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Camtasia Studio 5.1 now supports iPhone, iPod Touch

Camtasia Studio 5.1 now supports iPhone, iPod Touch

For professional screen-recording software, it’s hard to top Camtasia Studio, a popular–and pricey–application for capturing, editing, and producing screencasts, especially tutorials and presentations. One of Camtasia Studio’s strengths is its well-rounded list of preset production values for multiple media formats, including Web-optimized Flash, DVD, and iPod. On Tuesday, TechSmith released Camtasia Studio 5.1, an update that officially packages your screen recordings as MV4 files for playback on the iPhone and iPod Touch. This is good news for owners of Apple’s vanguard media players and great news for corporate Camtasia producers trying to reach them.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

In addition to adding support for the two touch-screen gadgets, Camtasia Studio 5.1 enhances a few other operations. For instance, users will now find a drop-down menu for a third audio track. The tools for adding and editing call outs have also been streamlined, and two new call outs have joined the library. Producers will appreciate that the slick Express Show template has opened up to FLV files, and that Camtasia Theater can now wrap FLV and Express Show files into a snazzy presentation that users can navigate on their own, instead of just SWF files.

Licensed users of Camtasia Studio 5 will receive the updates for free. Everyone else can download the 30-day trial.

Source: www.download.com

Killer Download: Share your photos with Web albums

Killer Download(Credit: CNET Networks)

I take a lot of pictures with my digital camera at birthdays, family gatherings, and other events, so I’m always on the lookout for new ways to share the photos. As new programs hit the scene and older programs evolve over time, my favorites change because of various factors like ease of use, number of features, and of course, the king of all reasons: price.

One of the best ways I’ve found to share pictures with friends and family is to make them as accessible as possible by creating Web albums. With the right software, you can lay out your pictures any way you want, create a template to fit the theme, and write in your own captions. When you’re done, simply send a link to your personalized Web album.

There are plenty of paid offerings to choose from in this category of software, but I’ve found several free programs that do the job nicely. The best Web album software provides ways to host your work on the Web so all you’ll need is some creativity and your already honed photo-snapping skills.

Photozig Albums Express

The step-by-step process makes it easy to create simple albums.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

Photozig Albums Express offers a step-by-step process so you can design your project from start to finish. Big button icons with descriptions make it easy to start your project and select the preferred output for your images including sending in e-mail, burning to a CD, or uploading to a Web site. The finished product is a basic layout of thumbnails that you can click to enlarge, but you’ll have no skins to choose from with this one. The Photozig Web site requires you register with an e-mail address, but you’ll be able to display your albums on the Web for free once you’re signed up. For basic albums, this is the one to choose.

Web Photo Album

A clean-looking interface and several themes make album creation easy.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

Web Photo Album is another simple free album creator offering several nice (if sometimes cheesy) templates. A nice interface layout makes it easy to find the pictures you want and quickly create a simple album. It offers basic editing functions like red-eye removal and picture rotation, and you can add captions to each picture. The finished product comes out as a page of thumbnails and once you click on a picture, you’re given a close up with the ability to navigate to other shots across the top of the page. Though there are a staggering number of themes to choose from to match your pictures, your overall layout is unchangeable. Web Photo Album lets you sign up for the free Photo hosting service, or you can save to a folder to burn to CD or post to your own site.

JAlbum

With numerous skin and layout choices, JAlbum is tough to beat.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

JAlbum for both PC and Mac users is one of my long-time favorite free Web album programs. It doesn’t direct you through the process like Photozig, but a quick look through the menus will be enough for you to get started creating great Web albums. There are several great-looking templates and skins to choose from, with more skins available at the JAlbum Web site. An integrated FTP program makes it easy to post albums to your Web site or blog. The JAlbum site also lets you post your projects to their Web hosting service for free, but as with the others, you’ll need to register with a name and e-mail address.

With spring weather returning here in the Northern hemisphere, you’re going to have a lot of chances to snap some great pictures. Use one of these free Web album programs to turn your pictures into a nice project that’s easy to share with anyone.

Source: www.download.com

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Download Squad moving to Planet of Internet

Download Squad moving to Planet of Internet

Filed under: Internet, News

Regular Download Squad readers will remember that we reported last month on a revolutionary browsing platform that will completely change the way you use the web. That’s right: Planet of Internet! Our initial review was almost entirely negative, but after a wild party at the Download Squad offices last weekend, we have seen the light. You heard it here first, people: Planet of Internet is going to be the next big thing.

If you have any money at all, you should probably just give it to Planet of Internet right now. That’s what we’re doing! Weblogs Inc. and AOL have been good to us, but Planet offers things that no collective of popular, credible blogs could ever give us. Eat your heart out, Engadget: have you SEEN our new house in Peacetown?

We’re confident that our faithful minions readers are going to love the new site as much as we will. Now you can find out about the latest and greatest software while exploring the glorious 16-bit hallways of our new digs! Well, metaphorically, anyway. Houses on Planet of Internet don’t actually have interiors. Regardless, you’re all invited for fruity tropical drinks at our new rooftop pool. We’ll even put in a little 16-bit umbrella, just to show how much we care.

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Court: Turnitin does not violate student copyrights by scanning homework

Court: Turnitin does not violate student copyrights by scanning homework

Filed under: Internet, Utilities, News

Turnitin

A judge has thrown out a suit filed by a group of students who claimed that the anti-plagiarism software Turnitin violated student copyrights. Turnitin scans student papers to determine the likelihood that they were plagiarized, and saves a copy in a database to make it easier to detect fraudulent papers in the future. But the students said iParadigms, the company behind Turnitin was essentially using their works without permission, which amounts to copyright infringement.

The judge presiding over the case ruled that since iParadigms does not republish the stories and “makes no use of any work’s particular expressive or creative content beyond the limited use of comparison with other works.” Therefore, the judge decided that the whole thing falls under “fair use.” There’s also the fact that the students kind of, sort of give permission for their papers to be scanned. Really what happens it that schools and teachers decide to use the system and students who don’t want to feed their papers into a big computer can refuse to turn them in and take an F. Not really much of a choice, is it?

[via Techdirt]

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Opera Mini preview for Google Android

Opera Mini preview for Google Android

Opera Mini preview available for Android platform

While Google’s mobile phone platform, Android, and its Open Handset Alliance have been on the brink of significantly changing the mobile landscape since mid-November 2007, little has come out of the young software developer kit with its still-developing community and code.

On Thursday, Opera Labs announced a technical preview release of the Norwegian company’s popular Opera Mini mobile browser for the Android platform. Not only are developers encouraged to scoop up the just-released app, Opera is itching for programmers’ feedback to help smooth over any rough edges for an upcoming beta release.

Opera’s Chris Mills provides a technical back story in his introductory article, in addition to links to the latest build of Google’s Android SDK and a direct download link to the Android-Mini preview. Mills is quick to note that Opera Mini for Android is a compound neophyte in the Android universe–the method of running Opera Mini’s code base within Android is still experimental, and as Android itself is far from completion, layers of back-end change are inevitable.

Source: www.download.com

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Best Web Hosting Companies for Webmasters

I just found this cool website that reviews the top 10 web hosting companies and provides an indepth review of each one with recommendations.  As a webmaster and software developer, its also good to know the best web hosting companies and what they offer. These days web hosts offer so many things for a very reasonable price. But beware! Not all web hosting companies are the same! Customer services various from company to company so check out this site and educate yourself before you buy. I did and I’m a happier dude!  Here is that saite I was talking about, checkit out its cool…..

top-10-best-web-hosting.com

Gavin Perry

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BBC’s iPlayer DRM scheme cracked again

BBC’s iPlayer DRM scheme cracked again

Filed under: News, Blogging, iPhone

BBC, DRM, and the iPhone: it doesn’t sound very steamy. But things are definitely heating up in regards to the BBC and DRM.

The release of BBC’s new iPlayer brought with it the typical suffocating DRM restrictions, with the typical amount of outrage in the blogosphere.

However, when the BBC released the new beta iPlayer software that allowed users to view BBC streams on their iPhone, the streams made for the iPhone didn’t didn’t include any DRM.

Certain intrepid programmers and users were quick to jump on the fact that the iPhone streams were unencrypted. One user was able to use a PC to watch the unencrypted streams by using the Firefox plugin Fast Agent Switcher to convince the iPlayer that it was an iPhone. Developer Paul Battley released a Ruby script to download the iPhone formatted files to your PC.

In response, the BBC iPlayer took countermeasures to block the streams from non-iPhone devices. Just yesterday, in fact.


Continue reading BBC’s iPlayer DRM scheme cracked again

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HP launches Upline, offers unlimited storage for a fee

HP launches Upline, offers unlimited storage for a fee

Filed under: Business, Utilities, News, Web services, Commercial

If it feels like the online storage and file sharing market is getting a little crowded, that’s because it is. Just in the past few weeks, we’ve seen services such as Dropbox, AOL’s Xdrive Desktop, Windows SkyDrive, and more, come into the market.

Now HP is dropping its hat into the ring, with HP Upline. HP Upline offers unlimited storage for as low as $59 per year. Features of Upline include:

  • Automatic Backup
  • 1-click restore
  • Access from anywhere
  • Ability to share files with friends

HP Upline also offers upgraded packages for family and professional use. If you want to try HP Upline, you can sign up for a limited account with one measly GB of storage. The limited account expires in one year; after that, you’ll need to upgrade to the paid service to access your files, or kiss them goodbye.

One other note: The Upline software requires Windows. Mac users, you’re out of luck. Well, out of Upline, anyway.

It’s nice to see that two formerly disparate services, online backup and file sharing, are slowly merging into one complete service, with the choice of several offerings from big players.

[via TechCrunch]

Gallery: HP Upline

Upline InterfaceUpline SettingsUpline Sharing WindowUpline Remote Access

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Free List of Website SEO Tools

WebsiteStatsCounter.com has just released new free webmaster tools to help you promote your website.

http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/view-http-headers.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/spiderview.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/sourcecodeviewer.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/server-status.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/server-speed.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/reciprocal-link-checking.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/page-rank-checker.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/multiple-search-engine-position.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/multiple-keyword-search-engine-position.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/multi-rank-checker.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/meta-tags-extractor.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/meta-tag-generator.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/md5-encryption.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/keyword-suggestion.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/html-optimizer.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/html-encryption.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/googlebannedchecker.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/google-datacenter-search.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/fake-rank-checker.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/browser-detail.php
http://www.websitestatscounter.com/webtools/alexa-traffic-rank.php

Its all free and you can also embed these tools on your website!

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Host a video conferencing party on your phone

Host a video conferencing party on your phone

I’m looking at a cell phone screen and four faces are looking back. It’s CTIA 2008, the biggest wireless and cell phone trade show of the year, and the CEO of iVisit, a multiparty video conferencing app for PCs, Macs, and mobile phones, is demoing the product, iVisit Teleport. I must say, the slick, feature-rich app looks pretty cool on Orang Diamaleh’s large-screen smartphone.

iVisit Teleport's feature-rich app manages to avoid distraction.

The simplest way to think about iVisit Teleport is as a P2P social network that lets you call, chat, video conference, and transfer multimedia for up to 8 contacts at a time. You sign up for an account and can start adding any contact who has also registered with the service. Conferencing starts when you enter a room, after which you have an array of controls to launch multimedia sharing functions with a one-button click; that is, tap or click the interface to chat, start a video conference using the phone’s camera as the lens, send a file, and see a buddy’s GPS location on a map.

I like the glossy black interface, which packs in a lot of features without making the app feel overcrowded. The video quality wasn’t too shabby either, and definitely an improvement over other video software I’ve seen, but a lot of that input will depend on the capabilities of the phone itself. On mobile phones, iVisit Teleport supports 120×160, 320×240 video. It will be interesting to see how iVisit Teleport plays out on an actual conference call when the app’s beta release goes live in April on Windows Mobile phones, and if the pricing will appeal more to consumers or small businesses. In the meantime, anyone can pre-register for the iVisit Teleport private beta or iVisit desktop for Windows and Mac.

Source: www.download.com

Obama - the new digital web strategy

Filed under: Internet, News, Social Software, web 2.0

Obama

We’ve noted the widening gulf between Obama and Hillary’s online campaign strategies, but according to one marketing executive, the Obama campaign is waging a digital strategy while the Hillary campaign is more along the lines of analog technology.

While both campaigns hope to eat each other’s lunch through typical traditional media buys, Obama harnesses the full capabilities of the internet to his advantage, according to Rishad Tobaccowala, chief innovation officer of the media buying division of Publicis, the French advertising giant. For example, the Obama campaign uses email to keep supporters informed up to the minute on matters ranging from “Watch the debate now,” to fundraising challenges synchronized to Hillary’s own fundraising efforts.

While Hillary’s strategy is almost entirely reliant on traditional media, the Obama campaign pulls in from the blogosphere and co-ops content that is not just campaign generated, effecting a more credible grassroots movement where people have a voice from the bottom up. One example is the Black Eyed Peas music video which garners over a million views a day and is featured on the Obama website, although not created by the campaign.

It seems Obama is more in tune with the idea that in today’s digital world, the buyer is in control and he deftly adapts his message to this reality. His campaign uses the words “you and me” which are inclusive. Hillary’s campaign is more in line with the seller is in control. Her language is “I and me”, which in this new era of the wisdom of crowds is not resonating as well.

“Experience from day one” versus “We are the change we seek.” What do you think? Which one speaks to today’s digital reality?

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EU fines Microsoft another $1.3 billion

EU fines Microsoft another $1.3 billion

Filed under: News, Microsoft

Microsoft MoneyAfter ruling that Microsoft has failed to comply with a 2004 antitrust order, the European Union has added $1.3 billion to the fines already owed by Microsoft. That brings the total to about $2.5 billion, or just slightly more than pocket change to Bill Gates.

A few years back, EU regulators had decided that Microsoft was abusing its position as the number one operating system provider by bundling software with Windows that would decrease competition. Wednesday the EU ruled that Microsoft hasn’t done enough to remedy the situation

Microsoft released a statement pointing out that in October of 2007, the EU found that the company was “in full compliance with the 2004 decision,” meaning that the fine relates to past misdeeds. This could explain why Microsoft made such a big show of launching an open standards initiative last week.

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