According to eMarketer, 24% of the 34.3 million US child and teen Internet users will visit virtual worlds once a month in 2007. This will rise to 34% in 2008 and by 2011, 53% will do so. Emarketer

TD Ameritrade Holding Corporation, an online brokerage company, said one of its databases was hacked into and the personal information for more than 6.3 million customers was stolen. The company found malicious code in one of its databases. DM News

According to the latest figures, 250,702 of the total purchased were standalone units, while 75,943 Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core bundles have also been snapped up. That’s a total of 326, 645 in just ten days. Next Gen

Compete introduced its Search Analytics solution to fill an unmet need for marketers at both large and small companies — the need for affordable and robust search tools that can have an immediate impact on online and overall business strategy. DM News

Users can also obtain an anonymous credit card with no name or account number on it, something that could cut the risk of identity theft, fraud and problems stemming from lost or stolen cards, Revolution said. Reuters

“We believe great advertising is interrupted all the time,” said John Lack, co-founder and chief executive of Firebrand. “We curate the best TV commercials and promotions -- connecting consumers directly with their favorite brands in an integrated environment.” New York Business

Facebook has overtaken News Corporation's MySpace site as the highest-traffic UK social networking site with 6.5m unique users last month, according to data published today by Nielsen//NetRatings. media.guardian.co.uk

Among the more than 120 arrests announced on Monday in what the authorities called the largest steroids crackdown in the nation’s history, five men charged in a Connecticut sting stood out not for what they were peddling, but for where they were suspected of doing it: on MySpace.com. NY Times

Democratic contender John Edwards will be first presidential candidate to dive head-first into a "presidential dialogue" jointly hosted by MySpace and MTV Thursday. Wired

David Burden, managing director of Daden Ltd, said: “This is an example of the power of Second Life, and virtual worlds in general, in providing a shared visualisation system....offering possibilities for both the consumer and for business operations and scientific research. Being able to walk around data, and view it with others, can bring out insight and analysis that would be impossible in 2D systems, or PC-based 3D systems." Flightglobal

Good use of Twitter?

News/Web 2.0/Website/Twitter
Found: twitter.com

Due to a power outage in San Francisco, many popular web 2.0 websites went down for several hours yesterday, sites like Craigstlist, Technorati, Yelp and Six Apart's VOX and Typepad. While most sites just waited patiently for the power to get restored, Six Apart was busy sending out updates via twitter.

Six Apart's twitter stream says it all:


An update on today's outage: http://tinyurl.com/2bebg4

TypePad blogs are back up; LiveJournal and Vox and the TypePad application are under way.

More at http://status.sixapart.com/ 04:50 PM July 24, 2007 from web

http://status.livejournal.com/ has LiveJournal status info, and we've got details back up on http://status.sixapart.com/ as well. 04:13 PM July 24, 2007 from web

http://status.sixapart.com/ is back up, and will be updated as we progress. 03:44 PM July 24, 2007 from web Power is being restored to our data center, and TypePad, LiveJournal, Vox are each bring brought back online carefully. 03:13 PM July 24, 2007 from web

TypePad, Vox, and LJ are unreachable for many due to a power problem @ hosting facility, also affecting Technorati and Craigslist.

NEWS: Roam Un-Free

News/Social Networks/Second Life
Found on: msnbc.com

HiPiHi's 38-year-old CEO and founder, Xu Hui, has some ambitious goals; not only does he want his new virtual world, HiPiHi to be China's answer to Second Life, but through strategic partnerships with U.S., Japanese and other foreign firms, he plans to establish discrete virtual continents and then have them all linked to Second Life, creating a vast metaverse - the big question being: will China's government actually allow him to do it? I guess only time will tell.



MSNBC Post:

Zhao Gang surveys his nearly empty virtual world, and finds it to be good. Zhao is head of the tech team that built HiPiHi—China's answer to Second Life. With the virtual world's basic landscape complete, one of Zhao's jobs these days is to wander HiPiHi, schooling roughly 10,000 ethnic Chinese from the mainland, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore who have been specially invited into the test phase to help work out the kinks. The "residents," as they're called, roam, swim and fly around the new world. Zhao approaches two avatars for a chat. Face to face with the virtual world's Master Builder, they have an urgent question: "Can you tell us how to change our clothes?"

NEWS: FaceBook’s First Acquisition: Parakey

News/Social Networks/Facebook
Found on: techcrunch.com

Why would Facebook, currently the hottest property on the Web want to make Parakey, the "web operating system" created by Blake Ross their very first acquisition? Simple - Facebook is in the process of transitioning from being a Social Network into the first Social Operating System - right?

Techcrunch.com post:

Their first acquisition: Facebook has bought Parakey, the yet-to-launch “web operating system” created by Firefox co-founders Blake Ross and Joe Hewitt. The price isn’t being disclosed, but Facebook should be issuing a press release this afternoon.

Parakey was founded in 2005 and raised a seed round of financing from Sequoia Capital (although this was never confirmed). There is a good background story on Parakey, which will include both browser and client software, here.

NEWS: Justin.TV Network Launches: More Shows to Come

News/Social Networks/Videos
Found on: techcrunch.com

Using a process called "lifecasting" sites like Justine.TV and Ustream.tv are taking off and reality television just made a huge shift over to the web. Both platforms provide a network and a set of tools to create your very own live show using a webcam.

Techcrunch.com post:

24/7 reality online TV show Justin.tv has has turned into a bit of a mini-phenomenon since launching just two months ago.Their apartment was raided by the police, and they were later evicted by their landlord. They were on the Today Show. Justin has hung out with famous rappers. They’ve taken extravagant dares from their audience, and a crowd always surrounds Justin and his ubiquitous camera. Hundreds of adolescent viewers watched (sort of) as Justin had sex on the show, although users were left with a black screen and silence until the Justin.tv team started playing porn music. The site has been far more successful so far than the founders anticipated.

NEWS: Companies try eBay to sell themselves

News/Web 2.0/ebay
Found on: news.yahoo.com

Looking for a deal on a Web 2.o dot-com? Well look no further - USATODAY.com is reporting that there are plenty to be had on the popular auction site eBay.

USA Today post:

What do Beanie Babies, Pez Dispensers and troubled Internet companies have in common? They're all for sale on eBay.

More than 10 dot-coms have recently sought buyers on the popular auction site. Search engine DigForIt.com sold for $25,400 this month after promising bidders "great revenue potential." SynapseLife, an online calendar and organizational site, sold for $60,000 despite warning it had "no advertising revenue."

NEWS: Europeans predominate in Second Life - study

News/Social Networks/Second Life
Found on: reuters.com

Before you log into Second Life again, you might want to consider brushing up on your German, because chances are you'll be speaking to one -- Guten Tag Avatar!

Reuters post:

Second Life was born in the United States, but 61 percent of its active residents are Europeans, a study by research firm comScore said on Friday.

The number of active German residents exceeds the number of active residents in the United States, although growth rates in the U.S. are the highest worldwide, said comScore, which
specializes in measuring various kinds of Internet usage.

More than 6 million user accounts have been created in Second Life, up from about 1 million at the end of 2006, but the number of active users is far lower.

NEWS: Digg.com User Revolt

Web Culture/YouTube/Videos/Digg
Found on: Youtube.com

HD-DVD crack code on Digg results in multiple users getting kicked off the site and banned - then all hell breaks loose.



Youtube Stats(as of this post):

Views: 214
Comments: 3
Favorited: 3 times

Bonus link:

Kevin Rose Speaks out

NEWS: 'Second Life' User Numbers Don't Quite Add Up

News/Social Networks/Second Life/Users
Found on: foxnews.com

Clay Shirky just completed a four-month study on the number of users in Second Life, based on his findings, Shirky claims that the actual number of regular users are less the 200,000 versus the 3.2 million Linden Lab reports to have...numbers don't quite add up?

FoxNews post:

How many people use "Second Life"? Not as many as you might think.

In December, New York University lecturer Clay Shirky launched a one-man Web crusade against the widespread misrepresentation of "Second Life"'s popularity, claiming most publications — including PC Magazine — were inadvertently overstating the number of users.

When reporters ask how many people are using "Second Life," the folks at Linden Lab typically respond with the number of "residents," and most reporters assume that "resident" means "unique user."

But as Shirky points out, a resident isn't a unique user. A single user can create multiple virtual residents. "Second Life"'s popularity is significantly smaller than the press claims, and though Linden Lab won't tell us how many people are really using the service, Shirky thinks he's finally gotten to the bottom of things.

NEWS: NBA Headquarters Unveiled in Second Life

Social Networks/Second Life/Sports
Found on: nba.com

With it's multiplayer games, retail stores and a variety of other features designed to draw repeat visitors, the NBA unveiled their Second Life "Headquarters" on Tuesday - anyone up for a game of HORSE?



NBA.com post:

The NBA announced the launch of NBA Headquarters, a new virtual destination featuring a variety of innovative and interactive NBA elements in Second Life, the popular 3D online world with nearly six million residents. The announcement was made by NBA Commissioner David Stern during a recent media event conducted in the NBA Headquarters.

The NBA’s 3D virtual destination, developed with The Electric Sheep Company, a leading creator of 3D virtual world content and solutions, will provide basketball fans and Second Life residents with access to comprehensive features including the T-Mobile Arena, broadband video of classic NBA games and highlights, and an opportunity to have their picture taken with the NBA’s championship trophy in the Toyota Larry O’Brien Trophy Room.

Additionally, in Second Life fans will be able to purchase NBA and WNBA jerseys and merchandise for their identity or avatars at the NBA Store, walk along a special path highlighting the 50 Greatest NBA Players and participate in a variety of basketball activities at the NBA Jam Session.

NEWS: US Army's computer game recruiting plan takes fire

News/Web Culture/Youth Trends
Found news.yahoo.com

The United States Army has invested an estimated 2 million dollars sponsoring an online gaming channel on the popular GGL website. The channel is centered around a first-person shooter based on the Army's training manual; groups opposing the war are calling this sponsorship as a blatent attempt to find new recruits among young online gamers in the prized recruiting age range of 17 to 24.

Yahoo News post:

Anti-recruitment groups are slamming a US Army deal to sponsor a computer war game channel, charging that real war is no game.

In June, the Army is set to sponsor a channel at the Global Gaming League website, a popular spot for Internet computer game lovers.

"It is part of this campaign for the last 20 years to invade youth culture with militarism," Project on Youth and Non-military Opportunities co-founder Rick Jahnkow told AFP.

"It affects the way young people think. It affects their world view. That is a very dangerous thing."

NEWS: MySpace offers news recommendations

News/Social Networks/Myspace
Found: hosted.ap.org

Last week Myspace jumped into the "News Service Business" and with it's non-Digg like features (the rating system is based on a scale of 1 through 5) I have to admit, I was pleasantly surprised but Newsvine is still my favorite site for news-aggregation and Mike Davidson is still my hero!



Hosted AP post:

The popular online hangout MySpace entered the news business Thursday with a feature that lets its users determine what items other members see.

MySpace News brings to a much larger audience the user-recommendation capabilities already available through Digg and Time Warner Inc.'s Netscape. It also marks the site's further inroads into becoming an Internet portal akin to Yahoo Inc. and others.

YouTube Offering 50/50 Revenue Split with Users Next Week?

News/Social Networks/YouTube/Videos
Found on: Mashable.com

Mashable.com is reporting that YouTube may offer a revenue-sharing model for their users as early as next week -- basically, offering a 50/50 revenue split similar to the one that their rival Revver.com offers.

Mashable post:

YouTube may offer a revenue-sharing model for their users, taking an important step in that direction as soon as next week.

The option to insert a video ad before or after an uploaded clip, with an offering to split the ad revenue 50-50 with users, is said to be in the works. With the issues surrounding pirated videos on the site as well as many advertisers not being able to ensure the type of content that their campaigns will be shown alongside, it’s no wonder that an ad revenue-sharing model has yet to be installed.

NEWS: Microsoft sheds light on Flash rival

News/Web Culture/Web Browser/Video
Found on: news.com

Microsoft's so called Flash "Killer" Silverlight, was announced at the NAB show in Las Vegas yesterday.

The Web browser plug-in will be available for both PC and MAC platforms and will play web videos as well as display interactive Web applications.

Microsoft's initial focus will be developing partnerships with advertising agencies, media and entertainment companies.

CNET post:

On Monday at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Show in Las Vegas, Microsoft launched Silverlight, a Web browser plug-in for playing media files and displaying interactive Web applications.

The company intends to release a beta of Silverlight, formerly called Windows Presentation Foundation/Everywhere (WPF/E), at the Mix07 conference for designers and Web developers in Las Vegas later this month.




Bonus Link:

Stealing the limelight from Adobe?
With the rapid rise of Web video, the competition between Microsoft and Adobe is set to intensify.

Help Save Pandora and Internet Radio

News/Web Culture/Politics/Internet Radio
Found on: blog.pandora.com/pandora

Internet radio as we know it is in dire straits and could potentially be wiped off the web.

A recent decision by the Copyright Royalty Board in Washington, DC will almost triple the licensing fees for Internet radio sites like Pandora which will basically shut them down and put them out of business.

You can do something about it, here's how:

Pandora Blog post:

To add your voice to this movement, please take a minute to sign the PETITION urging your representatives in congress to act at the new website Savenetradio.org.

And please share this petition link with friends: http://capwiz.com/saveinternetradio/issues/alert/?alertid=9631541

NEWS: Groundbreaking Internet Drama to Air on UK's Top Social Network

News/Social Networks/Web Culture/Videos
Found on: sys-con.com

The team that brought us the world's most popular interactive drama: Lonelygirl15 is teaming up with Bebo.com to launch a spin-off called "Lonelygirl15 presents... KateModern," this should prove to be a really smart move on Bebo's part.

sys-con.com post:

Lonelygirl15 was launched last summer and the program has since been viewed over 50 million times. Bebo was founded in 2005 and has over 31 million users worldwide who spend an average of 29 minutes on Bebo each day.

Following the massive success of Lonelygirl15, "Lonelygirl15 presents... KateModern" will expand from the original storyline to that of a teenage university student in London and her struggle to balance her complex social life with the dark forces that shadow her. Containing all of the best loved elements of Lonelygirl15, "Lonelygirl15 presents... KateModern" will leverage the high involvement of its fan base, enabling them to post messages for the show's characters, exchange plot ideas with each other and upload their own videos to the characters' profile pages.

NEWS: MySpace Store Looks Promising?

News/Social Networks/Myspace
Found on: mashable.com

Mashable.com is reporting that the long anticipated Myspace store may actually come to fruition.

On a side note, I noticed that Peter made his post around 1:30 AM this morning - god, I wish I had that kind of stamina again.

Mashable post:

Another good sign for MySpace-eBay and Bebo-eBay - a report being released on Tuesday from iProspect once again shows that web users make buying decisions based on information gleaned from social sites: 1 in 3 Internet users say they made purchase decisions based on information from social networks and sites.

NEWS: Keep track of your friends with The Coop

News/Social Networks/Firefox
Found on: labs.mozilla.com

A set of new tools could make Firefox the next Myspace?

I'm not quite sure about that but what I do know is these new social-centric tools could mean some serious trouble for Flock - the net's best social web browser currently out.



Mozilla Lab's post:

Just a few years ago, one of the most popular uses of the internet was to send jokes, cute pictures, and news stories to friends and family (social networks) via email. Fast forward to today, and you’ll find that not a lot has changed except the medium. Now one of the most common uses of instant messenger services and social networking sites is to send people links to jokes, cute pictures and interesting news stories.

This behavior isn’t at all surprising - it’s friends sharing experiences, the very backbone of social interactions and friendships. It’s also unsurprising that most “Web 2.0″ services have a feature that makes it easy for you to build a social network so that you can share things more easily, or subscribe to a friend’s activity as a way of keeping in touch.

MySpace competition? The world is big enough

News/Social Networks/Website
Found on: latimes.com

MySpace continues to dominate in North America but overseas it's a different story - Social Networks like the Friendster, Bebo and Google's Orkut are thriving.

LA Times post:

The online social networking site was on track to become the Internet's next big phenomenon a few years ago until an upstart called MySpace eclipsed it in popularity and media attention. But being spurned by America's fickle teenagers doesn't mean the budding social networking site went into hibernation or shrank to cater to a few true believers. While MySpace may continue to dominate in North America (more than half of its 100-million-plus accounts come from the United States), Friendster, Google's Orkut and other general-use social networking sites are thriving overseas.

In the Philippines, for instance, Friendster is used by an estimated 87% of the country's 8 million Internet users. About 70% of Friendster's 40-million-person user base comes from Southeast Asia.

NEWS: Second Life Sex Business Sells On eBay For $50,000

News/Social Networks/Second Life/Sex
Found on: informationweek.com

Virtual sex sells but who's buying? Apparently some guy named nedstede2769 form the Netherlands and he is shelling out some big bucks for it, over $50,000 US dollars -- isn't that like a 500 billion Linden dollars or something?!?



InformationWeek post:

One of the landmark businesses on Second Life, Amsterdam, sold on eBay Monday for $50,000 to a buyer located, appropriately enough, in the Netherlands, said the developer of the popular adult-oriented business.

Amsterdam's developer, Kevin Alderman of Tampa, Fla., put the site up for sale on eBay last week, and it sold at 6:34 a.m. PDT, according to the eBay listing. The buyer didn't bid; he just paid the asking price.

We weren't able to find out who the buyer is; he goes by nedstede2769 on eBay, where his 3-year-old account has no feedback. Alderman said he didn't want to give the buyer's name without checking first.

NEWS: Hacking John McCain

News/Social Networks/Myspace/Politics
Found on: newsvine.com

Presidential candidate John McCain announced today on his Myspace page that he had reversed his position on gay marriage and is now in support of it, particularly marriages between passionate females.

Sounds too good to be true - you're right, it's not. This now infamously delicious prank or what some are calling "the immaculate hack" was the handy work of Mike Davidson, CEO and co-creator of Seattle-based online news media company, Newsvine.com.

Newsvine post:

If you visit John McCain's MySpace page (as of 9am PST Tuesday morning), you will notice an interesting announcement from him. He's apparently reversed his position on gay marriage as well as revealed a bias towards attractive lesbians.

Why would a presidential candidate make such an important announcement on his MySpace page?

The answer? He wouldn't.

But I would.

You see, John McCain's people commandeered my world-renowned MySpace design template and did a few things wrong:

1. They did not credit me for the template, even though the template explicitly requested credit.
2. They used my own unmodified imagery, specifically for the "Contacting John McCain" table.
3. As if #2 wasn't bad enough, the McCain crew is actually pulling their image directly from my server on each page load. So every time someone visits the McCain MySpace page, my bandwidth is being used to deliver part of the page! Bad McCain!

NEWS: GDC 2007: Phil Harrison, Sony, Unveil 'Home'

News/Social Networks/Sony/Games
Found on: 1up.com

Sony's set to muscle in on Second Life and their market share with their forthcoming online social media metaverse called, "Home", should be available as a free download for the PlayStation 3 in autumn 2007.



1UP post:

Last week's reports on Sony's potential 'Home' service either generated even more hype for Phil Harrison's Game Developer Conference keynote or stole the thunder from Sony's big unveiling. Maybe it did both, and considering what Sony showed with 'Home' -- that may not be a bad thing.

Home is officially being branded as a "3D user community for PlayStation 3" by Sony, but it's also being called an "innovative user community title," effectively blurring the line between "service" and "game." The two-pronged approach to marketing this product may show some confusion as to what home is. That's a question Sony won't be able to answer until this Fall, when PlayStation 3 owners will get their hands on the final free download (the experience enters beta next month).

BONUS YOUTUBE VIDEO --> PLAYSTATION 3 HOME

NEWS: Taking Out A Second Mortgage In Second Life

News/Social Networks/Second Life/Real Estate
Found on: webpronews.com

Are you in the market for a new home? A new virtual home? Coldwell Banker, one of the nation's largest real estate brokerage firms has over 500 "inworld" homes with styles ranging from modern to southwestern colonial and if you're a little tight on "lindens" (second life currency) right now, no problem, you can take out a virtual mortgage to finance it and they'll even throw in a complete set of virtual furniture as a closing gift - now you know.

Webpronews post:

Buying a home is usually the single largest investment that the average individual will make over the span of their life. Careful thought and planning are exercised when determining how much of a mortgage to take on, how large of a home to purchase, and what realtor to use.

Indeed, home ownership is not something to be entered into lightly. Buying a home in Second Life, however, can be as simple as a point-and-click transaction, and Coldwell Banker has decided that it wants to be the real estate company to meet the needs of the virtual world’s potential homeowners.

NEWS: Most-Searched-For Brand In 2006?

News/Social Networks/Myspace
Found on: publications.mediapost.com

Just when you think Myspace is losing some of it's luster, look who's brand is still on top and reigning supreme.

Market Daily post:

THE SOCIAL NETWORKING HUB MYSPACE was the brand most searched for in 2006, based on a 52-week average of industry search terms (excluding porn) among all U.S. Web sites, according to competitive intelligence monitoring service Hitwise.

Here's the complete list of Top 10 Searched for Brand Terms* (with spellings as reported by Hitwise):

1. myspace
2. ebay
3. yahoo
4. mapquest
5. craigslist
6. walmart
7. google
8. target
9. match.com
10. bank of america

NEWS: LONELY PLANET AND CURRENT TV

Web Culture/Website/Videos/Travel
Found on: lonelyplanet.com



Professional travel documentaries with user-generated content, sounds like a new online video network to me.

Lonely Planet TV post:

Lonely Planet and Current TV have teamed up to launch a new travel television franchise, “The Bluelist,” based on Lonely Planet’s well-known brand of the same name. The series of 26 short-form, three-minute “pods” will be hosted by writers and staffers of Lonely Planet worldwide, and will debut on January 18 on Current TV.

Lonely Planet’s “Bluelist” (www.lonelyplanet.com/bluelist) brand presents hip “top ten” lists of travelers’ favorite travel experiences, and the new program on Current follows the same format. The show will spotlight some of Lonely Planet’s writers’ and staffers’ “Top 3” travel recommendations, from the expected (big wilderness escapes; best places for 24-hour party people) to the more unexpected (best places to have an existential crisis; best places to get into a fight).

NEWS: Man Behind the Clinton Clip Worked for Obama's Net Strategists

News/YouTube/Video/Politics
Found on: washingtonpost.com

With the presidential elections still a good two years away the fight for the democratic seat just got really nasty and the fireworks are already starting to fly - yeah, I'm talking about the Hilary video that's running viral on YouTube, "allegedly" sanctioned by Obama's camp.

Washingtonpost.com post:

The creator of a controversial YouTube clip that attacked Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) was an employee of the Internet strategy firm on the payroll of the presidential campaign of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.).

"I made the 'Vote Different' ad because I wanted to express my feelings about the Democratic primary, and because I wanted to show that an individual citizen can affect the process," Phil de Vellis wrote on the liberal blog Huffington Post.

NEWS: MySpace News is for real

News/Social Networks/Myspace
Found on: wired.com

Wired.com is reporting that Myspace "NEWS" site is a done deal and it's just a matter of time before Myspace starts slugging it out with the likes of Digg, Newsvine, Reddit and other Social news sites.



Wired post:

A leaked document from MySpace's parent company, Fox Interactive Media, confirms the existence of its rumored Digg-style news aggregation portal.

The leaked sales document outlines the structure and taxonomy of the forthcoming site, and includes screenshots of the site, but gives no details about when the portal will launch.

MySpace News will automatically collect news items from various news sites and blogs. MySpace users will then be able to discuss and rate each story on the site, and the stories will change position on the page based on popularity. The portal is rumored to launch during the second quarter of 2007.

NEWS: Tech Firms Push to Use TV Airwaves for Internet

News/Web Culture/Internet
Found on: washingtonpost.com

If the coalition made up of six of the biggest tech companies in the world (Microsoft, Google, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Intel and Philips) gets the green light from the FCC, we could start seeing unused television airwaves called "white space" being gobbled up to bring high-speed internet access to consumers as early as 2009.

Me in 2009; "Hey hun, come quick, look what's on TV -- it's the internet and it's fast!"

Washingtonpost.com post:

A coalition of big technology companies wants to bring high-speed Internet access to consumers in a new way: over television airwaves. Key to the project is whether a device scheduled to be delivered to federal labs today lives up to its promise.

The coalition, which includes Microsoft and Google, wants regulators to allow idle TV channels, known as white space, to be used to beam the Internet into homes and offices. But the Federal Communications Commission first must be convinced that such traffic would not bleed outside its designated channels and interfere with existing broadcasts.

NEWS: Wanted poster on MySpace

News/Social Networks/Myspace/Police
Found on: smh.com.au

Talk about your virtual Dragnet - some web smart cop in Arkansas created a Myspace profile page for a serial bank robber in hopes to enlist the millions of other Myspace members to help the Arkansas Police Dept. track down the guy pictured in the image below.

SMH post:

Police have have created a MySpace account for a serial bank robber hoping to enlist the millions who use the popular social networking site as a cyber posse to help track down the fugitive.

The MySpace profile - Do You Know Me??? - is the work of Sgt. Jarrard Copeland from the Fort Smith police department in Arkansas.

The suspect, a man estimated to be about 60, is linked to four bank robberies across the US state.

NEWS: Andreessen's Ning.com takes on MySpace

News/Social Networks/Myspace/Ning
Found on: news.com

I had a dream the other night that I got a phone call from my Granny; she was bragging to me about how she just put together a new "Myspace" in a just few minutes and that I needed to step up my game and before I could say anything in my defense she abruptly ended the conversation by dropping a "holla back youngin!" and hung up on me.

Alright, so I made all of that up, but if Marc Andreessen has his way there would be millions of little mini Myspaces and "Ning.com" would be leading the way.

Ning is a web based company that Andreessen is backing, he and the other investors hope that the new set of tools that they just launched will make creating your very own Myspace so easy, you guessed it -- your Granny could do it - holla!



News.com post:

In Marc Andreessen's vision of the future, MySpace is going to face stiff competition from a million mini-MySpaces.

One of the cofounders of Netscape and a symbol of the technology revolution of a decade ago is now backing a company called Ning, which launched a set of new tools on Tuesday designed to help even the most tech-challenged person build a social-networking site.

"(Ning) is essentially MySpace version 2," Andreessen said last week, adding that he is placing a bet that social-networking sites will follow a similar development as that of Internet service providers of the 1990s.

NEWS: A winning business plan for 'Second Life'

News/Social Networks/Second Life/Business
Found on: news.com

Minnesota-based research company, Market Truths took home first place honors in the first-ever business plan contest in Second Life.

Cnet News.com post:

The honors, announced Monday, went to Minnesota-based Market Truths, which devised a market research and analysis system to help real-world companies figure out what works and what doesn't in the burgeoning virtual world.

The contest's judges rewarded the Market Truths submission because the team has conducted similar market research in the real world for years, and because it appeared to have the best profit potential of the four finalists.

"I was really impressed by the quality of (all) the ideas we received," said Susan Wu, a contest judge and a venture capitalist from Charles River Ventures. "Each one of these businesses could turn into a viable ongoing enterprise, not only in terms of Second Life, but as a service that stands across multiple virtual worlds."

NEWS: Viacom lands video deal with Joost

News/Web Culture/IPTV
Found on: reuters.com

If you don't know what Joost is by now, here's the skinny: the boys that started Kazaa and Skype recently launched a new Ad-supported internet TV service, leveraging the P2P technology that they used to make Kazaa what it was back in the day (totally sucks now) and Skype what it is today.

Fast forward to this story; earlier this week Viacom agreed to provide video content to Joost and it's users in return for a piece of the pie - huge!

Reuters post:

Viacom Inc., engaged in a public copyright battle with Google Inc.'s YouTube, has agreed to offer videos to Joost, the Internet video service created by the founders of Skype and Kazaa.

Viacom said on Tuesday hundreds of hours of TV programing from its MTV and BET Networks and feature-length films from Paramount Pictures will be available to Joost users for free under a revenue-sharing deal between the two companies.

It did not disclose financial terms, but an industry source said Viacom was likely to have secured a slightly better agreement than its traditional deals to receive two-thirds of advertising revenue.

NEWS: New Portal to Second Life: Your Phone

News/Social Networks/Second Life/Mobile
Found on: technologyreview.com

Looks like Second Life's "metaverse" just got a litte bigger. Comverse, makers of the mobile software that allows Second Life users to connect to the "grid" using a mobile phone and communicate to other residents via text messages - scary.

Technology Review post:

With new software for mobile phones, citizens of the burgeoning online universe Second Life will never have to leave their cozy virtual world, even when they're away from their computers. The new software is a program that lets cellular users with Java-based, Internet-capable phones log in to Second Life remotely, see who else is "in-world," and communicate with them via text messaging.

Comverse, the wireless multimedia networking company that developed the software, demonstrated it this week for wireless carriers at the 3GSM conference in Barcelona, Spain. Attendees using Comverse's phones could see and manipulate avatars who appeared in Comverse's virtual 3GSM booth inside Second Life. Using simple commands, they could direct the avatar to walk around the booth, identify other avatars, and send them greetings via SMS, MMS, or instant messaging. And in a twist typical of today's virtual environments, people logged in to Second Life over traditional PC connections could walk into the virtual Comverse booth and pick up virtual phones that connected them directly to fellow members logged in from their real phones at the real booth.

NEWS: SXSW Web Awards Reveals this Year's Finalists

News/Web Culture/SXSW/Awards
Found on: sxsw.com

Hundreds and hundreds of developers and web designers from around the world submitted their work hoping to become a finalist in the 10th SXSW annual Web Awards.

Well, for a few of them the wait is over and for the rest there's always next year.