Who Knew Infoblog Would Be Affected By DST?

Ok I think the new DST schedule may have screwed me up a little. I slowed down my postings to a crawl but don’t worry, I’ll reset my body clock and get back to a regular posting schedule ASAP. In the meantime, if you have any news or stories you’d like to see here let me know. Send your tips and/or suggestions to Infoblog3.0@gmail.com

Comic Break

Courtesy of Penny Arcade

Time To Spring Forward

In case you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve heard that the start of daylight savings time has changed this year. In what might go down as the most futile attempt to curb energy consumption, the Energy Policy Act of 2005 changed both the starting and ending dates of DST. The new dates this year are March 11 to November 4.

Some people are predicting this year to be another Y2K but there are a few steps you can take to protect yourself from imminent doom and disaster.

To make sure your system clock and Outlook appointments are correct, Microsoft offers a Time Zone Update Tool as a free download. Check the list of products affected by DST to see if you need to crawl back under that rock and wait it out.

If you are an OSX or Vista user you should be fine. Also make sure if you use XP that you set your computer to update automatically.

Related Links:
Lifehacker 1
Lifehacker 2
History Of DST

Netvibes Announces Universal API For Widgets

Netvibes just announced the release of their universal API that will allow widget builders to use the API for Netvibes, Google IG, Apple Dashboard and many more…

The Universal Widget API (UWA for short) is the name of the 1.0 release of the Netvibes API. With it come major changes and possibilities.

While previous version of the API only let you build modules for Netvibes, UWA makes it possible for you to see your widget be used not only on Netvibes or on personnal websites, but also on many other platforms, both online or on the desktop. For instance, it is already possible to install a UWA widget on Google IG, in Apple Dashboard, soon the Opera browser, and many more to come…

Thanks to its open-source JavaScript runtime, the Netvibes UWA can be easily ported to other platforms. As a developer, you can leverage your existing code on a large number of platforms. As a user, you can use all your favorite UWA widget on your favorite platform – it doesn’t have to be on Netvibes only.

The reliance on open content pushes for the availability of more and more web services, leading to a “Wall of APIs”. Netvibes UWA promotes the use of legal or personnal web APIs, thus leading to a blossoming of web services, all available to UWA widgets users and developers.

Related Links:

Google operating System blog

Netvibes Blog

Jury Awards Verizon $58 Million in Vonage Suit

It what could have wide ranging effects on VOIP providers, a jury ordered Vonage to pay out $58 million dollars to Verizon in its patent case. Vonage was found guilty of infringing on 3 of the 7 patents Verizon originaly sued on. Verizon originally asked for $197 million in damages. The Judge may issue an injunction but that will be decided in the next two weeks. Vonage has announced they will appeal and that thier customers will not see a change in service.

Related Links:

Vonage Press Release

GigaOM

AP Story

Picasa Undergoes Major Update

Picasa Web Albums, Google’s online photo sharing tool, underwent a major update today.

The free version of Pacasa Web increased its storage from 250mb to 1 gig (and counting) mirroring its Gmail plan to increase with time. 1 Gig is enough to hold about 4000 standard resolution photos.

Picasa Web also allows users to search for photo’s withing the community. Previously you could only search within your contacts.

Another new feature is better integration with Blogger. You automatically get new albums for your Blogger pics and a refined linking system.

For information check:

Official Google Blog

Google Operating System

Digg Hits the One Million Users Mark

The website Digg has announced in its blog that it has reached one million members in just over two years:

It’s now been more than two years since the first story was submitted and dugg on Digg. Since then you guys have helped Digg move from a personal project amongst a group of friends to a huge online community. Now, your contributions in submitting, digging, and commenting on content have propelled Digg to a point I never dreamed of – as of today Digg has one million registered users.

I’d like to let this post serve as a thank you from me to you — the Digg community faithful. You’ve not only made it possible for the Digg team to continue the Digg concept in new and exciting ways, but you’ve also driven us, with a sense of pride and excitement that genuinely makes going to work a lot of fun.

For those of you who can make it to the Bay Area in mid-April, we’re planning a party to thank you for your contributions to Digg. We’re tentatively looking at an event on Thursday, April 19th in San Francisco. Stay tuned for more updates, because obviously this milestone calls for good celebration!

Digg on,

-Kevin

Sony At GDC: You Can Go “Home” Again

At the Game Developers Conference, Sony announced a free application for users of it’s Playstation 3 Network. Home, Reminiscent of Second Life, is a 3d virtual world that attempts to tie together the various multimedia capabilities of the PS3.

The application, to debut in the fall, will “allow PS3 users to interact, communicate, join online games, shop, share private content and even build and show off their own personal spaces to others in real time”

TOKYO and SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., March 7, 2007 – Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. (SCEI) today announced the unveiling of a first-of-its-kind 3D online user community service for the PLAYSTATION®3 (PS3™) computer entertainment system. The service, known as “Home,” will enable users to create their own avatar and explore a real-time virtual community, as if they are playing a detailed 3D game for PS3. The service will become available globally beginning in fall 2007.

Home will be demonstrated at the Game Developer’s Conference (GDC) in San Francisco, California on March 7 as a key element of SCEI Worldwide Studios’ President Phil Harrison’s keynote presentation titled “Game 3.0: Developing and Creating for the 3rd Age of Videogames.”

Home is a real-time online 3D, networked community available on the PLAYSTATION®Network. It allows PS3 users to interact, communicate, join online games, shop, share private content and even build and show off their own personal spaces to others in real time. Home will be available as a free download from the PLAYSTATION®Store and will launch directly from XMB™ (XrossMediaBar) on PS3.

With an avatar uniquely customized according to each user’s preference, users can explore the 3D community that is Home – a sleek, modern environment featuring spacious common areas; custom spaces dedicated to specific games; and personal apartments. Each user is assigned an apartment in Home where they can invite others to join them as they show off their own style in an area they can personalize themselves with furniture, art and other items – even a different view from their windows. They can also show their personal video, pictures and other digital media content found on their PS3 hard drives in their apartments. Very rich interactive communication with others is achieved through built in text, audio and video chat, along with sophisticated emotional animations for each character.

Sharing continues in the “Hall of Fame,” where users can display new 3D trophies that will be unlocked through in-game achievements, as well as real time score rankings in PS3 games.

“This is a significant step forward in the area of user community services and emergent entertainment experiences,” said Izumi Kawanishi, Corporate Executive and CTO Software, SCEI. “While the 3D graphics demonstrate the power of PS3 and the PLAYSTATION Network, the most impressive feature in Home is the variety of ways in which multiple consumers, as well as our third-party partners, can experience the next generation of communication by interacting and sharing among each other. I feel strongly that this unique blend of community, user-generated content, collaboration and commerce will expand the future of computer entertainment.”

Home will go into a closed beta test this spring with a full launch targeted for later this year. By having a broad range of business partners participate in Home, along with an expansive catalog of upcoming game software titles for PS3, SCEI will continue to enhance the new world of entertainment and vigorously promote PS3 as the next generation computer entertainment platform.

Press Release

Couchville: If Google Maps Were TV Listings

does one thing and it does it well. SnapStream, the company behind PC DVR program BeyondTV, has ventured out into the intertubes to bring you a simple, working, online tv listings guide. Just plug in your zip code, select your provider, and off you go into channel surfing bliss. Couchville doesn’t try to muddle up its offering by adding unnecessary features.

After entering your initial information you are greeted with an Ajaxian interface that allows you to drag your listings in any direction -ala Google Maps. A vertical red line indicates the current time on the grid. You may configure your listings by hiding the channels you never watch but its probably more useful just to star programs that are your favorites. There is a search at the top that you can use to find a program and all related information, although it seems to need some refining.

Clicking on a program brings up its “tv show page” which lists a description of the show and future showings of it. Using Beyond TV collected data, Couchville also ranks shows according to number of dvr downloads. SnapStream also hints at a future “blurring of the lites” between its two offerings.

The only question is, does it work? Precisely, and thats all it needs to do. It is after all just a TV listing.

Couchville

Google Desktop Matures

Today Google released Google Desktop 5.0 beta (it’s Google, isn’t it always beta?) and they seem to be elbowing for room on the Vista desktop.  Without adding any real functionality they did greatly improve the visual.  Google says their sidebar will “ fade in” the color of you wallpaper so that it will blend in more seamlessly.  It actually looks to me like they just made their transparency smarter.  They also added some phishing detection in your search and it also displays a thumbnail of the site.  I’m still waiting for the sidebar to be able to double as a dock for shortcuts but that’s just me.

From Google Desktop Blog:

The sidebar has a completely new look and feel. It samples the color of your wallpaper and fades in the sampled color so that it fits seamlessly onto your desktop. Some of our gadgets have been redesigned so that they are easy to tell apart, easy to read, and easy on the eyes. More differentiated gadgets allow for faster scanning of information through the sidebar. And we’ve created a new dialog for adding gadgets so it’s easier and faster than ever to find the right gadgets for you.

In addition, we have improved two other key features of Google Desktop:

• Desktop Search – Ever searched your computer and seen a row of results that looked almost identical – so you had to open file after file until you found the right one? Now there is a better way: preview search results from within Google Desktop. Don’t wait for an entire application to load, just click “Preview” and find the information you want right away. Finding the right file has never been easier!
• Security – We take your security extremely seriously and have added new features to help make your search experience safer. Whether you’re clicking on links from documents, IMs and email or browsing the web, if we have information that the site you’re visiting might be trying to steal your personal information or install malicious software on your computer, we’ll give you a warning first so you can decide if you want to use the site.

Google desktop 5.0 beta is available for Vista, XP, and 2000+sp3