Webremix Articles

Big budget movies that got their science right | Bad Astronomy

Thu, 02 Sep 2010 20:08:22 GMT

For my second article for Blastr — SyFy Channel’s web portal — I wrote an article about five movies that actually got some science correct. Not all of it, mind you, but at least some! So head on over there and see what I chose, and add your own to the comments.

Sajid’s Anjaana Anjaani hotting up

Mon, 30 Aug 2010 23:17:04 GMT

Celebrations are already on the cards way before the release as the first promo of Anjaana Anjaani garnered over 11,000 video views within the first 5 hours of its release on a popular web portal – a response received by a privileged few....

Playboy teams up with BigPoint, forming new games label in late 2010

Thu, 26 Aug 2010 03:30:00 GMT

Playboy, otherwise known as "that stack of mags you hide from your mom under the mattress," is stretching out beyond the flesh game and into the online gaming game. A press release (past the break) announces intentions to offer online games through a new games label, which Playboy will formally announce later on this year.

In the meantime, Playboy is teaming up with Bigpoint, which is currently working on Battlestar Galactica Online yet offers other free-to-play games via its own web portal -- which Playboy will now also distribute through its domain. The first game to get the red carpet treatment is Poisonville (link is probably NSFW) with "select titles" available in the future. Playboy also mentions other "development partnerships" in the coming months."

"Gaming is a growing, mainstream area. And part of our plan is to extend Playboy's brand into the mainstream," Paul H. Lee, Playboy's managing director for new digital ventures, told PaidContent . "Previously, Playboy's gaming interests included a few licensing deals and some editorial in the form of gaming reviews. But there was no clear, over-arching strategy in place. With Bigpoint, we've established a clear path in terms of where we want to go." Apparently, the 18-35 male audience Playboy has is also into gaming. Hey, we're just as surprised as you guys!

Jokes aside, Lee said that Playboy is investing a "significant" amount in this new venture. Here's hoping it works out for 'em, because we're not really sure what they could fall back on if things go south -- oh, right .

Continue reading Playboy teams up with BigPoint, forming new games label in late 2010

Playboy teams up with BigPoint, forming new games label in late 2010 originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 25 Aug 2010 22:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sony planning to expand Crackle presence on PSN

Wed, 25 Aug 2010 10:00:00 GMT

Speaking with the New York Times about its web-based video content portal Crackle.com (it's not a TV channel, folks), Sony execs ambiguously noted that "an expansion is in the works" for the service on PlayStation Network. Currently, Crackle content is available through PSN in the "Featured Collections" video section, offering some free and some paid programming (as seen above).

Through its web portal, Crackle avails a sizeable piece of Sony Pictures' film collection as well (read: over 200), though, currently, these films are only offered on PSN behind a pay gate. In the future -- with any luck, at least -- we might find ourselves perusing that same, streamable selection of films at no charge from the comfort of our living room couch. Or we might just see more content in general from Crackle making its way to PSN in a similar, partially paid structure. Yeah, we're betting on the latter too.

Sony planning to expand Crackle presence on PSN originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 25 Aug 2010 05:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Indian company buying Lycos from Korea's Daum (AP)

Mon, 16 Aug 2010 15:30:44 GMT

AP - An Indian company on Monday said it is buying Lycos Inc., once a high-flying U.S. Web portal, for $36 million from Korean Web company Daum Communications.

Lycos Is Still Around – Sold By Daum To Ybrant In $36 Million Deal

Mon, 16 Aug 2010 10:10:51 GMT

Lycos , the ill-fated operator of a search engine, Web portal and whatnot originally established in 1994 (!) has a new owner - once again. India-based digital marketing solutions company Ybrant Digital has purchased Lycos from Korean Internet company Daum for a reported $36 million in a stock purchase agreement . Daum bought Lycos for $95.4 million in cash in August 2004, a fraction of what its then-owner had paid for the site four years earlier (Lycos was acquired by Terra Networks, the internet arm of Spanish telecom giant Telefónica, for $5.4 billion in May 2000).

Good for them! We need more people to show patriotism. I say to them, "Thank you for caring!"

Wed, 11 Aug 2010 23:30:57 GMT

Enjoy your community web portal. It's a work in progress, so let us know how it can serve you even better.

Palin pushes back on video of testy exchange (The Upshot)

Tue, 10 Aug 2010 16:10:54 GMT

The Upshot - Sarah Palin was the target of much Webby snark Monday for a viral video featuring her encounter with a schoolteacher from Homer, Alaska, who had unfurled a banner reading "Worst Governor Ever" at a shooting location for Palin's TLC reality series. So now the former Alaska governor has adjourned to her own powerful Web portal, [...]

Vultures circle over Google's lost market share

Mon, 09 Aug 2010 23:34:27 GMT

Sohu.com Inc, operator of China's fourth most-visited Web portal, said on Monday it will link up with Alibaba Group in an effort to grab market share lost by Google Inc. Sohu said Alibaba Group and Yunfeng Fund, a private fund, would take a 16 percent stake in its search engine subsidiary Sogou.com. The company did not reveal the amount of the new investment. This is a major move among smaller search engine providers since Google rerouted its online search service from mainland to Ho ...

Canaan to buy 25% in Naaptol.com

Wed, 04 Aug 2010 20:03:00 GMT

Venture capital fund Canaan Partners is set to acquire nearly 25% stake in country?s biggest online shopping web portal Naaptol.com for `40 crore.

Canaan to buy 25% in Naaptol.com

Wed, 04 Aug 2010 20:03:00 GMT

Venture capital fund Canaan Partners is set to acquire nearly 25% stake in country?s biggest online shopping web portal Naaptol.com for `40 crore.

Sipgate offering low cost business VoIP

Wed, 04 Aug 2010 03:45:17 GMT

Sipgate, a German company targeting UK-based SME's has launched Sipgate Team, a business web portal that gives customers access to VoIP telephony technology. Companies can use the web interface to configure their telephone service.

The service will offer some basic features that we've come to expect from VoIP service including call holding, forwarding, conference calling, up to 2 hours of call recording, as well as personal user inbox management for voicemail, fax traffic and SMS sending and receiving. Initially targeted at SME's of 100 employees or less, the company claims any number of extra virtual lines can be set up.

For more:
- read the Techworld article

Hosting Companies Need Advanced DNS, Here's Why…

Mon, 02 Aug 2010 18:35:00 GMT

How can better DNS be easy for hosting companies? DNS shouldn't have to be a choke-point or vulnerability in a hosting architecture. Nor should it be a headache for network administrators to provision, manage and secure. Technologies such as Afilias' new FlexDNS Platform, offers hosting companies or other resellers easy ways (Web portal, AXFR, or an API) to integrate with a massively diverse, flexible and distributed DNS network that guarantees 100% availability. Using Anycast, Afilias network can provide bulletproof DNS resolution from widely dispersed nodes on multiple continents, using multiple backbone providers and a diverse array of technology providers, creating a level of robustness and redundancy that would be prohibitively expensive for many hosting companies to deploy themselves in-house.Hosting companies face many challenges today, from differentiating their services in a crowded market with decreasing margins, to an increasing pressure to defend against growing sets of attacks against their infrastructure. As more and more services drift into the cloud, up-time is becoming one of the most critical factors for customers choosing a web host. A hosting company's record of reliability can often be the deciding factor for a customer to choose one service over another. Recently at HostingCon, Afilias was able to talk to hosting companies about their current DNS problems and why they need to now look at advanced DNS solutions to improve reliability or to seek new revenue with premium DNS offerings.

What we've been saying for some time now was confirmed by many of the hosting companies visiting and exhibiting at HostingCon. Over the last year we've seen an increase in size and number of attacks against the DNS. Both continue to grow as criminals seek any way to exploit vulnerabilities in networks. DDoS attacks against DNS infrastructure as well as sophisticated DNS hijacking attacks are now top of mind for most hosting companies.

Recent research from Arbor Networks shows that the risk of DDoS attack is by far the most worrying problem facing companies today, with 35% of organizations classifying such attacks as their biggest fear. The same research shows that over a quarter of all DDoS attacks target application-layer protocols such as DNS, with the largest attacks amounting to almost 50 Gigabytes per second (Gbps).

Here are some suggestions we have for hosting companies to not only improve their DNS architecture, but also how they can utilize a more superior and reliable DNS network to expand the services they currently offer today:

Add a secondary DNS provider to shoulder the load

An attack against a single hosting customer can severely impact performance and availability for a hosting company's entire network, especially when a DDoS flood is large and targets a shared network bottleneck such as DNS resolution. Every customer who puts content online, blogs, or shares links to your hosted sites in social media, creates a target that could put your entire customer base at risk.

The risk of taking out an entire set of customers based on the target of just one popular or controversial customer, presents a greater need for hosting companies to harden their DNS infrastructure from attack. Rather than bearing the added capital expense of building out a bigger DNS network, simply integrating a second DNS provider to serve part of your DNS traffic can alleviate bottlenecks in your current DNS infrastructure and give you an entire second network to rely on incase of a crippling DDoS attack.

Indeed, we've even seen some customers reap additional positive outcomes of integrating a secondary DNS provider. This approach allows them to seamlessly take out any or all of their own DNS nodes for planned or unplanned maintenance or even deploying critical patches.

Strengthening your network with Anycast

Of course, the DDoS problem is not confined to DNS alone. DNS is just one piece in the overall architecture of a hosting company. However, DNS is one area that is often not provisioned as well as other, more obvious, pieces of potentially vulnerable infrastructure. The risk of attacks taking down DNS for all hosting customers can be substantially mitigated by building out a robust DNS infrastructure that uses a diverse selection of technology providers and is globally distributed using IP Anycast.

Anycast enables companies to advertise the same IP address from multiple nodes, deployed on different parts of the Internet, simultaneously. In the DNS context, this allows companies to present a more localized way to resolve domain names, reducing latency and increasing performance for end users, while mitigating the impact of one node going down for maintenance or due to attack.

Don't run a monoculture - integrate diversity

The number of vulnerabilities found in ubiquitous data center hardware and software platforms is forever increasing, and is expected to double this year compared to 2009. Companies that have adopted software monocultures, or failed to incorporate enough vendor diversity in their DNS architectures, could find themselves more at risk from exploitation. By also introducing some of Afilias' principles of DNS Diversity, where each node is provisioned by more than one connectivity provider, and uses more than one vendor for each of its operating system, name server, server hardware and network infrastructure needs, single points of failure in your DNS are virtually eliminated.

Premium DNS is a selling feature

Advanced DNS not only does not need to be a cost center, it should also be viewed as an opportunity to increase revenues. As your customers' businesses depends more on their Web services, they are aware of just how critical the availability of their website actually is. Customers that want to safeguard their e-commerce revenue will pay for Service Level Agreements (SLA) and guarantees on their DNS resolution. Even a marginal increase in your per month hosting fee could be just enough to differentiate a premium DNS package, and collectively across your customer base can present an easy added revenue stream to help your bottom line this year.

Keepin' it real fake: because in China, even websites aren't safe from knockoffs

Sun, 01 Aug 2010 18:02:00 GMT

When you've gone and built yourself an imitation MacBook Pro , a Magic Mouse-equipped pseudo-iMac, and an upcoming iPad-esque tablet, there's little reason left to be shy with your website. That must be the thinking behind the design of Dragonfly's web portal, which seems to have taken plenty of inspiration from Apple's home on the internet. Upon visiting the Qing Ting address, users are confronted with a glamorous product shot, set against a black backdrop and accessorized only with some bold words -- which happen to be as inane as the overreaching exaltations Apple likes to post up. So full marks for realism, but these aspiring KIRF merchants seem to have omitted the most important aspect: there's no online store! How are we supposed to get our Q Pad now?

Keepin' it real fake: because in China, even websites aren't safe from knockoffs originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 01 Aug 2010 14:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Gizmodo | Qing Ting | Email this | Comments

HTC will ship all Android phones in China with Froyo on board, fuels fire for immediate update closer to home

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 07:09:00 GMT

A wordy headline, to be sure, but a pleasing one nonetheless. We came across HTC's Chinese web portal listing the Desire as coming with Android 2.2 (with Sense!) and simply had to ping the official source for confirmation. It turns out the info up there is no mistake: all HTC Android handsets shipping to China -- which includes the Wildfire and Tianyi -- will do so with Froyo preloaded, cutting down on your upgrade angst at least until the Gingerbread man comes a'knocking. HTC has also reiterated that a 2.2 update for its phones already on the market will be delivered "very soon," so if all goes well, we should be looking at a Froyo-dominated August in the land of High Tech Computers.

[Thanks, Christian]

HTC will ship all Android phones in China with Froyo on board, fuels fire for immediate update closer to home originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 29 Jul 2010 03:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Purported myTouch HD leaks out alongside promise of T-Mobile's first HSPA+ smartphone

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 17:43:00 GMT

Someone should really tell T-Mobile USA it's got a rather large hole that needs plugged. Hot on the heels of the (presumably) T-Mob-bound G1 Blaze leak comes this duo, which includes a purported leak of the myTouch HD (or 3G HD) as well as a web portal that quite clearly prepares us for the launch of the carrier's first HSPA+ smartphone . Of course, there's no official confirmation that the handset you're peering at above is anything more than a fan render, but it certainly has a look of authenticity to it; sadly, there aren't any rumored specifications to tag alongside the JPG, but it's a pretty safe bet that this one will run some flavor of Android and rely heavily on screen presses for letter input. As for the promo page? Scrutineers have drawn a link between it and the Vanguard that we peeked a few weeks back , so feel free to let your imagination run a bit wild there. Looks like it's gearing up to be quite the second half for America's number two GSM operator.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Purported myTouch HD leaks out alongside promise of T-Mobile's first HSPA+ smartphone originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:43:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Online games lift Sohu's 2Q net income by 10 pct

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 10:05:44 GMT

Chinese Web portal Sohu.com Inc. said Monday its second-quarter net income rose 10 percent as online advertising and games revenue jumped.

Online games lift Sohu's 2Q net income by 10 pct

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 23:40:28 GMT

Chinese Web portal Sohu.com Inc. said Monday its second-quarter net income rose 10 percent as online advertising and games revenue jumped.

Online games lift Sohu's 2Q net income by 10 pct (AP)

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 19:54:42 GMT

AP - Chinese Web portal Sohu.com Inc. said Monday its second-quarter net income rose 10 percent as online advertising and games revenue jumped.

Online games lift Sohu's 2Q net income by 10 pct (AP)

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 19:54:42 GMT

AP - Chinese Web portal Sohu.com Inc. said Monday its second-quarter net income rose 10 percent as online advertising and games revenue jumped.

Black Lotus Selects Afilias to Improve DNS Reliability

Mon, 19 Jul 2010 15:03:00 GMT

Afilias, a leading provider of Internet infrastructure services, announced that Black Lotus Communications has selected Afilias' FlexDNSSM Platform to provide DNS infrastructure in support of its distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) protection solutions. Black Lotus needed to replace its previous DNS provider in order to improve its resiliency to DDoS attacks and achieve better economy in its DNS management.

"Outsourcing our DNS allows us to focus on our core competencies and leverage numerous off-site nodes to discourage DDoS attacks against our name resolution infrastructure," said Jeffrey Lyon, President of Black Lotus. Black Lotus"Since switching to Afilias, we were able to cut our costs by more than 50 percent and receive more value for about the same cost of running our own off-site nodes."

Afilias' FlexDNS Platform provides three different ways to utilize Afilias' DNS network: A Web-based portal, AXFR (DNS zone transfer), or an Application Programming Interface (API). Black Lotus selected Afilias' Web-based portal, which provides a simple, easy-to-use online interface to manage DNS settings for small or large portfolios of domains. The Web-portal also provides bulk import functionality, an advanced reporting suite, and enhanced security alerts and notifications.

Black Lotus also selected Afilias' SiteCertain™ IP monitoring and failover service to ensure that their customers will always have a working IP address to failover to incase of emergency or compromise.

"Any organization that is providing critical services across the Internet needs to take their DNS seriously and ensure that they avoid single points of failure," said John Kane, Vice President of Corporate Services for Afilias. "We are pleased to provide Black Lotus with both a valuable and cost-effective DNS solution to enhance the resiliency and reliability of their important DDoS protection services."

About Afilias Managed DNS Services
Afilias' state of the art DNS network ensures security and resiliency through a diverse Anycast architecture. Its multi-layered, tiered design uses multiple hardware and software solutions, multiple bandwidth providers, and is dispersed across numerous geographic locations, avoiding single points of failure and guarantee 100 percent up-time. Afilias' system also supports DNSSEC. To learn more about Afilias' FlexDNS platform visit http://www.flexdns.info/

About Black Lotus (HOSTINGCON Booth #101)
Black Lotus Communications is first and leading in distributed denial-of-service protection solutions. The company was the first to market a commercially viable DDoS protection solution and provides protected hosting services, web proxies, IP tunnels, and the ecologically friendly LotusCloud VM, a dedicated server environment that is 16 times more efficient than its bare metal counterpart. For more information visit http://www.blacklotus.net/

Afilias (HOSTINGCON Booth #535)

On-line report on agroforestry

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 14:03:11 GMT

A thematic report on agroforestry is available on the "Knowledge for Development" web portal run by the Centre technique de coopération agricole et rurale. Its authors include researchers from CIRAD and its partners in developing countries.

Russian Usmanov finalizes deal on ICQ purchase

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 07:48:00 GMT

Co-owner of leading Russian internet investor Digital Sky Technologies Ltd. (DST), Alisher Usmanov, has finalized the purchase of messenger service ICQ in a deal that could become a headache for the U.S. security services, vesti.ru web-portal said on Tuesday.

RIM introduces BlackBerry Protect, security features for your BlackBerry

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 00:48:59 GMT

Section: Communications, Cellphones, Cellular Providers, Smartphones, Computers, Security, Software / Applications

RIM recently announced a new piece of software for the BlackBerry and it is called BlackBerry Protect. As of now, the app is in beta stage and limited to BlackBerry Beta Zone users who will be receiving special invite codes later this week. It is set to reach open public beta later this year for the general public.

One of the first things the BlackBerry Protect software will do is backup your necessary and important files. For example, you have the ability to backup contacts, tasks, calendar events, memos, bookmarks, and messages and you can choose how often to backup data. It will only update new data after every backup in order to minimize data usage. Now, let’s go through some of the key security features that makes BlackBerry Protect a solid application. In case you misplace your phone, you can choose to play a loud ring for a minute on your phone and even change it from silent to loud volume if you wish to call the phone. I don’t know about you, but I happen to misplace my cell phone all the time and such a feature is really convenient.

In case you actually lost your phone somewhere, not simply misplaced around the house, you can set a password lock feature by going online to BlackBerry Protect web portal. In addition, you can display a lost and found page which features your contact information. In addition, you can take advantage of the BlackBerry’s onboard GPS to view its current location in case the phone is on and functioning. If push comes to shove, there is a Remote Wipe feature which will delete all data on the phone and microSD card. This is where backing up your data often comes in handy, just in case you have to wipe all your memory.

I’m not sure how well the software and online program works together, but just reading about the product makes me believe it could work really well.

Via [BlackBerry]

Full Story » | Written by Natesh Sood for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »

USA.gov Relaunches with New Mobile Apps (PC Magazine)

Tue, 06 Jul 2010 14:49:30 GMT

PC Magazine - Want to keep up with various government recalls on your phone? Maybe you want to calculate your BMI or keep tabs on the FBI's "Most Wanted" list? Not a problem. USA.gov, the government's official Web portal, last week got an overhaul that includes a number of new mobile apps.

Intel Lab To Study Computer, Human Interaction

Thu, 01 Jul 2010 07:44:18 GMT

Intel has launched an Interaction and Experience Research division, focusing on natural interfaces, such as touch, gesture and voice. Projects include SENS, using sensors in devices to monitor a person's real-time activities and displaying them live on the computers of networked friends and family; the use of projectors and 3D cameras to light up a tabletop or other flat surface, using an interactive Web portal that would recognize hand gestures and objects; and technology that would enable a computer to read a user's thoughts. (Source: http://www.informationweek.com/news/security/client/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=225702022&cid=RSSfeed_IWK_News )

Hulu Rolls Out Subscription Service Preview Beginning Today

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 21:37:34 GMT

Hulu, the free web portal that offers ad-supported content from News Corp., NBC Universal and Disney to viewers in the US, has been planning for months to launch a paid subscription version of the service. A preview of the new paid iteration, called Hulu Plus, is being rolled out today. The LA Times reports that the subscription service will cost $9.99/month, and "offer the full run of current prime-time shows such as Family Guy, Glee, Modern Family, 30 Rock and The Office."Currently, the free version only offers the latest five episodes of shows in the site's roster. Full past seasons of some shows (Arrested Development, Law & Orders: SVU, The X-Files) will also be offered. No word yet on any particular premium movie content. But here's the kicker: the Times report describes Hulu Plus as "an ad-supported subscription service." So will shows still be interrupted by ads? If so, Hulu has a ...

BT and GENBAND upgrade BT's iComms UC service

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 15:06:21 GMT

BT and GENBAND jointly announced the latest upgrades to BT's iComms Unified Communication service, which provides businesses with a variety of carrier-hosted IP communications solutions aim at enhancing how people do business.

Powered by GENBAND's carrier-hosted offering, the new upgrade allows BT to provide Centrex IP and SIP services to customers. The new upgrades to the service include advanced voice and multimedia collaboration services such as unified communications, real-time presence and customized Web portal capabilities. Customers can now launch a voice conference with a personal conference bridge and run web meetings on their personal web collaboration tool while sharing their desktop.

For more:
- read the release

Sweden launches web portal for Afghan issue

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 06:41:30 GMT

Sweden Wednesday launched a web portal for Swedish support in international involvement in Afghanistan, according to a statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Minister for Foreign Affairs Carl Bildt, Minister for International Development Cooperation Gunilla Carlsson and Minister for Defense Sten Tolgfors are the three key persons to launch the portal. "Sweden's involvement in Afghanistan is long-term and is one of the most important expressions of our commitment to international p ...

HHS gears up for Web portal's launch (Politico)

Tue, 22 Jun 2010 08:51:11 GMT

Politico - When HealthCare.gov debuts next Thursday, it will allow users to determine program eligiblity.

Afilias Extends Managed DNS Services With FlexDNS Platform and API

Thu, 17 Jun 2010 14:00:00 GMT

Afilias' NEW FlexDNS Platform allows you to manage DNS your way. Resellers, Registrars, TLD registry operators, and Corporations can now get a custom DNS solution, made for their unique needs.Today Afilias, a leading provider of Internet infrastructure services, announced the expansion of its Managed DNS services with the availability of its new FlexDNSSM Platform. The FlexDNS Platform now provides Afilias' DNS customers with three different options for managing their DNS over Afilias' network: A Web-based portal, AXFR (DNS zone transfer), or an Application Programming Interface (API).

Afilias' Managed DNS service, which leverages the DNS network that supports 15 top-level domains (TLDs) including .INFO and .ORG, has always provided a convenient Web-based portal that allows customers to manage their DNS easily and quickly. The FlexDNS platform expands this service with new features for registrars and others who offer Web services, or for users who have a need to make frequent changes to their DNS in an automated fashion.

"Afilias' Managed DNS service is becoming increasingly popular as threats across the Internet grow and organizations recognize the need for better DNS that can guarantee 100% up-time," said John Kane, Vice President of Corporate Services for Afilias. "Other solutions are often limited in features or functionality. However, with the launch of our FlexDNS Platform, Afilias makes DNS management easier for a wider range of customers, including registrars, whose domain customers often rely on them for DNS services."

"As the first DNSSEC-signed TLD, Afilias has made it easy for us to provide 100% reliable DNS," said Danny Aerts, Managing Director of the Swedish Internet Infrastructure Foundation which manages the .SE registry for Sweden and uses the AXFR portion of Afilias' FlexDNS platform to provide Secondary DNS for their top-level domain.

The FlexDNS Platform

Afilias' FlexDNS Platform now makes three choices available for customers using Afilias' diverse, secure and reliable AnyCast DNS network:

Application Programming Interface (API): Afilias' new API is ideal for customers like domain name registrars who need to integrate Afilias' DNS offering into their own interface for ease of use, or to offer the API as a value added or premium DNS service. Afilias' API is fully documented REST and XML-based.
AXFR: Customers that update their DNS frequently need an automated solution that reflects these changes worldwide in near real time. Afilias' new AXFR option allows these customers to act as a "hidden master" and transmit their updates to Afilias via AXFR. This choice is especially useful for customers with large zones, like TLD registries, and it provides superior service in either a Primary or Secondary DNS role.
Web-based portal: Afilias' traditional Web portal remains available for customers with smaller domain portfolios and enables them to easily manage their DNS settings. It offers extensive customization options including multiple user groups, domain folders, extensive Web-based reporting, bulk import, advanced permissions, and SMS notifications.

"Our FlexDNS platform provides an ideal solution for corporations as well as other managed service providers like hosting companies or domain name registrars who need to easily integrate a secure and reliable DNS network to augment their product offering," added Kane. "Afilias provides significant cost savings over building out your own network, and provides DNS that is already proven to support millions of domains and billions of DNS transactions across the Internet."

About Afilias Managed DNS Services

Afilias' state of the art DNS network ensures security and resiliency through a diverse any-cast architecture. Its multi-layered, tiered design uses multiple hardware and software solutions, multiple bandwidth providers, and is dispersed across numerous geographic locations, ensuring no single points of failure and 100 percent up-time, guaranteed. Afilias' system also supports DNSSEC. To learn more about Afilias' FlexDNS platform visit www.flexDNS.info

More LittleBigPlanet 2 community features, LBP.me functionality revealed

Wed, 16 Jun 2010 23:22:36 GMT

At a recent E3 preview presentation, LittleBigPlanet 2 mastermind Alex Evans revealed a handful of new innovations that Media Molecule is incorporating in the do-it-yourself sequel. One aspect of the game that will see a major (and oft-requested) improvement is its community features. According to Evans, the days of hunting for levels randomly distributed across the face of a planet will be gone -- player creations will now appear in a simple list, which players will be able to filter using a number of metrics (genre, keyword, etc.).

More exciting than that was the explanation of the functions offered by LBP.me, the web portal which will give players their own personal websites, which will automatically update with that player's creations, recently played levels and top scores. If you're looking at one of these pages in a browser, you can set the game to automatically queue up the level next time you play -- or, alternatively, you could just print out a QR barcode assigned to each level, place it in front of your PlayStation Eye, and watch as it loads up the appropriate creation.

More LittleBigPlanet 2 community features, LBP.me functionality revealed originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 16 Jun 2010 18:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Planet Eclipse: Bob Balfe: Lotus Notes IS the ultimate platform

Wed, 16 Jun 2010 13:41:09 GMT

While I completely sympathize with the people who have lost large contracts, work, or even their jobs because of some company moving to another platform I honestly do not understand some of the comments about Notes not being a good platform for application development. I do think IBM AND the Community need to do a much better job marketing things like the Eclipse and Lotus Expeditor Platforms because that is what its primary installed Lotus offerings are based on. More and more companies are getting it, each week I hear of a new plugin, extension, or Eclipse view being created for some use case – so its not only the few business partners that have given Eclipse programming a chance, IT shops are starting to get it. What I would like to see are more business partners expanding the organic marketing campaign of Eclipse and Expeditor. XPages has gotten a lot of attention but I think once again the client has gone to the back burner; but I also see a lot of stir in the client space with plugins coming from partners like GIST, LinkedIn, SAP, customers, etc. I was just at customer site yesterday and they have built an amazing plugin that integrates Notes with EMC’s Documentum – it was very cool – and guess what – that was an IT shop that did it because they have Eclipse developers.

In short, you have XPages for Web and the Expeditor platform for rich client. Mix Expeditor plus NSF, Web, Portal, SWT, and native applications and you get composite applications. You can do things in the Notes client today you could not imagine doing in version 7 and below. Some stuff is easier, some just different but now you can do most of it in Java and it works on all platforms. I have personally been pushing Eclipse and Expeditor for well over four years and I am sure my readers are aware of that – we as a community need to create compelling applications that make the platform stand out!

Now, in Notes 8.5.1 you can even create XPage based components that run locally in the client – meaning write your components once and they run in both Domino and Notes applications. Many may not be aware, but you could also do this with pre-compiled JSP’s and Portlets for over 5 years in Lotus Expeditor – and yes, that means in Lotus Notes also. So the Notes community has had the ability since Notes 8.0 to completely enhance their skill set to industry standards like Java, Eclipse, and many web technologies. With technologies like XULRunner in the platform the web technologies that can be deployed to the Lotus Notes client are essentially limitless and are only held back by your imagination.

I am not sure how to close this rant but in short I would like to see the community better selling “the platform” versus posting long rants in the opposite direction. I do not speak for IBM or the marketing behind our products, I can only “sell” what the platforms can do technically and from a technical point of view the Lotus Platform is an amazing piece of software that can present amazing applications.

technorati tags: eclipse, expeditor, java, Notes, platform

"Love in a Puff" to open in cinemas

Sun, 13 Jun 2010 23:20:08 GMT

Urban romance story "Love in a Puff" will be opening in mainland cinemas on June 18. Its producer, Media Asia, said that the movie has got a pass from the film bureau for screening. &$ &$Poster of "Love in a Puff." (Photo: CRIENGLISH.com)&$&$ According to a report on web portal sina.com, the romantic comedy was rated as a third level film in Hong Kong, which means it's forbidden for people under 18 years of a ...

Yahoo Extends Facebook Partnership

Tue, 08 Jun 2010 21:55:58 GMT

Web portal strengthens its ties with dominant social network, announcing plans to integrate content on the two platforms, as well as a new privacy dashboard.

Yahoo Appoints New Chief Technology Officer (PC World)

Thu, 03 Jun 2010 19:00:16 GMT

PC World - Consumer Web portal company Yahoo has appointed a new chief technology officer, with former Chief Architect Raymie Stata taking on the role immediately, Yahoo announced Thursday.

Ad Planner 1000 Lets Google Ad Clients Target Top Sites

Fri, 28 May 2010 19:12:56 GMT

Google gave its online advertising clients a new tool Thursday that gives them the ability to restrict their online marketing campaigns to the world's top 1,000 web domains from Facebook on down, based on unique visitor numbers. Google said it launched the new Ad Planner 1000 filter in response to feedback from a number of customers running branding campaigns.

With Ad Planner 1000, the goal is to enable Google's online advertising clients to only show their ads on the leading 1,000 web sites around the globe, noted DoubleClick Ad Planner Product Manager Sean Harvey. "This new feature will ensure that your ads reach a large number of users, but only on well-known sites best suited for branding goals," Harvey wrote in a blog.

Web Site Leaders

With Facebook having generated 540 million unique web-site visitors and a staggering 570 billion page views in April alone, the social-networking site is doubtlessly high on the wish lists of many advertisers contemplating the launch of online media campaigns. Number-two Yahoo generated a respectable 490 million unique visitors, but its page views lagged far behind Facebook at 70 billion.

Microsoft's top web properties Live.com, MSN and Microsoft.com had 370 million, 280 million and 230 million unique visitors, respectively. Rounding out the world's top 10 were BlogSpot (230 million), Chinese web portal Baidu (230 million), and e-mail and messaging service qq.com (170 million). Though Wikipedia (310 million) and Mozilla (140 million) also made the top 10, neither web site currently accepts advertising.

Other popular web destinations include Bing and Adobe Systems, which were tied at 110 million unique visitors in April. Twitter and Ask.com made the top 20 with 96 million and 88 million unique visitors, respectively.

Google's web-site performance rankings for April didn't include any data for the company's own web properties, such as the number of unique...

Tips To Harness the Power of Search Engines

Mon, 24 May 2010 14:32:47 GMT

In the race to be the dominant Web portal, Internet search engines are constantly growing smarter. Although outward appearances may not change much, the algorithms churning behind the scenes are getting better at predicting what users want and delivering answers almost instantly.

Google recently unveiled new tools for its search-results pages to help users further refine their queries. But there's plenty of power built into the search box on the main page. Most users will find what they're looking for with just a basic query on a search page. But there are some lesser-known tricks to help consumers maximize the search function.

Most of the shortcuts below also are available on Microsoft's Bing and Yahoo Search. Those portals have their own unique features: typing in a company name such as "Amazon" on Bing spits out a toll-free customer-service number, for example, and entering "gas" and a ZIP code on Yahoo calls up a list of local gas prices.

Still, Google remains dominant in search. According to Experian Hitwise, Google captured 71 percent of all U.S. searches in April, compared with 15 percent for Yahoo and 9 percent for Bing.

Here are some quick tips to make searching easier:

* Packages: Enter a tracking number to get a direct link to the page listing a shipment's status. It works with the U.S. Postal Service, FedEx and UPS.

* Show times: Enter a movie title and ZIP code to see nearest theaters and times. Clicking on the name of the theater will return complete listings for that location, while clicking on a movie time leads to a Fandango site to purchase tickets if online sales are available.

* lights: Enter an airline and flight number to track its status.

* Conversions: Calculate the number of teaspoons in a fluid ounce, or try something more obscure like pascals to pounds per...

Web portal Warrior Gateway helps digital-age vets (AP)

Mon, 24 May 2010 13:03:06 GMT

AP - For young veterans returning from duty in Iraq or Afghanistan, the process of re-entering society can be daunting, especially if they have been injured or have struggled with mental health problems.

Web portal Warrior Gateway helps digital-age vets (AP)

Mon, 24 May 2010 13:03:06 GMT

New Web portal Warrior Gateway takes cues from Yelp, Google to help digital-age vets

Sun, 23 May 2010 18:51:26 GMT

For young veterans returning from duty in Iraq or Afghanistan, the process of re-entering society can be daunting, especially if they have been injured or have struggled with mental health problems.

Summary Box: Web portal helps digital-age vets (AP)

Sun, 23 May 2010 16:45:50 GMT

AP - THE OFFERING: Warrior Gateway is a free site designed to help young veterans find services in an environment they are comfortable in: the Internet.

Summary Box: Web portal helps digital-age vets (AP)

Sun, 23 May 2010 16:45:50 GMT

AP - THE OFFERING: Warrior Gateway is a free site designed to help young veterans find services in an environment they are comfortable in: the Internet.

Web portal Warrior Gateway helps digital-age vets (AP)

Sun, 23 May 2010 16:45:00 GMT

Web portal Warrior Gateway helps digital-age vets (AP)

Sun, 23 May 2010 16:45:00 GMT

EidosMedia Powers Firm's New Web Portal

Wed, 19 May 2010 23:55:39 GMT

AllianceBernstein has launched a suite of redesigned Websites powered by Methode technology from EidosMedia.

Yahoo Fields Concerns Over Microsoft Ad Switch

Fri, 14 May 2010 22:45:46 GMT

Web portal seeks to answer questions of advertising partners concerned with the transition to Microsoft's adCenter once the companies' search partnership is completed.

Port.Hu takes 50% stake in Filmklik

Tue, 11 May 2010 19:18:10 GMT

Hungarian web portal Port.Hu has taken a 50% stake in Budapest-based video-on-demand platform Filmklik.

Port.Hu takes 50% stake in Filmklik

Tue, 11 May 2010 18:25:52 GMT

International News: Hungarian web portal invests in VOD platform -- Hungarian web portal Port.Hu has taken a 50% stake in Budapest-based video-on-demand platform Filmklik.

FoxSports.com Tackles TV-Web Integration With Streaming

Mon, 10 May 2010 04:19:44 GMT

By John Consoli

FoxSports.com is making a serious run at ESPN.com's online dominance by turning its web portal into a virtual cable channel, with hourly streaming of a live daily sports news report beginning Monday.

The strategy also reflects an aggressive effort to integrate televised and online content – at least as far as selling advertising is concerned.

Called Fox Sports Flash, the show will originate in Los Angeles and be anchored by sportswriter/sportscaster Barry LeBrock...