Gadgetell | Tech News, Reviews, and Interesting Things

“Pics show beauty topless, kissing married TV star”..
“Reality show couple calls it quits"…
“Star is skin and bones on red carpet”...or if you don’t like that anorexically-inclined headline, try “Skinny actress frumpy in white"…
“One busy, hot mama tells how to get in shape quickly"…

At 10:30 p.m. PST on July 15, 2008 - the end of a day that saw more stomach-churning stock market volatility, more violent death in Iraq and Afghanistan and closer poll results in the presidential race - the front page of AOL showed some, shall we say, interesting priorities among those who are making the news judgment calls and authorizing the headlines at this major portal.

Not that Yahoo! or MSN, viewed at the same time, were in danger of being confused with PBS’s “Newshour with Jim Lehrer.” It’s just that AOL seemed to be taking most of its news cues lately from its sister entertainment/celebrity gossip website TMZ.com. 

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As the ads for the drug Cymbalta say, “Depression hurts.” A new study out of the University of Bristol suggests that doing a web search for information about a certain permanent solution is not a good idea.  The search engines that were used were Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask.  For each search engine, 12 searches using simple terms were performed, and the top 10 results of each search were taken for a total of 480 search results in the study.  Sadly, only 13% of the results were about suicide prevention, and the top 3 hits for each search engine were pro-suicide (the fourth was Wikipedia).  According to the researchers, it appears that safety controls by ISP’s aren’t as effective as they should be and that rather, search engine optimization is the way to go.

The 12 search terms were not given in the Reuters article, and obviously search terms make all the difference as to what results turn up.  However, since the researchers were trying to put themselves in the shoes of someone contemplating suicide, the last thing they would think about is how advanced the query is.  I could also see why they used only the four search engines and didn’t include some of the original search engines such as AltaVista, Lycos, and Excite to get some more results, because the four search engines are what people most likely use.  But of the four search engines, MSN ranked highest for suicide prevention and support sites, so to me this is saying that going with an underdog yields more responsible results.  Of course though I think everyone would agree that if you rely on the Internet for information, it’s best to go directly to a trusted health website and bypass the search engines altogether, or if you don’t know of any dedicated health websites, to get help offline the old-fashioned way.

Read [Revolution Health]

Movie trailers are one of the most popular forms of online video downloads. Keeping this in mind, Philips has collaborated with MSN Movies to offer the first online movie trailer viewings in Ambilight (you know, the colored lights that emit from the rear of the TV to “expand the picture"). Even better is that these trailers are offered in HD with Ambilight backlighting.

Visitors to the Ambilight online experience on MSN Movies will see two to three new trailers added each week from major Hollywood studios including 20th Century Fox, Universal, New Line Cinema and others. This is currently part of a three-month trial in the United States but may be expanded internationally in the future.

This launch also coincides with the production of the one millionth Ambilight television.

Check it out [MSN]

Like Quintura, Zeedex gives you suggestions to help you search, but they come from users instead of a computer, and are categorized in lists to navigate them. When you are searching, you do a search for a topic you want to learn about and then Zeedex will pop up lists of terms related to your search. If you find a term you’re interested in, you can click on it to add it to your search box. Each list is a mini-wiki that can be edited, rolled-back, etc.

Example: Let’s say you are searching for “guitars.” Zeedex might return a list of famous guitar players, guitar manufacturers, or songs with great guitar solos. Looking at the Guitar Players list, you click the box next to “Jimi Hendrix.” That term is now added to your search box, and when you search again, you will see results for Guitars and Jimi Hendrix.

The preference between the two engines all comes down to if you are a more visual or analytical person. Either way, Zeedex and Quitura can teach Google/Yahoo/MSN a thing or two about search and how to stay ahead of the curve.

Search [Zeedex]

So you are talking to your friends have 3 other programs open and really need to get some info. The normal reaction would be to open yet another program, either Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari… But why be forced to do that, your IM client is already connected to the internet, wouldn’t it be great to search within it. Kozoru, a new internet start-up, is trying to do just that. Users will select their sources in advance, Wikipedia, news sites, shopping sites, etc. Kozoru then conducts a general search on one of the major search engines, extracts the relevant links from the preselected sources, and delivers them into the chat window.

Most likely, users will primarily use this while on a Treo handheld or some other mobile device. Kozoru launched a public beta of the service on June 5. Right now, it is compatible only with AOL’s AIM service, but the company expects its technology to work with chat clients from Yahoo, MSN, Google and Jabber.

Update: Now anybody who has Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo Messenger and any client that supports the Jabber/XMPP protocol (like Google Talk) can use byoms.

Read [News.com]

Plantronics introduced the Voyager 510-USB, the first Bluetooth headset system optimized for VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) that provides instant wireless connectivity to PC-based softphones. The Voyager 510-USB includes a plug-and-play Bluetooth USB adapter that eliminates cumbersome software setup processes and enables you to place hands-free calls through any VoIP service with one easy step. In addition, Voyager 510-USB features multipoint technology to allow users to switch between multiple Bluetooth-enabled devices, including softphones and mobile phones, with the touch of a button.

The headset has noise-cancelling technology, wind-reduction, is lightweight, foldable, one-touch answer/end, voice activated dialing, usable on either ear, 6 hours of talk time, and 100 hours of standby. The Voyager 510-USB is also compatible with most popular consumer Internet telephony services, including AOL, MSN and Yahoo!.The system comes with a convenient desktop charging stand, USB charging cable, three-foot USB extension cable and AC charger.

The Voyager 510-USB has a MSRP of $199 and will be available in June 2006.

Read [Press Release]
Read [Product Page]

Apple, the company that has sold itself as the pure alternative to big business (specifically Microsoft), will be adding graphic ads to iTunes to increase their revenue stream. The introduction of ads could be the first step to allowing ads in other content areas or on iPods. Apple CEO Steve Jobs has supported the idea of ad-supported podcasts, so adding a visual component to the existing audio ads isn’t much of a stretch.

While users typically don’t tend to mind today’s advertising tactics (everyone you know is using MSN, Google, and are reading blogs), adding ads to a service that was previously pure (iTunes) or when you have your headphones in and are trying to unplug from the world (iPod/MP3 player) doesn’t typically fair well with consumers.

That may be why Apple’s current plans call for the ads to appear only in the lower-left corner of the iTunes library while users listen to podcasts from their computers rather than from portable devices. But it’s a big step for the service, which has so far limited ad intrusions to audio spots embedded in some of the podcasts offered via iTunes. ESPN Radio, which supplies some of iTunes’ most popular ad-supported sports podcasts, is working with the service on the new advertising offering.

For now, the TV networks are making money from iTunes’ ad-free model, charging viewers $1.99 to download an episode of a show. J.P. Morgan analyst Spencer Wang estimates the networks make $1.44 per iTunes sale compared to 57 cents per viewer in ad revenue for every episode aired on broadcast TV. Even still these networks are testing their own ad avenues. ABC is going to offer free versions of several of the same shows it sells on iTunes on its own site with ads that can’t be skipped. NBC will launch free original Webisodes this summer of its hit “The Office.” AOL’s In2TV plans to offer free, ad-supported original fare and just signed a distribution deal with A&E Network.

Not only does iTunes face distribution from content owners’ sites, it will soon face competition from other digital download sites. Amazon has announced it will enter the game, and MTV is weeks away from the Beta test of Urge, the digital media service it created with Microsoft.

I guess it all comes down to whether consumers prefer to pay for convenience and portability or just want free content but whenever they can get it.

Read [Ad Age]

The MSN team is working on a new Windows Live service, code-named Live Drive, that will provide users with a virtual hard drive for storing hosted personal data. Google is currently developing similar technology, code-named Gdrive.

Google’s Gdrive solution is expected to provide both consumers and business customers with an unlimited amount of online storage for their data. Microsoft, likewise, has shared few specifics about Live Drive.

Microsoft, in an attempt to spread the word about Windows Live, has struck a deal with 72 colleges all across the world. The colleges have agreed to let Microsoft host their student’s e-mail accounts. Windows Live@edu, as the service is called, will allow university students to keep their existing e-mail addresses but use Windows Live Mail as their client. Students won’t have to deal with ads because Microsoft has agreed to turn them off for those specific accounts, at least until the students graduate.

Back in February, Google made a deal with San José City College which allowed the school’s students to use Gmail as their client, but that was just one school with 10,000 students and also have Google domain for your business, where businesses can utilize the Gmail service.

Read [Fox News]
Read [Ars Technica]

T-mobile was the only major carrier that did not have a 8700 Blackberry model. This past week they added the Blackberry 8700G to their handset lineup. The 8700G has EDGE technology, a 312 MHz Intel processor, Quad Band GSM connectivity, a QVGA color display, QWERTY keypad, instant messenger (AOL, Yahoo, MSN and ICQ), and Bluetooth 2.0. It also provides 4 hours of talktime and 16 days of standby time.

The phone is available for a price tag of $299 after rebates. Dimensions are 4.3 x 2.7 x 4.7 and the unit weights 4.7oz.

Read [New Launches]

There are currently a few companies out there that have some really great, prospective search technologies. These features can benefit a Google, MSN, and more. Riya is looking to add facial recognition techniques, Podzinger searches audio within Podcasts, and blinkx searches primarily video (besides other formats).  Read on for the full story.

First up is Riya, a CA based company that is currently working on facial recognition techniques. Actually as we speak the beat version of the software is being released to test users. You open your pictures folder to the system and it ‘scans’ your photos. Then is prompts you to identify the people in the photos and saves this information. Like any other network (such as the web) the product functionality and performance increases as the number of users on the system and identified faces in the system. AS this increases the company hopes to let you search for a person or character and it or another search engine return the correct results (Unlike today’s photo searches that only rely on the text tags manually entered as the filename, not the file itself).

Podzinger analyzes the sound waves in Podcasts to help you search through the millions out there, without having to listen to everyone. This is obviously extremely beneficial. Unfortunately, it does not understand the context of the information presented, but it does allow you to listen to portions of the podcasts that it found. “When you type in a word or terms, PODZINGER not only finds the relevant podcasts, but also highlights the segment of the audio in which they occurred. By clicking anywhere on the results, the audio will begin to play just where you clicked.  There are also controls that let you back up, pause, or forward through the podcast. Or you can download the entire podcast.”

Finally, blinkx started to hit the radar when Google, Yahoo, and MSN launched their video search functions. Unfortunately, the major three only searched, that’s right, the text (or metadata) not the video files themselves. Blinkx actually made deals with various stations to analyze their video content and attach metadata tags to the video for advanced search functions. Since I have last looked at them, their video search capabilities have drastically improved and they have worked their way up to version 3.5, adding MS office files, podcasts, mp3s, PDFs, blogs, iTunes, and more.

It will be interesting to watch these companies evolve, as they become acquired, die, or go public in the future. There are many companies that have developed these same features and more but these are just three that have been grabbing my attention.