Windows Live Mail Takes A Big Step Backwards

This article was written on May 20, 2006 by CyberNet.

Windows Live Mail Takes A Big Step Backwards

Microsoft recently released Windows Live Mail Milestone 6 (M6) which had a lot of needed features in it, like Firefox support! Well, the Windows Live Mail team is taking a step back to Milestone 5 (M5) because they were having many issues with M6. What happens to Firefox users in the meantime? They get to use the “Classic Hotmail”. Here is what the Windows Live Mail team had to say about the issue:

You may have noticed that some of the new features in Windows Live Mail Beta have gone missing! Well, you’re right. We hit a couple of bumps with M6, our most recent release, but we’re working hard (and very late on a Friday) to bring back the great new features. In the meantime, we’ve restored the service to the prior release so that you can access your mail quickly and reliably without hitting any of those bumps. This is all new stuff we’re doing so we appreciate your patience while we work the kinks out.

For all you Firefox users out there, this means that you’re getting our Classic Hotmail experience for the time being. Don’t worry we’ll get your new Windows Live experience working as soon as we can. And if you’ve been enjoying your Russian language version of Windows Live Mail, we’ll bring that right back, too.

Ben Poon
Windows Live Mail Beta Program Manager

News Source: Windows Live Mail Blog

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Worldmapper Gives You A Different Look At The World

This article was written on November 20, 2006 by CyberNet.

WorldMapper

Numbers on maps are no longer needed with the way that Worldmapper does things. They have a unique approach to displaying maps where they make countries and territories larger the higher they are in the statistic. The example map that I have shown above is for the total world population in which it is apparent that India is at the top of the list.

Total there are 227 maps available some of which help to illustrate trends. One of the prime examples for that are the maps for population:

  1. Population at Year 1
  2. Population at Year 1500
  3. Population at Year 1900
  4. Population at Year 1960
  5. Population at Year 2050
  6. Population at Year 2300

The only problem with the maps is that they give you a good idea of the statistic relative to other countries and not the actual magnitude of the numbers. Looking at the population maps there are few differences between them despite the population increase to 134 trillion in 2300. They are all pretty interesting though like the Aircraft Departures and Alcohol/Cigarettes Imports. Browse through them because I’m sure you’ll find it to be kinda fun…but it is educational, too. ;)

Thanks for the tip Ed!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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CyberNotes: Three IMDB.com Alternatives

This article was written on February 23, 2008 by CyberNet.

CyberNotes
Weekend Website

Anytime that I’ve needed to lookup information regarding a movie, I’ve always turned to The Internet Movie Database. They’re considered to be “the biggest, best, most award-winning movie and TV site on the planet” and they have all kinds of information available. While IMDB remains my favorite source for TV and movie information, I thought it was worth taking a look at some alternatives because there are some great ones out there. Today we’ll be looking at three sites to visit which include Movies.com, Yahoo! Movies, and MovieWeb.

–Movies.com–

Movies.com has actually been around since 2000 and they include everything related to movies.  If you’d like to keep up with movie news or you want to buy tickets and view show times, you can do it all at Movies.com. Here’s a quick run-through on what you’ll find at the site:

movies

Homepage

The homepage includes the movie spotlight which shows the box-office leaders, movies opening during the week, upcoming movies, and new DVD releases.

The Buzz

The Buzz is where you’ll read all about the latest buzz! At the moment, of course it’s all about the Oscars. Right now you can take the Headless Oscar Fashions Quiz or see the list of Oscar nominees.

New & Upcoming

In the “New & Upcoming” section you’ll find a spotlight for the week. This week it’s Jumper which is now in theaters. You can get all kinds of info on the movie of the week as well as other new movies including movie details, tickets and times, trailers and clips, and reviews.  They also post an upcoming release calendar by week so that you know when movies you want to see are headed for the big-screen.

Reviews

Want to know what people think of a movie before you see it, this is where you can do that. They graph results which include their opinion, the opinion of critics, and what their site visitors have to say. For example, Jumper was given a C rating by Movies.com, a C- by the critics, and a B by site readers.

Other “Stuff”

Additional components to the site include a fan forum, a place where you can see photos of your favorite actors and actresses, as well as a section to view trailers and clips from upcoming movies.

If you end up visiting the site frequently, you’ll want to become a member and then you can customize the content that you see on the site, keep track of reviews that you’ve written, and more.

–Yahoo! Movies–

Yahoo! Movies is another great site to go to when you want to keep up with movies. Out of any of the sites we’re talking about today, Yahoo! Movies has the best interface.  The main components to this site include the list of the top movies at the box office, a list of movies opening this week, the option to get showtimes and tickets for movies in your area, and a section with movie news and gossip. They too have trailers and clips for new movies.

Below you’ll find a quick run-through of what you’ll find when navigating through Yahoo! Movies.

 yahoo movies

There are three main tabs on the Yahoo! Movies site – “Movies,” DVD,” and “My Movies.” Today we’re just focusing on the content that you can find under the “Movies” tab.

In Theaters

This is where you’ll get all of the information you could ever want about movies that are opening in theaters shortly, and those already in theaters.  One of the best parts about the information that they provide is the user reviews. There are SO many user reviews for movies so you really get a good idea of whether or not it’s worth seeing. For each movie, they provide a brief summary, but then they also provide links to more detailed movie information, showtimes, trailers & clips, and user reviews.

Showtimes & Tickets

Just enter in your location and it will pull up a list of theaters and showtimes in your area. They also provide the address and phone number for the theater, and a link so that you can map it on Yahoo Maps.

Coming Soon

By visiting the “coming soon” section, you’ll be able to see a list of movies that will be coming out over the next several weeks.

Top Rated

Remember how I mentioned all of the user reviews? They are most useful in the “Top Rated” section.  A list of movies that are in the theaters is displayed, and then they display what the average grade was that Yahoo! users gave the movie.  For example, The Bucket List has been given, on average, a B by users. They also included a list of Top Movies of All Time which includes movies like The Shawshank Redemption, The Godfather, Star Wars, and more.

–MovieWeb–

MovieWeb’s slogan is “The Best Seat in the House” and like the other two sites we mentioned today, they include all kinds of information on the latest movies hitting the theaters, those just coming to DVD, and more. While their site can be a little difficult to navigate, there’s a lot of great content there so searching through it is worth it. Some of the main components you’ll find on their homepage include a list of movies on DVD this week, the latest Blu-Ray and HD DVD movie reviews, today’s box office numbers, and all kinds of news, features, and interviews.

Below you’ll find some of the information that you can find on MovieWeb’s site.

movieweb

Releases

Under the “Releases” tab you’ll find a list of the movies that will be in theaters, those that will be released on DVD, and HD DVD and Blu-ray releases for the week.  What I like about MovieWeb’s release section compared to the others is that they show the movie cover instead of just listing the movies which is nice.

User Reviews

There are pages upon pages of reviews for movies in the theater as well as those on DVD.  I clicked to view a review of Spiderwick and I was able to get reviews as well as all kinds of information regarding it. Aside from the review, here’s a list of all of the information you can get for movies:

  • Summary
  • Synopsis
  • Videos (like the Trailer and different clips)
  • Photos
  • Headlines
  • Comments
  • Show times if it’s in the theater

Hi-Def

Unlike the other sites we mentioned, MovieWeb has a section dedicated to the latest Hi-Definition News.  The only downside is that you can’t subscribe to the news which would be great if you were keeping your eye out for movies being released on the Blu-ray format. Aside from the news, they also list the latest HD DVD and Blu-ray movie reviews which can be found on the homepage as well.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Google Reader Updated for iPhone

This article was written on May 13, 2008 by CyberNet.

new google reader.jpgGoogle has always been pretty good about catering to iPhone users, and the Reader team is kicking it up a notch with a new AJAXy interface (pictured to the right). Other good news is that it’s not only supposed to work with the iPhone, but any mobile device that has an advanced browser. You can even use it in your desktop browser if you feel so inclined (ex. works in Firefox).

To use the new version you need to point your browser specifically to google.com/reader/i/, because they’re not going to automatically redirect you since it’s still in Beta (of course). I’ve been using the new interface this morning and I have to say that it’s a nice improvement over the previous version. The ability to quickly star an item is very much welcomed, and when you tap on an item it expands in place.

The whole Google Reader experience on the iPhone now feels much more like it does on the desktop. I’ve noticed that it will take a few extra taps/clicks to do some of the same things that you could on the Google Reader mobile interface, but I think it’s worth it in the long run. The only bad thing that I have to say about the new service is that the initial load time is much longer than it was.

I’m guessing this step was taken to help compete with Newsgator, who has had an AJAX-driven iPhone feed reader for nearly a year. Newsgator also has the benefit of full synchronization with their desktop feed readers, which are freely available for both Windows and Mac.

Gotta love the (free) things that competition brings. ;)

[via jkOnTheRun]

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Joost Getting Ready For the Web

This article was written on September 05, 2008 by CyberNet.

joost logo.pngIt’s been a while since we’ve heard any significant news from Joost. They launched into an invite only beta back in early 2007 and made quite the stir with everybody eager to get their hands on an invite. Since then, not a whole lot has been said. While there was a demand for invites at launch, the masses weren’t impressed with the service. Some of the complaints we heard and experienced first hand included an unimpressive selection of channels and the simple fact that it is desktop based and the software is sluggish.

These days, lots of companies are focused on offering web based services, so why wouldn’t Joost? According to TechCrunch, Joost is about to ditch the desktop based software and move to an online based service. A small browser plugin is all that users would need to be able to watch TV and video through the service. All we have to say is hallelujah! Now the thing is, they had a pretty nice interface with the desktop software, so hopefully that will be something offered with the web based version as well.

Of course we also know that content is what matters at the end of the day with any TV/video service, so hopefully Joost will be able to continue to add the content that people will want to see. It has definitely improved since launch, but there is still room for improvement. Overall we see this move as only a good thing for Joost. People like the convenience of having access to their favorite services online instead of relying on a desktop application. We don’t know exactly when this change will take place, but it should be soon.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Turnitin Gets Sued for $900,000 by Students

This article was written on March 31, 2007 by CyberNet.

TurnitinAnti-plagiarism site Turnitin is being sued by students for violating copyrights on 6 papers submitted to the service. Turnitin is in use by more than 6,000 universities and school systems to compare papers that students write with articles and papers from the Internet. The goal of the service is to catch students who plagiarize, but there was one detail that two students decided to target.

When teachers upload papers to Turnitin they are stored on their server for future comparisons. Eventually this would become an easy way for teachers to see if a student is simply submitting an article written by another past student. While this is a privacy issue, two high-school students also saw that it could violate copyright laws.

The two students first filed for copyrights on 6 papers that they had written, and once they were granted those copyrights they submitted them to Turnitin. One of the papers even gave explicit instructions for Turnitin not to archive the paper, but seeing that this was an automated service those instructions were ignored. Now they are suing for $150,000 per paper which brings the lawsuit to $900,000!

How do other sites get around this? The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) protects sites like YouTube under the safe harbor laws. This pawns the illegal act off on the uploader instead of the person hosting the service. YouTube is therefore doing no wrong as long as it removes the copyrighted content when asked to do so.

So in your opinion are services like Turnitin doing anything illegal? Some say that they are because they are boasting the database of 22 million student papers as a huge selling point of the service. The service reportedly costs a lot of money, and every time an instructor uploads a paper it will just make the service even more valuable in the future.

There is also the issue of privacy if by chance their servers were hacked. Papers written by thousands of students would be in the hands of someone who could easily make a website to sell the papers online…all without the consent of the students who wrote the papers.

So what’s your take on this? Is it wrong for Turnitin to make money off of archiving these student’s papers or are they offering a valuable service who’s benefits outweigh the copyrights?

Source: Washington Post [via Download Squad]

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Play Contra On FlashPlayer.com

This article was written on June 20, 2006 by CyberNet.

Play Contra On FlashPlayer.com
 

You can now play the classic game of Contra on FlashPlayer.com. I’ll have to warn you though, it is pretty addicting. It comes complete with cheat codes (yes, even God Mode if you wish).

Amazingly this has only received a 52% rating when this is the best flash version of Contra that I have ever seen. It has multiple difficulty settings, image quality settings, and the ability to customize what keys you want to use. This will do more than kill some time, it will bog down your day!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Photovisi: Standout Photo Collage Creating Service

This article was written on April 09, 2010 by CyberNet.

Sharing content, particularly photos, has exploded in popularity over the last decade. It’s easy, it’s fun, and as a result, many websites offer services that help you create photo collages. One standout in this area is called Photovisi.

We like Photovisi for several reasons; ease of use, it looks good (nice templates), it’s free, and it’s available as a Facebook app in addition to the Photovisi website. We’ve tested out both methods (Facebook, and their website) for creating collages, and both prove to be outstanding.

There are basically three steps involved in the creation process – first you choose a template (shown below are some examples), add your photos (you browse for photos already saved on your computer), crop photos if you’d like, and then you can save, download, and or print your collage. As you are creating your collage, you can select a background color or choose an image to be displayed as your background.

When you’re ready to save your collage, choose the resolution you’d like for your download – 800×600, 1024×768, or 1600×1200. Additionally, Photovisi has partnered with Zazzle so that you can print your collage as magnets, postcards, mugs and more.

photovisi.png

If you’re using the Facebook app, you choose an album of photos you’ve already uploaded to Facebook to work with. When you save your collage to Facebook, you can post it to your profile and save it to an album. Below is an actual collage that I created using photos from an album I had already uploaded to Facebook.

Photovisi2.png

You’ll see one ad at the top of the page (I saw ads for Google’s Picasa and Intuit), but good services have to make money somehow, and it’s really the only ad you’ll come across, so it’s not bad.

One feature we would like to see would be integration with online photo services. Instead of browsing for photos on the computer, it would be great to be able to access collections from sites like Flickr, Smug Mug, etc. Other than that, we’re impressed with Photovisi. It produces great results for the amount of effort required to create a collage and will be fun to share with family and friends.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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MyBloop Back for More…You can still Download Music

This article was written on June 14, 2007 by CyberNet.

MyBloopIt was more than a year ago when we last wrote about MyBloop, a file sharing site, and we mentioned a way to download music that others upload to the site. They shutdown for awhile because they couldn’t keep up with the hosting needs, and after several months they are back for more.

Since it is a file sharing site you would think that you could download anything from there, but that’s not the case. Music and videos are copyrighted to their owner, so only the person who uploads a song or video can actually download it. Other people can listen or view it though.

So why is MyBloop cool? They host thousands of songs and videos, where a search for Nirvana returns 800+ results, Metallica returns 230+ results, and Green Day returns 660+ results. Many of the songs are duplicates of each other, but the point is that they have a nice selection available. Out of the 175,000 files being hosted you’re bound to find something cool.

Previously it was as easy as changing one thing in the URL to be prompted to download a song from the site, but it’s not quite as easy this time around. I have tried to make it a little simpler by creating a bookmarklet that does most of the hard work, so drag this link into your bookmarks: MyBloop Download

Here’s what you have to do now that you have the bookmarklet stored:

  1. Go to the MyBloop page with the video or song that you want to download, right-click on the "Add Comment" link, and copy the URL to the clipboard:
    MyBloop Download
  2. Click the bookmarklet and enter in the URL that you just copied:
    MyBloop Download
  3. A box will automatically popup to download the file. :) You have to run the bookmarklet while viewing the MyBloop site, otherwise they think that someone is hotlinking to a file and they don’t let you download it.
    MyBloop Download

As you can see it is a piece of cake to download songs or videos from the vast selection that users have uploaded, but I’m sure MyBloop will be catching on sooner or later and will change the way their system works. The nice thing with using MyBloop to download the songs is that you can listen to them before you take the time to put them on your PC. So go play around, search for some music, and have a ball downloading!

Oh yeah, and no downloading anything you don’t own! Almost forgot to say that. :)

MyBloop Homepage

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Twitter is Exploding in Popularity, but wait, what is it?

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

TwitterYou’re probably already sick of the word Twitter. I know, I’m just about at that point too. It wasn’t long ago that I hadn’t even heard of it, but lately it seems to have exploded in popularity. I was getting sick of seeing the word “Twitter” everywhere I went, yet I really didn’t know what it was. Yesterday I decided to search around and read up on the thousands of people writing about it. In case you are unfamiliar like I was, here’s Twitter in a nutshell:

  • Twitter calls themselves a community of friends (and strangers) who answer the question, “What are you doing?”
  • You can constantly update your friends with your answer to the above mentioned question by phone, IM, or on the Web.
  • You’re given 140 characters (it’s not much) to get your message across.

With everybody answering that one simple question, “what are you doing”, it’s a lazy way to keep in touch with your friends.  It eliminates the need to call your friends to see how they are doing, or what they’re up to because they’ll have already answered that question with an informal, impersonal Twitter message.

Do you really need or want to know what everybody is doing? I don’t know about you, but I’m okay with not knowing when someone is stuck in a traffic jam, or when they’ve stopped at the grocery store. I’m sure there are also plenty of instances of TMI (too much information) that people could do without.

I think part of the explosion occurred at SXSW where hundreds of people were using Twitter and talking about it. And it seems that either people love it, or they don’t. There’s really no in-between. If you must stay connected at the hip with everybody around you, this would probably be the best way. It’s also being used for “micro-blogging” with short snippet posts (remember, only 140 characters) using SMS.

While I haven’t used it, the idea of updating my life for everyone to see isn’t really my thing. I like personal phone messages with friends and family to get updates, not text messages. Despite this, I could see some benefits to using it.

If you have a question that you don’t know the answer to, you could easily send it out to all of your friends and get multiple responses back. For example, if you’re going out for dinner and you want to know what the best Thai restaurant is in town, just ask, and then get all of your friends responses back.Another benefit might be if you’re hanging out with a group of people for a night out on the town, Twitter would be a good way to keep track of everybody and where they’re at.

If you’re not a Twitter user yet, but it sounds intriguing, Webware put together a Newbie’s Guide to Twitter so that you can get yourself caught-up with the frenzie.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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