Archive for: March 9, 2008

According to MessageLabs, the amount of spam originating from Gmail accounts doubled, from 1.3 percent in January to 2.6 percent in February.

The amount of spam may not be significant in and of itself. But according to MessageLabs, it's proof positive that the CAPTCHAs (Completely Automated Public Turing Test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart) that guard the doors of new Gmail accounts have been broken.

Relatively speaking, the amount of spam originating from Gmail accounts is a drop in the bucket, compared to the spam originating from Yahoo. In terms of all spam sent from free ad-supported email accounts, spam from Yahoo represented 88.7 percent in February, with 4.6 percent from Hotmail and 4.2 percent from MSN.

What the new Gmail spam means, according to MessageLabs senior antispam technologist Matt Sergeant, is that unknown Gmail email now must be treated with the same care as any other. "Don't trust email from addresses that you don't know," he said.

Typically, the Gmail spam advertises adult Web sites, Sergeant said.

A CAPTCHA typically presents a group of letters or numbers in such a way that a human might be able to recognize that them, but a machine cannot, as in the case of the CAPTCHA to the upper left. Entering the correct sequence of letters allows the user to create a new account, and for the spammer to begin operating.

According to MessageLabs, the CAPTCHA success rate by these spammers is between 20 to 30 percent. Spammers have two ways of breaking these: either by a sophisticated optical-character recognition system -- or, more likely, by a dedicated server that rips the ...

It was only a matter of time before app developers were to jump on the iPhone's Software Development Kit (SDK) platform. And what's not to like. With its accelerometer, a 3.5-inch widescreen, the touch screen feature, and a dynamic 3D processor, the iPhone is proving to be a miniature gaming powerhouse.

That's why during its keynote speech at the recent Game Developers' Conference, Gameloft, a leading developer and publisher of gaming software for mobile phones, announced its plans to build over 15 SDK-based games over the course of this year. This initial lineup will be available via WiFi or EDGE once Apple's App Store, featuring downloadable third-party apps, is officially kicked off in June 2008.

"The Apple iPhone has changed the way consumers perceive and interact with their mobile phones, and the release of the SDK is a tremendous opportunity for Gameloft to apply its creative and innovative approach to mobile gaming," said Michel Guillemot, President of Gameloft. "Due to our investment in creating one of the most advanced and creative development studios to date, we are ideally positioned today to seamlessly integrate new opportunities and quickly produce games that are as evolutionary as they are enjoyable."

So, the crowd's been really rowdy today at SXSW. Geez. Sarah Lacy conducted a fairly pandering keynote interview with Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, during which the thousands-strong crowd revolted and demanded to cut her inteview short and do a crowd Q&A with Zuckerberg instead. Meanwhile, the Twitter crowd ripped her a new one in real time.

Later (actually, right this second), in a panel entitled "Gossip," Evan Williams of Twitter, Owen Thomas of Valleywag, a general manager from TMZ, and a New York Times reporter joined Heather Gold for a very lively discussion with several crowd revolts. Julia Allison booed Valleywag and was invited to join the panel on the stage, where she promptly went at it with Owen Thomas. Key quote: "Valleywag made me cry this week."

ANYWAY...I've already undercut the point of this post, which is that I won't be posting on any of this stuff (just because this isn't the venue for it, not because I'm against gossipy coverage). So if you're interested, check out Valleywag and Twitter to catch up on all of it. I doubt it matters to anyone who isn't in the Austin echochamber, but if it interests you, check it out.

One of the frustrations of the modern Web user is keeping track of all the different social networks you belong to. LinkedIn for professional networking, a Facebook/MySpace profile for social connections, Last.fm or GoodReads or Netflix for swapping music/book/movie recommendations, and then maybe you belong to a singles network, or Yelp, or who knows what else. But then you've got this other social network that you actually use and interact with every day: your list of instant-messaging contacts.

A new startup called Social IM aims to merge your social-network friends with your IM list. Currently, it's a desktop client with a corresponding Facebook app. The service automatically pulls your Facebook friends into a buddy list and pulls Facebook activity onto your desktop, even when you're not logged into Facebook.

"People are friending each other on social networks; that's where they're managing their social graph, it's where they're keeping in touch with their friends, but there's no synchronous communication around social networks," said Social IM Founder Yanda Erlich.

And while it's only on Facebook now, Yanda plans to expand it to other social networks, making it a kind of Trillian-type aggregator for social-network IMing.

I installed Social IM a couple weeks ago, and I have to admit, while its idea is great, I had some issues with it. For one, it hasn't reached critical mass in my social circle yet, so I don't have many people to talk to. Secondly, why should I have to install a desktop client for a Facebook app? Yanda had some very good answers to that question, which I'll quote at length:

"The nature of IM is an interruptive experience—it's most interesting when you're ...

Filed under: Cellphones
Finally, iPhone owners no longer have to mope around with a feeling of shame and embarrassment in their hearts: AT&T has blessed them with an “unlimited” calling plan. That’s right, whether you so desire (and you do so desire, don’t you?), you can latch a $119.99 all-you-…

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Gadgets

Filed under: GamingRemember that Xbox 360 price cut we mentioned a few days ago? Well it appears that the Financial Times Germany is reporting that that Monday, Microsoft will trim the fat from the Arcade and Pro consoles, shaving €80 and €50 off the price tag, respectively. Of course, rig…

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Gadgets

Filed under: GamingRemember that Xbox 360 price cut we mentioned a few days ago? Well it appears that the Financial Times Germany is reporting that that Monday, Microsoft will trim the fat from the Arcade and Pro consoles, shaving €80 and €50 off the price tag, respectively. Of course, rig…

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Gadgets

 Previously, the highest number of free minutes Apple and AT&T had to offer was 1350 minutes. That’s nearly 23 hours; nearly a full day. whether you spend more instance than that on the phone, you’ll probably like that new offer for the iPhone (assuming you already have one). Apple now has …

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Apple

Filed under: Portable AudioWord on the street (and by street, we mean mostly British tabloids) is that Paul McCartney’s deal to sell the Beatles back-catalog is done, and the Greatest Works of Musical Art Ever Recorded will be appearing on the iTunes store “within months.” Of course, we’ve been hear…

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Gadgets

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets
Keeping with the Tangent tradition, the Quattro Mk 2 looks an terrible lot like most every other tabletop radio the outfit cranks out. Nevertheless, that specific iteration pays no intellect to DAB and focuses its attention on providing access to a smorgasbord of Net radio…

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Gadgets

So, I've always thought of MapQuest as the mapping service that my parents use, despite my best efforts to get them to switch to something with more features and a tolerable design. They've never come around, but it seems that MapQuest has.

The AOL-owned mapping service announced some huge updates this morning at SXSW, and the tone of the announcement was apologetic and contrite. In an e-mail about the update, AOL corporate communications said, "We wanted to showcase something competitive in regards to a truly robust free offering," indicating a recognition that the service wasn't competitive in its current form (except for my parents, I suppose). "There have been people hard at work trying to change the culture and perspective to something that can thrive in a 'Web 2.0' Internet," AOL said in an e-mail.

Anyway, the key to the update is a new developer offering called MapQuest Platform: Free Edition (http://developer.mapquest.com/beta/), which opens up the APIs for "nearly all the features of our platform." It might be too late, though. Google Maps has really capitalized on opening its APIs, spawning a huge and diverse collection of mashups and third-party adoption. Will MapQuest's new features be enough to get developers to switch?

Either way, they'll always have my parents.

Filed under: Portable Audio, Portable Video
No sense in forcing someone to stick with the tried and true MP3 / WMA regimen when formats such as OGG, APE, FLAC and AAC are out there, right? Apparently, the folks at Teclast are nodding their heads in agreement, as the firm’s latest PMP handles all of …

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Gadgets