Google debuts even more unbelievably helpful labs
Google Labs today officially announced the "Similar Images" and "Google News Timeline" tools, which have been deepening the well of useful search apps from the number one search provider since late last week.
Similar Images does exactly as its name suggests. When in Google Image search, queries for common or ambiguous terms frequently yield a lot of undesired results. A search for "colt," for example, could return images of a gun, a horse, a car, or an American football player: quite disparate results. By clicking the "Similar Images" tag under an appropriate picture, the search is narrowed to only the pictures that look similar to the chosen result.
Sun goes down: Larry Ellison disrupts the software landscape again
There were two business models for the software industry, and now once again, there are two respective champions of those models: In one corner is the undisputed master of the "embrace and extend" principle, perceived worldwide as looking after itself and its own interests, while recently opening up its communications protocols to free licenses, supporting developers with free tools, and giving away the software needed for users to build its platform. In the other corner is a seasoned dealmaker, stalking after prey sometimes for years before trapping it into a deal it can't refuse, preaching the principle of openness while clearly and even transparently acquiring the components for a comprehensive platform where all roads lead through the company and into the company, not even hiding the fact that it rarely creates its own technology.
Pop quiz: Which one's Microsoft and which one's Oracle?
Eighteenth W3C tackles the Web at 20
As we mourn the passing of the first great Internet company (into the maw of Larry Ellison), academics are gathering in Barcelona for the eighteenth World Wide Web Conference. Underway already but officially kicking off Wednesday, W3C will look both forward at where researchers believe the Web to be heading, and back at its 20-year history.
In the beginning, of course -- when Sun's sunsite.*.* efforts were supporting the first great explosion of Web creativity -- things were moving so fast they had to have W3C twice a year. (Your reporter was in attendance for the second, "Mosaic and the Web;" for a blast of real nostalgia, check out the best-of-the-Web awards given at the very first W3C, held five months previous.)
Microsoft: All netbooks will run any Windows 7
There will very likely be some netbooks shipped in the US and other developed markets this year that will feature the Windows 7 Starter Edition SKU announced in February. But this version will have some limitations to it that go beyond the inability to display the Aero front-end using Windows Presentation Foundation -- the direct implication of a statement made by a Microsoft spokesperson to Betanews this afternoon.
But that will not mean that premium editions of Win7 will not be able to run on netbooks, the spokesperson continued, but rather that OEMs may end up choosing to pre-install this limited edition on netbooks for sale.
Starbucks Wi-Fi deja vu, now in British Isles
Starbucks really had its hands full with T-Mobile and AT&T hotspots last year. After the giant coffee seller dropped T-Mobile for AT&T, T-mobile then sued over a breach of contract, and the two mobile carriers ended up effectively splitting their Starbucks hotspot coverage between company-owned stores and franchises, with a goodly amount offering connectivity from both.
Now, more than 650 Starbucks in the UK and Ireland will undergo the same hotspot carrier swap, abandoning T-Mobile in favor of British Telecom. BT broadband, BT FON Wi-Fi, iPass, Boingo, and BT Openzone users will gain access the Internet at any Starbucks location in Britain, additionally, O2 iPhone users will have access included within their contract.
Microsoft promises Web-based 1080p with 'Smooth Streaming'
Today, Microsoft announced updates to its "Smooth Streaming," which is a set of technologies for IIS and Silverlight designed to allow consistent full-screen high definition streaming.
Among Web servers, Microsoft's IIS enjoys about 33% market share (and slipping slightly) against market leader Apache, according to Netcraft analysis. Smooth Streaming leverages IIS Media Services (formerly known as IIS Media Pack) and Silverlight 3 to provide on-demand high-def media (720p to 1080p), or live adaptive streaming. The technology was first used with the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics.
Now an Oracle product, what happens to MySQL?
Attendees at the open source database's annual developers' conference in Santa Clara this morning are waking up to the incredible news that their own product, whose value to Sun Microsystems was to have been lauded by none other than Sun co-founder Andreas von Bechtolsheim in a keynote address scheduled for Thursday, is now owned by Oracle Systems.
The initial value of MySQL to Oracle -- up until this morning, its biggest competitor -- was obvious by its absence from this morning's joint press conference featuring Sun and Oracle executives. Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz mentioned MySQL along with OpenOffice as part of what he now calls the world's largest supplier for open source software. Until Oracle's SEC filings are made public, we won't know whether MySQL even factored into its valuation of Sun.
Flash it up: Adobe moves even deeper into TV
Adobe's already dominated the Internet with Flash, and now, the company has begun its move to the next connected platform: the home theater. This morning, Adobe introduced Flash for the Digital Home which is designed for use on connected HDTVs, set-top Boxes, Blu-ray players, and other such devices.
Familiar Flash-based videos, apps, and widgets will be available on home theater devices as soon as the second half of this year, Adobe says. Since the company has a strong backing from OEMs, chipmakers, cable companies, and content creators in its Open Screen Project, the delivery of Flash-based content is going to become much more uniform.
Mr. Mobile DTV goes to Washington
Even though the United States' DTV transition has been handled with all the grace of a pianist wearing boxing gloves, there is still hope for a relatively smooth introduction to mobile DTV, despite the host of standards, brand names and incompatible technologies. The first market with a genuine mobile DTV deployment has been revealed.
Washington, D.C. will begin to broadcast mobile digital television in late summer, with the local CBS, NBC, PBS, Fox and ion stations participating. The stations will reportedly broadcast exactly the same shows and commercials that they're broadcasting to standard televisions.
'Industry in a box:' Sun acquisition will lead to Oracle Java
After spending decades waking up every morning, as Scott McNealy's old keynote speeches used to repeat, thinking singularly of how to slay the beast that is Bill Gates, his company finds itself this morning swallowed by Larry Ellison. Signifying the apparent catastrophic collapse of Sun Microsystems and IBM to have come together, in bargaining efforts that both sides vehemently and vociferously declined to comment about, Sun has agreed to be acquired by Oracle.
"One of the key reasons that Oracle's acquisition strategy has been so successful is because we buy companies with market-leading products," stated Oracle CEO Larry Ellison this morning, literally parading his latest acquisition like the latest trophy among many, or like a big game fisherman hauling in a shark. "PeopleSoft was #1 in human resources. Siebel was #1 in customer relationship management. BEA's WebLogic was the #1 Java virtual machine. Hyperion was #1 in enterprise performance management. And so on. Sun Microsystems has a variety of exciting products, but two of their software products -- the Sun Solaris operating system and Sun's Java programming language -- were instrumental in Oracle's decision to acquire Sun."
Sun launches cost-conscious x86 servers for clouds
11:45 am ET April 20, 2009 - Sun Microsystems' announcement last week came before the business deal last weekend that led to the absorption of Sun by Oracle. Most noteworthy from Monday morning's joint conference call with Oracle and Sun management was that Oracle CEO Larry Ellison characterized the deal as a software acquisition. Though the fact that Sun makes servers was mentioned (Oracle does now as well), that fact wasn't high on anyone's list this morning. And because no questions were taken from the press, we don't actually know the fate of the Sun Fire server lineup that Jacqueline Emigh covered just late last week.
Sun's new x86 hardware is designed to bring speed, simplicity, and "obviously savings, [as we] deliver the same application performance as before," said Sun CTO John Fowler, in a rollout this week at Sun's North American Partner Summit in Las Vegas.
Zoho gets widget-y on iGoogle, Facebook, more
Zoho may never have the name recognition of a Google or even an OpenOffice, but the company's quest to provide a comprehensive, extraordinarily Web-friendly business application suite continues. Widgets are the latest addition to its stable.
The six Zoho Gadgets -- Docs, Mail, Calendar, Tasks, Contacts, and Planner -- are available for Facebook, iGoogle, and Orkut, as well as sites cognizant of OpenSocial XML (e.g., MySpace, Blogspot, Zoho or other wikis), and there's a generic embeddable version as well. The company says on its blog that more will come.
Analysts: While 3G gadgets thrive, only five mobile 'App Stores' will survive
The small subset of software 'app stores' most likely to survive includes Apple's download site, Google's Android Store, and RIM's new BlackBerry App World, according to recent analysis during a webcast featuring Andy Castonguay, Yankee Group's research director.
But outside of downloadable apps, other big differentiators in the increasingly crowded broadband gadget space will include size of the device, connectivity, keyboard, screen, and user interface.
Windows Mobile 6.5 to launch at TechEd 2009
Microsoft's annual TechEd conference, which is taking place in Los Angeles this year from May 11 to 15, will play host to the official debut of Windows Mobile 6.5, the Windows Mobile Team Blog said today.
On The opening day of TechEd at 2:15 pm PDT, Stephanie Ferguson, the General Manager of Business Experiences at Microsoft, will lead the launch presentation of the Windows Mobile release that is meant to bridge the gap between old key-and-D-pad-driven interface with the touch-based interface.
Blu-ray Today: An analyst predicts 2009 will finally be its year
The most recent quarterly analysis from Futuresource Consulting estimates that 12 million non-PlayStation 3 Blu-ray players will ship this year, showing the substantial increase in support for the format which from July 2006 to January 2009 shipped only 10.7 million players, according to DisplaySearch.
Futuresource is putting a lot of stock in this year's holiday season, expecting shipments to exceed six million units in the fourth quarter alone.
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