17 new stories on The Next Web today |  |
- Google Gets $10M from Jordan – Why You Should Care? [TNW Middle East]
- Weekend Beat – The Best 30 Seconds of my Life! [TNW Shareables]
- Internet in the Classroom [Video from 1993] [TNW Shareables]
- Instagram gets an update. More social, new filters, new languages. [TNW Apple]
- The Decline Of Web 2.0 [TNW Industry]
- The Woman Who Cannot Feel Fear [TNW Shareables]
- Kobo adds Instapaper & Facebook “like” button [TNW Canada]
- Neighborhoodr gets it right as a hyperlocal news source on Tumblr [TNW Media]
- This is how you cheer at an under 12 football (soccer) match. [TNW Shareables]
- Privacy and Permission in the Global Age [TNW Social Media]
- Japanese woman sues Google over Street View shots of her underwear [TNW Google]
- Google To Invest Millions in Palestinian Tech Industry [TNW Middle East]
- Samsung Galaxy S gets Gingerbread via ported Nexus S source code [TNW Mobile]
- Is Google TV Doomed? [TNW Google]
- Groupon.com to Provide Daily Deals to the UAE via Groupon.ae [TNW Middle East]
- Smartphones Get Arabic Gmail HTML5 App [TNW Middle East]
- 7 Flickr alternatives, just in case… [TNW Apps]
- 3 ways the Web is making music smarter [TNW Apps]
| Google Gets $10M from Jordan – Why You Should Care? [TNW Middle East] Posted: 19 Dec 2010 01:38 AM PST
The deal also holds in it folds a reciprocal investment on Google’s part, where the search giant plans on investing at least %25 of that amount back into the local Jordanian tech scene. "These governmental and semi-governmental organisations should utilise Google in a manner that serves tourism in the Kingdom and encourages investors to open businesses here," Minister of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Marwan Juma as reported by the Jordan Times earlier this week. Quoting HM King Abdullah of Jordan ”ICT Now constitutes 40% of Jordan’s GDP”. That fact Tourism was speculated to have been 18.3% of Jordan’s GDP during the same year means the Google/Jordan marriage is a match made in heaven. If properly used. This of course means terms like Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Social SEO are now part of the daily fabric Jordanian governmental entities will be working with. That in addition to the technical aspects of pushing their web presence to an entirely new multilingual level means the web industry in Jordan is about to see a surge in a business not only on a local scale, but also on a regional one due to the rich experience companies working in that atmosphere will acquire. The other part of the deal (the USD $2.5 million investment from Google to Jordan) will also create a competitive environment for startups and companies to prove who and what is worthy of partnering with Google in Jordan and the Middle East. Ben Flanagan of TheNational reported earlier today Google planning on opening 2-3 more offices in the region adding to their existing 2 offices in Cairo and Dubai. “Next year in the Middle East and North Africa, we hope to open between two to three offices,” said Carlo d’Asaro Biondo, Google’s vice president for southern and eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa. With this deal Amman will be a perfect candidate for a new regional office serving the greater Levant area, that with the US blockade on Syria and unstable political situation in Lebanon ruling the two countries out (although not entirely for Lebanon) as candidates. It will also help establish itself before it’s multi-million dollar anticipated investment in Palestine tech industry also next year. Not only will Jordan and Jordanian businesses be positively affected by this, because considering the region’s notorious jealousy factor in governmental decision-making we expect to see other countries like the UAE and Qatar to adopt similar initiatives to promote their countries on a global and regional level traditional media alone can’t do. Looking to 2011, this deal might actually prove to be a catalyst for Google in the Middle Eastern enterprise services sector that Microsoft will apparently have to start fiercely defending.Projects Middle East, Jordan Times, TheNational [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Weekend Beat – The Best 30 Seconds of my Life! [TNW Shareables] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 10:25 PM PST The Lonely Island is an awesome comedy group and they just released their latest single: “I Just Had Sex” featuring Akon. It is funny as hell and you should watch it. One problem though, when you watch it you’ll want to watch it again, and again. Just like this classic:
Watched it while having sex? Doesn’t matter, still counts.Daily What [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Internet in the Classroom [Video from 1993] [TNW Shareables] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 08:29 PM PST “This video was a made to introduce K-12 teachers to the Internet (hard to believe now, but back then, the public was largely unaware). Riding the meteoric rise of the Internet, this video became NASA’s most popular K-12 VHS tape.” What I’m most impressed by is that the one thing nearly everyone in the video claims is the Internet’s most significant benefit – access to information – still holds true to this day. [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Instagram gets an update. More social, new filters, new languages. [TNW Apple] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 07:30 PM PST
Amongst a number of bug fixes, the update brings two new filters (hurrah!), suggested users to find high quality photo sharers, and collapsed comments for longer comment threads. For international users, you’ll be happy to know Instagram is know available in Japanese, Germ, Russian, French, Mandarin, Italian and Spanish. While all very nice, it’s Instagram’s web interface I’m waiting to get my hands on, being forced to browse and navigate solely from the iPhone is just not what this era is about. Fortunately, it shouldn’t be too long a wait.. [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| The Decline Of Web 2.0 [TNW Industry] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 06:39 PM PST
It's amazing what a couple of years do though because as we can see below, some of the biggest sites from the “Web 2.0 generation” are either on a massive decline, facing huge competition or about to be closed down. There’s a good lesson here to highlight; how the hype cycle around websites and services can come and go and what was once lauded and destined for great things can within a couple of years shut down and be abandoned… DeliciousOne of the most popular and useful sites of the Web 2.0 era this massively practical bookmarking tool was used by many people to keep track of content that they found online. Yahoo bought the site at it's peak but users have started to drop off (the graph below might not be reflective as many people use browser plugins etc) and just this week there was speculation that Yahoo are pretty much going to be killing off the site much to the amazement of some of the loyal user base who use it on a daily basis. Fortunately that isn’t the case but the company is looking to sell.
DiggPossibly the highest profile of all the casualties given it's rise to fame, the high valuations it received and the online celebrity of it's founder Kevin Rose. The traffic had started to stagnate and fall last year but the downturn really accelerated this year when the returning Rose tried to introduce a whole host of new features to try and compete with Facebook and Twitter but those changes backfired spectacularly by alienating the loyal community and the site is shipping users as fast as they once gained them.
FlickrI wouldn't say Flickr is in chance of dying nor has it'd downturn been as marked as the other sites on the list but there is no doubt that it is under pressure from a whole host of new photo sharing sites. Flickr is still massively popular but the rise of Twitter and sharing sites like Twitpic, Yfrog and newer apps like Instagram are certainly making people share photos in a whole new way.
MyspaceIt's amazing to think that just over a year ago Myspace were still competing directly with Facebook as one of the world's biggest social networks but now the decline is so big that Myspace have had to redesign their entire site and allow you to use Facebook connect to make the site more social. The site has been re-positioned to focus on content but it'll never be the force it once was and you wouldn't be surprised to hear it was closing down sometime next year.
BeboNot as massive around the entire world as it was in Ireland and some other markets but people did think the site had enough potential for AOL to pay 850 million for it. Since then the users have pretty much left it and AOL were trying to give it away for free to anybody who would take it. The latest valuation was somewhere around the $20 million mark and you can expect Bebo to fizzle out completely pretty soon I reckon.
What Does All This mean?It means that you shouldn't hedge all your bets when building up social media profiles or community within a site. Even though you are getting great results or find a site massively useful at the moment doesn't mean that in a couple of years it will be the same site. Trends come and go faster than ever on the Internet and sites that you one couldn't live without are obsolete within a couple of years. I just cringe at some of the money brands poured in to the likes of Bebo to try and promote their products and grow an audience and what are they left with now that Bebo is in a digital cemetery? There are probably sites out there that we all use and love on a daily basis which in a couple of years will be closing their doors and it's important to just be mindful of that.
[Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| The Woman Who Cannot Feel Fear [TNW Shareables] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 05:25 PM PST
Known as SM to protect her privacy, she has damage to a key emotion centre in her brain called the amygdala, which means that nothing makes her afraid. The woman is reportedly to be the first of the case. The woman experienced fear as a child and knows that some situations should be frightening but as an adult she been sky diving, threatened with a knife and held at gunpoint and felt no fearBBC [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Kobo adds Instapaper & Facebook “like” button [TNW Canada] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 02:26 PM PST
The Kobo's free app provides a slick user interface coupled with 1.8 million free books and access to discounted offers for magazines, newly released books and newspapers. In the past, we've seen quite a few mobile apps like Seesmic and TweetDeck add Instapaper to their feature set because Instapaper is ideal for content junkies. While surfing the web, when you find a great article that you don't have time to read, Instapaper can save the article for later making it available for reading offline. And the Instapaper tool within Kobo's app works in a similar fashion. Within the Kobo iOS app (Phone, iPad, iPod touch), users will be able to clip articles on the web and save & sync them to the Kodo library using the Instapaper tool. It's sort of Kodo's 'save it for later' folder. Books, magazines and newspapers , in addition to articles on the web, can also be added as Instapaper clippings.
Kobo's iOS4 updates follow a string of new social tools available on Kodo's iPad, iPhone and iPod touch apps. Last week, Kobo launched a new feature for publishing a series of shareables to Facebook; book check-ins, passage sharing and reward-badges. Users will also be able "like" a book within the app, another feature of their Facebook intergration. These new enhancements are great, but they're arriving a bit late to the party. And if they really wanted to go 'social' with their badges, they should have teamed up with a service such as Glue, a service that unifies your badges across multiple entertainment platforms. I'm admittedly a bit of a Glue fangirl and I just like my badges neatly displayed in one place. Nevertheless Kobo has extended huge value to their customers with their new social entertainment features.Kobo Blog, Image: Kobo iPad [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Neighborhoodr gets it right as a hyperlocal news source on Tumblr [TNW Media] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 01:37 PM PST What’s going on in your neighborhood? If you live in New York City, you can find out on Neighborhoodr’s local Tumblr built blog network. If Craigslist is the modern day Classified section, then Neighborhoodr is its editorial component. It acts like a newspaper for each neighborhood, filled with little stories. In New York City, people move around a lot. (I’m only 26 and am now living in my 7th apartment in NYC.) There’s also a lot going on in New York and its inhabitants are notorious for wanting to share that information. Neighborhoodr provides local content for 60 New York City neighborhoods, so that wherever you are, or whenever you move, they’ve got a news local outlet for you to browse, contribute to and share. Here’s how it works. Visit the Neighborhoodr site and pick your neighborhood, which takes you to the specific Tumblr blog. View the blog’s content or click the big red button to submit a post. Once you’ve submitted a post it will be added into a queue to pass by the eyes of one of Neighborhoodr’s 50 local moderators.
Gawker‘s Richard Blakeley and Reuters‘ Anthony De Rosa started working on Neighborhoodr two years ago, which officially launched in September 2009. While Neighborhoodr doesn’t aim to be the go to place for political crises in the world, it was the go to place for local Brooklynites to share information and read about the tornadoes that touched down in the hood this fall. And a local Williamsburg resident even used the blog to find her lost puppy.
Neighborhoodr is riding atop a pretty big wave. Tumblr hit 1.2 billion pageviews in the U.S. in October, up 1,540% from the year before, according to a recent TechCrunch article. Yesterday, Tumblr announced that their network has expanded to more than 11 million blogs. And RWW just reported that in fact Tumblr now has more page views and money than WordPress. Co-founders Blakeley and DeRosa are bullish on Tumblr. “Tumblr is way more viral than Twitter and tweets have a short shelf life,” says Blakeley. “But Twitter does act like CB radio, leading eyeballs to Tumblr.” Since they use Tumblr, they measure their user base by subscriptions not page views. In less than a year they’ve grown from 600 subscribers to over 3,000. ”I like to call re-blogs ‘sideways traffic,’” Blakeley says, “Because when you see something good enough, you just have to reblog it because it’s so easy.” And the best part about Tumblr? The site is free for users and there’s literally no overhead for the site. In fact, they haven’t put a penny into the operation since it started. But they have started to make money. They’ve signed up their first advertiser, Tanqueray, the gin company, that is sponsoring a “cocktail safari” in Manhattan for the team and their friends as I write this post. De Rosa says the blog will be a powerful tool for businesses who don’t want to take out expensive ads in sites like Eater but want to cheaply advertise to a hyper local, targeted market. While they haven’t nailed down a number yet, ad space on the site will be in the ball park of $100 p/month. With 3,000 dedicated contributors who know how to spread content virally, I’m feeling pretty bullish on Neighborhoodr. After all, how could you live in a neighborhood, use Tumblr and not want to follow your local news? [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| This is how you cheer at an under 12 football (soccer) match. [TNW Shareables] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 12:59 PM PST
[Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Privacy and Permission in the Global Age [TNW Social Media] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 12:28 PM PST With Wikileaks dominating international headlines, governments across the globe will no doubt begin assessing how their digital borders are patrolled to ensure their diplomatic data doesn't fall into the wrong hands. Most of the public have warmly welcomed the cable leaks, many following the riveting revelations with fervor. Put the boot on the other foot, however, and most of us wouldn't be overly ecstatic with our private information finding its way into the public domain. Of course, the two scenarios are different. Our own personal information relates to ourselves, whilst the leaked cables from the US State Department involve the whole world, even if it does cause diplomatic distress. Privacy and data protection in 2010Privacy and data protection have been major talking points throughout 2010 with social media at the centre of much of the furore. For example, Facebook has ruffled a few feathers this year when it made certain key privacy changes 'opt-out' rather than 'opt-in'. And then there was the admission that many of its third-party apps and games breached data-protection rules. However, public privacy concerns don't seem to have been too bad for business, with Facebook now teetering on the brink of 600 million users worldwide and showing no sign of slowing. But one of the by-products of its global growth – in a year that saw Facebook overtake Orkut in India and make significant inroads in key markets such as Brazil and Russia – has been the security issues raised by various countries. No global privacy lawFacebook is entering a minefield of State-led objections to how the social networking giant handles its users' private information. Canada's privacy commissioner has previously threatened legal action against Facebook, whilst Korean, German and Swiss regulators have recently voiced concerns too. Brussels has also stated that privacy will be one of its key regulatory issues moving forward. And this is where Facebook could come unstuck: there is no global privacy law. Mark Zuckerberg can continue to add pages to the social network’s privacy policy – a policy that's already longer than the US Constitution – but can it really cater to the hundreds of different laws across the lands? It can try, but it may find it difficult to keep everyone happy. Facebook's growing legion of users clearly can't get enough of it, whilst businesses love having access to the 24-hour global gathering that permeates Facebook. It's a match made in heaven for all involved. Given that data protection and privacy laws vary between countries, it's difficult for any company to know what they can and can't do across the world. Google discovered this to its chagrin earlier in the year, when three Google executives were handed out jail sentences in Italy for allowing users to post a controversial video on its website – a violation of local privacy laws. The sentences were suspended, but it helps to highlight that many companies – including the major digital players – are constantly treading a thin line between facilitating freedom of expression, and breaking the law. US vs. EUIn the US, data privacy isn't heavily legislated. There are regulations in place – but there is no overarching governmental law that stipulates how data can be acquired, stored or used. Bill Clinton and Al Gore even recommended in their “Framework for Global Electronic Commerce” that private companies should 'self-regulate'. Europe, on the other hand, heavily regulates and rigidly enforces laws to protect a person's "family life, his home and his correspondence", as outlined in Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. To ensure information flows freely across the EU, the various data protection regulations from the member states were brought together under the directive on the protection of personal data, which EU states were required to transpose into their respective laws by the end of 1998. And for US and other non-EU parties, this directive specifies that data can only be transferred to other countries where a similar, adequate level of data protection exists. The US-EU Safe Harbor Principles were thus drawn up, a program which US companies can sign-up to if they adhere to the seven principles outlined in the privacy directive. US organizations – in theory – must re-certify under Safe Harbor every twelve months. The seven principles are: 1. Notice: Individuals must be informed that their data is being collected and about how it will be used. Whilst this EU legislation is designed to unify policy across the member states, each country within the EU still has its own individual laws. And this is why it's so difficult to know what's allowed and where. Throw into the equation the myriad of other cultures and laws across the world, and it's clear that the Schmidts, Zuckerbergs and other digital Dalai Lamas will have their work cut out for them in an increasingly global market. Facebook unleashed its Open Graph protocol in early 2010, meaning developers can now integrate their websites with the social sphere. So whilst you can now 'like' something on any website, this data is passed through the Facebook channels and you can be pretty certain that you'll be receiving targeted ads that correspond with your 'likes'. And if you change your relationship status to 'single', you can expect to be inundated with ads for dating websites soon. So Facebook can either adapt its model to suit each country's requirements – something that really isn't workable for any true social network – or adopt a different philosophy that adheres to a one word philosophy at all times: permission. Permission marketing was a term coined by marketing guru Seth Godin. It applies to all areas of marketing, where you seek permission from the user before proceeding to the next stage of the buying process. In the case of Facebook, permission simply means being open and up-front at all times about what data it's gathering, how it will be used and, crucially, it should always be opt-in. This won't circumvent every international legislative concern, but it will go a long way towards getting local regulators on its side.FT.com, Wall Street Journal, w3.org [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Japanese woman sues Google over Street View shots of her underwear [TNW Google] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 12:02 PM PST
The unnamed woman is seeking damages of 600,000 Yen (approximately $7000), claiming that the images had caused her psychological distress, resulting in losing her job and the changing of her residence. Japan’s Mainichi newspaper reported news of the suit, highlighting that the lady first saw the photo on Google’s Street View service in Spring when she performed a search on her own house. It is claimed that upon discovering the pictures of underwear on her washing line, the woman’s existing obsessive compulsive disorder worsened as a result of increased anxiety, leading her to feel as if her life was being secretly recorded. It’s not the first time that Street View has come in for criticism – Google escaped punishment for collecting private data with its Street View cars, only recently deleting the data it collected. In Germany, the service launched to much objection with 244,000 citizens opting out of the service as a result. Google has confirmed it is looking into the case with the woman claiming that images of her underwear were pulled from Street View mapping in October, the same time as when the woman filed the suit.Telegraph, Image Credit [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Google To Invest Millions in Palestinian Tech Industry [TNW Middle East] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 10:43 AM PST Earlier this month, Google sent a team to the Palestinian territories of Gaza and the West Bank to meet with local entrepreneurs and techies. As reported by a local tech blog, Google’s team has taken multiple trips to Palestine for meetings and to host events and workshops. Yesterday, December 17 2010, Gisel Hiscock, Google’s Director of New Business Development for Europe Middle East and Africa, confirmed this investment with the following update on her Facebook profile.
Google’s interest in the area coupled with such a large investment is an incredible boost to an area of the world that is notably stricken with violence and tragedy. Approximately 2.4 million Palestinians live in the West Bank and another 1.4 million live in the Gaza Strip. The news follows Google’s recent $10 million agreement with Jordan that includes a 2.5 million dollar investment into the Kingdom’s local tech sector. In Jordan, Google will provide intensive training to local techies in online marketing and how to make their web content more user-friendly.Wikipedia [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Samsung Galaxy S gets Gingerbread via ported Nexus S source code [TNW Mobile] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 07:28 AM PST
Whilst it hasn’t been ported from the AOSP release, XDA Developer supercurio managed to port the Nexus S Android 2.3 source code to the Galaxy S with not a line of code changed in the process. Galaxy S owners will need to exercise some restraint for the time being as WiFi, voice control and GPS location features aren’t currently operational, so it will not be an able replacement for the devices’ current firmware. Luckily, we can see how Android 2.3 looks on the Galaxy S, supercurio uploading two videos to demonstrate the snappiness of the device with its new software. We believe it won’t be long until the Cyanogen’s and Modaco’s of the world join the guys over at XDA and get in on the act, releasing their own port. For now, it’s just a case of watching and waiting. [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Is Google TV Doomed? [TNW Google] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 06:55 AM PST
Google TV is the search giant’s play to bring its advertising to your living room by turning you TV into an Internet video player, where the major networks’ shows can be searched for alongside YouTube videos, the Web and apps that, as they evolve, have the potential to change the way we use our TVs forever. It’s an appealing prospect. Unfortunately, things haven’t got off to a good start for Google TV thanks to one main factor: the major TV networks. Content is kingShortly after Google TV launched in the US, many networks began blocking the service from receiving their online video streams. A Bloomberg report yesterday indicates that the situation isn’t set to change any time soon. Big names like Fox, NBC, CBS, ABC and Hulu are unhappy that Google is packaging their catch-up video streams in a way they can’t control and, crucially, can’t sell advertising against. Even in-stream ads pull in less revenue than on-air ads. Bloomberg reports something of an impasse between the traditional TV industry and Google. Discussing CBS and Fox, the report says “After months of talks they're in no hurry to let Google TV offer shows via the Web for free. They say there have been no lucrative offers and they aren't sure of the search company's intentions.” Meanwhile, Google TV’s Rashi Chandra told Bloomberg: “"I don't think there's any magical solution that's going to happen right away. Our job from a platform basis is to make sure that we support all the different business models that they want to support.” So, don’t expect your Google TV box to get access to top US shows tomorrow, or even next week. That said, Google may well find a way to make it work that pleases the owners of the shows it will need to make its product a success. The question is, will this end up being a diluted version of Google’s current product? Echoes of the pastRemember earlier this year when Google wanted to transform the mobile phone industry by letting you buy phones directly online, choosing your carrier separately? That didn’t work and Google’s new Nexus S is being sold in the traditional way. This showed that while Google holds great influence on the future direction of the Internet, that doesn’t necessarily translate to well to other industries. Could we see a similar change in direction for Google’s latest foray into a new industry? Google TV is unlikely to become a hit without major network content. If the networks are going to allow their content onto the service, they could negotiate significant changes to the way the service works. That’s if they want an advertising giant from another industry on their patch at all. What might those changes be? It’s too early to say, but it may well be that if Google TV is to become a hit it may well have to be a very different product than it is today. [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Groupon.com to Provide Daily Deals to the UAE via Groupon.ae [TNW Middle East] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 05:34 AM PST
One of the most significant findings is that Groupon.com will be expanding in the Middle East with their first portal covering an Arab country through Groupon.ae. We’ve sent a couple of emails out to those suspect have the answer but have yet to get anything official. What we did find was an interesting link on the homepage of Groupon’s European portal Groupon.co.uk pointing to the Groupon.ae domain everyone has been wondering about recently.
If you’re not familiar with Groupon’s European network, CityDeal was a Berlin based Groupon clone that got acquired back in May 2010. Which means the UAE portal will probably be managed from there until they set up shop in the UAE. Which doesn’t look like it’s going to be the near future. This of course is sad news for the other Group Buying startups in the region, because this basically means Groupon probably isn’t going to be looking for acquiring any of them. Groupon would rather compete. Now don’t get too excited, most only have a homepage so far. Nonetheless we thought we’d let you know how things are going and which to keep a lookout for.
So there you have it a dozen websites mainly providing deals for the UAE and Jordan as launching pads for the rest of the region, with one launching from Lebanon. Let us know if you’ve heard of any other websites so we can put them on the list and enjoy.Image [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| Smartphones Get Arabic Gmail HTML5 App [TNW Middle East] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 05:00 AM PST
Yes it’s true, among the new 44 language supported in Gmail.com’s new HTML5 web application User Interface is Arabic, but it’s not for everyone since it only runs on Android and iOS 2.2.1+ with Arabic as their default language. We’ve tried to get a glimpse of it ever since it was reported by WWWery but it turns out Gmail doesn’t care if we’ve set our language to Arabic in the Gmail account settings, it has to be the phone’s language setting that’s Arabic for the web application to work in Arabic. That’s quite a challenge since all Android phones have yet to get full Arabic support from Apple and Google. The only way you can set you’re device to Arabic is if you have it rooted and install your own ROM (you can check out a tutorial from Rami Taibah if you’re interested). So to Google thanks for the support it really means a lot, but could you please add the option to set the default OS language to Arabic so we can check it out?Image [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| 7 Flickr alternatives, just in case… [TNW Apps] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 04:30 AM PST
So what does it take to make this list? Any alternative needs to have a great community (or at least the potential), a solid mobile application and sharing features galore. That narrows things down pretty quickly, so here’s our list: Picasa Web AlbumsYou can’t talk alternatives without talking about Google’s offering. Picasa is a free photo editing software for Mac and Windows, provided by Google. But there’s an added feature — Picasa Web Albums.
As you can see, the Explore feature is a lot like what you’ll find on Flickr. There are also games, reasonably tight groups of people and Picasa is ridiculously easy to use on the go. If you have an Android device, it’s built in from the ground up and you can even sync it with your Gallery. If you’re an iPhone user, emailing photos to your Picasa Web Albums is a great alternative. SmugMugWhen it comes to alternatives, you simply can’t ignore SmugMug. With many of the same features, apps for iPhone, Android and iPad, as well as the ability for professional photographers to sell their work. Like Flickr, SmugMug lets you upload video (up to 1080p for Power and Pro accounts), protect your photos and it saves full-resolution work. Themed sites, which each SmugMug user has, are your central hub for everything that you do. Instead of having a simple photo stream, you can fully customize your landing page to your liking. The social feature? It’s handled by integration with Twitter, Facebook and more.
While SmugMug is arguably a bit more professional than some of us point-and-shoot heroes will need, it’s still a site that you absolutely must consider. If you’ve been paying for a Flickr account, you’ll likely appreciate that SmugMug has monthly payment plans. They’re a bit more pricey, on the whole, but we like the bite-size payments. Phanfare Firmly in the middle-ground between the photo collector and the professional photographer, you’ll find Phanfare. It’s a slick site, with unlimited photo storage available, and iPhone app and integration with third-party apps such as Picasa, Photoshop and Aperture. What Phanfare lacks in social skill, it far makes up for in features.
Two pricing options (Premium for $99/yr and Pro for $199/yr) give you some options that other, free sites simply won’t. The tools and service integration are second-to-none, and Pro users can even sell merchandise featuring their photos. It’s absolutely worth a look if you consider yourself a bit more advanced than just a point-and-shoot paparazzi. DPHOTODPHOTO is another mid-level professional site, meaning that it does involve a subscription fee. But what you get for that fee is absolutely gorgeous. Ranging from $30 to $90 per year, you’ll have options from 1,000 photos all the way to unlimited, with the ability to upload files up to 24 MB each. What’s really compelling, though, is how your photos are displayed.
DPHOTO might not have an app, but what it does have is a beautiful interface via mobile Safari or your Android browser. You can flip, flick and zoom to your heart’s content. As for the social aspect? Twitter and Facebook become the site’s entire social reach, allowing you to easily share your photos on the services. YogileAn interesting twist in things is brought to you by Yogile. As we wrote before, it might just become your favorite photo sharing site, but more because it allows you to collaborate with friends and family to make your albums. So now, instead of wondering why your drunken best man took off with your camera, your wedding photos can be preserved by combining the work of the entire audience.
The collaboration is awesome, Yogile really is all about sharing. With public and private albums, plus the ability to collaborate, it’s a huge advantage over what other sites are offering. Though Flickr groups were close, Yogile’s full integration of sharing into a single album is a welcome change. PhotobucketA few years ago, Photobucket was simply where you dumped pictures if you wanted easy access to the HTML code to share them on other sites. My how times have changed. With a revamp of its entire system and the integration of social collaboration features, Photobucket is rearing its head again as a force to be reckoned with in the photo sharing world.
It’s not the prettiest site you’ve seen, but it’s highly functional. Combine that with years of use by a strong community and Photobucket comes out from the shadows as a hard choice to beat for the low price of free. This is the elephant in the room. Nobody wants to admit that Facebook actually does a pretty good job with photos now. The down side, of course, is that you need to be friends with someone in order for them to fully access your photos, if you happend to change your privacy settings.
The site has recently added new features to the Photos section. You can now download full-resolution images, pictures are displayed in a lightbox format, and that annoying “loading” animation doesn’t plague you after each time that you select a new image. The changes are good, but not quite good enough that we’d skip over an external site. However, if sharing with your Facebook friends is your main concern, it’s hard to be the original. Going Mobile, SociallyIf cellphone camerawork is your thing, then it’s hard to beat the options that we showed you today. However, there are still a couple worth mentioning. Flickr’s mobile app isn’t great, but it’s something. As for a company that seems to have it all figured out? Check out Instagram. on top of having a cool photo application, the company could, with the flick of a switch, also have a gigantic social network on its hands. The follower and following aspects of Instagram are key. Mobypicture is another that has to be mentioned. With apps for darn near every phone on the market, groups, integration with almost every social network and a keen business understanding, Mobypicture is carving itself out a nice little niche in the mobile/social photo world. Have some others? You’ll find us curious, so leave your thoughts in the comments, eh? [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
| 3 ways the Web is making music smarter [TNW Apps] Posted: 18 Dec 2010 04:17 AM PST Music data is increasingly becoming of more value to labels, artists and developers who are using it to create platforms and services which allow fans to discover more about their favourite artists and genres. In this article I'm going to take a look at three of the platforms out there that are both making use of, as well as generating, this data and how these benefit audiences and fans. Songkick
The service allows you to list your top bands and then informs you by e-mail when they are playing nearby, even allowing you to import artist information from Pandora, Last.fm, or iTunes. It also creates a personalised calendar, a profile which allows users to share information on past and forthcoming gigs – something which I think helps build a fair degree of excitement about them. Songkick's data is available via an API, which Yahoo have recently made use of by providing gig information on searched for artists which links directly back to Songkick to allow fans to purchase tickets – although this service is currently only available in the US. The Echo Nest
The platform looks at the songs themselves – extracting information on musical aspects such as key, tempo, rhythm and timbre as well as crawling the web and analysing text to gather information about the song and the artist who performed it. It even goes one step further by scanning social networks, p2p, blogs and forums to gauge activity around new music trends – resulting on information which, as you'd imagine, can be a kind of digital gold-dust to labels and publishers. With all this essential and unique data around songs and artists its not surprising that the platform has become an essential tool for developers of a whole range of music related apps, be they for recommendation, analysis or just plain simple fun. The future is looking bright for The Echo Nest too, especially following an agreement with MTV that was announced this week where it will aid the development of a "series of forthcoming music products that will that allow fans to further their music discovery, consumption and interaction online"- the first of which is the rather impressive MTV Music Meter we covered earlier this week. SoundCloud
SoundCloud's API allows the widget to be used on just about any website, blog or forum as well as on Facebook. Its also been used in some very impressive mashups – especially when combined with location data, and is becoming a regular feature within a good many music and audio related mobile apps. In addition to simply sharing, SoundCloud recently introduced a means of recording directly to their platform using a PC or iPhone app, something which I can see being useful for organisations and individuals as a kind of digital, web based dictaphone or field recorder – especially since text notes can be created (and responded to) along the timeline of the embeddable player. [Notice: this is the RSS feed for ALL stories from across The Next Web - that means a lot of stories every day - for just our top stories, subscribe to our Top Stories RSS feed here.] |
We are all obsessed with sites like Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin at the moment but rewind a few years to when the term Web 2.0 first popped up and a whole host of different sites were the hot young startups destined for great things.
A woman who cannot feel afraid because of a missing structure in her brain may help scientists discover treatments for 
A Japanese woman is suing Google over claims the search giant displayed images of underwear hanging on her washing line on its Street View mapping service.
Just a day after Google released the source code for its Gingerbread Android update to the Android Open Source Project (AOSP) comes some good news for Samsung Galaxy S owners; Gingerbread is incoming (unofficially).
With Yahoo 
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