Internet Salsa

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

On Vacation

Hey Folks..
I m still here but on vacation.
I will be back soon.

Till Then take care.

Thursday, March 23, 2006

Where do you get your news from?

Where do you get your news from? Do you get your news from your local newspaper/TV, national paper/TV or the Internet?

With growing number of Internet users, many are getting their news via Internet. According to the survey done by Pew Internet and American Life Project, there are about 70 percent of Americans have internet access, and half of those (74 million) have faster internet connection.

Below is some of the figures reported by the study:

Out of 40% of broadband users,

  • 71% had used internet for their source of news
  • 59% used local television
  • 53% cited radio

Based on Age :

  • Broadband users under 36 are most likely to get news online than the older folks who uses internet
  • 43% of those over 50 are getting news online

Foreign Sources:

  • Due to the faster connection people have been using foreign sites such as BBC and Al-Jazeera to get news

So is it affecting other medias such as local news papers, local TVs, etc with more and more people getting their news online? I don't think so, because we have to remember that the local news paper, and local TVs also have their websites with up to date news. And the people are using such sites as well. May be the question could be--Is it affecting the advertisers who is advertising on local news papers/Tvs?

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Google Finance!!! Whats Next?

Google has introduced yet another section-- and its "Finance." You can now visit http://finance.google.com to get into the finance world and can learn more about their Finance section. Most of you know that Google started as a simple search engine and over the years it has been adding many more services.

Google Finance according to its website says that it is in beta phase, and provides a "broad range of information about North American stocks, mutual funds and public and private companies along with charts, news and fundamental financial data. "

Their website claims that it has some specific features, but I didn't find anything special about this section. I still prefer Yahoo's finance section. The finance section at Google is pretty simple and the content on the front page is basically the headlines from various sources.

However, it might be better for bloggers since Google Finance displays blog posts, when you search for information on any company. This can be a big promotion for good bloggers. Well Good Bloggers don't need that much of a promotion but still helps a lot.

I guess the Google Finance will start featuring Advertisements.

So lets see what's next? I guess Google will be coming with new interface now that they gave many features already on the roll..

Sunday, March 19, 2006

A Town will be on Sale again on Ebay!!!

Just couple of days ago I had mentioned about a town being auctioned at Ebay. Now the same town will be back for sale at Ebay in April. The opening bid will be $1,750,000.

The town called Bridgeville was first auctioned at Ebay and ended up with a winning bid of about $1.7 million. However, the winner didn't get the town, because the seller didn't disclose information about the poor condition of the town. Later in May 2004, Bruce and Elisa Krall bought the town for $700,000.

The town of 25 people have been maintained with big investment from the current owners. Current owners are selling it due to some family reasons.

Details such as history, opportunities, property overview/description/investment opportunities are mentioned on its website.

The town which is about 83 acres has its own Zip code 95526.

Friday, March 17, 2006

".XXX" Domains for Porn Sites

Are you a Kiss fan? I mean the musical group "Kiss." If you are, then you might have heard of a song called "Lets put X in sex."

Well now the senators are proposing for ".XXX" domains for porn sites. Basically they do not want porn sites to be associated with popular domains such as .com, .net, .gov, .edu, .org. I am not sure there are sex/porn sites with .edu or .org domains. But you get the idea here...The other point they are making is that by providing ".XXX" domains; it will be more easy for parents to monitor their kids from visiting porn sites.

Not a bad idea, but I think it might lure kids to sneak in and visit such sites since ".XXX" sounds spicy.


Source: Yahoo News

Thursday, March 16, 2006

Who was selling Canadian Military Items on Ebay?

I have to tell you that Internet/Online can be crazy at times. I m sure you have noticed that too.

You have heard about under wears being sold on EBay. I mean used under wears. Have you heard a town being auctioned at EBay? I don't want to continue with the list..You get the idea.

This morning I read about Canadian military uniform and equipment being put up for sale at Ebay.com. It has however taken off from EBay now. Canadian military is investigating the incident.

So who is putting on EBay? How did he/she get the item (unless the military personnel themselves putting the items on sale)? Don't EBay monitor such stuff?

May be luggage got lost in the airport and whoever later found it thought that by putting on EBay would make him some money..Who knows?

Canadian uniform is unique. George MacLean, an international security analyst said "Canadian military uniforms would be highly coveted because of their pixilated pattern, which makes them difficult to see even with night vision equipment."
I hope they work harder to prevent such incidence to occur in the future. According to the report, this is not the first time since this happened.

How about EBay? Don't they monitor such stuff? I guess they care less since they are overwhelmed with millions/billions of transactions that take place every day. They should have one big security department that monitors suspicious items being put for sale.

Tuesday, March 14, 2006

Don't worry Be Happy..You have one another Search Engine to Use

Have you heard of "Accoona.com"? Well, its another search engine that was launched in 2004. Their logo looks similar to Google.com....well not exactly but both of have two Os.
According to its website, word Accoona is derived from the Swahili phrase "Hakuna Matata," which means "Don't worry be happy."

Privately held Accoona.com said that it "uses a heavy dose of artificial intelligence to find results that Google and other search sites may miss."

Unlike Google and Yahoo, Accoona is based in Jersey City. According to New York Times, the site started in China "as a partnership between the China Daily Information Company, the official English-language news site of the Chinese government, and China Communications Corporation, a search technology company."

They were trying to take advantage of the upcoming Olympics in China making e-commerce between China and USA easy which led to the creation of a search engine.

I also tested the site, and I m pretty impressed with the result I got. The site also says that it returns only relevant searches even if the the search word do not appear in the result (but the result will be relevant). SO I guess that means it will not produce millions of search results including bogus ones.

Another feature is that it links advertisers with its potential customers. For instance if you search for an electrician then it will also give you an option to be contacted by electricians. You will need to provide your contact information if you are interested in the service so that the highest bidder will contact you. Sounds like service auction. Must be tough for smaller guys the money will be limited to bid. So will the big guys (those who spend most) always win?

Still too early to tell how this each engine will compete with Google or Yahoo. Wait!!! Yahoo also has some stake (investment) on Accoona.com!!!

So, "Don't worry be happy" you have one more search engine to use.

Sunday, March 12, 2006

Microsoft is serious about adCenter!!!

It was Amazon.com who waited this long to get started in videos now its Microsoft who is trying to challenge/compete Google and Yahoo.

Based on the article by Daisuke Wakabayashi at Reuters, Microsoft wants to pocket large portion of "15 billion dollar US market for Internet Advertising." Microsoft is going to sell pay-per-click ads similar to that of Yahoo and Google with its new program called "Adcenter." The program was already announced last year but now they are serious about it.

Microsoft is planning to use the ads on Microsoft related sites, and can be beneficial for Microsoft since millions of people are already using its services such as hotmail, and messenger. However, it can be tough to challenge both Yahoo and Google. MSN's search engine is behind Google and Yahoo. MSN generated only $1.4 b compared to that of Google($6B) and Yahoo ($4.6b) in 2005.

Article also mentions that most of the "paid search ads" on Microsoft is handled by Microsoft. I m wondering how that will affect Yahoo when Microsoft wants to go solo.

But it can go in favor of Microsoft also since the online ad market is moving up as Microsoft's Bradford says "The online advertising market is growing at such a rapid pace and we want to participate in some of that, this isn't a winner-take-all proposition."

Saturday, March 11, 2006

Chinese Backstreet Boys

Amazon.com also moving towards movies!!!

Is Amazon.com making a good move when they are actually going to offer movie/TV programs downloads?

According to newsfactor, Amazon.com is in talks with three Hollywood studios (Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios, and Warner Brothers) to come up with a service that would let its customers download the movie and even let them burn on a DVD.

I guess Amazon don't want to be left out in this growing segment. Some of the big players who is already involved include Yahoo, Itunes, and Google.

Elizabeth Millard quotes Michael Goodman, a Yankee Group analyst that "Those coming into the market later have the benefit of having digital-rights-management issues largely sorted out, also, record labels and studios are more involved and willing to sign partnership deals."

How about censoring Porn Sites in China?

Interesting post by Kevin Ohannessian at Fast Company's blog on "the state of Chinese websites."

I agree to what he is saying about the Chinese government who is busy censoring terms that are sensitive towards government, human rights, and not that serious about porn/sex sites.

According to New York Times, "by some estimates, there are more than 30,000 people patrolling the Web in China, helping to form one of the world's far-reaching Internet filtering systems." But how serious are they patrolling the sex sites? I m sure not enough. Who doesn't like porn sites. Sex/porn sites are popping up like mushrooms in China despite the government's effort to crack them down.

So can it be controlled? I don't think so..Please note that China is second to US in number of Internet users. And I m sure its gonna beat US in matter of few years. With such rapid growing number of internet users, it will be impossible to control fully. I guess such sites brings in heavy revenue, due to heavy downloads, and can help China when the owners/businesses involved in such industry pay taxes. I m no expert on how they deal with taxes, but that's just my thought.

Sex do sell at last...

Thursday, March 09, 2006

Robot Monitoring Blogs for Spam

I m finally back..

I was blocked for few days by a robot that Blogger is running. They try to fight spammers. However, it can even attack valid bloggers. You know a robot is not a human so sometimes it acts strange.

After couple of emails with Blogger Staff, I m back on the track.

If you are also facing the same problem then try writing in their help group also.

Monday, March 06, 2006

Try Pronouncing this Domain Name

I didn't want to put the whole domain name in the title of this post due to the length of it.

Here is the domain name..

"llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyll-llantysiliogogogoch.com"

Try saying it. If you want to hear it then click here.

This is an actual working domain name and "It is the World's Longest Single Word Domain Name." The domain was named after a town in North Wales. According to the website, it means "The church of St. Mary in the hollow of white hazel trees near the rapid whirlpool by St. Tysilio's of the red cave in Welsh."

You can even send an email from this site to somebody. You can read more about this domain name and also about the town by visiting to their website.

Please note that this is the longest domain name which is named after a town.

There is however another domain name that is longer than this one but is not a word. Its called
"abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzabcdefghijk.com"

Saturday, March 04, 2006

AOL owns AOLSUCKS.COM

Isn't that interesting?

I m sure you know who/what AOL is. America Online is a divison of Time Warner Inc.

AOL in recent years have seen their members going away. But I don't think that is the reason for owning this domain "AolSucks.com." The domain was created a decade ago. May be AOL don't want its consumers writing against them.

However "AolDontSuck.com" is up for the grab.


You can check for information on AolSucks.com at WHOIS database via Godaddy.com as well.

Friday, March 03, 2006

What do 13 kids from 11 mothers have in common?

So what is your guess? When I first heard that I was like..huh?? All those 13 kids share the same father, but they have no clue who the father is. Not even the mothers know who the father of their kid is. Don't take this in a wrong way.

And best of all, they all found one another through the Internet. All the kids were sired by one donor who goes by the name "Donor 401."

Donorsiblingregistry.com is the website where you can find some details on the donor, when you do a search on "Donor 401." According to the website and the report by "Inside Edition", a donor is
  • German who stands 6' 4"
  • Weight of the donor is 230 lbs
  • Blue Eyes
  • Brown Wavy Hair
  • Has Masters Degree
  • Former football player

Thursday, March 02, 2006

Flaw in GMAIL?

Since Gmail announced that they were going to offer 1 gig space, I was waiting for an invitation to sign up for one. That was in 2004.

Now I have one and been using Gmail a lot. I have both good and bad experiences with Gmail. But I m not going to say at this moment. May be later.

I was reading Yahoo News and found out that a teenager had claimed that he found a flaw in GMAIL. Anthony, a 14 year old blogger, said that when he sent a JavaScript code from a yahoo to gmail account, the code executed whereas when sending from Gmail to Gmail account, the code did not execute.

You can visit his blog to see responses from others on this issue.

Wednesday, March 01, 2006

Microsoft is so confident about its new upcoming Search Engine!!!

Search Engine war ain't over yet. According to a report by David Lawsky at Reuters, the EU president of Microsoft announced that a new search engine by Microsoft will be launched in about 6 months and will beat Google. This is what he said-- "What we're saying is that in six months' time we'll be more relevant in the U.S. market place than Google."

From reading the, it looks like that they are pretty serious about this. Neil Holloway (President of Microsoft for Europe, Middle East and Africa) further said that the current search engines are not doing its best. They are still not returning relevant searches. Microsoft plans to turn that around and get more involved by producing relevant results.

But do you think Google and Yahoo gonna' just wait for Microsoft to launch their new improved search engine? I don't think so. I m sure these guys will also get into the box and compete.

But again there were rumors that Microsoft was planning to buy Yahoo for $80B. If that happens then I think Google might be really concerned.


 
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