Offering a programming interface to an online service is now standard practice amongst this generation of web companies. Through APIs, we get to enjoy a range of innovative Twitter clients, wide
availability of maps and location information, custom search engines, and more. However, delivering superior user experience
on major platforms should be as much of a priority as opening up via an API.
Just last week, we wrote about rumors that Google would be bringing offline access to Gmail and Google Calendar using Gears very soon. Today, Yahoo announced that it will be giving offline access to all free and paid Yahoo Mail users through the Yahoo Zimbra Desktop. This is the first time that all Yahoo users get offline access to their accounts. Zimbra Desktop is available on Windows, Mac, and Linux.
