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New Media News Every Morning

YouTube Overhauls its Video Page, Hoping We Will All Like It

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YouTube is currently overhauling its standard video page view into something that it considers as one of the site’s biggest redesigns ever. Basically once the redesign is finished, you will noticed two major changes – new playlist interface, search queue and integrated comments.

The new playlist interface will now include an option for autoplay mode which if turned on will automatically bring you to the next video once the current video has finished playing. If you don’t want like this feature, you can always turn it off anytime. But if the search results consist of robusts set of videos You Tube will automaticall play these videos one after the other. This will now become a standard in all of the YouTube videos.

As for the search queue, this feature will let you add videos to your queue. While the integrated comments will now lists both text and video responses to trigger conversation around a video.

The new video page view is currently being tested by selected individuals. Once testing is done, expect the new video page view to appear the next time you check out YouTube.

Or, if you can’t wait that long, check out this preview site to prepared yourself for the coming changes in the way you watch video on YouTube.

Hope you like the new page view. Honestly, it’s way cleaner and more organized than the current interface.

Via Business Insider

 

Originally posted on February 26, 2010 @ 1:24 pm

Google Gives Android Phones a Cool Shopping App

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Recently, Google has quietly released a new shopping app for Android phones. Available for free from the Android market, Google Shopper is a smart shopping app that lets you purchase items online by various means plus do some product searches including reviews and ratings by other consumers.

As a mobile shopping app, Google Shopper lets you scan barcodes, album art, book covers and then use those information to search for the product online. From there you can directly purchase the item using the application.

But aside from purchasing products online, you can also use the app’s search function which is powered by Google Product Search engine. You can search for product reviews, prices, specs and more. You can do these using your Android phone’s screen interface or through voice search.

The app also lets you save your shopping and search history, star your favorites, as well as share your product finds through Gmail, Facebook, Twitter and other mobile services.

I downloaded the app on my Nexus One and I would have to say that it is indeed a pretty sleek-looking app. Banking on Google’s mobile infrastructure and massive product databases which it cull  from various online sources, the app would be a good tool to have if you want to quickly find out about products you encounter everyday. Since it is a mobile app, that goes without saying that you can use this feature even while on the go.

You know the drill, right? Search for Shopper from the Android market and download the app for free.

Originally posted on February 19, 2010 @ 3:59 am

Google to Force Users to Stop Using IE6

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If Microsoft could not make Internet Explorer 6  users to upgrade to IE8 Google might actually succeed in doing so. And what could be a better way of forcing users to let go of the old IE6 web browser? – By disabling YouTube support. But Google is not doing this to make IE6 users upgrade to IE8 but rather to a more advance browser which could either be Google’s own Chrome browser, IE8, Opera Mini 10, Safari 4 and Firefox 3.6.

So if you’re still using IE6 and try to visit YouTube, you will see a message prompting you that you are using an older browser and that while you may still enjoy watching videos, after March 13, YouTube will stop supporting it. And unless you upgrade to newer browsers you will no longer enjoy new features that will be introduced after the said date. The message will appear for three weeks until you upgrade to a newer browser.

Interestingly, while Microsoft is not really that active and pretty succesful in convincing IE users to upgrade to the latest version, Google’s strategy might actually work. I’m pretty sure majority of these IE6 users will not want to miss out on the good things that YouTube is about to offer in the future.

Another interesting point here, which I think Microsoft should be thankful for is the fact that Google is forcing users to abandon IE6, it is still suggesting IE8 as an alternative browser.

Let’s see whether this strategy will gain Google more users for its Chrome browser  and whether users will finally stop using IE6.

Originally posted on February 23, 2010 @ 5:35 pm

Social Search Engine Aardvark Joins Google

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Whenever I’m looking for an answer to a trivial question I normally type in the question on the Google search box. Yes, that’s how lazy I am. And so far Google search results are pretty much accurate and were able to give me some good links. Interstingly, most of the links to the answers given by Google are entries from Yahoo! Answers.

The point I’m trying to drive at here? Google badly needs a Yahoo Answers-like service. A crowd-sourced database of information that is of capable providing the best answer to the most mundane question that could possibly come up from anyone’s mind. And Google seems to be embarking on achieving that feat. To start off, it just acquired a social search engine called – Aardvark.

Aardvark’s model is pretty simple, you ask a question and Aardvark will find the perfect person to answer your question in minutes. Aardvark has several interfaces, via an iPhone app, IM, email and of course its web interface at vark.com.

Aardvark’s technology taps into the knowledge and experience of your friends and extended network of contacts. It analyzes your questions and determines what they are about until it is able to match each question to people who are knowledgeable about it to give you the final answer to your question. And it does that as quickly as it can.

Google has not announced yet how it is going to take to integrate Aardvark to its various products and services, but as soon as the deal was finalized, Google quickly put Aardvark into Google Labs.

With Google Buzz as a social sharing site and now this social search engine, Google is really getting into the social game.

Originally posted on February 12, 2010 @ 6:05 pm

Comcast Launches Secure Backup and Share Service

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Comcast has just launched it new Secure Backup and Share service with the aim of helping you reduce the risk of losing important files that are saved on your computers. In short, it’s a cloud storage service with a facility for sharing some of the files you store easily.

While there maybe free services of this kind available online, Comcast however will offer the service for a fee. If you’re an existing Comcast subscriber you automatically gets 2GB of file storage for free, or should I say as an incentive for subscribing to its Internet service.

But of course, 2GB of storage won’t be enough for you, so you can always upgrade to a paid account. A 50GB storage plan will cost you $4.99 monthly or $49.99 annually. While a 200GB storage plan will set you back for $9.99 monthly or $99.99 annually. Those two options give you enough storage for all your photos, videos, files and other digital documents.

And since you are paying for the service, Comcast assures that all your files are in good hands. They’ve got a secure and reliable protection system plus a file restoration facility in case disaster strikes and your files are destroyed.

For file sharing and access to files, Comcast gives you a site which you can share with your family and friends.  You and your friends and family can access the said site from any Internet connection as well as on your mobile phone.

So, if you’d rather store and back up your files on a highly secured server, you might want to give Comcast Secure Backup and Share service a try.

Originally posted on February 18, 2010 @ 5:20 pm