I reported on this before, but Wincent today has launched Synergy 3.1, completing the addition of Audioscrobbler support. And, looks like he’s pulled a few ideas out of the beta cycle to put into 3.2. Nice.
Category: Technology
Three days left on OmniWeb sale
Somehow it’s only come to my attention that OmniWeb is on sale this month for a mere $10, $20 off the regular price.
I know you’ve got a lot of free choices for Mac browsers, but the Omni folks are good people, make excellent products and, hey, OmniWeb is worth it.
So, before time expires, you really should consider taking advantage of this deal. Nothing’s in it for me, it’s just a really good deal for a really good piece of software!
Hotness: Civil Netizen redesign
I’ve been watching the Civil Netizen guys for awhile, since they’re one of the few apps besides Flock built on top of Firefox that I’ve found in the wild. Well, they’re getting close to one-point-oh, and the latest designs, by veteran buddy-o-mine Wolfgang Bartelme, are looking hot.
XING adds support for microformats
The popular-cum-controversial professional networking site formerly-known as OpenBC recently relaunched with a new name and design with wide support for hCard.
Tara first spoke with Daniela about implementing microformats ages ago and in follow up emails and blog posts, we encouraged and worked out various strategies (pro bono, mind you) around their microformats implementation. They’ve started basic with support for hCard and I hope that over time, they’ll add support for XFN, rel-tag, hCalendar and hResume.
Various extensions and web services can now detect private contacts in your XING account and add them to your address book or perform additional functions.
This work follows LinkedIn eventually adding support for hCard and hResume — work that, just maybe, we had something to do with as well. 😉
Hopefully XING’s support of microformats will make Sebastian happy for now, though it seems like he’s still a bit skeptical (though Google Translate didn’t help me much with his post).
Ben Brophy’s Linkwalla adds xFolk support
Ben Brophy‘s databaseless personal link aggregator, Linkwalla, has recently been upgraded to v0.9.7. Aside from Flickr and Ma.gnolia integration, the output is now marked up in the xFolk microformat.
Skype + eBay + Google Local, Base and Payments, oh my!
Had a meeting with our advisor Don Thorson today (who’s currently at Jajah) and found it interesting to see that Google is strongly moving to make good on the deal they inked with eBay in August into the voice communications area.
First, they started talking about giving away ad-supported cell phones, then they added Skype to the Google Pack and now they’ve gone and made the most obvious play by adding click-to-call dialing to Google Local, executing on part of the original agreement.
With Skype adding SMS capabilities it’s curious to watch Google and Skype fight a pitched battle into telephony systems while the rest seem to be waiting and watching.
I mean, doesn’t this have an obvious end point?
I mean, take eBay listings, take Google Base, take Adwords as it spins out into radio and print, take Skype and take free click-to-calls where Google aka Skype foots the bill… add free cell phones… free wifi. And now give Google the tools to monetize the whole lot of the transactions flowing over its servers, airwaves and cell towers… and the ability to know who you are, what you’re up to, what you like, and how much you’re worth to advertisers.
If I were a farming man, I’d be a tad concerned about these Google silos cropping up along the horizon. But that’s just me.
Skype adds SMS capabilities
With the latest beta of Skype for Mac, they’ve added some pretty slick SMS integration.
Om Malik adds:
In addition, the company announced a deal with FON and SMC. SMC will sell a Skype enabled WiFi for for 139 Euros, and buyers will get a La Fonera router from FON and 500 SkypeOut minutes.
Update: Note that this beta seems to lose your bookmarked chats — and they don’t reappear until someone in the bookmarked channel sends out a message!
OS X Leopard mauls Little Snitch
Check it out. Looks like Apple’s at it again, this time ripping off independent Mac developer Obdev and their excellent Little Snitch firewall app in Leopard, Apple’s next version of its OS X operating system.
I mean, does it get any more blatant than this? Even over-simplification can’t save you from the fact that you’re clearly pushing out derivative work without crediting sources…
With Coverflow, hey, you guys did the right thing. You bought all the IP and, if I’m not mistaken, gave the guy a job. I don’t know the full story here, but if Obdev contributed to your thinking here, a little hat tip seems apropos.
Microformats + Flash: Who knew?
One aspect of microformats that’s not been widely discussed or perhaps even considered is their interaction with Flash apps like YourMinis… you might be guffawing there, but fer real — it’s not just shiny shiny!
Ok, so check this out. Go grab the YourMinis extension (recently updated!) and install it in Firefox. Restart, as usual, and now, whenever you’re on a page with microformatted content, you can launch the extension to “suck out” the data and toss it into your app of choice…
It only gets better from here as YourMinis can be used to unify your experience across sites… So if you thought that semantic web is only good for HTML, well, guess again… especially with the Adobe-Mozilla deal in place, expect more very interesting developments in the microformats-slash-rich-interface department very soon.
ConceptShare nearing launch…
Our friends from the great white north are nearing the launch of ConceptShare — a collaborative design product that looks very complementary to apps like Basecamp and Bugzilla (if only I had this when I was at Flock!). They’ve finally released a video tour of how it works — and it’s looking awesome. Oh — and don’t forget to wish Scotty Brooks a happy birthday (Nov 13)!
Factory Joe 