Evsion Lab

Myspace goes to China

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

Oh snap! Australian media Mogul Rupert Murdoch who own the American social networking site Myspace is expanding the site to the People’s Republic of China. According to the New York Times, “The News Corporation signed a deal to license the brand for its popular online social networking site and allow local Chinese entrepreneurs who understand their market to pick and choose to build an indigenous business. Using this approach, the News Corporation hopes to succeed where other Western Internet ventures have failed.” The decision to allow independent natives of China to run the venture is smart, as it will allow the site to be better adapted to that part of the world. It will be interesting to see the differences between the Chinese version of the site and the current U.S. version. While China has limited civil liberties and privacy rights compared to the U.S., many Americans have gotten into trouble with their employers or schools for content on their pages. Some admissions officers even check the site and will reject students who have particularly objectionable content on their pages. [ Via BloggingStocks ]

Popularity: 9% [?]

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How to beat that traffic ticket

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

If you’ve ever been ticketed for speeding or running a red light, you already know that the fine you pay may only be the beginning of your cost.If it’s your second offense, that mistake may very well drain a whopping $700 out of your pocket over the next three years. That’s because, on average, a driver’s insurance premiums can increase by 25 percent after a second violation.

Most traffic courts rely on the fact that nine out of 10 drivers will just pay their tickets and move on. Established to expedite cases quickly and efficiently, traffic courts serve as vital sources of revenue for many counties.

Their desire to get you in and out can work in your favor when fighting a ticket. Attorneys who specialize in traffic court cases have very high dismissal rates based simply on technicalities. In many cases, with a little effort and research you can obtain the same results.

Auto clubs and insurers are unlikely to publicly give drivers tips for beating tickets in court, but there are a number of things you can do on your own to keep your tickets off your driving record.

Alex Carroll, author of “Beat the Cops: the Guide to Fighting Your Traffic Ticket and Winning,” says that challenging a ticket is one of the easiest things a person can do in the legal system. Carroll runs a Web site that gives people information they can use to fight their tickets. As a former courier that was “basically paid to speed,” he has beaten eight out of 10 of his tickets. [ Read more via Yahoo ]

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Google Apps: Don’t bother unless you know the following

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

Despite what Google may tell you, Google Apps is not ready for companies that currently depend on Microsoft products. Companies without formal processes to enforce change usually have many employees that prefer to work within the familiar confines of Outlook — and why shouldn’t they? it has served them well for many years. If you are thinking of moving to Google Apps, please read this first.

These real-life observations are being made by myself — the domain administrator for a company with close to 100 employees that have been using Google Apps for just over 6 months.

Let’s start with Gmail. First, deliver messages via POP that are sent to oneself — it is the first thing people do once their mail client set up. Domain administrators will hear several complaints about this with varying levels of urgency (sometimes by the same people over and over again). As a domain administrator, all you can do is tell the user “that’s how it works”, and “I will file a suggestion”. Even if you are paying for the service, a telephone call will yield similar results — none, or at least the perception of none.

Then you have users who “don’t get some mail” — this usually happens to only the most important messages. There are several probable causes for this — messages are either labeled as spam (in their Gmail interface which many business users never log into), the message sits for hours in a queue somewhere (especially handy when an urgent message is expected to arrive instantly), or they genuinely didn’t receive the message (which should never EVER happen). Domain administrators hear about every message that doesn’t arrive — and again, there is no way to offer a real solution or explanation to the user.

Ok, so some people might say: “Then why don’t you just use the webmail client like you are supposed to?”. That’s usually what I recommend to users when they are having trouble, but they soon realize there is no offline access, signatures have to be in plain text and/or they get a message that looks like it’s from a James Bond movie (”error code 007″) with no explanation why or estimates for when it will be fixed.

This usually isn’t more than an annoyance for personal use, but businesses users have a whole different set of expectations. How about meaningful error messages, features that business users want, and tech support that is a little more helpful than a forum with hundreds of people complaining. That would be a great start.

That is only part of the reason why most users only use the engine of this brand new car though. Outlook syncs email, calendar and contact information easily and effortlessly with the software available on most mobile device. On top of all that, users typically don’t like change.

I could go on for paragraphs about complaints that I have received from my users, and even longer if I wanted to give real examples from people on Google’s suggestion group — but I will leave it at that. If you want to do some more research on your own, you can get a great sense of problems that plague users here.

That said, Google Apps does work for many people — and some of you may have a corporate culture that is very forgiving and embraces change. These are ideal candidates for either the free or enterprise version of the product. But for the rest of you, I urge you to keep away from this product until the tone on their suggestion group switches from “this doesn’t work!” to “it would be really cool if”. [ Via ZDNet ]

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Apple accepting applications for iPhone tech support reps

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

Wanna become one of the first telephone tech support representatives fielding questions on the iPhone? Well Apple recommends you submit your applications promptly, as training classes begin in May.

An official Apple job listing posted to AfterCollege.com seeks a Sr. iPhone support representative who will be responsible for answering questions for Apple customers and partners at the company’s existing facility in Austin, Texas.

“Viewed as an escalation point, the candidate should be able to provide prompt, reliable, and accurate information to customers while maintaining effective communications during conversations by adjusting to the pace and technical level of the customer,” the company says.

Duties for the full-time position include reporting issues through the appropriate channels as well as diagnosing data service inquiries related to GPRS/EDGE, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth wireless technologies.

Apple says it will consider various degrees of experience and education provided the candidate holds a Technical Associate Degree and/or 2-3 years related experience in the fields of Network, customer support or wireless voice/data technical support.

Meanwhile, a similar listing over at the company’s official jobs site courts a number of lower-level iPhone technical support representatives.

Qualifications for the latter positions are more relaxed, requiring only a high school diploma and/ or 2-3 years related experience as a customer service rep, help desk member or wireless tech support rep. [ Via AppleInsider ]

Popularity: 7% [?]

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Are Mac users “in denial” about security?

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

The contest held at CanSecWest security conference in Vancouver to see who could find and exploit a vulnerability in Mac OS X has re-ignited the debate about which is the safest operating system. Are Mac users in denial over security?

The contest was an interesting one. Two MacBook Pros, each fully patched using the latest updates, were pitted against anyone wanting to take a shot at them. The contest was won by Dino Di Zovie, who walked away with the $10,000 prize put up by TippingPoint’s Zero Day Initiative.

The exploit that Di Zovie discovered was a bug in QuickTime and he leveraged it through Safari. It’s the nature of the bug that has caused some to question the validity of the contest - after all, is a QuickTime bug an Apple exploit?

My take on it is that a bug is a bug. QuickTime is Apple’s code and Apple ships QuickTime with Mac OS X. It’s interesting that Di Zovie decided to attack the system using Safari, following in the footsteps of hackers who attack Windows via Internet Explorer. No one argues that an Internet Explorer-based attack on Windows isn’t a valid one, and similarly this attack shouldn’t be dismissed because of the chosen attack vector. [ Via ZDNet ]

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Internet2 Operators Set New Internet Speed Record

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

We all know that data transmission records don’t hang around too long these days, but for operators of the Internet2 network, the final “official record” may have just been set. At the Internet2 consortium’s spring meeting, it was announced that officials “sent data at 7.67-gigabits per second using standard communications protocols,” but crushed even that milestone 24 hours later by achieving 9.08Gbps with IPv6 protocols. Notably, the data had to travel a whopping 20,000 or so miles roundtrip, and it’s being suggested that the newest record may be there awhile, considering the theoretical 10Gbps limit on Internet2 transmissions and the requirement for new records to sustain “a ten-percent improvement for recognition.” The best bit, however, is the mention of a “a new network with a capacity of 100Gbps,” which could see a full-blown DVD shot practically around the globe “within in a few seconds.” [  Via Edgadget ]

Popularity: 6% [?]

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This week’s best posts

Posted by Gina Trapani under Uncategorized

For a once-weekly update on Lifehacker's best posts, subscribe to our Highlights feed - or get a handful of daily best posts with our top stories feed.

This week's best posts include:

• LH Top 10: Home networking tricks
  "By now you've probably got several connected computers at home, sharing an internet connection, maybe a printer and files between them. But are you getting the most out of your home network?"
• Alpha Geek: Turn an old hard drive into an external drive
  "The best possible fate for an old internal drive is to become a super-handy external drive, which it can do with a small investment of time and money."
• Hack Attack: Control multiple computers with a single keyboard and mouse
  "You don't need a hardware switch to share one keyboard and mouse amongst several different computers. All you need is the free, cross-platform application, Synergy."
• Geek to Live: Build an internet jukebox with Jinzora
  "With Jinzora installed on your home server, you can browse your music library, create playlists on the fly and stream your music from home over the internet to another computer or handheld anywhere."
• Coolest Workspace Contest: The home-integrated office
  "Check out three reader submissions: the sunny cacti office; the Mac-based living room-cum-office; and the pink persuasion office."
• Lifehacker Code: Swept Away (Windows)
  "Swept Away is a simple system tray utility that automatically minimizes applications that you aren't using."

• IM Survival Tips: Productivity and instant messenger
  "...a few tips that can help balance chatty-McChatting with worky-McWorking."
• Download of the Day: Protect Textarea (Greasemonkey)
  "...monitors the textareas on a web page and alerts you if you try navigating away from the page before submitting the changes in the textarea."
• Download of the Day: Launchy 1.2.5 (Windows)
  "...the new Runny plugin supports customizable commands with multiple arguments."
• Browse the web with keyword shortcuts
  "OpenDNS, a free domain name service, lets you visit web sites just by typing keyword shortcuts into your browser's address bar."

Shutterstock raises photographers’ pay

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

(Credit: Shutterstock) Shutterstock, a company that sells “stock art” images taken by members of its community, gave its more valuable photographers a raise on Monday. The company pays photographers 25 cents for each image that a customer downloads. Beginning May 1, founder and Chief Executive Jon Oringer announced Monday, anyone who sells more than $500 worth of images will get 20 percent more per image–30 cents. Oringer also said his company now has 25 full-time employees. Shutterstock competes chiefly with Internet-based stock art shops including iStockphoto, Fotolia, Dreamstime, but also with traditional powers including Corbis and Getty Images. (Via Stock Photo Talk) [ Via WebWare ]

Popularity: 6% [?]

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Some notes about Wikipedia from Jimmy Wales in Cape Town; spending at $3 million in 2007

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

Wendell Roelf from Reuters was able to grab some time for an interview with Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia founder during a conference in Cape Town, South Africa. Wikipedia was able to raise $1 million in donations last year and is expected to spend about $3 million in 2007.I think Jimmy’s quote regarding advertising is spot on considering that they are a non-profit company, “When we’re turning down millions and millions of dollars in advertising revenue that could be used, to for example, put computers in schools in Africa … we have to very thoughtful and responsible about why we’re doing it.”

Wales also spoke about his new search engine expected to compete with Google and Yahoo, “Hopefully it’s successful and would provide funding back to Wikipedia.” Wendell noted that Wales said last month that Wikia is aiming to take as much as 5 percent of the lucrative Internet search market.

Check out our previous coverage of Wikipedia and the wiki format in general. [ Via CenterNetworks ]

Popularity: 6% [?]

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Yapta Will Be Awesome For Heavy Travelers

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

I don’t know what it is about Seattle and travel startups, but newcomer Yapta now joins Farecast and TripHub, two other startups we’ve been tracking from that cold, rainy place.

I saw a pre-launch demo of the company yesterday from co-founder and CEO Tom Romary. The site, which should launch around May 15, helps users find deals on flights and (later this year) hotels.

Yapta is very different from other travel sites. It is not hooked up directly to airlines’ systems (as Expedia and Oribitz are), nor is it essentially a search engine for low fares like Farecast. Instead, they’re using some of the ideas behind del.icio.us and bookmarking to create a potentially compelling new way for people to search for cheap flights.

The core of the Yapta service is a browser bookmarklet or addon that lets users “bookmark” fares that they find on major travel sites. At launch, ten airline and travel sites will be supported, many more will be added over time. See a flight you are interested in and bookmark it. The flight and fare information is then stored in your account at Yapta.

Find a number of different flight options at different sites, and then go back to Yapta to compare them. This is particularly useful when you fly Southwest or Jetblue, which do not provide flight information to other services. If the fare increases or decreases before you make a purchase, that will be reflected on the Yapta site.

If you make a purchase by clicking through to the airline or travel site from Yapta, they’ll continue to monitor the price. If it falls, they’ll ping you and suggest you contact the airline for a refund or flight coupon. All airlines offer these on price drops but few consumers follow up. Yapta will help by reminding you.

The company has quite a few sources of revenue. They collect affiliate fees from most airlines and sites if the user clicks through and purchases a previously bookmarked flight. There will be some advertising on the site, and Yapta will offer information on Travelzoo-like “deals” to users who opt in. Finally, for customers who are eligible to receive flight coupons for price drops, Yapta will offer to do all the work to get the coupon for a 10% fee (or a flat yearly subscription fee of $40).

In beta testing with 275 users over the last several months, Yapta found that 34% of purchased tickets became eligible for a refund. The average refund was 16% of the ticket price, or $85. During the beta period that worked out to a total of $28,900 in aggregate potential refunds, or about $100 per beta user. If Yapta can successfully tap into this refund pool and get a share, the numbers look good. More importantly, this is a great service for consumers, who rarely even bother to check for price drops. Users can also use just this feature of Yapta by entering in the flight information on the Yapta site - they are not required to use the Yapta service for research or buying beforehand. For a lot of users, just this one aspect of the service will be very compelling. [ Via TechCrunch ]

I know I’ll be using it.

Popularity: 5% [?]

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PureVideo Launches Another Niche: PoliticsUpClose

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

PureVideo Networks, known for their flagship video search portal PureVideo and Stupid Videos, launches their latest niche media site, PoliticsUpClose.

Modeled in a very similar manner to one of their other sites, HollywoodUpClose, PoliticsUpClose brings you a focused search site dedicated to politics. The site includes bios on all the members of the U.S. Congress and the Senate, as well as all 50 governors and every political hopeful out there. PoliticsUpClose offers multimedia search results, bringing videos, images and articles to the forefront of your search. Their main tabs give easy access to humor, political blogs, featured politicians, videos, issues and more. As PoliticsUpClose is bipartisan, you’ll get information from all points on the spectrum, from liberal to conservative.

With the increasing interest in the ‘08 elections, and the utilization of the Internet for political information dissemination, it’s no surprise that PureVideo Networks has chosen politics to be one of the many verticals they’re launching this year. While politicians are creating their own social networks and have profiles and blogs with all the major players, finding a centralized wealth of information is often difficult when it comes to politics. Others entering this realm include OpenCongress, which brings a level of transparency to the legislative process while offering political information, and Knover, which aims to join political bio information with user-generated opinions. [ Via Mashable ]

Popularity: 5% [?]

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How to Make Gmail/Gcal Rock Your Tasks

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

There are a million tools out there to keep track of your tasks, your appointments, your emails and reminders. But let’s face it — each of them have their drawbacks, and finding the right combination can be an ongoing quest.

Many people also love Gmail and Gcal as two of their online tools of choice - they’re simple tools that get the job done fast, wherever and whenever you need them. If you count yourself among this group, here’s a guide for using the Gmail/Gcal combination as your online information center. [ Via Lifehack ]

Popularity: 6% [?]

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Your first resume: how to make the most of it

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

That first resume is always the hardest to write; there’s usually just not that much you’ll be able to put on there. However, the resume specialists over at Emurse have written up a practical tutorial on how to write the best entry level resume ever.

Not only do they give you a general template to go by, but there’s also sample resumes you can check out to see what kind of resume goals you should be shooting for. Do you remember your first resume? What made it stand out (or not)? Thoughts in the comments. [ Via Lifehacker ] [ Entry Level Sample Resumes [ Via Emurse]

Popularity: 8% [?]

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How to Get to the Top of Google - The Basics

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

I’m getting a few emails per day from people who read the Fortune Small Business article in which I mentioned that one of the initial ways we built Broadwick was through search engine optimization.

I wanted to post the four basic steps for search engine optimization here as well as link to a free copy of my ebook on the topic…

Tim wrote:

Ryan, I was inspired by your story and would like to learn more about how you got to the top of Google for comptetitive search terms. Could you email some advice on how to do this?

Ryan wrote:

Hi Tim. Thanks for writing. You can download a free copy of my whitepaper on how to get to the top of the search engines at http://www.search-engines-guide.com/thankyou.html.

The key advice is:
1. Choose which keyword you want to rank well for.
2. Increase the number of times this keyword shows up on your home page (keyword frequency).
3. Add additional content to your web site about this topic.
4. Build links from related web sites using the keyword as the text that is clickable (the anchor text). The easiest ways to build links from related web sites are by writing good quality articles with a link in the byline and offering them to related sites for publication and asking for links from related web sites in exchange for a link on yours.

Also, my other company Virante provides search engine optimization consulting. You can reach them via www.virante.com. [ Via RyanAllis ]

Popularity: 5% [?]

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Summer Entrepreneurial Internship at Preation in Durham NC

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

 Broadwick’s sister company Preationhas an Entrepreneurial Internship available for the summer.

“Preation Entrepreneurial Internship Program – Summer 2007

Preation is seeking motivated individuals to participate in a three month summer entrepreneurial internship program in Durham, North Carolina. Interns play an integral role in assisting Preation team members in planning, executing, and achieving project goals. Interns participate in individual projects and will learn and utilize techniques to produce results on a short timeline. Inters work closely with successful entrepreneurs and will learn through hands-on business experience. Our 2007 summer program will offers interns an unprecedented opportunity to launch a new venture inside of an already successful entrepreneurial company. The future success of this new venture will be determined by the success of its launch during the internship program. If you are looking to make a difference and create a great success this summer then this opportunity is right for you. To apply, please send a resume and cover letter to Nick Lisi, Marketing Associate via email at nick[at]preation.com before Friday April 27th, 2007″. [ Via RyanAllis ]

Popularity: 5% [?]

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New BlackBerry app suite will run on some Windows Mobile devices

Posted by Eunjin Gregorio under Uncategorized

This morning, BlackBerry announced its intent to become more interoperable with rival OS Windows Mobile.

That’s because of a new software applications suite due “later this year” that will enable third-party devices (i.e., Windows Mobile 6-powered handsets) to run what BlackBerry-maker Research In Motion calls:

“A virtual BlackBerry application experience, including support for BlackBerry email, phone, calendar, address book, tasks, memos, browser, instant messaging and other applications developed for the BlackBerry platform. WinMob6 devices able to run the BlackBerry application suite will be able to connect to BlackBerry services via BlackBerry Enterprise Server as well as BlackBerr Internet Service.

On compatible devices, the BlackBerry utility will be accessible via a BlackBerry icon. Clicking this icon will call up a UI similar to the BlackBerry- with the Windows Mobile applications running in the background and retrievable to UI prominence via its own icon. [ Via ZDNet ]

Popularity: 6% [?]

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