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Are game system web surfers an untapped market?
We're not really that big on the whole web browsing on a gaming system thing -- the home computer does a fine job for most of our 'net surfing needs. There must be some people out there who disagree though, because a recent press release from sci-fi eBook provider NextGenBooks reveals that "over half of its traffic coming from Nintendo Wii, DS and Sony PS3 and PSP users."Perhaps this isn't too surprising, given that the site offers optimized versions of its free eBooks for all four systems (and the site's overall traffic doesn't even cause a blip on monitoring sites like Alexa). Still, the explosion of game-system-browser-friendly versions of everything from YouTube to Virgin Radio to porn sites seems to show that at least some people think the surfing-on-a-system audience is going to be big big big.Do you use your favorite game console for web browsing? Are you perhaps reading this on your favorite system right now? Or do you think the web is meant for computers?
TUAW Exclusive: Skitch screenshot gallery
We've been blogging Skitch, a new 'hybrid' photo editing and web services tool from plasq (makers of Comic Life), since Scott first met and fell in love with it at Macworld 07. Using the app through its development, it's clear that Skitch is going to knock people's socks off, with a well-executed blend of desktop editing and integration with web services like Plasq's new MySkitch and Flickr. For example: a major new feature in an upcoming public beta (that's right, I said 'public': join the mailing list for your chance to get a copy) includes iPhoto and Aperture integration: Simply double-click an item from the library panel shown here to begin applying all manners of Skitch editing. Another feature that brings the 'hybrid' element to the table is Skitch's tight integration with web services. Skitch can send pics to FTP, .Mac and even Flickr accounts, but it also integrations with a new MySkitch service that will debut. MySkitch does a lot of interesting things, like giving you embed code for zoomable thumbnails (ideal for the likes of eBay and blogs with thin columns), a direct link for sending in email and even forum-friendly embed code. Skitch doesn't stop there though: you can also remove images from these web services directly from within Skitch, effectively making it a one-stop management shop for your images both local and otherwise.That's enough blabbing about features for now though. The folks at plasq were kind enough to allow us to publish an exclusive Skitch screenshot gallery, and published we have. Check out more screenshots of Skitch's good side, and don't forget to hit up plasq's mailing list for a chance to snag your own copy when they release an upcoming public beta. %Gallery-2528%
Xerox wants to extract demographic information from web surfers
The age of Big Brother everywhere is certainly upon us, and while we've seen (or at least heard of) tracking devices being implanted in the most unusual of places, it looks like Xerox is hoping to join the devilish fray. In an attempt to craft a demographic extractor to garner marketing dollars galore, a recently filed patent application spells out a system that utilizes software (and potentially hardware) to map users to "centroid vectors" which would determine a person's age, sex, and other "private" information simply based on their website visits. Interestingly, test cases are reportedly showing a respectable "75-percent accuracy rate" so long as a "sufficient number of pages were visited." Still, we can't imagine any tracing technology would be lawfully allowed behind the backs of law-abiding citizens (right?), but considering that even your TiVo has the potential to sell your soul to lucrative ad agencies, we wouldn't put it past 'em.[Via ArsTechnica]
Arena comparison tool
I love nifty web tools. Andreas "bds" Thorstensson has created a page that lists the top-rated Arena teams in every bracket, worldwide (or filterable by region). This is nice, but the killer feature for me is the ability to show the top rated players in each class. Using this information, and since everything on this page links to the Armory, I can look into the top 5 players in each class, and see if any trends emerge as far as talent specs. Warrior: Arms/Fury, with all five specced exactly or very close to 35/23/3 Paladin: Holy, with four 41/20/0, one 37/24/0 Hunter: All Marks, ranging from 42 to 50 in Marks with the rest in Survival Rogue: Finally, some variation. Everyone's got at least 25 points in Assassination, but which tree the rest of the points go in varies. Nobody's taken any of the 41-pointers. Priest: Four 28/33/0, one 14/0/47 Shaman: Four 40/0/21, one 0/15/46 -- our first Korean top fiver (careful, the Korean armory loaded very slowly for me; spec mirrored here). Mage: Three 33/0/28, two heavy frost (10/0/51 and 4/12/45) Warlock: more variation. Three destro, one afflic, one demonology. Everyone has a 41-point talent except one of the destro locks. Druid: Everyone has most of their points in Resto, and everyone has at least 11 in Feral. Although three out of five have at least 41 in Resto, only one has Tree of Life. It's a nice page. Go and compare things!
Sandvox 1.1.2 available
Sandvox is the WYSIWYG web editor from the folks at Karelia Software that we've written about before. If you're unfamiliar, it features a nice interface, attractive default templates and simple publishing (choose .Mac or your own host). Today, Karelia announced the availability of version 1.1.2. This version includes a long list of changes and enhancements, including: A greatly improved media browser Enhanced publishing and exporting Memory leaks cleaned up There's more, of course, and you can get the full run-down here. Sandvox requires Mac OS 10.4 or later, is universal and comes in both pro ($79US) and "regular" ($49US) versions.
Armory tools for guilds
I knew the Armory was a good thing. The actual Armory site is already useful enough, letting me check out party members' specs so I don't have to ask "are you imp sap," etc. But being as how this is the era of web tools, it's only natural that such a huge data source has given rise to a few tools for rearranging that data. We've already seen the awesome signature generator, but I think this is even better.A player going by Antiarc has written a few tools that pull data from the Armory on every character in your guild, and then give you some great tables you can sort in various ways. For instance, I can look at the character stats page and gloat over the fact that I'm the highest Spirit and +healing Priest in my guild, and then look over in the spec column and realize that's because all the other Priests are Shadow (besides one level 64). Or if I'm looking to get something crafted, I could call up the profession comparison page, and see who's put in the effort to get a Jewelcrafter up there. Finally, if I'm looking to see who can join me in some thrilling Heroics, or just who's got way too much time on their hands, I can check their standing with the various factions.Due to the fact that these scripts do pull down and process quite a bit of data, they take a while to run; but the results pages are static, so once you've generated your results you can share the link around and it'll load quickly. If you just want to see what the pages look like, please do use the preview pages to avoid undue server stress.By the way, if Antiarc's site goes down or just to spread the load around, there's a mirror here. Now go forth and compare![thanks, jbob, for sending this one in!]
Nintendo's web stats soar above rivals'
What do you do when you can't get a Wii? You stare at pictures of it. Nintendo's hardware shortage has likely encouraged a startling boost in web traffic for the company. According to data from Nielsen & NetRatings, Nintendo.com's unique visitor count reached 2.08 million in January, up 82% from last year's count.The numbers were enough to trump both PlayStation.com (1.55 million uniques) and Xbox.com (1.5 million uniques) -- and land Nintendo.com in seventh place among the top computer hardware manufacturer sites. Nintendo also recorded the third longest browsing time per visit at 19 minutes and 29 seconds. Despite Nintendo's web growth, Apple.com proved it was still the destination for lustful consumers, recording 43.51 million unique visitors, who averaged 79 minutes and 25 seconds of perusing. It's called the iPhone.[Via Gamasutra]
Five iWeb Shareware Alternatives
Over at Informit, Ryan Faas posts about five shareware alternatives to iWeb. I spent a bit of time using iWeb when it first shipped but quickly abandoned it when it became clear how slow and clunky it was as a development tool. Although iWeb produces some beautiful pages, it wasn't useful enough for me to make up for its operational difficulties. So it was nice to stumble across this list of alternatives including programs like Sandvox and RapidWeaver and revisit a space that I had more or less already written off.
Hackers attempt to break the internet, fail miserably
Alright folks, you should all be well aware by now that the internet ain't nothin' to mess with, but apparently a few folks in the South Korea area have just learned that the hard way. In what is being called the most severe attack on the web since the barrage of 2002, the same 13 "root servers" were targeted within the past 24 hours in a presumed attempt to disrupt global network traffic. Hackers were able to "briefly overwhelm" three of the 13 computers managing virtual thoroughfare with a series of "powerful attacks lasting as long as 12 hours," and while even the Homeland Security Department confirmed that it had witnessed "anomalous" internet traffic, most of the digital world hummed along without a care. Motives for the attack still aren't clear, but initial reports are suggesting that extortion of data or other malicious intent is probably unlikely, and what's more probable is a few folks trying to disguise data coming from South Korea were just having a bit of frowned-upon fun. Now, who else in the world thinks they can single handedly dismantle the internet?
Attributor software scours the internet for copyrighted material
While we can't argue the usefulness of sites like YouTube, certain content "owners" have some (understandable) beef with their media (or text, etc.) being passed around the internet like hors d'oeuvres at a reception. While scanning programs aren't exactly new, Attributor Corp. is hoping to cash in on the recent push to eliminate unlicensed content from floating around so freely. The company's yet-to-be-named software purportedly scans the internet for specific "digital fingerprints" tailored to a client's media, and can sniff out occurrences with "as little as a few sentences of text or a few seconds of audio / video." The firm says that it will have "over 10 billion web pages" in its index before the end of the year, presumably implanting fear in the hearts of dubious uploaders everywhere. Of course, the company could stand to make hefty profits by extracting portions of royalties companies and individuals are able to garner thanks to its eagle-eyed software, and also hopes to "encourage more owners to put their content online with confidence that they'll be able to police its use and share in any profits." Although Attributor has started testing the system already, it won't be officially available until "the first quarter of 2007," and more notably, it won't be sweeping those oh-so-dodgy P2P networks anyway (at least initially).[Via Slashdot]
Opera Mini 3.0 unleashed
For those of us still using dumbphones (and even some of us with the smart variety), Opera Mini is just about the best thing out there for doing us some web surfin' on the road. Version 2.0 of the Java-based browser is pretty darn good, but 3.0 has just hit the streets and it's offering up some key improvements. Top on the list are comprehensive support for RSS feeds, inline uploading of pictures snapped using the phone's camera, and streamlined connection handling that should lead to faster browsing. Perhaps the most intriguing new feature, though, is something Opera calls "content folding" whereby long content on a page is automatically collapsed with a "plus" sign -- great for long-winded sites not necessarily designed with a phone browser in mind.[Via jkOnTheRun]
Start building your Wii site
WiiNintendo.net is assembling a thorough guide for all y'all web designers interested in tailoring your sites for Wii's Opera browser. The initial entry reveals that the Wii Shop Channel displays at 608x456 pixels, although the browser will be capable of displaying in 640x480 resolution. If you want to be consistent with Nintendo's apparent tastes, make sure your site scales properly to the 608-pixel width.The guide also provides samples of Nintendo's choice of buttons, information about the Wii font, and some Javascript and CSS files. Future guide updates will focus on Javascript performance, Flash, sound, cursors, Wiimote buttons, zooming, selecting, and Wii standards. The next update is scheduled for later today.
New Leopard Build Introduces New Feature, Tweaks
The latest build of Leopard, (9A303) introduced some small but nifty features to the list of enhancements that will ship with the new OS next year. Lets take a look: QuickLook is a new feature which allows users to view a full size preview of any image by right clicking on it, without having to open up the full Preview application. The workflow for creating Dashboard Web Clips has changed. Instead of having to first open Dashboard, users can now create Web Clips directly within Safari. When connecting a new external storage device, Leopard will ask you if would like to use the drive as a Time Machine backup drive. The Spaces switching dialog is now a glossy black. Small news, but news none the less, and we'll take anything we can get until we see some new announcements from Mr. Jobs himself.
Today's hottest game video: PS3 web browser in action
We're leapfrogging to spot number three tonight, because the top slots are currently being pwned by the Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess trailer (117,537 views!) and the intro video that we've already hit. Coming up a distant third (a paltry 27,797 by comparison) is the PlayStation 3 web browser in hot, glorious video action.Some of the cool features are that you can have six browser sessions active at any given time, you can punch in addresses and text using the controller, a usb keyboard or *snap* a bluetooth keyboard. Slickest of all is the ability to use the left analog stick as your mouse, FTW! It will be pretty sweet to surf the web between gaming sessions, but it would be even sweeter to be able to upload screenshots of yourself owning someone online to a website using the browser. Give us some kind of smacktalk feature, Sony. We're gonna need it.
United Nations "Internet" Summit held sans internet
Do you lose any and all direction in your life if your internet goes down for more than 20 seconds or so? Sadly, the same goes for us, but imagine the hysteria that ensued when participants realized the United Nations "Internet" summit was completely devoid of web access. Amazingly enough, the one conference where free WiFi was all but guaranteed failed to deliver, as the techies working for the "luxury resort hotel on the Athenian Riveria" couldn't iron out the connectivity issues. The hotspot initially presented the dreaded "could not connect to the network" error, and after repeated troubleshooting efforts were completed in vain, conference organizers apparently gave up on ever finding a solution. So, are you rethinking that decision to pick up one of those snazzy 3G ExpressCards yet?
Homebrew: Okiwi web browser
Pedro J. Estébanez, a homebrewster who we assume is too frugal to purchase the already-available Opera browser, is apparently hard at work on creating a homebrew browser. Meant to cost users nothing, this browser, dubbed Okiwi, is to support .pdf files, JavaScript, file uploading, as well as a few other features. No word on release date as of right now.[Thanks Steve!]
Opera guys talk Wii
Based out of Oslo, Norway, the fine folks at Opera have been hard at work on the Wii's browser. While the company has been tight-lipped about the final features of the Wii's Opera browser, they did manage to let a few things slip. Given that some have considered the DS version of Opera to be a bit lacking, it looks like the browser for the Wii will have all the same features as Opera 9 for PCs and Macs, and stored on the console's Flash ROM. The gang also goes on to say that bookmarks will be supported, as well.
Why wait for Leopard? Get Dash Clipping now
Let's face it: Apple on Monday previewed some really slick new features in the next version of Mac OS X, but they aren't going to let us get our hands on them until some time next spring. Even though that's technically 6 months or so away, that's really like a few years when translated into computer industry years. So why wait for Leopard?Some of the features in the upcoming Mac OS X 10.5 either already exist in present applications (as Dan pointed out), or developers have been inspired from Monday's keynote and are producing their own versions, with Web Clippings as our first example. The developer of Shrook looked at this new tool, realized that it's utilizing a fairly simple trick and whipped together his own Dash Clippings tool.After playing with this for a bit, I can say it more or less works very similarly to the Web Clippings tool demoed in the keynote. You enter a URL into the widget, and it loads up the page. You then drag the widget to the proper size and over the specific area of the page you want to clip, and presto - you've just made yourself a live, dynamic web clipping tool that will check the page for updates as often as you tell it to.Hey, who says Apple is the only company that can use the "good artists copy, great artists" steal philosophy? Once you're done answering that (or not), go snag yourself a copy of Dash Clippings and check one drool-inducing feature off your Leopard shopping list.
Google releases Mac photo uploader for Picasa Web Albums
No, Google hasn't brought Picasa to Mac OS X, but they did release two tools to let Mac users upload photos to their Picasa Web Albums service (think: 'Google does Flickr'). The first app (honesty a bit of a surprise) is a full-on plugin for iPhoto to let users upload their images right from within Apple's popular photo-management app. The second tool is a good ol' fashioned stand-alone uploader for those who want to fly solo.I've never used the service before myself, though I signed up when Google first opened it up (I like to make myself available, when possible). I just took the iPhoto plugin for a spin and it works well, though I don't think Picasa Web Albums is aimed at your typical Flickr user (its largest and most obvious potential competitor). Most of the social aspects of Flickr, such as tagging, groups, etc., don't exist in Picasa Web Albums - it seems much more geared to those who mainly want a place to upload their photos online, with a simple gallery that is easy to link family and friends to (it's also obviously geared towards Picasa users on Windows too). Users can chose whether to make uploaded albums public or private, which is where one of Picasa Web Albums' social features comes into play: users do have the ability to set other users as favorites in order to more easily view images and albums they upload (though, strangely, I can't seem to find any kind of public area where I can go hunting for other users). On the downside, however, Picasa Web Albums only offers a measly 250MB of storage space for free, with a $25 upgrade option for an extra 6GB of space.All in all this is a handy service and the new tools are a great gesture on Google's part towards the Mac community. However, due to Flickr's overwhelming popularity (especially among Mac users) and a seeming lack of integration with other Google tools (where are my GmailThis! and BlogThis! buttons?), I think Picasa Web Albums has a little ways to go before it gains any significant interest among Mac users.
OS X browser test, fourth edition
After reading this article, I'm simply giddy with self-righteous indignation for all the people who have ever told me I was silly for paying money for a browser. The guys over at macintalk have revived their popular Macintosh browser shootout and re-tested all of the competitors using the latest universal binaries of Firefox, Camino, Safari, WebKit, and the OmniWeb 5.5 beta. As many of you might expect, Firefox, the PC favorite, lagged behind all other browsers tested in the speed tests, with its sleek sibling Camino not scoring much better. The two gecko browsers also failed to render the Acid2 test properly, while OmniWeb and Safari/WebKit passed with flying colors.Now, I don't want anyone to get the idea that I'm bashing Firefox and Camino. Camino will always have a place in my dock to handle all of the sites that WebKit can't, but I much prefer OmniWeb for my day-to-day usage, and the test results seem to agree with me.[Via Creativebits]
