As those of you using the popular “social utility connecting you with people around you” are aware of, Facebook has changed their look and now their tagline. Getting some bad reviews to their claim of not being a social networking site and punishing users making online friends as oppose to strictly offline contacts (high school, college and work colleagues) , Facebook has redesigned their Home page (you must be logged out to see it) and came up with a new tagline. Facebook was deleting accounts of those who were creating multiple accounts for online purpose. With the negative response that Facebook started receiving, they made the move of “refreshing” their home page and changing up the tagline to reflect their new “flexibility” with users wanting to keep contact with online friends. I, for one, think it is insane to not allow people to have online connections on an online “social utility“. Facebook claims to not be a social networking site, but realistically, isn’t that what everyone is using the site for? I connect with current friends, college friends, old high school friends, co-workers and even people I have met through face to face AND online networking. If I am only allowed to connect with people around me then I would only be talking online to the people I see everyday! I have friends in other countries and they aren’t exactly around me. Were would Facebook put the limit on controlling everything? I believe that Facebook has made the realization that they can’t take over accounts and punish users for wanting to make new friends. With the new look, Facebook rephrased their viewpoint on how users should consider the site, “Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life”. Check it out for yourself and see what you think.

For about 7 years now, I have had the pleasure of being good friends with Frank Ishman, formerly a Chicagoan now in Manhattan, and wondered why he hasn’t yet struck the big time with his photography. He recently re-launched his website, and is in the process of putting together a small group of NYC shooters to form a collective rep agency (more details to come).

Please take a look at his work if you get a chance. There’s some really beautiful images, especially in “the book: new york”.

Enjoy!

So, I am aware that I am pretty behind when it comes to discovering new technology. I have never really been a big fan of internet radio, but my co-workers, here at Blueye, have been using it and my curiosity of this website has grown. Being a music lover and Loving the ability to discover new artists, I have, so far, enjoyed pandora.com very much. I didn’t like it for the first hour or so, simply because I didn’t get the fact that they would replay some of the same songs over again (one fallback on this site), but I soon grasped the idea of “driving” the station, as Uncle Brice puts it. Basically, for those of you unfamiliar with this internet radio website, you can do a “QuickMix” or you can type in any artist that you enjoy and they will begin playing a mix with songs by your selected artist, as well as songs by other artists who are within the same genre or style of your artist. You can Bookmark the song to your profile, rate the song with either a thumbs up or thumbs down. You can even mark a song to not be played for a month, in case it’s been over played. Like other internet radio stations out there, Pandora can only allow you to skip so many song within an hour. The plus side, if you know how to “drive” your station, you can give a song a thumbs down rating and Pandora will automatically skip that song and play something more to your liking. When you bookmark songs on your profile, you have the option to purchase that song from Amazon.com or iTunes. You can also just save the song on your profile to share with your friends who are also using Pandora. It even saves the radio stations that you start, so there is no need to retype anything in when you sign back in later. I am certain that most of you out there have already heard of Pandora, (Tim has been using it for years) but if you haven’t, now is the time to check them out, you may discover some great finds.

Okay, so we’re pretty much a Mac-based environment here, and I have been using Macs since they were Apples, but I do have to give a little credit to the folks at Microsoft for the latest ad in their most recent campaign. The new campaign apparently revolves around how Microsoft has connected billions of people over the years, and continues to do so. Apple, however, seems to be converting quite a bit of these people to Macs with easy-to-use tools, interfaces, and software that appeals to everyday life whether it’s photos, videos, or creating a simple website. Perhaps the most recognizable Apple/Mac product over the last couple years is their television and web-based ads. Put simply, the ads are as clean as a brand new set of iPod headphones, with the cool guy telling the business geek why Macs are better. Very simple.

The first installment of the Microsoft ad campaign left me a little confused. Gates and Seinfeld, wandering around the mall, buying shoes, no real substance. Nevertheless, this lack of substance was the basis for one of the most well-respected TV shows of all time, Seinfeld – the show about nothing. In that vein, however, the latest segment of the ad is, in my opinion, a much better attempt. Gates and Seinfeld, living with a “normal” American family. There’s ping-pong, housework, family dinner, even a random (possibly scenile) grandmother.

Hopefully there’s some reward for all of this nonsense at the end of the rainbow. The last time I can remember hearing about Microsoft’s “next big thing”, their customers were graced with the presence of Vista, and Apple was graced with the presence of more Mac newbies and more profits. Anyway, here’s a couple laughs for your Friday courtesy of, yep, I’m going to say it – Bill Gates?

A New Family for Gates & Seinfeld

Tim, one of our genius developers was looking through an article about the new ipod nanos coming out and I could just kick myself for not waiting until they came out! The colors are way prettier and look eye popping, base on the photos I saw on TechCrunch. They seem to have meshed the old design of the original ipod nano with some of the new functionality of the new ipod touch. You shake it to activate shuffle and it’s perfect for showing off photos on TechCrunch. I just purchased an 8G ipod in black (which really is more of a charcoal gray then a black), and paid $199.00 plus tax not much more than a month ago! Had I waited, I could have had the sleek, sexy, skinnier new ipod nano, which comes in 8G and 16G, in a brilliant candy apple green! I could have had double the memory and a color that I was proud to show off, but it’s too late! I am stuck with my boring Charcoal gray “black” ipod touch. I guess it is okay though. Critics who were able to preview the new nano mentioned that it isn’t worth upgrading to, as the only features that are different from the ipod that just came out last year, are the screen that you can tilt, which is better for photo sharing, and the shaking shuffle feature. I guess, for me, I would prefer to have a prettier ipod with more memory then the ability to shake my ipod. After all, it isn’t an Etch a Sketch.

Well, I am not an expert on Web browsers or anything, but I recently upgraded my Mozilla Firefox to the 3.0 version, and I have to say, so far, I love it. I like the new look, it’s pretty fast, I like the new predictive browser memory (you know, when you go to type in a website and it pulls whatever you have visited in the past that starts the same). Usually I am good at memorizing my websites but it’s nice how much easier it is to see what Firefox thinks you may be going to visit.
Luckily I have a Mac at the office and I love it. I cannot say what I think of the new browser, Chrome, just released by Google yesterday, as it is only Windows based currently, but I hear it’s lightning fast compared to the Firefox. I did read in TechCrunch today that Firefox is already working on a 3.1 version of Firefox which is being tested on TraceMonkey, an evolution of SunSpider (which has only been in development for a few months) currently. As much as I love using Google for my searching, I equally love Firefox and I am excited to see what comes of this new browser! Keep your eyes and ears open for it, as it comes out close to the end of this year.
I would love to hear from people with PC’s to know what they think about the brand new Chrome!