The Ugly Bug Ball Is Online Dating for the "Aesthetically Challenged" [Online Dating]

Here at Gizmodo we've profiled online dating sites for Apple fans, ok cupids, and even virgins. Did you know there's also a dating site for ugly people? There totally is! And it's just bagged its first engagement. More »

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IE9 Beta downloaded 10 million times, more details on Developer Preview 6

Filed under: Microsoft, Browsers

A few moments ago Dean Hachamovitch took the stage at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference, summarily bounced around, and then gave us the news: IE9 Beta has now been downloaded over 10 million times, in just six weeks.

Today also sees the release of Platform Preview 6, which unfortunately -- as far as non-developers are concerned -- doesn't feature any significant outwardly-facing changes. Under the hood, however, there have been lots of bug fixes and performance enhancements. News is good on the standards-compliance front, too: IE9 now has support for CSS3 2D transforms and HTML5 semantic tags. For further details, check the release notes.

The real question, though, revolves around IE9 Beta 2. When is it due? And if the rumors about IE9 launching in January 2011 are true, is there even time for a second beta?

IE9 Beta downloaded 10 million times, more details on Developer Preview 6 originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 28 Oct 2010 12:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google Chrome to add option for custom DNS servers

Filed under: Google, Browsers

Google Chrome's (and Chromium's) about:flags page is becoming quite the playground for intrepid feature testers. In a recent Chromium snapshot build, another handy new feature has appeared: user-specified DNS servers.

Being able to specify custom servers right in the browser might not be a big deal on other operating systems -- where you can already do that in your network settings. On Chrome OS, however, it could provide an easy way for parents to lock their child's netbook into the OpenDNS FamilyShield in order to block inappropriate content (for example).

I'm sure there are other applications for this as well -- testing, for example. Want to run GoogleDNS in Canary against your ISP's servers in Chromium to see how they perform side-by-side? Go for it!

...Or maybe your favorite site won't load, or an outdated copy of a page you're working on keeps loading when you refresh (I'm looking at you, MTS). If it's your DNS servers at fault, you could quickly pop a new server into Chrome, reload, and off you go.

Sure, you could achieve the same result using a proxy server, but why bother if the functionality is built right into your browser?

Google Chrome to add option for custom DNS servers originally appeared on Download Squad on Sun, 24 Oct 2010 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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CrunchGear Week in Review: Caps for Sale Edition

$$$: Team Fortress 2 Modders Make Nearly $50,000 Apiece End Of An Era: Sony Stops Manufacturing Cassette Walkmans Apple Announces The Apple MacBook Air Refresh Including A Smaller Model Inflatable Photo Studio Sets Up In Minutes, Is a Firetrap New Pleo Peeks Out From The Antediluvian Mists

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End Of an Era: Panasonic Kills Off Technics Turntables [Discontinued]

If you've ever been a DJ, known a DJ, or listened to a DJ, there's a good chance you're familiar with Technics. Panasonic's analog turntables are legend among scratchers and spinners. And now they're gone. More »

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New B&N Nook Colors Outside the E-Reader Lines

Barnes & Noble took a big swipe at Amazon's dominance of the e-reader market with the introduction Wednesday of a new color Nook reader and a program to encourage development of apps for its devices. The $249 Nookcolor is designed to appeal to readers interested in periodicals and graphic books as well as traditional text-dominated books.

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Johnny Cash Graphic Novel Goes HD For iPad App [IPad Apps]

Already available for iPhones, the Johnny Cash graphic novel biography I See A Darkness has arrived on the iPad for $5. If you already own his music, it will be used at relevant points in the story. [iTunes via Recombu] More »

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BitDefender safego protects you from Facebook dangers

Filed under: Security

Facebook's immense popularity has made it a prime target for cybercriminals. Malicious (or 'poisoned') links, spam, and malvertising are all too common -- and it's far too easy for an unsuspecting Facebook user to be taken in. Hey, if one of your friends sends you a link to what seems like a hilarious picture, there's a decent chance you'll click through, right?

... And that's how the bad guys get you. Fortunately, however, there's a slick new Facebook app from BitDefender called safego that can help protect you (and your less-technical friends and family).

The idea is simple: install safego and let it scan your profile. Any links you've received will be scanned, including short URLs from services like bit.ly and tinyurl. Fire up the scanner and let it check all those new messages and wall posts you've received, and you'll know in an instant if there's anything that you should avoid clicking.

My mind boggles when I think about all of the infected computers I've cleaned that could have been spared that fate if their owners had used an app like safego to defend their Facebook profiles.
safego even checks your account for any privacy issues which might need to be addressed. Right now, unfortunately, attention items aren't linked -- so I can't find out what it is about my profile safego thinks I should check.

The app is in beta, however, so I'd fully expect that problem to be addressed by the time it sheds the tag. It's also worth noting that on some versions of Google Chrome the bottom boxes in safego's dashboard (last scanned items and infected items) never update. Again, this is likely a beta issue.

Growing pains aside, BitDefender safego is still a fantastic way for any Facebook user to protect him or herself. If you've ever been the victim of a malicious link on Facebook or had your profile attacked by some nasty malware, safego is an app you simple shouldn't be without.

BitDefender provides safego totally free, and with good reason. The Facebook app is a great idea, and it's got tremendous viral potential. That means a lot of free PR and more name recognition for BitDefender -- which in turn could lead to increased sales of the company's paid products.

It should also allow BitDefender greater insight into the Facebook threat landscape, and that's a good thing for all of us. The more security companies know about what the bad guys are up to on Facebook, the better equipped they'll be to protect us.

Install the BitDefender safego Facebook app

BitDefender safego protects you from Facebook dangers originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 27 Oct 2010 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Powercast and Microchip fire up interest at a distance with wireless power development kit

We're sure if you asked Powercast nicely it'd tell you a whale of a tale, about how the "more than 100 companies" who allegedly signed up to develop products that seemingly pull energy from the ether materialized into this light-up Christmas tree. Still, we'd be happy to forgive and forget if meaningful products emerged instead, and that's why we're moderately happy the company's announced a nice big development kit. $1,250 buys your firm or deep-pocketed hobbyist the spread pictured above, with a wireless transmitter to throw three watts and a pair of receiver boards to catch them from over 40 feet away, plus a low-power development board from Microchip equipped with that company's proprietary short-range wireless protocols and ZigBee functionality. We can't wait to see what people build, but we won't be snapping one up ourselves -- we're still holding out for the firm to go open-source and build an Arduino version. PR after the break.

Continue reading Powercast and Microchip fire up interest at a distance with wireless power development kit

Powercast and Microchip fire up interest at a distance with wireless power development kit originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 27 Oct 2010 09:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Intel And Another 70 Companies Launch Cloud 2015 Open Data Center Alliance

Today at a press event in San Francisco, Intel and a group of 70 companies announced an alliance to build a system of open standards for cloud computing. Part of the Cloud 2015 initiative, The Open Data Center Alliance makes it easier for customers to deploy cloud computing solutions, as it focuses on interoperability, flexibility and unifying industry standards. The Open Data Center Alliance will represent more than $50 billion in annual IT investment. Intel, which powers 9 out 10 of the servers for cloud today, will be a technical advisor and non voting member in the alliance. The companies involved are cross-vertical including Lockheed Martin, Marriott International, BMW and JP Morgan Chase, joining together with Intel towards the ultimate endgoal of simplified virtual computing. While Google, Amazon Yahoo are missing from the list, Intel commented that membership is still open, "There's a lot of people still in the pipeline. We're adding people by the minute."

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It?s A Location Turf War As Google Rolls Out Place Search

Back in April, we noted that Google was about to escalate the so-called "location wars" by reworking and rebranding their Locale Business Center as Google Places. They've since done a lot of work on improving the area (despite an on-again/off-again war with Yelp over results) and they're clearly feeling good about it. How do I know? Because starting today, they're going to add Place results to Google Search in a major way. Place Search will now reside on Google.com when you're doing a search that Google believes is attempting to discover a location. And it will also have a home in the left toolbar (you know, where "Images", "Videos", "Shopping", etc reside) as "Places", which a user can click on to just get location results.

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Does Using Yahoo Mail Lower Your Credit Score?

Yahoo Mail just announced its first redesign in five years and it took the tech community 20 hours to notice. Meanwhile�Aol Mail went down last week without making a sound. Imagine the echo chamber uproar if either had happened to Gmail.

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Phras.in helps you decide which of two words you should use

Filed under: Text, Utilities, Education

Here's something that I do all the time: when I want to know how to use a certain word or phrase, I just google it. And when I'm trying to decide on one of two options, I just google them both and see which one is more common, or how it works in a sentence. I use it a lot when I translate ("do people really say that?"), but I also use it when I just write in English.

And now, Phras.in lets me do the exact same thing, but I can do it in style (or is it "with style"? Exactly!) and a great deal faster. So, I just type the words "in style" in the top text box, and then I type "with style" in the bottom text box. By the time I'm done typing, I can see that "in style" got 43.4 million hits, while "with style" has only 23.5 million hits. The search is live, and it's super-fast; there's no Enter required. And clearly, "in style" wins.

But maybe I'm not sure, or I want to see how they're really used. I just have to hit the big Contextualize 'em button, and I get a whole bunch of Google results that show the phrases in their natural habitat.

It even works in Hebrew, so I guess it can handle pretty much anything that you throw at it (anything Google can handle, that is). It's very, very useful!

Phras.in helps you decide which of two words you should use originally appeared on Download Squad on Sun, 24 Oct 2010 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Microsoft announces next stage of cloud strategy: Office 365

Filed under: Utilities, Office, Microsoft

If the screenshot above seems a bit grainy, it's because I snapped it off of a live video that Microsoft has just finished streaming. It was a 30-minute event announcing Office 365, which is a very bold foray into the cloud for Microsoft. Some of the highlights of the announcement:

• Full access to Microsoft Word and Excel -- plus video conferencing, quick-setup website, intranet, extranet, and more
• Subscription-based -- from $2-$27 per month per user, with the average small-business user coming in at $6/month
• Single-sign on - log on to your PC (or phone), and you're logged onto the entire system
• IT administrators have almost full control -- just like local installations, the administrator will be able to configure how a user can interact with the system

Microsoft's idea for enterprises is that the whole place would run on a single platform; so the CTO will use the exact same system and infrastructure as the guys down at the mail room, but each user will only get "what they need" (which explains the wide price range).

It sure sounds interesting, but I'm afraid I can't show you any in-product screenshots yet because this is an announcement rather than a launch. The product will be generally available sometime in 2011, but beta signups do begin today over at office365.com. Just to show you how fresh off the press this is (or how unprepared Microsoft is), the Office365.com website isn't even ready yet - as of this writing, it still hosts the website for an IT company from Melbourne, which was apparently the domain's previous owner.

At any rate, Microsoft says that both large organizations and tiny businesses can benefit from Office365, so if any of this sounds interesting, go sign up for the beta! (It should be up from 3PM EST, but we'll see!)

Microsoft announces next stage of cloud strategy: Office 365 originally appeared on Download Squad on Tue, 19 Oct 2010 11:48:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Holla is an open-source Campfire alternative you can run on your own server

Filed under: Open Source, Social Software, Web

Campfire is a slick way for teams to communicate, collaborate, and share via the Web -- but if you're searching for a simple, free alternative, a new project called Holla is worth a look.

Holla is an open-source chat and file sharing Web app. While it lacks Campfire's more advanced features, like transcripts and voice calling, Holla still provides an elegantly simple way to assemble a group for keyboard-powered brainstorming sessions or socializing.

One of its best features is Gmail-style drag-and-drop uploading. As you can see, images that you upload are automatically displayed inline. Files of any type can be dropped in, and members of your chat can simply click to download.

Holla scales well to handheld devices, too. It felt every bit as snappy on my iPod touch as it did in my desktop browser (image after the break).

You can take developer Alex MacCaw's demo for a spin or download the code from GitHub and run it on your own server.

[via Hacker News]

Holla is an open-source Campfire alternative you can run on your own server originally appeared on Download Squad on Mon, 25 Oct 2010 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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YAHOO YAHOO XILINX

Apple now offering free iPad engraving

Been holding off on an iPad until you could put just the right two-line message on the back of it? Well, today's your day, as Apple is now finally offering free engraving for both the 3G and WiFi models just as it does with iPods -- and conveniently just in time for the holidays. That will change the shipping time from 24 hours to one to three business days, however, so make that message count.

Apple now offering free iPad engraving originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Oct 2010 13:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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