Yahoo Cozies up to Bloggers
Yahoo announced a new feature for its My Web 2.0 “social search engine” on Friday that’s meant to appeal to bloggers and Web site publishers.
The new trait is further evidence that Internet search engines are embracing blogs, which are online diaries on any number of topics with links directing visitors to the operators favorite Internet locales. There are an estimated 20 million blogs.
With its new feature, Yahoo is exposing blogs to its My Web 2.0 community of users, the size of which a Yahoo does not divulge.
My Web 2.0 sets-up people with their own Web sites to store and organize favorite Internet findings. Yahoo calls My Web 2.0 a social search engine because users get to contribute their listings to a communal database that’s searchable by others in the My Web universe. The benefit is “access to Web content that’s ranked by search technology,” Yahoo says.
The new attribute announced Friday is a “Save to My Web” button that’s displayed on Web sites or blogs. The feature lets My Web 2.0 users instantly add the site to their collection during their Web wanderings, rather than a more cumbersome alternative involving a visit to their My Web 2.0 Web page. Bloggers and Web site operators must first add the element onto their sites.
Music P2P goes legit
Since the RIAA’s long legal fight against peer-to-peer file-trading networks began, the P2P companies have touted legal applications in their ultimately doomed legal defense. Now that the MGM v. Grokster decision is a few months old, iMesh is poised to prove whether or not consumers will embrace P2P for legal downloads, with more RIAA-approved P2P networks to follow.
From a distance, iMesh looks like another subscription service à la Yahoo Music. You pay your US$6.99 per month and are able to access all the legal music on the iMesh network. Like the other subscription services, the music is tied to the PC on which iMesh is installed. Unlike NapsterToGo and Yahoo Music, there’s no option to copy the music to your digital music player; a future update will include that functionality. Naturally, if you want to keep the music, you still have to buy it.
iMesh will still search Gnutella and other P2P networks for files, but users will not be able to download them. That’s due to a filtering function that will keep users from downloading “illegitimate” files found on other PCs on the network. Some free downloads will be allowed, such as those in the public domain or by artists who release the songs themselves. Videos less than 15 minutes long or 50MB in size can also be downloaded, which rules out most of the stuff file-sharers would be looking for (e.g., tv shows, movies).
Regardless of whether or not it will play in Peoria, music executives dig the new service. Mitch Bainwol, the RIAA’s CEO said that the labels are “excited” about iMesh and hope “that P2P becomes a legitimate part of the distribution of music.” Whether it will remains to be seen. iMesh and other P2P music-commerce networks that come online will have to deal with expectations on the part of file-traders that music should be free. It’s essentially the same situation that the labels faced a few years ago when the iTunes Music Store came online. The iTMS model—adopted by other music download services—of about a buck per song with “reasonable” DRM restrictions proved to be an attractive alternative to P2P networks.
iMesh’s offering, on the other hand, doesn’t look as compelling. For one, it’s a music subscription service that’s trying to avoid bandwidth bills. As is the case with other subscription services, you’re only renting the music for as long as you subscribe. And while the quality and integrity of the files you download over their network will be guaranteed, you’re reliant on the connection speeds of other users to get your tracks. iMesh also has some social networking features that allow subscribers to find and interact with other users of similar ages, musical tastes, etc., and browse their music collections. Instant messaging functionality is planned for the near future. However, when you strip all the features away, you’re left with a paid-access P2P network that ties the songs you acquire to your PC. What’s the point?
Rarely Available Photos
Tim Berners Lee — Founder of the World Wide Web
Picture taken when microsoft was started.
Steve Woznaik(sitting) and Steve Jobs of APPLE Computers.
He was three months late in filing a name for the business because he didn’t get any better name for his new company.
So one day he told to the staff: “If I’ll not get better name by 5 o’clcok today, our company’s name will be anything he likes…”
so at 5 o’clcok nobody comeup with better name, and he was eating APPLE that time…
so he keep the name of the company ‘Apple Computers’
Bill Hewlett(L) and Dave Packard(R) of HP.
Behind them in the picture is the famous HP Garage.
Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard tossed a coin to decide whether the company they founded would be called Hewlett-Packard or Packard-Hewlett.
And the winner was NOT Bill… the winner was Dave.
Ken Thompson (L)and Dennis Ritchie(R) ,creators of UNIX.
Dennis Ritchie improved on the B programming language and called it ‘New B’.
B was created by Ken Thompson as a revision of the Bon programming language (named after his wife Bonnie)
He later called it C.
Larry Page(L) and Sergey Brin(R), founders of Google.
Google was originally named ‘Googol’.
After founders (Stanford graduates) Sergey Brin and Larry Page presented their project to an angel investor…
they received a cheque made out to ‘Google’ !…
So they kept name as GOOGLE
Gordon Moore(L) and Bob Noyce(R) ,founders of Intel.
Bob Noyce and Gordon Moore wanted to name their new company ‘Moore Noyce’.
But that was already trademarked by a hotel chain…
So they had to settle for an acronym of INTegrated ELectronics… INTEL
Andreas Bechtolsheim , Bill Joy, Scott Mc Nealy and Vinod Khosla of SUN(StanfordUniversity Network) MicroSystems.
Founded by four StanfordUniversity buddies.
Andreas Bechtolsheim built a microcomputer;
Vinod Khosla recruited him;
Scott McNealy to manufacture computers based on it;
and Bill Joy to develop a UNIX-based OS for the computer…
SUN is the acronym for Stanford University Network .
Linus Torvalds of Linux Operating System Linus Torvalds originally used the Minix OS on his system which he replaced by his OS.
Hence the working name was Linux (Linus’ Minix).
He thought the name to be too egotistical and planned to name it Freax (free + freak + x).
His friend Ari Lemmk encouraged Linus to upload it to a network so it could be easily downloaded.
Ari gave Linus a directory called linux on his FTP server, as he did not like the name Freax.
Linus like that directory name and he kept the name of his new OS to LINUX…
AND THIS PICTURE WAS TAKEN WHEN SUPERHIT SHOLEY WAS STARTED……
They were looking at ashrani when he was doing practice first time with his funny Jailer’s dress…
Win a Free Domain !!!
Here at Gamerspin Community we have arranged a contest. Winner of the contest gets a chance to win a domain name of his choice. This contest is arranged to keep the competion spirit of our members high. This contest is open for all please join the community and be a part of it.
More info: Contest
Computers learn a new language
COMPUTER scientists have developed a program that can teach itself new languages. Feed it a piece of text, in any language, and the program analyses its structure and can then produce new, meaningful sentences.
Conventional translation software programs have all the rules of grammar coded into them. But the ADIOS (automatic distillation of structure) program, developed by researchers at Cornell University in New York and Tel Aviv University in Israel, infers the building blocks of a language using statistical and algebraic processes. The software learns the grammar of a new language by searching text for patterns. The researchers think the program will be useful in cognitive science and bioinformatics, as well as in applications such as voice recognition.
Google initiates second email phase
IT SEEMS that Google’s email service is getting into the final phase of preparations to loose the “beta” moniker and become a fully fledged service.
We have begun seeing ads for Gmail distributed via Google Ad Network, so expect to see those on every student visited site in the near future. Google invites college students, and people with a valid .edu e-mail address, to become a part of Gmail.
Besides logging in via a web-page, you can also now get an invitation code if you give the number of your mobile phone and write a provided code onto the box – you will receive a text message containing the invitation code for Gmail.
This is an excellent ad for Google Mobile Services, a future sub-division of Google. That service will feature secure password recovery and SMS alerts.
Currently, invites work for students and mobile phone owners in the US of A, but it is surely only a matter of time before Google goes international with these services.
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Titan’s long-sought sea revealed by radar
The first sea discovered on any surface other than Earth’s may have been found on Saturn’s moon Titan.
New radar images from the Cassini spacecraft, which made its eighth close approach to the moon on 7 September, have revealed what appears to be a very distinct shoreline, fed by meandering channels carved deeply in the surrounding terrain.
The dark, flat region next to the bright shoreline “is the area where liquid or a wet surface has most likely been present, now or in the recent past”, says Steve Wall, Cassini radar team deputy leader from NASA-JPL.
And several long sinuous channels can be seen cutting through the bright region and ending at the shoreline, suggesting the existence of an Earth-like cycle of evaporation, rainfall and river systems to carry the liquid back to the sea. But instead of water, the liquid in this case is believed to be methane, kept liquid at Titan’s -179°C surface temperature.
Thick atmosphere
Seas of liquid methane, perhaps mixed with other hydrocarbons, had long been expected on Titan, the second-largest moon in the solar system. It is also the only moon with a thick atmosphere – thicker than Earth’s.
Seas seemed necessary to explain the amount of methane seen in Titan’s atmosphere. The fact that no clear evidence for such seas had been found was one of the big mysteries of the Cassini mission.
“We’ve been looking for evidence of oceans or seas on Titan for some time,” Wall says. The quest was one of the main goals of the four-year Cassini mission. The discovery of the new features suggests Titan may indeed have periodic episodes of methane rainfall.
Ellen Stofan, another radar team scientist, says the network of bright channels indicate “that fluids, probably liquid hydrocarbons, have flowed across this region”.
Some of the channels extend more than 100 kilometres, says Larry Soderblom of the US Geological Survey in Flagstaff, Arizona. The channels appear to be of two different types, some long and deep with few tributaries, others forming denser networks. “Some of them may have been fed by springs, while others are more complicated networks that were likely filled by rainfall,” Soderblom said.
Earth analogue
Titan’s abundance of hydrocarbons, thick atmosphere, and now evidence for the presence of large volumes of liquid, means it is considered a close analogue of the early Earth.
It may even host some of the early complex chemistry that on Earth led to the first living organisms, but whose traces have long been obliterated here. Cassini project scientist Dennis Matson has called Titan a “time machine” for studying how the early Earth “evolved into a life-bearing planet”.
But exploring the new-found sea further will be tricky. Two coincidental glitches caused half of the data from the radar flyby to be lost. One glitch affected the spacecraft’s data recording system, the other the receiving antenna in Goldstone, California, US.
Even worse, the region will not fall within the radar’s view on any of Cassini’s 37 remaining Titan approaches. However, all the data from Cassini’s cameras and spectroscopes was saved and may reveal more details of the features.
Cassini’s next close flyby of Titan will take place on 26 October and will focus on the region where the Huygens landing probe hurtled down to Titan’s surface in December 2004.
Instant messenger could control hacked computers
A US computer programmer has created a software robot that uses instant messenger – a program that allows people to exchange messages over the internet in real time – to control a computer remotely.
So-called “chatterbotsâ€? have been created in the past, allowing programmers to use IM to automatically upload files from their computer. But “Nmapbot”, created by Virginia-based Abe Usher, is the first that allows someone to scan a remote network for machines that could be hacked into. Nmapbot also allows a hacker to use compromised machines to launch a denial of service attack.
Usher has released the bot to highlight potential security risks posed by IM. But he says that Nmapbot is also a useful tool for computer security personnel, allowing them to patrol networks from out of the office using a PDA or cellphone equipped with IM.
“This is one of those dual-use tools that can be used for good and for evil,� says Ron Gula, chief technology officer at intrusion detection firm Tenable Network Security in Columbia, Maryland.
Flaw in Google Desktop Search
A flaw in Google’s desktop search program was revealed on Monday by a team of computer researchers. They showed it could be used to capture valuable personal information from a remote user’s computer.
Google Desktop Search (GDS) lets users quickly hunt for files and documents stored on their computer using a web browser. After installation, the program runs in the background – indexing documents, emails, instant messaging conversations and web browser history – so that searches bring up results almost instantly.
Dan Wallach at Rice University in Texas, US, and two students, Seth Nielson and Seth Fogarty, discovered the flaw shortly after the application was released on 14 October 2004. They developed demonstration code to exploit the flaw and steal search results via a web page.
A query entered into Google on a computer running the desktop search program automatically adds results from the computer itself to results from the web. The researchers suspected that the way GDS integrates these results could prove a potential weak spot.
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Yahoo fixes Web mail security flaw!
Yahoo has fixed a security flaw in its free Web-based e-mail service that opened the door to phishing scams, account hijacks and other attacks.
The flaw, known as a cross-site scripting vulnerability, existed because Yahoo’s Web site did not detect certain script tags in combination with certain special characters, according to SEC Consult, which issued an advisory on the flaw Friday.
Cross-site scripting flaws are found regularly, including recently in Google’s Web site and earlier this year in Microsoft’s Xbox 360 site.
Flaws have also been found on Yahoo’s site. An attacker could exploit this type of flaw to hijack user accounts, launch information-stealing phishing scams or even download malicious code onto users’ computers, experts have said.
A Yahoo representative said it fixed the most recent flaws in the “last few weeks” and that its users are protected.
“Yahoo recently learned of an issue in Yahoo Mail and worked immediately to begin rollout of a server-side fix which does not require users to take any action,” said Karen Mahon, a Yahoo spokeswoman. “We are unaware of any users who were impacted by this issue.”
