Sep 24

Yawn…Hotmail Reaches 1GB Inbox

Posted in: Today's Chili, Web Sites

This article was written on November 16, 2006 by CyberNet.

Hotmail 1GB

A friend of mine, and also a trusty Hotmail user (no idea why), just noticed that his account got upgraded to 1GB of storage. I checked mine out as well and I’ve got it, too! Boy am I excited. I finally have enough room to store 3 to 4 days worth of spam that I receive at my Hotmail account!

It has been awhile since I checked into my “trusty” Hotmail and when I did the first thing that I noticed was the green bar near the Hotmail logo. It was giving me the opportunity to join Windows Live Mail Beta which is something you have to be invited to join. Why is that a big deal? Because my Hotmail account finally got upgraded to 1GB but if I update to Live Mail then I’ll receive 2GB of storage! Something doesn’t seem right there.

Those of you who got the Live.com email addresses the other day also have nothing to worry about as “javasharp” pointed out in the comments. Microsoft decided to let it slide this time but they are watching for accounts that were created for spam purposes. If you are yet to use the Live.com service I will be the first to say that it is 100% better than Hotmail but I still have all kinds of troubles using it in Firefox. Doesn’t look like anything will be pulling me away from my Gmail account. :)

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 24

Huge Learn Firefox Redesign!

Posted in: Firefox Extensions, Screenshots, Today's Chili, Web Sites

This article was written on September 25, 2007 by CyberNet.

Learn Firefox Thumbnail After about a month in progress, we have finally launched a huge Learn Firefox redesign! Our focus was to bring a graphical appeal to the site since it is a “visual guide to the Firefox web browser,” and we believe that we’ve successfully done that.

For those of you who haven’t visited Learn Firefox yet there has never been a better time. Almost 100 Firefox extensions have been reviewed thus far, and screenshots of over 200 themes have been taken. Of course, at the center of all this are the countless guides that have been created to help new Firefox users learn the ropes.

Here’s a list of what’s new:

  • New design with simplicity in mind
  • Significant speed improvements
  • Works great in all the popular browsers
  • Each category has the posts broken up into “Guides” and “Extensions.”
  • Mini navigation buttons are located on the bottom of every page (except for the homepage for obvious reasons)

We would like to welcome you to the new Learn Firefox! This is quickly becoming a hub for new and existing Firefox users alike, and you can always subscribe to the feed to stay up-to-date with the latest articles. The next time you know someone switching to Firefox, point them in our direction so that we can help them along!

Note: We’re still in the process of updating some of the graphics on this blog, but that should be done shortly.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 23

Convert Measurements into Something Sensible

Posted in: Today's Chili, Web Sites

This article was written on June 19, 2008 by CyberNet.

sensible units-1.png

The other day we showed you some excellent online tools for converting from one unit of measurement to another, but as a commenter pointed out (thanks Nate!) we missed a rather awesome one. It’s called Sensible Units, and while it can be used like any other conversion utility there’s one thing that really makes it stand out from the crowd.

The whole site uses JavaScript to make the conversions fast and painless. Just type the value you want to convert into the box along with the corresponding units, and you should see a drop-down menu appear once you start typing the units. You can select one of the units from the list, or continue on your merry way typing it out manually.

Once it recognizes a number and unit it will automatically process the conversion, and show the results along the right side. By default it converts the measurement into real-world objects. For example, if you are trying to convert 100 pounds it will tell you how many microwaves and MacBooks that is equivalent to in terms of weight. Or, as you you can see in the screenshot above, when converting hard drive space it tells you the number of Vista installations and Wikipedias that the amount space can hold.

If for some odd reason you want to actually convert a measurement into “real” units you can just switch to the Units tab. When you’re on both the Objects and Units tab make sure you keep an eye out for the “See All” link to appear in the upper-right corner. This will show you the full list of units available for the measurement you specified.

Sensible Units Homepage
Thanks to Nate for the tip!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 22

Photobucket and Adobe Expected to Announce Flash-Based Video Editing Tool

Posted in: adobe, flash, Today's Chili, Web Sites

This article was written on February 16, 2007 by CyberNet.

Come Monday, an announcement is expected from Photobucket and Adobe in regards to a web-based video editing tool that Photobucket’s users would be able to take advantage of. It would require Flash Player 9 to be installed, and would be found under Photobucket’s media-sharing site. 

From there you’d be able to get creative and create your own concoction of photos, videos, and music. Similar to other non-web based video editing software, you’d be able to drag and drop your snippets of video along a timeline depending on where you wanted them.

This adds a whole new element to sharing videos and pictures on the web.  Adding captions, transitions, and effects really gives the movie you created a “production” feel. Loads of people take advantage of Photobucket for placing pictures on social networks like MySpace, and this would just be an extra tool to take advantage of.

While Photobucket and Adobe haven’t released anything official regarding this, Adobe has said that this deal with Photobucket is not exclusive. This means that you could potentially see this around the web in the future.  Currently, it is referred to as Adobe’s Web-based Video Remix and Editing Technology, but Adobe is expected to name it at a later date.

Speaking with Webware, Alex Welch, Photobucket’s CEO says: “A photo is no longer good enough, a straight video is not good enough.  This lets you use a combination of photos, videos and music to build something truly custom.”

Source: Webware

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 22

CyberNotes: Viddler Video Sharing

Posted in: CyberNotes, Today's Chili, videos, Web Sites

This article was written on January 08, 2008 by CyberNet.

CyberNotes
Time Saving Tuesday

A few weeks ago we, gave Viddler 1st place for being the best sharing site of 2007. That’s when it hit us that we’ve been using Viddler for quite awhile without actually writing about it. Not spreading the word about Viddler is pretty much doing an injustice to our readers. And we can’t forget to mention that we currently have 3 out of 20 of the most popular videos on Viddler. :)

We use Viddler for all of the screencasts and videos that we produce. The video quality is pretty amazing, and they offer users an incomparable amount of control over the videos that are published. Lets take a look at how it all works…

–Upload a Video–

Viddler’s uploading process couldn’t be any easier. Their Flash-based uploader lets you queue up as many videos as you would like. It will upload each of them one-by-one, process them, and let you know when they are completed. What really makes the uploader intelligent is that you can enter in the title, description, and tags for each video while you wait for them to finish:

Viddler Upload

You can upload videos that are up to 500MB in size, and they support the following types of files: AVI, DV, MOV, QT, MPG2, MPEG2, MPEG4, MP4, 3GP, 3G2, ASF, WMV, and FLV. In the next version of Viddler they have plans on letting users upload music and pictures.

After the videos finish uploading you can navigate away from the page, and optionally you can be notified via email when they are ready for you.

–Embed/View the Video–

We optimize all of our videos for Viddler’s largest resolution. That way when we embed the videos they look clear and concise, which is especially important when posting screencasts. Here’s an example of our most popular screencast (there’s no sound):

–Features–

Viddler Stats I’m frequently amazed that Viddler is a free service because of how well it’s designed, and the number of features it brings to the table. Here’s a quick overview of the things you’ll want to checkout when using Viddler:

  • Stats – With every video that’s uploaded you’re able to keep track of how many views they’ve received. You can also see the URL of other sites who are embedding your video, and how many times it has been viewed on any particular site. Pretty cool, huh?
  • Privacy – There are three different privacy options that you get when uploading a video. You can make a video public where anyone can watch it, shared where you designate which of your Viddler friends can watch it, or you can make it completely private so that you’re the only one able to view it.
  • Downloadable Videos – Unlike many video services, Viddler gives publishers the option to make their videos downloadable. And I’m not just talking the compressed Flash version of the video either! If enabled, Viddler will let viewers download the original video that you uploaded.
  • Powerful Menu – When a video finishes playing, or the user presses “Menu” in the bottom-right corner, they will be presented with all kinds of information. They’ll see stats for how many times the video has been viewed, a list of other videos from the publisher, recommended videos, and all of the stuff that you would need for embedding or linking to the video.

–Sharing–

Naturally with any video service, the focus is on members who share their videos with other people. Viddler has the most powerful set of sharing options out of any other video site that I’ve used. You can control whether everyone, your friends, or just you can comment, tag, embed, and download videos. Each of the settings can be configured on a per-video basis, thereby giving you the ultimate control:

Viddler Sharing 

–Overview–

As you can see, Viddler is jam packed with features, but there is one thing that I would like to see to make it a little bit better. As of right now you can share your videos with only friends and family by using the appropriate “Shared” privacy option. The problem is that anyone who views the video has to be a registered Viddler user in order for you to make them a “friend,” and I think it would be easier if they offered the option to just password protect a video. Once that’s possible I’ll deem the service perfect!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 21

eBay’s CEO Meg Whitman Says “See Ya!”

Posted in: Today's Chili, Web Sites

This article was written on January 22, 2008 by CyberNet.

Meg Whitman eBay eBay’s CEO, Meg Whitman said shortly after she came onboard at eBay that “no CEO should stay more than a decade in the same job because people need new challenges and organizations need fresh perspectives.” She joined the company in March of 1998 when there were only 29 employees employed over at eBay. It’s been about 10 years since her first day on the job and now the Wall Street Journal says Whitman has plans to retire. Apparently she’s sticking to her original belief that 10 years is enough time for one person to lead a company.

Remember those original 29 employees we mentioned that were there when she started? Now that number has grown to over 15,000! Her net worth has also increased substantially while at eBay to over $1.4 billion. During her time at the popular online auction site, the company has experienced both major ups and downs as any company experiences over a period of time. Some more recent examples of the ups and downs include a 3% decrease in auction listing during their third quarter. While that may not have been good, last year their income rose 4% to $1.13 billion which is certainly a positive thing. Although, lets not forget the big loss eBay took last year after they realized Skype wasn’t such a great buy after all.

Whitman hasn’t confirmed that she is leaving, however, sources say that she has been slowly delegating her responsibilities out to other people including John Donahoe, the current president of eBay’s auction business unit. He’s the one that’s expected to take her place once she say’s “See ya!” once and for all to eBay.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 21

Yahoo! Mail Rolling Out Unlimited Storage

Posted in: Today's Chili, Web Sites, Yahoo

This article was written on May 15, 2007 by CyberNet.

One month after announcing their “to infinity and beyond” unlimited email storage, Yahoo has finally started rolling it out to their users. The entire process of enabling all users with the unlimited storage will take a few months, and they do this to make sure that it’s a smooth process.

We already mentioned the fact that there really is no such thing as “unlimited” storage because there’s no such thing as unlimited hard drive space. It’s not possible for hard drive space to be infinite because the storage would have to grow at a faster rate than what people are storing their mail at.

So at what point will they cut someone off? You know there will be at least one person who will want to test the “unlimitedness” of it, and when they do, will Yahoo stop them at some point?

You’ll know if you’ve been upgraded to the unlimited storage when your counter has been removed. In case you’ve never paid attention to where your counter is at, the image below points to it.

Yahoomailstorage

I don’t think I’ve seen anybody overly-excited about the idea of unlimited storage. When the announcement was first made, here are some of the ideas from our comments section of what readers thought would be better features to have:

  • Increased attachment size
  • POP3 enabled

YahoomailplusWhat’s also interesting is that they haven’t updated their Yahoo! Mail Upgrades page – the paid accounts. You’d think that they would upgrade their paying customers first that have Yahoo! Mail Plus, but that page still says “virtually unlimited storage – 2GB.” So now the Yahoo! Mail plus customers are paying for their 2GB when the free accounts have unlimited.

If you use Yahoo! Mail, keep your eye out for the removal of your storage counter. Once it’s gone, you can begin hoarding all of your email messages for life!

Source: Yodel Anecdotal

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 20

eBay Gets a New Look, New Features

Posted in: Features, Today's Chili, Web Sites

This article was written on September 19, 2007 by CyberNet.

eBay is in the process of making some major changes to the look and feel of the site in hopes of bringing people back to buy and sell. They’ve come a long way in the 12 years that they’ve been around, but over the last few years, things have gotten a bit rocky.  According to a recent article in Business Week, this is "eBay’s bid to win back buyers." With multiple places online to buy and sell, eBay is no longer "the" place to go.

So what is it that has changed? Probably the most obvious is the look of their new home page. Sometimes change is hard for people to deal with, and in this situation, I think that’s the case. Now when a user logs in, they’ll see four main things – eBay categories, My Recent Activities, My eBay at a Glance which includes items you’re watching or selling, reminders, and more, and the option to Start shopping.

ebay changes

Another change you’ll notice as Download Squad pointed out, is that there’s now more options for viewing items that you’re searching for. In certain categories like computers – instead of just viewing all the items in a list, you can view them in a picture gallery, or snapshot view.  The picture gallery is probably going to be the most beneficial because you get to see an image of what’s being sold, but you also have pertinent information like the price, shipping costs, and when it was listed. Think of it as window shopping.

ebay changes 2

This is only just the beginning of what eBay has in store. Coming soon they’ll have a few new features. One of them is  "quick and easy," an option for selling items, and another is a countdown- a new way to manage and bid on auctions. The last change we can expect soon is one click bidding where users won’t be taken to a new page to confirm the bid that they entered.

If you’d like to test out some of eBay’s new features which they haven’t rolled out quite yet on their main site, you can visit The Playground where you’ll see some of the new things eBay is testing out.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Sep 20

Extend Browser Capability with BrowserPlus from Yahoo

Posted in: Software, Today's Chili, Web Sites, Yahoo

This article was written on May 29, 2008 by CyberNet.

Last year on May 31st we saw Google push Google Gears out the door, their open source browser extension project. One of their goals with the project was to provide a way for web applications to interact naturally with your desktop. More recently they decided to drop the “Google” part of the name and just go by “Gears” so that people realize that it’s for everyone to get involved with. People have accepted Gears well because it does offer amazing functionality and now Yahoo wants to do something similar with new software called Yahoo! BrowserPlus.

Like Gears, Yahoo says that Yahoo! BrowserPlus was designed to extend the capabilities of your web browser, “to make richer web experiences possible.” What they mean by this is that they want people to be able to drag and drop from their desktop to their browser. They want to make uploading files easier, and more efficient, and they say they want to “secure acquisition of feeds and information, and native desktop functions.” Sounds similar to Gears, doesn’t it?

yahoo browser plus.png

Now we know that Gears has allowed web applications to come offline, so does this mean that Yahoo! will eventually use BrowserPlus to enable web apps to come offline? They could, and they’d be smart if they did. What both Google and Yahoo (and others) are trying to do is bridge the browser and the desktop together so that they don’t feel completely separate. Yahoo mentioned that they’d like to be able to support native desktop notifications which would be so nice – an example of how this could be used is with email. Say you have a Yahoo Mail account. When you received a new email message in your inbox, you would be able to receive a notification on your desktop saying so.

At this point Yahoo says that because it’s just a “Sneak Peek”, you can only run BrowserPlus on sites operated by Yahoo! or its partners, but once they’ve received some feedback and improve the software, they’ll open it up. They currently support Windows XP, Windows Vista, Mac Leopard, and Mac Tiger (Intel only). It’ll definitely be interesting to see what kinds of web applications developers are able to come up with, that take advantage of Yahoo! BrowserPlus and have desktop capabilities.

To see BrowserPlus in action, checkout the Demos page where you can see how it’s used in a Photo Uploader for Flickr so that users can drag, crop, rotate, tag, and upload photos to Flickr from a web page. Two other demos are available (an IRC Client, and a JSON Inspector) as well.

Source: Webware

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Sep 18

SlashDot Needs Your Help For Their Site Redesign

Posted in: Today's Chili, Web Sites

This article was written on April 26, 2006 by CyberNet.

SlashDot Needs Your Help For Their Site Redesign

SlashDot has decided that it is time for a site redesign and they are having a contest to see who produces the best design. The winner will receive a new laptop, but you have to follow their criteria in your design. The most important thing is that you must use their existing CSS framework that they designed a few months ago when they started to plan for this redesign.

They also don’t want to see new features in your design because they are just trying to change the look and feel of the site, not the functionality. Another important thing is that they want to keep some consistency with the current design, like the use of the Slashdot ‘Shade of Green’ (#006666).

Hopefully they will post some of the designs and ask the users to help decide on the best one.

Read The Redesign Criteria On SlashDot

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