WeSeePeople

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Data Privacy Day! Raising data privacy awareness

US and Canada is celebrating Data Privacy Day with 27 other European countries today. I am not sure why not the other countries. Because data privacy affects every one.
In the USA, the Information Technology Association of America is hosting an event called "Data Privacy Day: Increasing Privacy Awareness and Trust." Google is supporting this event by joining government officials and privacy community members.

In addition to collective efforts, Google is offering its users with their own privacy initiatives, from face blurring on street views to incognito mode on Google Chrome, which I use every day and like very much.
Follow the link to read more about Google privacy initiatives and policies.
Official Google Blog: Raising data privacy awareness

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Google Earth and Google Maps Become Art Museums


Google Earth and Google Maps have become an art museums by bringing the famous and lovely (I love museums) PRADO museum (Museo Nacional Del Prado) online. I was lucky enough to have visited the real one but I would not miss any of these high res images displayed by Google.
I was thrilled to read;
"Experience some of the most important Masterpieces from the Prado Museum. In the next two weeks, you will be able to access a new painting every day on Google Maps. To see them all together in full screen, use Google Earth"
If you an art lover, the classics, the kind that leaves with your jaws in your hands, follow this link.

Friday, January 16, 2009

Tweetnews! Twitter Authorized Yahoo News!

Determining how fresh and relevant the news are a question to news publishing sites. Sorting them by time has been the initial method with some other authorization schema has brought us the fresh and relevant news to us.
But Yahoo developer Vik Singh has seen that perhaps binding the time stamped Yahoo news articles with Twitter and order them by the number of tweets, Tweetnews, could be of a better relevance. Yes, they seem to be. I did a few searches and was happy with the results. (Above is a search on Israel on Tweetnews and at the bottom is the same done on Yahoo News at the same time.)
Vik has written a very good blog post on the suject and sums ip up as "To sum up, the contributions of this service are: (1) Real-time search + freshness (2) Stitching social commentary to authoritative sources of information (3) Another (hopefully cool) BOSS example."

Monday, January 12, 2009

My Senetor Is On YouTube! Is Yours?


YouTube in conjunction with both the House and Senate, today launched two new hubs that will help you access your Senator and Representatives' YouTube channels: The Senate Hub (youtube.com/senatehub) and The House Hub (youtube.com/househub).
These channels will give you time to interact with your senator and representative. According to Google Policy Blog, People on the hill will be posting videos direct from their Washington offices, as well as clips of floor speeches and committee hearings alongside additional behind-the-scenes footage from Capitol Hill.
I think this is getting better!

Twittbation

If no one comments on your twits, you can comment on yourself like our Diordna did!

Twitters Crunched

Twitter folks were recognized as the "Best Startup Founders" at last Friday evening at San Francisco's Herbst Theater for the second annual Crunchies awards.


Twitter Blog: We Got The Crunchies

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Butcher's Guide To Social Media!

Actually it is a guide for butchers who wants to be social media moguls. According to the first comment, bakers and candlestick makers will not cut it even thought the article, Build A Social Media Cheat Sheet For Any Topic is slated for Butchers, bakers and candlestick makers. Even though I am none of the above, I found the article to be very interesting. It was Written by Marshall Kirkpatrick and now running on RWW. Go build your Social Media Interface.

Tuesday, January 06, 2009

Obama's Twitter Account Hacked?

Twitter blog tells us that quite a few, 32 accounts were hacked using the twitter phishing scam that we mentioned earlier. But all have been restored and our president's Twitter account is safe. By the way the president, is already working in bringing the much needed stimulus package forward. We certainly see Barak Obama!
The phishing incident has made Twitter investigate OAuth. According to Twitter blog, it is in closed beta test at the moment. But OAuth would not have prevented the phishing attack. Only us, users can prevent such things by being a bit vigilant.

Twitter Blog: Monday Morning Madness

Monday, January 05, 2009

Plugged In Twitter


I just installed Firefox plugin, Power Twitter. (So new that I have not restarted my browser yet as some other web application is running on another tab and hence the screen caps from the web. But I have seen and played with the installation on my partners browser).
Power Twitter seem to be a must for twitters who twitch their fingers wanting to do more with their twitter. From what I have seen so far it gives a real boost to the twitter. Praises have come from techcrunch to me and many other web dignitaries in between.

With this plugin, Twitter now can include:

  • Photo sharing with embedded flickr photos
  • Video sharing with embedded youtube videos
  • Shared tinyurls are unwound so you know where they link to (No more twiter Phishing) and url translation to page titles
  • All links are mapped to their web page titles
  • Additional user information is mapped to twitter users thanks to data conduits via 30 Boxes (e.g. flickr accounts, blog posts, del.icio.us links, and tons of other social media!, such as Facebook status updates, inline YouTube, Flickr, and TwitPic,
  • Search, search scoped to a specific user, status history peeking on mouseover.
  • open web update (news feed) mapping
You can get the plugin from the link below but you may want to follow the discussion and information on Social|Median first. The app comes from 30 boxes!

Plugin from Mozilla.org

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/9591


Twitter Phished

In case if you did not know, there was a twitter phishing saga that unfolded. According to the news a few people have got caught in the Phishers net and given away their passwords to bad people.
So if you have not done so be careful with your surfing and if you DID give the password away, please go and change it. Twitter has proactively reset the passwords of suspected accounts that may have been tricked. Please use the reset password link. This process will send an email to the address associated with your account and you'll be able to create a new password.
Twitter Blog: Gone Phishing

Sunday, January 04, 2009

NTT Launches Mobile Social Network, FAMI NAVI!

NTT Com, Japan has launched a social networking service (SNS) that families can use to share pictures and schedules through their mobile phones. The beta version of "fami navi" ("family navigation"), is initially targeted towards families. NTT Com expects its SNS service to build a better tomorrow by helping to strengthen family bonds, foundation of our socities.

NTT Com offers the service for free (packet data charges may apply from the carriers). Fami Navi is currently compatible with NTT DOCOMO, au and SOFTBANK handsets equipped with Flash®Lite™ 1.1 or above.

Since the the network id geared towards the family units, there are a limit of 20 members to a unit. With small families that Japan has, this limit will not prevent a few generations be in touch where ever they are during the day. I am not sure what happens when a member has multiple memberships! As of now, one person registers as the site manager and then can invite up to 19 other family members to register.

With current services, photos, usually those taken with a camera-equipped mobile phones, could be shared with family or unit members. One also will be able to create a slide show with a compilation of these photos with a provided application, and the same could be used as a Flash Video standby screen for handsets.

The other prominent service, calendering or scheduling is uniue in itself. There is nothing new from traditional calendering service but having it available on your mobile device might make it easier to be home before dinner. Everyone’s schedule can be viewed by other members anytime and anyplace making it easier to plan family functions together. Members can receive an automatic e-mail reminders before special days, such as birthdays and other anniversaries.

As usual with Japanese Internet culture, A variety of graphics are available to decorate messages exchanged among the members. Members also encouraged to access the site frequently. Each time a person accesses the site, a decorative item such as virtual flower or building block icon is added to the site and that reflects the frequency of use. When the site collects a certain number of flowers/blocks within a given time, the members can receive a present from fami navi, such as a photo album template.