[Yet another] A step closer to seamless transition for Mac-users...

Messenger on a Mac has been less than desirable, but that is not an obstacle anymore:

this week Skype released their 1.5 Beta for Mac, INCLUDING SUPPORT FOR VIDEO.. and that means that the iSight camera is supported.

There's a nice full-screen video view for the PC on the receiver end...

This is certainly another distance killer (both on the distance from Macusers to the rest of the world.. and from conversations between family members that live far from each other).

Now, as per the things it can improve.. it would be nice to see something more than a small thumbnail of the local video.

Microsoft listening skills are NOT getting better..

All those who blame Microsoft's poor listening as one of main reasons for the low-quality/stability of their software, now can even claim that it is a genetic problem... at least judging by their coming offspring: Vista

Nowadays... even tying your shoes can be done faster..

nossa!.. no pais do futebol isso tem que ajudar (quanto tempo perdido em arrumar chuteiras!!..)

Another (this one is addictive) improvement to Youtube

As if we needed more reasons to be hooked to the screen watching online videos, now they had a very simple idea.. yet quite effective.

They have always had an "Explore more videos" sidebar next to the video.. but it took some effort, and the masses are lazy.

Now they just put the top (in pairs) related videos and they give you the option of just clicking on the video window and go straight to them (once you've seen the initial video you wanted to see).

amazingly simple idea.. and sure it does provide a tangible benefit

Aug 7th: will that be the date/day when Hollywood goes 2.0?

Apple to announce iTunes movie RENTALS at WWDC (story in the link below from digg):
[That's right folks. MOVIE RENTALS. - Because the movies will be rented and not sold, people familiar with the situation report downloads will be coded with a date stamp that will restrict playback.]

It sure does like a big shake-up. Nicholas Negroponte has been hammered enough for how his apocalyptic vision of a non-future for Blockbuster (he pretty much sentenced them to dissappear in his "Being Digital" book by '95) never materialized. He might have to thank Steve Jobs for that.

If it is true, we have a two-fold story:
- How bloggers keep stealing Steve Jobs' thunder consistently. On an era of blogging-driven transparency and voyeurism, not even Apple Computer's legendary secrecy can stand unscathed the winds of change.
- How apple gives yet-another-proof that they can shape the future the way they want it, with vertical integration (Macs, iPods, iTunes, studio deals).

You can bet that I will be "standing in line" (more like in Digg.com's Spy watchmode ;-) ) waiting to see the first options of movies. At a minimum they should be better than the pay-per-view for movies in Silicon Valley hotels.

read more | digg story

Geographic Arbitrageurs: (re:150 Cheap Places To Live)

[We've all heard about the wonders of the broadband Web. You can stream video, surf at lightning speeds, search for God-knows-what, get your e-mail in a blink. Here's what you may not know: It can let you live far richer than you probably live now. (read the full article at the end of this post)]
Rich Karlgaard in Forbes "gets it".. but what about adding some other ingredients to the mix:
- There are more chinese kids learning english than american kids at all K-12 levels
- Skype offers now free calls ALWAYS to US and some portions of Europe, and free calls within specific dates to places like Mexico
- Many places in the 20M+ square kilometers of Latin America are way cheaper than the places he considers "cheap". and 9M+ sq km for China alone and the cheap land factor starts to sound intriguing

I can't help but looking at it as: "the big real estate bubble: When the knowledge worker in an emerging market can live great with

read more | digg story

seeing beyond the big, obvious and not-so-telling number...

Google news lists today more than 50 articles about Youtube.com passing 100 Million video views everyday. I can't help feeling that they are missing the point.

When seeing thru the eyes of traditional media that is probably the key figure to focus on. But i'd like to propose other interpretations that tell more about what youtube means instead of just a huge, and rapidly growing number:

- The top 5 most seen videos ever total 65M+ views.. but we're not talking about video segments ripped from NBC, Fox or other mainstream media outlets. The ones we are talking about include Judson Laipply's "Evolution of Dance" performance, and other 4 examples of content created by amateur users that under normal circumstances WOULD NEVER pass the filter that mass broadcasters tend to use to decide what to broadcast or not.
- PR coverage on youtube used to focus on it become a repository of pirate videos, where the copyright is not respected. While that happens, I can't agree about that being the reason of youtube's growth
- The top 10 most commented videos are also amateur videos, whether great guitar performances, creative editing or just good coreography
- Today's top 20 videos include descriptions in japanese, chinese, french, and english.. demonstrating brutal diversity and challenging the usual assumption of how much people care about their LOCAL contant. this thing is really crossing borders. This generation is really so multicultural that it becomes quite hard to spot where the differences start

what it means to be a virtual listener in this century..

I have been listening for the last 2 years a daily radio segment from a well known financial advisor in the country in which in live. The guy always have valuable advise on personal finance, savings, the stock market, and what to expect from the day-to-day fluctuations of the markets as they navigate the rollercoaster of economic news that an emerging market has.

But today I got to the office at an unusual time... and I did realize that I had never heard him live. It just happened today. Every single time in the past, it had happened free-of-commercials, and streamed over the web. It was quite unusual.

Is Firefox 2.0 beta a hairball? [missing the google toolbar for a start]

Testing it sounded like quite a temptation.. and I just did, but I have to confess that not having the full google toolbar (in particular the "I feel lucky button"-the clover w/4 leafs and the monalisa button - google images) is quite annoying. It seems that they don't have a FF2.0-capable version yet.

The tab scroll bar is more discrete than what I expected. That's a good thing.
It is hard to assess speed at this very moment, and I guess that the interaction action will start once I install several extensions.

oh.. and hats of to the "undo close tab" function: that one is REALLY cool!

I'll use it for 1 week and will let y'all know how it goes

Zidane video views update..

it has been roughly 28 hours.. and videos of Zidane's foul that ended up resulting on his expulsion already are #1, #2, #3, #4, #6, #8 and #9 out of the top 10 of most viewed videos of the week in youtube, exceeding 2.5M views.

that's a quite public way of screwing up..

100 minutes... and 40k+ views ago...

Zidane started making waves. The clip (its more popular version, since there are several) is already top 10 in youtube.

If he were to choose, probably he would not pick exactly this way to "retire at the top of his game"...

Mais pourquoi? Heroes in the spotlight (with a huge magnification factor)

It has been barely an hour.. and the scene in which Zinedine Zidane headbulls materazzi in the 2nd extension time of the Soccer World Cup finals already has 11k+ views on youtube.. and is getting digged quite fast on digg.com. It is already (twice) in the top 20 of most discussed videos on youtube.

With hundreds of millions watching, plus the drama of this final being ZiZu's last match (worse, last 10 minutes) and the added intrigue factor of nobody knowing what is it that Materazzi said to him.. this really has the chance of being a "fastest growth ever" in youtube.

A sad way of reacting to provocation.. but does it really make sense to jump on top of Zidane with brutal criticism?

Probably it was an extreme situation (certainly it was from the ratings perspective), but if this society judges its heroes on every blink, every move and every single second they are on the spotlight, it sets an unachievable expectation of perfection; one that note even heroes can comply with.

It might be worth thinking what alternatives did Zidane really have against the obvious provocation trick.

nossa senhora!...

Despite being on the 21st century, some roads look more like 19th century roads. See this link about what they claim is the most dangerous road in the world (in bolivia).

I guess the world is just not as flat as Thomas Friedman wants us to believe... how on earth can these people eBay their goods out or Amazon other goods in?

source: http://javimoya.com/blog/pics/200607/bolivia.htm

me dijo un pajarito...

The Apple guys pressed.. but when Judge Conrad Rushing stated:

"We decline the implicit invitation to embroil ourselves in questions of what constitutes 'legitimate journalism," he wrote. "The shield law is intended to protect the gathering and dissemination of news, and that is what petitioners did here."

He gave a lot of space (as he should had) to many bloggers around the world.

So, welcome to an open market of rumours.. probably the same way than tracking markets of "futures" for the outcome of presidential election, or a sport contest start to serve as a proxy for adivination... blogging can take us to greater transparency (from governments, companies, and oh yes.. individuals). I once heard a F500 CEO saying "Privacy? forget about it, it doesn't exist. Get over it".

It would be interesting to see many players from the major visible targets having to dance around "I heard that... " accusations coming from everywhere.

no hagas cosas buenas que parezcan malas?

El arresto domiciliario del ex-presidente mexicano Luis Echeverria por genocidio (la matanza de estudiantes de 1968 en la plaza de Tlatelolco) levanta una polvareda política bien interesante:

- es un triunfo para el CP Fox, quien apostó a una solución apoyada en las instituciones existentes?
- o es simplemente una gran coincidencia (especialmente el momento en que se anuncia, un día antes de las elecciones

Hay una frase siempre que se usa bastante en México y siempre me intrigó bastante: "no hagas cosas buenas que parezcan malas"