Media consumer, tech enthusiast, and gamer
Blake Ross, cofounder of Firefox, spent part of his Christmas explaining his dissatisfaction with Google due to its latest move: displaying “tips” (allegedly not ads, you decide; see screenshot below) right above search results that point searchers to Google Calendar, Blogger and Picasa for any search phrase that includes calendar, blog, and photo sharing.
Read More “Google Accused of Going Evil, Google Employee Responds by Sidestepping the Issue” »
So the latest Economist article (subscription required) discusses how Arizona State University made the switch to using Google Apps for Your Domain. As the article puts it, “with one flick of the proverbial switch 65,000 students had new e-mail accounts.” Now all emails are stored on Google servers rather than on university servers.
The head of IT for ASU, Adrian Sannier, mentioned that no one is being forced to switch, though many students are already used to Gmail. And since now they can use their “asu.edu” address with a Gmail interface, students have been voluntarily migrating to the new email at a rate of 300 per hour. Sannier explains that he pays less than $10,000 for support and that the in-house IT staff do absolutely nothing for email now.
Read More “Case Study: Google Services Too Good, Making IT Departments Shrink” »
Wow. The Blogosphere is all a buzz today on what seems to be a battle for which you’re supposed to pick a side. The major stories have to do with YouTube allowing CBS to filter comments on its videos and have them on a separate page (rather than right below the video itself) and the New York Times adding, that is, “surrendering to” social news (meaning, you can submit NYTimes articles directly to Digg, Newsvine, or Facebook from within an article).
Mix that with the lingering rumor that Fox, Viacom, CBS, and NBC might have a YouTube competitor in the works, and you have all sorts of opinions flying!
Read More “Social Content vs. Big Media Content: Do You Have to Pick a Side?” »
The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) has an excellent article discussing email addiction and what to do about it. It’s the type of thing you laugh about with words like “CrackBerry” until you realize that professionals (including time-management experts, professors of psychiatry and family studies, and family counseling therapists) have weighed in on the subject and consider it closely related to Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. Luckily, they’ve compiled a 12-step program for the email addict:
According to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required), Blockbuster is introducing a holiday promotion that will let Netflix subscribers rent Blockbuster movies for free. Here’s how it works: Netflix members can turn in the tear-off flaps from any red Netflix envelopes for free rentals at any Blockbuster store. The promotion is set to run through December 21.
Read More “Blockbuster Inviting Netflix Customers to Rent Movies From Stores for Free” »
Symantec recently released the beta version of its new security suite: Norton 360. The question is whether the 360 part of the name refers to what Symantec would have you believe: “Norton gives you a full circle of protection.” Or could it refer to Symantec doing a 360 and being right back where it started with a bloated, buggy, and overpriced product?
When I covered the Norton AntiVirus 2006 release last year, the thread turned into a place for consumers to vent on how the product caused more problems than fixes. Some were even wishing for a class-action lawsuit. Well, I’ve been playing with the latest iteration for a few days now to see which implication of using the term 360 is true. Here’s what I found:
So I recently reviewed Carbonite, a $5 per month online backup service for unlimited data backups from one computer. But the last few days I’ve been playing with Mozy, another online backup service with a different offering. In a nutshell, Mozy offers more control, more features, and is completely free for two gigabytes of online storage. The down side is that for $5 per month, you only get a maximum of 30 gigs (see update at end of article). And though the interface gives power users more control, it may be less inviting to the average user. But free is free. There is no reason why any of us shouldn’t take advantage of backing up our most important two gigabytes of data.
The Economist (subscription required) had some choice words in describing Digg and “social news.” After your typical one paragraph introduction to the concept, we get the following:
“Digg has become an internet phenomenon. It has over half a million registered users and has been valued at over $200m despite having just $3m in revenues and no profits. Its success has spawned similar sites such as Reddit and Newsvine, and prompted the world’s largest media company, Time Warner, to turn its ailing Netscape.com news portal into a social-news service instead.”