Recent Links » March 2008

• Upgrade to Wordpress 2.5 - Mar 31, 2008 → Wordpress is now at version 2.5 (a leap from 2.3.3), this post gives you the real skinny on what’s hot with the new release, including one-click plugin upgrades and more. #
• UK broadband bans file sharing, offers usenet binaries - Mar 31, 2008 → If I were writing this a day later, I’d assume it was an April Fool’s joke. But broadband cable ISP Virgin Media is set to go after illegal file sharers, despite having upped its bandwidth to individuals massively over recent months. But even more ironically, it’s going to offer a 7-day latency usenet system to users, which means they’ll be able to get all the illegal files they want without worrying about legal comeback from copyright holders. #
• Comcast promises net neutrality - Mar 27, 2008 → Comcast is to work with Bit Torrent to lift the ban on torrent traffic that it claimed was causing too much congestion on its systems. #
• The foundations of OpenSocial - Mar 25, 2008 → Yahoo!, MySpace, and Google are joining with the broader community to create a non-profit foundation to foster the continued open development of OpenSocial - OpenSocial.org #
• OpenOffice ver 3 - Mar 22, 2008 → Version 3 of OpenOffice could be the Microsoft Office killer we’ve been waiting for. Check out the sneak preview. #
• BBC iPlayer rumors - Mar 22, 2008 → BBC iPlayer has unfettered itself from the shackles of DRM and so you can now stream BBC programming on your iPhone, but rumors from BBC iPlayer boss suggests that they’re about to launch yet another version that will give users of another gadget access. My bet is on the Nintendo Wii. Here’s hoping. #
• Do Not Reply - Mar 22, 2008 → Have you ever replied to a corporate missive that was ostensibly from notread@donotreply.com? If you did then Chet Faliszek of www.donotreply.com will have got your message. You just have to hope it wasn’t too sensitive. #
• Auction Inquisitor - Mar 21, 2008 → Auction Inquisitor sniffs out slippery sellers on ebay by doing the history and feedback searches you probably don’t have the time to do and so saving you a lot of heartache when you finally fire up Jaybird ebay sniper to grab that bargain at the last minute. #
• Social bookmarking for scientists - Mar 20, 2008 → Hotcites exploits the collective intelligence of scientists to determine what papers are attracting their attention by scraping Nature’s Connotea scientific social bookmarking system #
• Prase - Page Rank Assisted Search Engine - Mar 19, 2008 → Praise for Prase (it’s web 2.0, dontcha know?). Actually, it is an interesting tool, although the fundamental meta search concept is years old and has been implemented before in a lesser form. What Prase brings to the table is searching with Pagerank/rank as a parameter. #
• Get the big picture - Mar 18, 2008 → Computer team atUniversity College London created a piece of software that cuts up Google maps (or any very, very large) and allows it to be displayed on a website without the page taking hours to download. Your visitors can then pan and zoom across panoramas you display, for instance. #
• Defraggler - Mar 17, 2008 → From the people who brought you CCleaner and Recuva, comes a new file-by-file defragmentation program - Defraggler. It sounds like some kind of Muppet, but it most certainly isn’t. #
• Social capital grows online - Mar 17, 2008 → As if you didn’t already know, researchers have now demonstrated that technical support communities have grown online, way beyond their real-world counterparts. Another from the Journal of the Bleeding Obvious. #
• Poor Phorm - Mar 17, 2008 → Inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee, has announced he will change internet provider rather than have his surfing habits tracked by companies like Phorm. Phorm has courted controversy with its tracking system for British Telecom that will follow your every move on the internet and serve up purportedly more relevant ads. Haven’t they heard of cookie cutters, AdBlockPlus and NoScript for Firefox. #
• LinkedIn Goes Facebook - Mar 14, 2008 → You can now let your LinkedIn contacts know what you’re up to, but this is not the frippery of Facebook status alerts where you might tell your friends you’re paintballing, the LinkedIn equivalent is to let your contacts know what you’re working on, with the emphasis on the work. #
• Blogger help videos - Mar 14, 2008 → Google launches Youtube help channel for Blogspot Bloggers who don’t like reading help files and FAQs. #
• AOL buys Bebo - Mar 13, 2008 → News just in via Crenk.com - online dinosaur AOL has bought infantile Bebo for $850 million cash. #
• Emotionally hard-hitting headlines - Mar 12, 2008 → Check whether your headlines pack emotional punch before you submit that blog post. This headline scored in the 30-40% bracket, which is roughly what most professional copywriters would achieve, hitting 50-75% is a gift. #
• Free advertising for file sharers - mar 12, 2008 → A court just ruled that Israel’s largest ISPs must block access to HttpShare, a BitTorrent and http file sharing site. Thanks to this novel bit of “IFPI advertising”, the site is busier than ever, and had to upgrade its hardware to cope! #
• WordPress 2.5 delayed, thankfully - Mar 11, 2008 → Having spent the last few days sorting out server issues and shifting Sig Figs to a new host, I was damned if I was going to do another Wordpress upgrade, even with WPAU! Thankfully, the release of the fully fledged ver 2.5 has been put back a week. #
• Backup your GMail - Mar 11, 2008 → Google’s Matt Cutts explains the ins and outs of backing up your GMail with Linux/Unix or via Thunderbird or Outlook. #
• WordPress permission - Mar 10, 2008 → If you’ve been trying to comment on Sig Figs lately and getting error messages, you will be pleased to know, I’ve spotted the fatal flaw in the system and hopefully fixed it, thanks to this reference which mentions 755 for folders/directories and 644 for files! #
• Beware Nigerians bearing text links - Mar 6, 2008 → Nigerian fraudsters have moved on from ludicrous phishing trips that, even more ludicrously, some people actually fall for. Now, they’re targeting bloggers and webmasters with requests to place text links ads and then spinning them a curve with a rubber check! #
• Your first date with Googlebot → Going on a first date with Googlebot? Mmmmake sure you dress your look - and just right to make a good first impression. #
• Higher Res YouTube video hack - Mar 6, 2008 → Just add “Add &fmt=18″ to the end of a youtube URL (without the quotes) and for some newer video uploads you will get to see an MP4-encoded version, with better audio and a 480×360 resolution. “&fmt=6″ is a lesser hack that bumps up res to 448×336. Meanwhile, there’s now Firefox extension to make use of the new YT features - http://snurl.com/213n7 #
• Epic end to chip piracy - Mar 6, 2008 → The chips will be truly down if a new locking system developed at the University of Michigan catches on. The hardware lock will be built into computer chip designs and only unlocks after a call back to the patent owners. Any hardware trying to use a knocked off chip built with the same blueprint will be permanently locked down.. #
• Google search teleportation - Mar 6, 2008 → Google has ruled out a search box that appears within search results as you search so that, say you were looking for NASA, but more specifically you wanted to know about the Hubble Space Telescope, you’d normally be teleported to the NASA site if you just search for NASA, but now, a search box shows up so you could search within the SERPs. Sounds more complicated than it is. Give it a try #
• Digital magazine rack - Mar 5, 2008 → AllTop.com is a digital magazine rack from the creators of the infamous Truemors website. More than a standard news aggregator it pulls together categorized feeds helping you find sites you never knew existed and putting a stop to Internet stagnation. #
• Free online Microsoft Office - Mar 4, 2008 → According to Amit Agarwal on Di, Microsoft Office Live Workspace is an online file storage for Documents, PDFs, Spreadsheets and Presentations. It’s now available for everyone without needing an invite (MS playing catchup with Google Apps me thinks). Go fetch! #
• Study computer science at Harvard - Mar 3, 2008 → Harvard, hot on MIT’s heels, has made available it’s 14 lecture computer science course available on the web for free. #
• GrandCentral calls invite - Mar 4, 2008 → GrandCentral is a free service from Google that allows your blog readers to call your phone or leave voicemail via your blog. It’s currently in beta but you can sign up for a free account via the link, if you’re in the US. #
• Study computer science at Harvard - Mar 3, 2008 → Harvard, hot on MIT’s heels, has made available it’s 14 lecture computer science course available on the web for free. mp3 and other formats, makes more listening sense than a pile of Amy Winehouse downloads. #
• Amazon mp3 downloads - Mar 3, 2008 → If you’re on Linux and been itching to get at Amazon’s mp3 downloads then your time has come (but only if you’re in the US). #

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