Sebastian Anthony
United Kingdom - http://www.mrseb.co.uk
Based in the middle of nowhere, England, Sebastian finds his lonely, friendless, hoboesque existence to provide the perfect vantage point for bias-free, objective opinionation.
Filed under: Google, Microsoft, Search
Microsoft will pay content providers to shun Google -- and get in bed with Bing
In a marketing ploy so draconian and heavy-handed as to be reminiscent of the original XBox launch, Microsoft is now offering to pay-off publishers if they delist their content from Google's indexes.Sounds crazy, but it's true. Microsoft have approached News Corp and offered to pay them to de-list from Google's search indexes. So you have some idea of how big a deal this is, News Corp owns Fox, the Wall Street Journal, MySpace and dozens of other publishers and news sources around the world. They are the second biggest media group in the world after Disney.
Google have already gone on the record and said that news content isn't a huge money-spinner for them, but it begs the question: how much money is Microsoft willing to throw around?
They have one of the largest cash reserves in the world. And let's face it, content providers drive the Internet. If Microsoft is really this serious about securing a slice of the search pie, you might begin to see 'Bing exclusive' content very soon.
It won't stop with News Corp -- slowly but surely searching for news on Google will become impossible. And then MySpace music pages won't turn up in your searches either. What if they go to the adult content providers...? What if Bing's new slogan becomes 'the only place to find porn on the Internet'? WHAT IF?
[via The Business Insider]
Filed under: Utilities, Microsoft
Hate the new Windows 'start menu'? Get the classic XP menu back with this little app!
By now a lot of you will have experienced the 'All-in-One Omnipotent Start Menu' thing that was first introduced with Windows Vista and can now be found in Windows 7. It combines My Computer, My Documents and your installed programs into one big, gribbly menu.Some people love it. Some hate it. Personally, I like the all-in-one search/run input box... but that's about it. I much prefer the old drop-out menu, even if it is a bit stupid when you've got 500 programs installed. I still use icons on my desktop, rather than getting at everything through my Start Menu.
There have been a few tools that replicate the old Start Menu, but this one(aptly called 'Classic Windows Start Menu'), unlike the others, also works with the Windows Aero theme. Sadly, as you can see in the screenshot below, there still seem to be some bugs with the display (ironically, probably when you have a lot of stuff installed), but otherwise it all seems to work as intended!
So if, for some reason (and I'm sure there are lots of possible reasons) you don't like the Vista/7 Start Menu, why not grab this tiny little app?
Direct download link / developer's site (it ain't pretty, but you can find other-language versions there, if you don't want it in English)
[via Into Windows]
Filed under: Internet, OS Updates, Google, Open Source
Google's Chrome and Android operating systems will converge sooner rather than later
by Sebastian Anthony Nov 21st 2009
Google's co-founder, Sergey Brin, spoke to some reporters yesterday, after the Chrome OS presentation. Citing the common WebKit and Linux code found in both operating systems, he said "Android and Chrome are likely to converge over time."
"We're reaching a perfect storm of converging trends where computers are behaving more like mobile devices, and phones are behaving more like small computers," Google said in a statement responding to questions on if and when the two operating systems would converge.
Sergey's frankness on the matter is a little odd and must be part of a very recent internal about-face, considering Google CEO Eric Schmidt said only a few days ago that there was space for both operating systems and no need for conflict between them.
It would make sense though. Mobile devices are becoming more PC-like. PCs are certainly becoming more mobile (excluding the brick-like gaming laptops of course). With mobile data packages from AT&T, Verizon and other international providers regularly dropping in price, Chrome OS and its fast, easy access to everything in the cloud would make for one, sad, lonely Android.
[via CNET]
Foobar2000 v1.0 Beta -- holy crap, it's finally here!
Foobar2000, if you were wondering, is a very light-weight music player. It's incredibly flexible thanks to its modular design and fully-featured developer kit. There are mods and plug-ins for Foobar that make it one of the most useful music players: if you're the kind of music buff that likes downloading 'quadrophonic gold remastered' albums in AC3 format from Torrent sites, then Foobar is the music player for you. If you have a large MP3 (or FLAC, AAC, MP4...) music collection and simply want to listen to it, Foobar is also the one for you.
There's all the usual functionality there too, like ripping CDs or fixing ID3 tags. My personal favourite is the keyboard shortcuts that you can set to work globally -- so even if you're playing a game like World of Warcraft, you can skip and pause your music using a finger-breaking keyboard shortcut. Handy. There's also a neat Windows 7 shell integration plugin, if you're fortunate enough to be using Foobar2000 AND Windows 7!
If you're one of those old boring types that's still using the antiquated WinAmp, or you're using the slow-and-disgustingly-bloated iTunes, give Foobar2000 a go -- you'll be surprised at just how good it is.
Official download (torrent) / MajorGeeks direct download (seems link was broken -- fixed now)
Filed under: Games, Time-Wasters
Waste some time and toss the turtle
by Sebastian Anthony Nov 20th 2009
Toss The Turtle is the epitome -- the end of the line -- the ULTIMATE 'fire a canon ball as far as you can' game, a genre that you might remember from the (really) olden days. The basic premise is obvious: you gotta toss the turtle as far as you can.
But oh boy is it more complicated and involved and awesome than simply firing a canon. This could be significantly more than a 10-minute-time-waster, I assure you.
Finally, serious competition for iTunes...from Sony!
They've been awfully quiet the last couple of years, except for the recent PS3 price reduction and slow drip-feed of good games. But it seems, after the appointment of a new CEO back in 2006, the results of some internal reshuffling might finally be coming to fruition! There's no name for the new software reported on by BusinessWeek. There's also very few details of the functionality Sony's ...Proper web browsing on a console: Firefox coming to the Sony PS3?
It seems the age of humdrum, crippled browsers on consoles might finally be coming to an end! Though the details are very slim, with the only source being an unnamed insider very close to Sony, it is exciting news indeed if it turns out to true. Games consoles have always had feeble browser offerings, with PS3's default browser generally considered one of the worst and most unreliable. Porting ...YouTube 1080p roll-out begins
We've just been tipped off that 1080p or 'the highest-quality HDTV standard' has begun to appear on YouTube. So far there doesn't seem to be a way to search for the high-high definition videos, and the only example I have is a Nokia video of some poor, disadvantaged Indonesian farmer -- but I'm sure it's only a matter of time before YouTube/Google officially announce the changes to their video ...Beginning of the end for the Internet in the UK
Often lauded as the 'CCTV state' and 'the most surveilled country in the world', the UK may soon deliver a killing blow to the Internet as we know it. Cory Doctorow of Boing Boing is reporting some leaked legislation from the UK government that would remove any kind of freedom or privacy that the Internet grants its users. The proposed amendments to the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act would ...Good for only a week: $10 cashback with Bing!
You need a PayPal account, and you have to spend $25, but good until November 25th 2009 you can claim $10 cashback thanks to BING! The list of participating stores is huge -- Ebay, BestBuy, Barnes & Noble amongst others -- so it shouldn't be a problem finding something to spend $25 on, especially with the holiday season now upon us! The only 'tricky' thing is you need a Microsoft Live and ...
So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do.
Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game.
The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...
