Netvibes UWA API might force Microsoft to open up it’s Gadget API

Michael Arrington looks like he has an exclusive on an upcoming coompetitor to Microsoft Gadgets. Netvibes (I’m a big fan) will release a Universal Widget API soon which will run on Vista, Mac, Google, Yahoo, Pageflakes and of course, Netvibes. Microsoft has a fast growing platform which is being ran by a growing number of developers from around the world. Mac Widgets don’t stand a chance against an OS installed app which will be home to 90-95 percent of computer users in the next 5 years.

What we really have here is great for customers. Users will be able to use this API and publish to the sidebar or Vista desktop. I have a secondary monitor set up solely for Gadgets, and I think the homes of the future will use auxilary displays (enabled in vista) to dispaly relavant infomation in and around the home in relavant situations. (a monitor in the sports lounge of a home which displays gadgets containing sports scores for instance)

At any rate, as Michael points out, the W3C has a Widgets 1.0 working draft over at http://www.w3.org/TR/widgets/ but that doesn’t mean anyone is using it or compying to it yet.

If you are a developer, head over to the Netvibes UWA page to sign up for access to beta.

According to TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington:

A single javascript embed code will add the widget to any of the supported platforms. The code will recognize the platform and run the appropriate code for that platform within the widget. Once Coriander has launched, sites will be able to create and promote a single widget embed code for most platforms.

Thoughts? They are going to be pulling 10 million users into this platform and with them embrasing the opensource community I could see both platforms going neck and neck. I think it’s great for us because that means that–as a develeoper–I’ll be able to put my Gadgets widgets anywhere I want.

Google Reverts Image Search Back to Old Design

From: http://blog.outer-court.com/archive/2007-02-21-n80.html

The old design above is back

The Google Image search results recently went live with a redesign which was hiding most image information, and only show it when you hover the mouse over the image. Google seems to have reverted this design step, and is now showing the old results layout… at least that’s how I can see it, as does Don Danz, who alerts us to this.

Not sure if this is a conscious undoing or a bug – usually Google tests something with a prototype for a small percentage of users, and then either permanently forgets about the prototype, or permanently puts it live. Was Google swamped with complaints, or did some Googleplex big boss decide the new design sucks? Personally I prefer the old (currently active) design over the new, though I think Google might as well have gotten rid of some of the info they display (like the file size in kilobytes). The new design also had some potential “fair use” issues because the thumbnail source was not designated until you hovered over it… besides, I believe showing the domain name is very crucial information to quickly navigate a search result.

I’m not sure if it’s a cool thing to mention this but I think Live’s Image search totally blows everything else out of the water. I always thought so, and recently I started using a nice Dell 30 inch, 2560×1600 resolution monitor as my primary display, and I can’t tell you how much nicer Microsoft’s images.live.com search is now. The way that Microsoft lays out the pictures combined with Microsoft’s most underrated online innovation, the unlimited scroll bar makes searching for images a breeze. If Microsoft would use the same scroll technology on the front end, with Google’s main search index for searching the web, I would use it over Google as well.

Back to the redesign of Google Image Search: Microsoft was also the first–AFAIK–to implement the AJAX rollover image for more info design. Google has said in the past, they are not interested in making their product more like their competitors which I think is a weakness on their part. Everyone but Steve Job’s knows that in the technology industry in order to survive, you not only have to copy other’s work, but you have to be the best at it. The first novel attempt at things are just enough to inspire the people who take it to market and end up getting all the credit for it. (about Steve Job’s, he’s the only person who’s unwilling to admit that his company actively copies Microsoft and other companies."

Google Image Search (new and same as it used to be, information is displayed without being rolled over, which gives you more information, but distracts from what you are really searching for, an image.)

Microsoft’s Live Image Search (same as it eva’ waz! Information can be displayed if needed about the source of the image, but there is distraction of text, letting one judge the merit of images based 100% on the image itself. Also, Microsoft utilzes their severely underated and very useful unlimted scroll button. Their research found that not many people click on the second page of results, but they will scroll down.)

 

Technorati tags: Microsoft, Google, Web 2.0, Search, Image Search

Xbox 360

After 6 months of bothering Microsoft they finally agreed to fix my defective Xbox 360 for free. They sent me a box, i shipped it to them, and they shipped me a new 360 instead of fixing mine. I was like, that’s cool.. So I plug it in, and I start checking out the Vista MCE feature on it then I go to bed at some point. The next day I wake up and the 360 is giving me the 3 blinking red lights of death. Long story short, my new 360 worked for less than one day, and then had a hardware failure.

 

I am waiting for the next box to show up still.

Steve Jobs says DRM is bad, but Sells it on Music from Labels that Don’t Require it.

Steve Jobs has an elequent blog like post on DRM entitled Thoughts on Music.

 

The third alternative is to abolish DRMs entirely. Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store. Every iPod ever made will play this DRM-free music.

 

Steve is making his happy rapid fans happy by trying to make them think he killed DRM. It’s a well known fact that many if not all of the major music companies are thinking about selling DRM free music shortly. Genious. I want to beleive that Steve is for real and that he doesn’t like DRM and that he wants them to get rid of it (it helps his business be a monopoly) but I’m afraid I’m not dumb enough to really do so. Steve even puts DRM on the music when the content owners don’t require it. This is what I don’t like about Steve Jobs, he does things to make himself look good, and then when no one’s looking he’s not doing good things. None of us are perfect but hey, if you want to music companies to Stop forcing you to sell DRM infested music, at least quit wrapping it on the music that doesn’t require it.

Wal-Mart Movie Downloads: Why it won’t do well

Om Malik, over @ gigaom.com points out why he thinks Wal-Mart won’t do well in the Digital Movie Download (IE only) business. He makes a great case in point: Enron and its broadband push and how they thought of bandwidth like they did with energy. And he’s right, Wal-Mart has a luster that is created SOLELY by it’s low prices–low prices–that aren’t included with it’s new digital download service. The reason of course is the studios protecting their DVD sales business. I wanted to point out why I think Wal-Mart will fail.

 

1. The people who are WalMarts biggest customers are still running Windows 98. What I really mean is the folks who will bother to download a movie in the next 3 years, probably shop at Costco, or at a local market, and tend to not be big Wal-Mart customers.

 

2. Well, I pointed it out above, who wants to download a movie for more than what it costs to go buy the DVD at the store which has more features? I don’t, if I ever transfer my entire DVD collection to hard drive, I’ll do it from DVD, and I won’t buy another copy just avoid having to put a DVD in a player.

 

3. I just went to their site in firefox, they don’t even redirect you to a get IE page, boy this looks ugly, do they know that about 8 percent of customers will see this? Probably not, back to what Om said about Enron.

Help us Scan images of Sea for Jim Gray

Please help chip in some time finding Jim Gray.

 

Jim Gray is a world renown scientist who specilizes in database architecture and distributed computing design. He is a technical fellow at Microsoft. He was very interested in making computers help scientists be more productive. He has been missing after a trip to the Farallon Islands.

 

Many Software engineers have pulled together to obtain a satelite scan of the area available, and then everyone is chipping in scanning through the images. This type of rescue effort is unprecedented in mankinds history. If you want to help out head here. (mturk.com Amazon.com service)

 

An example of what to look for.