Redlasso To Cease And Desist
Looks like Redlasso may go down before even coming out of private beta.
Techcrunch has a post today describing the service:
“The site captures content from big-name media sites (CNN, Comedy Central, and the BBC) within an hour after airing. RedLasso then creates an index of each file using closed captioning transcripts and phonetic audio detection (the company says that using phonetics instead of dictionary-based detection works better for proper names and places).
This index is searchable for relevant broadcasts, presented in their entirety. After finding a desired portion, the user can set the endpoints and a clip is generated and ready to be embedded.”
Techcrunch posted this prior to the cease and desist letter hitting Redlasso. Today, Fox, CBS and NBC each threatened legal action against the company. The big three sent redlasso a cease and desist letter, giving them until May 29 to stop or face legal action.
I haven’t used their service at all, but some other high profile sites have done so. It will be interesting to see what their play is from here.
Facebook Traffic Takes A Dive
Mashable has an interesting post on the decline of Facebook.
The latest Nielsen Online statistics show that Facebook has suffered a decline in month-on-month visitors in the US, with April traffic dropping from 24.9 million in March down to 22.4 million.
More significantly, the year-on-year traffic growth slowed from 98% to 56%.
Myspace also saw a slight drop in traffic, while LinkedIn enjoyed considerable growth, percentage wise.
This would appear to be unrelated to seasonal traffic in any way and I would suggest more related to people tiring of Facebook itself.
You can see the figures in the chart below.
the drop in users doesn’t surprise me in the least. On a personal level, my own use of Facebook has dropped and most of the people I know who have accounts on there feel the same way. The entire operation requires a massive overhaul to reduce the application spam clean up the interface. If the rumored Microsoft deal comes off, that would be one area I could see them improving.
Flip Video Ultra Coming To Australia
You may have seen the talk around the Web about these great little video cameras called the Flip Video Ultra by Pure Digital Technologies.
You may even have thought they look so good that you have tried to go out and buy one, or failing that, tried to buy one online. That is pretty easy to do if you live in the US, but if, like me, you live in Australia, you will find that not only are they unavailable in the shops, but you can’t even easily get one online. Amazon and the like will not sell one, due to the lack of warranty for the Flip’s in Australia.
The other issue with the Flip Video Ultra, from an Australian perspective is that they are NTSC, which is not compatible with the Australian PAL system.
It would appear that I was stuck with not being able to get a Flip Video Ultra to try out. I was pretty bummed about this, so I emailed the PR company for Pure Digital Video and told them I needed one to try out. A short time later, one of the managers from Pure Digital Technologies contacted me to say that they now have both an NTSC & PAL version of the Flip Ultra certified and approved and that they would be sending me one.
The PAL commercial product will be available by mid-June and will appear in the European market first, before coming to Australia some time after this.
Flip Video Ultra Details
If you are not familiar with the Flip Video Ultra, it is essentially a compact digital video camera, that takes a lot of the hassles out of recording video and uploading to your computer and the Web.
This is by no means a high end camera, but the quality is acceptable enough and great for putting on youtube. You simply shoot your video, flip out the USB key and upload it to your computer. Dead simple.
The main one I am interested in is the 2GB Flip Video Ultra camera. This unit can capture an hour of video at 640×480×30fps and doesn’t cost a great deal more then the smaller capacity units.
Key features of the Flip Video Ultra
Simple to use, pocket-sized camcorder with one-touch recording and digital zoom
Holds 60 minutes of full VGA-quality video on 2GB of built-in memory; no tapes or additional memory cards required
Convenient USB arm plugs directly into your computer for easy viewing and sharing
Built-in software lets you easily e-mail videos, upload to YouTube and AOL, and capture still photos from video
Watch videos instantly on TV with included cable
Some of the specs:
Screen size: 1.5 inches (diagonal)
Screen resolution: 528 x 132 pixels
Screen type: Transflective TFT (for bright daylight)
Resolution: 640 x 480
Sensor: 1/4-inch VGA CMOS sensor; large (5.6 µm) pixels for maximum light sensitivity
Video compression: Pure Digital Video Engine 2.0
Frame rate: 30 frames per second (constant)
Video bitrate: 4.5Mbps (average–auto adaptive algorithm)
Video format: Advanced Profile MPEG4 AVI
Dimensions (H x W x D): 4.17 x 2.16 x 1.25 inches
PC connection: Built-in flip-out USB arm (up to USB 2.0 speed)
Speaker: Built-in speaker
Microphone: Built-in wide range microphone (improved sensitivity and accuracy)
More images over the page. Read more
OLPC XO 2.0 Looks Sweet
Ncik Negroponte unveiled the OLPC XO 2.0 at the Global Country workshop. Due out in 2010, the XO 2.0 will feature a dual sunlight-readable touchscreen displays in a smaller, folding notebook.
It is about half the size of the XO 1.0 and has no keyboard or trackpad, using two touchscreens instead. When folded out, totally flat, the touchscreens work together as a single display.
The are aiming for a $75 price tag and a one watt power consumption, hence the reason for it not being available until 2010.
Looks pretty sweet all the same. More images over the page. Read more
