Xoopit + Yahoo! Mail = Moving beyond that massive digital shoebox July 23, 2009
Posted by hruf in Internet & Communities, Multimedia.Tags: Internet, Media Browser, Media Player, Search, Social Networks, Xoopit, Yahoo!
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Yahoo! has announced to acquire Xoopit.
If your email inbox is anything like mine, it’s turned into a “digital shoebox” over the years. It’s full of hundreds or maybe thousands of special photos that have been shared by close friends and family members, but they’re not organized in any particular way. I open them, occasionally print or forward them, and then move on to my mail, letting precious pictures become buried in the unlimited storage of my inbox.
Enter Xoopit, which Yahoo! signed an agreement to acquire today. Their name may sound familiar – they won our Open Hack Day last fall and we teamed with them in December to launch the “My Photos” app in Yahoo! Mail, which many of you are already using today. In fact, it’s the most popular third party app in Yahoo! Mail.
With the integration of Xoopit’s platform technology and capabilities, the task of sending photos via email will be as easy as it should be and sharing photo albums with friends and family members will also be a cinch. You’ll be able to share your pictures among a group of friends or family like never before – combining pictures from numerous sources into a single album for a private group to view. And soon your inbox will become an organized photo index as well. Just imagine having a tool that collects all the photos you’ve sent and received over the years into that scrapbook you’ve never had time to assemble.
In short, Xoopit will bring phenomenal photo organization, improved photo sharing, and the serendipity of discovering forgotten photos to Yahoo! Mail.
Why is this such a big deal? Yahoo! Mail is actually home to one of the largest online photo repositories in the world. And every day, millions of you use Yahoo! Mail as your primary way to share the photos of important moments in your lives. While social networks and community sites are great for sharing photos with everyone you know, we realize it’s not for everyone or every occasion. For many, email is still best for sharing photos among a more select group of friends or family. And now we’re making it all that much easier for you.
What does this i.e. mean for applications like Picasa, iPhoto etc.? How do you use photo in combination of media management and sharing? Makes it sense that such application are also import media items like photos from your preferred mail client (beside the question if it is an online or offline mail client)?
via Yodel Anecdotal » Blog Archive » Xoopit + Yahoo! Mail = Moving beyond that massive digital shoebox.
Is Veoh the Next Web Video Company to Tumble? | AllThingsD July 6, 2009
Posted by pannet in Multimedia.Tags: Hulu, Internet, joost, Streaming, TV, veoh, Yahoo!, you, YouTube
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Now that Joost has given up the ghost and bailed out of the Web video portal business, who’s next?A good bet: Veoh, one of the best-funded would-be YouTubes. Multiple sources tell me the company is aggressively marketing itself in hopes of finding a buyer. [...]
What happened to Veoh? The same thing that happened to almost every other Web video portal that isn’t Google’s (GOOG) YouTube or Hulu: Not enough audience, not enough ad revenue, too many costs. [...]
So who would buy Veoh? Theoretically, at the right price, the company could be attractive to a large Web player like a Yahoo (YHOO), which used to be a big player in video back when video was a small market. Or the company could try marketing its technical expertise to a cable/telco company like Time Warner Cable (TWC) that hasn’t done much with online video but says it will soon. [...]
Will TV Ever Get an App Store Moment? — GigaOM Pro July 1, 2009
Posted by pannet in Multimedia.Tags: App Store, Apple, boxee, Google, Microsoft, Netflix, TV, Xbox, Yahoo!
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Today’s TV application marketplace is in a similar, pre-App Store state today: lots of competing software platforms, a growing number of connected devices (but none dominant) and a fairly small number of apps. So, when will the TV have its App Store moment?
To answer that question, it pays to compare the two markets further. Much like the mobile market, PayTV has been controlled by the iron fist of the carriers over the past decade, leaving little room for innovation outside of DVRs and high-definition video. While some interactive features have been integrated, particularly by IPTV providers, there has been little to no development of open application marketplaces by carriers.
The good news is that there are many more hardware options for acquiring and using apps for on-TV display than there are for mobile apps: game consoles, media adapters, third-party hardware (such as Apple TV), computers and, increasingly, the TV itself. The combined force of such diverse enabling technologies is likely to be harnessed to eventually create a real market. Because of the more bountiful options for hardware and connectivity in the TV space vis-a-vis mobile (where control of the network and handset is nearly required), the door for new entrants can be kicked open more quickly. Once someone gets the right mix of a well-tuned storefront, a bounty of enticing apps, and good on-screen experience, the consumer will see the light.
Some alternatives have shown early signs of success — particularly game consoles. Xbox Live has proven there is a market for downloadable games with Xbox Live, and has also had success outside of the gaming category with Netflix Instant Streaming. But even accounting for Xbox Live Arcade and Netflix360, a similar tectonic shift for TV apps equivalent to the arrival of Apple’s App Store has yet to occur.
Right now, the odds-on favorites in a TV-app market are Microsoft, Apple and Nintendo, all of which have end-to-end hardware, software and online delivery assets, not to mention robust app development environments (a key difference from carriers and traditional consumer electronics players). Google and Yahoo could also seize opportunity here; Android is soon to appear in set-top boxes, and Yahoo’s widget platform has proved quite popular. Lastly, don’t count out players like Boxee and Vizio.
The underpinnings for a TV app revolution are already in place. While there’s no clear winner yet, the rise of connected TVs and associated platforms and the continued push by scrappy competitors to control the third screen mean the TV application market place will soon be as vibrant as Potsdamer Platz in the summertime.
How The Different Mobile Data Syncing Services Stack Up June 9, 2009
Posted by pannet in Mobile & Gadgets.Tags: Apple, AT&T, Blackberry, Google, Market Trends, Mobile, Nokia, Palm, synching, T-Mobile, Verizon, Vodafone, Yahoo!
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As the phones in our pockets become our second computers, it will become increasingly important to sync data between the two. Not just emails, but contacts, calendars, photos, music, apps, browser bookmarks, files, and more. Nearly every Web phone out there comes with at least some sort of rudimentary syncing app. Apple has MobileMe, Nokia has Ovi, Palm has Synergy, Blackberry has Internet Services, and Microsoft has My Phone.
An open-source competitor to all of these is Funambol. The startup evaluated all of the syncing services and scored them based on criteria such as how many kinds of data each one supports, cost, usability, and number of supported devices. (Full study embedded at bottom of post). It came up with a score for each out of a maximum of 40. Naturally enough, Funambol scored the highest, but if you throw that out you end up with the list below (with accompanying scores) [...]
- Nokia Ovi – 28
- Apple MobileMe – 27
- Palm Synergy – 26
- Microsoft My Phone – 26
- Vodafone Zyb – 26
- Google Sync – 23
- BlackBerry IS – 21
- Yahoo! Mobile – 21
- AT&T – 19
- T-Mobile – 19
- Verizon – 19
via How The Different Mobile Data Syncing Services Stack Up.
Social search startup Aardvark hires search and mobile experts, building iPhone app March 30, 2009
Posted by andre in Internet & Communities, Mobile & Gadgets.Tags: Community, Google, iPhone, Yahoo!
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Aardvark began opening its social search engine to more users earlier this month, and now the ambitious company is starting to reveal more of its future plans. It’s bulking up its Google-heavy technical team with Sameer Paranjpye, the Director of Yahoo’s grid computing group and a founding member of the Hadoop project. It’s also taking aim at the mobile market, hiring on Ben Keighran, the founder of mobile messaging service BluePulse. I caught up with Keighran earlier today and he sketched out what sounds like a very useful iPhone application — it will let you get answers from friends wherever you are. [...]
In testing so far, around 70 percent of active Aardvark users respond to a targeted question, more than 90 percent of questions get answered — and over half of all questions get answered in under five minutes. [...]
One of the most obvious use cases for wanting to get an expert answer from someone you know is when you’re away from the computer — like when traveling in a foreign city and trying to find a fun place to go out at night. You can already use Aardvark on your phone using mobile email or a third-party mobile IM client, but the company aims to make it even easier through mobile applications and SMS. First up for development is an iPhone application, Keighran (pictured) says, that will let you either type in a question or speak it into the phone. The message will then go into the Aardvark system, appearing in front of the experts you’re connected to on the site — sort of like a local review site, but live and just with your friends.
Look for the iPhone app in the next two months.
via Social search startup Aardvark hires search and mobile experts, building iPhone app » VentureBeat
Netgear unveils the Internet TV Player set-top box February 21, 2009
Posted by pannet in Internet & Communities, Multimedia.Tags: bitTorrent, cinemanow, Google, HDTV, Internet, Streaming, TV, Yahoo!, YouTube
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Netgear unveiled the Netgear Internet TV Player (ITV2000) today. From this box you can stream content to your TV from sites like BBC, CNN, ESPN, EuroSport, NBC, PGATour, and TMZ, as well as video sites like YouTube, Google Videos, Yahoo Videos, and MetaCafe. The box will be available in early Summer 2009 for $199.
NETGEAR’s Internet TV Player (ITV2000) is a compact, easy-to-use, “plug in and go” Internet set-top device with a simple remote control that enables viewers to catch up on the world of Internet videos including YouTube, live Internet TV, popular Internet video websites, premium video-on-demand and online video searches retrieving billions of Internet videos from a place it was previously unavailable — the TV in their living rooms. Rather than watching videos on PC screens in separate rooms, families can watch video from a variety of Internet sources on the TV together, in the comfort of their den or family room.
The Internet TV Player unlocks the value of new HDTVs as well as old analog TVs. It is ideal for the Internet families who enjoy online video, and for those who are geographically displaced from their preferred television content, such as international sporting events and Bollywood productions. It streams content from popular sites such as BBC.com, CNN.com, ESPN.com, EuroSport.com, NBC.com, PGATour and TMZ.com, as well as video powerhouses YouTube, Google Videos, Yahoo Videos and MetaCafe. NETGEAR’s Internet TV Player supports streaming of live TV broadcasts from Internet sites around the world, and premium, paid movies on demand such as CinemaNow.com, in addition to downloaded videos from sites such as BitTorrent. Its superior VTap video search capabilities enable the intelligent search of Internet videos, including targeting video sites by country, topic of interest, person or popular website. Consumers are also able to play video, music, and photos from a local USB flash drive as well as from the NETGEAR ReadyNAS family of storage solutions.
Netgear unveils the Internet TV Player set-top box.
Samsung / Yahoo Internet@TV widgets revealed February 11, 2009
Posted by andre in Multimedia, Programming.Tags: eBay, Flickr, HDTV, Internet, JavaScript, Streaming, Widgets, XML, Yahoo!, YouTube
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Samsung and Yahoo! promise the Best of the Web on select 2009 HDTV models, thanks to the Internet@TV widgets we snuck a look at a few weeks ago. Developers build Javascript and XML apps that then run directly on your Samsung HDTV, starting with USA Today, YouTube, eBay, Showtime and Yahoo properties like Flickr and Yahoo! News. Next up their sleeves? Video streaming and “other popular Internet services” running through the built-in Ethernet or optional Wi-Fi USB dongle. Also, unlike some others, the Internet@TV Content service isn’t just a U.S. thing, headed to 12 other countries this year: Canada, Mexico, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, The Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Finland. Having the Internet no further away than the nearest remote was your biggest request for ’09, right?
Samsung / Yahoo Internet@TV widgets revealed – Engadget HD
