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YouTube Clamping Down on Family-Unfriendly Content

Paul Lilly — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 09:14:37 -0600

In a move that would make FCC Chairman Kevin Martin proud, YouTube laid out several goals for itself, half of which had to do with clamping down on sexual content. Rest assured, YouTube has "been thinking a lot lately" about how to make the entire video viewing experience a more pleasant one, and here's what it came up with:

Stricter standard for mature content: YouTube's pulling in the reins on censored material and in addition to pornographic images and sex acts, which are already removed when flagged, the video sharing site is also redefining what it considers "sexually suggestive." Among other criteria, any video intended or designed to arouse viewers will be considered sexually suggestive.
Demotion of sexually suggestive content and profanity: Videos that fall under the above category and/or contain profanity "will be algorithmically demoted" from YouTube's 'Most Viewed,' 'Top Favorited,' and other browser pages.

The two other changes YouTube plans to make involve improving its thumbnails so that the image actually represents the video, and enforcing more accurate video information.

Like, dislike, or are indifferent to the changes? Hit the jump and post your thoughts.

Haven't Flickred Lately? Time to Log In and Enjoy a New Home Page!

Mark Edward Soper — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 18:29:44 -0500

Flickr's rolled out a new home page design that's intended to make it easier to see what's happening with your Flickr account and on Flickr in general.

Here's what's new:

The Your Photostream section now shows your five most recent uploads
Your Photostream also has a toggle to show recent activity (such as comments from friends, your replies, and pictures selected as favorites). Don't want any more comments on a particular item? Click its Mute button.
Click More Recent Activity to see other activity and change activity settings.
The Your Contacts section now shows more photos.
The Your Groups section now shows the most recent photos from your groups.
Want to reduce page clutter? Click the double arrow icon next to a section title to close it, or click it again to open it.
There's now a new Explore module on the home page that displays the latest activities.
The latest entry at the Flickr Blog and the latest Flickr Tip occupy the right margin of the page, along with more ways to use your photos.

Haven't logged in for awhile? I think you'll like the changes. Join us after the jump and let us know if you agree - or not.

Eye-Fi Gets Twittering, RSSing with New Manager Update

Mark Edward Soper — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 18:40:30 -0500

The Eye-Fi line of Wi-Fi enabled SD cards just keeps getting more social. The October update of the Eye-Fi Manager, in addition to adding à la carte support for geotagging, webshare, and hotspot access service updates, also adds support Twitter and RSS integration. You can use Twitter to tell your contacts when you have new photos posted on line, and RSS support enables you to publish pictures in real-time to your preferred RSS aggregator.

Eye-Fi now offers cards through its online store as well as at an ever-growing list of retailers.

RSS logo courtesy Variawa.co.za.

Kevin Rose Wants Digg to be More than Just a Fanboy Hub

Alex Castle — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 16:10:30 -0500

Browsing the Digg homepage, you’re bound to see a lot of links about videogames, open source, and Barack Obama. For all you readers of the Max PC blog, that might seem like a good thing, but according to founder Kevin Rose, it’s time for that to change. In “The Future of News,” a talk at the Future of Web Apps conference, Rose said that Digg needs to shed its status as a geek bastion and do more for the average web-surfer.

In the talk Rose outlined several of the strategies that Digg will employ to expand its userbase. One thing the site needs to do, he said, is get more users participating. Presently, even though more than 30 million people use the site a month, only 3 million have registered accounts, meaning that the vast majority of people who read Digg aren’t affecting which links make the homepage.

Digg needs to provide an experience that’s relevant to each individual user, Rose stressed. Along these lines, the site intends to allow users to filter out links about subjects they don’t care about, and is developing ways to automatically sort users into groups based on their interests. Also, the site is looking to weight users’ Diggs by their history as an accurate (or inaccurate) predictor of popular links.

Will Digg lose its geek following as it tries to go mainstream? Let us know what you think.

Overrated and Underrated Tech - Exposed!

Mark Edward Soper — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 21:56:45 -0500

Just as we nerds have overhyped some technologies, we've also overlooked some even better alternatives. PC World has put on its thinking cap and posted its picks for the ten most overrated technology products and services - and alternatives that deserve a closer look.

So, How Would You Rate These Contenders?

Ultra-portable laptops versus mini-laptops
Microsoft Zune versus Apple iPod Touch
Windows XP versus Windows Vista

To discover which ones get the overrated razz, and which ones deserve some unexpected love, join us after the break.

Eye-Fi Users, Circle October 5th for Big Changes

Mark Edward Soper — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 22:03:25 -0500

At Photokina this week, Eye-Fi, makers of the first Wi-Fi-enabled SD cards, announced two improvements to its product family effective October 5th:

First, a firmware update will double the photo transfer speed from Eye-Fi cards from the current 350KBps to 700KBps.
Second, users of Eye-Fi cards will be able to add the photo transfer features of their choice to cards that were not bundled with these features.

Here are the new options:

Users of the entry-level Eye-Fi Home card can add web sharing for $9.99/year, making the card equivalent in features to the Eye-Fi Share card.
Users of the Eye-Fi Home or Share card can add geotagging for $14.99/year.
And, users of the Eye-Fi Share card can add automatic uploading at open hotspots or at Wayport hotspots (there are over 10,000 of those) for $14.99/year.

By adding geotagging and hotspot support, users of Eye-Fi Share cards make these cards equivalent to Eye-Fi Explore cards.

The already long list of online photo sharing services Eye-Fi supports now includes Apple's MobileMe and AdoramaPix, effective immediately. Eye-Fi cards are now being bundled with digital cameras at Wal-Mart.com, and will be available at Best Buy stores starting October 5.

What do you think about the ability to add the features you want to Eye-Fi cards? Hit the jump for your chance to sound off.

Windows Live's Third Wave Now Ready to Try

Mark Edward Soper — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:06:05 -0500

Windows Live has come a long way since it was first introduced as a Microsoft brand in 2006. The first wave bolted Hotmail, Messenger, and Spaces into a single download. In last year's second wave, tools like SkyDrive, Events, Photo Gallery, LiveWriter, Calendar, and Family Safety joined the family, along with support for mobile devices. This week, Microsoft rolled out its third wave, adding a new member to the Windows Live family (Movie Maker) and new features to several existing programs (Messenger, Photo Gallery, Writer, Toolbar, and more). We've already told you about the new features in Hotmail, so join us after the jump to find out what's new and improved.

MySpace and Facebook Users Targeted by New Koobface Worm

Mark Edward Soper — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 15:07:27 -0500

MySpace and Facebook users now have bigger worries than whether Wordscraper will stay online: two new worms, known as the Koobface family, are attacking Windows users of these popular social networking (or "Notworking" sites, as our friends at The Inquirer call them). These new worms pose a threat to the peace of mind of people like Zac Koobface (a real Facebook user, by the way).

Kapersky Labs was the first to detect these worms: Net-Worm.Win32.Koobface.a (targets MySpace) and Net-Worm.Win32.Koobface.b (targets Facebook). McAfee refers to both worms as W32/Koobface.worm, while Symantec uses the terms W32.Koobface.A and W32.Koobface.B.

Both worms send comments or messages to other users of the service. The messages or comments contain alleged links to humorous YouTube files (such as "Paris Hilton Tosses Dwarf On The Street"). When the user clicks on the link, the link redirects to a website that displays an error message claiming the user needs an updated codec to enable the Adobe Flash player to play the video. The alleged Flash player update (codecsetup.exe) contain the worm.

When the Koobface.A worm runs, it configures itself to run automatically when the system starts, checks for MySpace cookies, and if it finds them, modifies the user's profile by adding links to malicious sites that contain the worm. To learn more about Koobface.A and Koobface.B, check the McAfee and Symantec links earlier in this article.

If you use Kapersky, McAfee, or Symantec antivirus, the latest virus definitions will detect and stop these worms. If you use other antivirus or anti-malware programs, check for updates daily - and don't click on funny video links from other MySpace or Facebook users. The results just aren't very funny.

Been bugged by these or other social-networking worms? Tell us your story after the jump!