Following up with their usual “Hey don’t forget about us we still can make things too” attitude, Microsoft is positioning itself to enter the social network game with a service called Tulalip. As the image above claims finding and sharing is now going to be easier than ever….is sharing the new Ghz fad from the early 2000′s?

Microsoft seems really dedicated to their new tile UI that can be seen in the new Windows Phone 7 and Windows 8 (yet to be released). We are optimistic about Microsofts approach with this new interface. Based on our tests (which will be posted soon) of Windows 7 devices, the user experience is very pleasant with only a few minor tweaks needed to be really incredible. I think Microsoft would be better suited to incorporate this directly into Windows Phone 7 before launching on a wider scale. Make it exclusive for those users, refine the experience they have when using it, create a little buzz through exclusivity and then a bigger launch. If this social network is just thrown to the lions den with Twitter, Facebook , Google+ and whichever social flavor of the week pops up then it will fade away quicker than Google Wave did.

The above image popped up at the url: socl.com which is apparently shorthand for social – witty. The url now simple has this:

Right, you clearly didn’t mean to let your splash page out there for the masses to see – and I’m not balding. We will keep an eye on this as, hopefully, more details come out.  (via venturebeat)

Google+ is about to embark on its three week anniversary. That turbulant time where you don’t know if it’s going to return your phone calls are answer it’s emails, but you two are still having a great time together – testing the water to see if this is real? See..anything can be compared to a freshman college relationship.

In the three or so weeks Google+ has been out in the open there have been roughly 10 million users of the new social network. 10 million users is a pretty impressive number, especially in three weeks, most modest tech companies would be thrilled with that. Remember when Apple sold it’s 10 millionth iPod – those were the times. At this rate of progression Google would match Facebook’s 750 million users in just over 4 years – at a rate of 10 million per three weeks. This is assuming, of course, that Facebook is even around in 4 years which equivalent to 1,000 in the tech world. I’m sure Myspace and Friendster thought they would last forever too, but their lifecycle was only four or so years of consistent use by the masses.

Google is known for creating revolutionary product lines and ecosystems but unfortunately also known for abandoning products faster than I abandon my yearly gym memberships. Lest we forget all the hoopla for Google Wave – which was going to change every aspect of email communication. Google music seems to be the next big flounder by Google – I’m sorry but my library is still uploading and its been nine days and I’m fairly confident I won’t even use the service now that Spotify has landed on U.S. soil. I’m skeptical that Google will wait four years to match Facebook’s current numbers. Giving the projections a modest influx even if it takes two and a half years to match 750 million will Google actually wait that long for those results? Plus, how is Google going to monetize this service? Naturally we’ll eventually see one of google’s ad services but how will users advertise on it? Will they open the floodgates to advertisers to register profiles to the service? The UI of G+ is very sleek and clean, but we shouldn’t get use to it because eventually we will start seeing ads for Pepsi and Lady Gaga albums. Will Google open up the API to allow an influx of pointless games about farming and running a mafia?

Google is currently playing G+ close to the chest, with it’s exec’s using the service consistently saying it’s still in Beta, they’re accepting feedback and all that jazz. It will be interesting to see if a company that preaches how open it is will actually listen to it’s users this time around – instead of accepting feedback for Google Wave the company simply abandoned it.

I love using G+ right now and watching the service come into its own is very interesting to observe. Who will find the best use for G+? The service seems to be flooded with “photographers” and “graphic designers” – or in laymen’s terms, “anyone with a $800 Canon DSLR and a Mac with Illustrator.” The service also seems to be flooded with dudes, with over 66% of users being male…where the ladies at?

I hope Google will stick with the service so that it becomes a sufficient alternative to Facebook and Twitter, options are always good. Naturally the downside is now we have yet another thing to log into every other hour. Hopefully Google continues to give us a reason to login.

I’m a big fan of With (made by Path inc.) and Instagram. I think both apps for the iPhone are great for the emerging social photography market. With that, I’m sure they’re a little weary of news today from Techcrunch that Facebook is planning their own photo sharing app. Statistically Facebook has over 100 billion photos that their users have uploaded at a rate of 6 billion per month – not small potatoes. MG Siegler of Techcrunch says the app is a “Path meets Instagram meets Color meets With – all popular social photography apps.”

Via Techcrunch - Such an app appears to be exactly what Facebook is on the verge of releasing. How do we know? We have obtained roughly 50 MB of images and documents outlining the entire thing.

To be honest, we’re still sorting through all of them. But again, the app looks amazing. We’ve heard that internally it is being called either “Hovertown” or “WithPeople”. And while it looks like a stand-alone app right now, there are also signs that it could be eventually integrated into Facebook’s main iPhone app — as well as the main site.

Now no disgruntled Facebook employees have provided me with any information but I do have some thoughts about it. Naturally, if all of this is true, then it could be a killer for some of these other apps. But if the current trend of  (allegedly) abandoning Facebook continues then perhaps it won’t affect these smaller companies as much. Facebook is still getting heat over privacy issues and even though our world is getting more social, end users want to ensure they’re protected and that their photo’s wont end up in an ad agency somewhere.

Regardless of your feeling about Facebook or any other social apps it should be an interesting summer for the entire social photography marketplace if these rumors are true. Let’s hope Path and Instagram have some new features up their sleeves in response to a Facebook photo sharing app.

Source: Techcrunch

A couple weeks ago we were presented with news about Windows 8. How did Microsoft follow up? With news about a new keyboard of course! The Microsoft Hardware blog updated yesterday with news of the Comfort Curve Keyboard 3000 – is Microsoft one of the last big companies to put numbers at the end of their products for seemingly no reason?

Building on the original Comfort Curve, this new key layout is designed to be a better option for straight-keyboard users and has been improved in two fundamental ways. First, the QWERTY keys are uniformly sized in a way that is more similar to a standard straight keyboard. That increases the familiarity. Second, the curve has been modified to be more organic – adding curvature in the third dimension. That increases the comfort.

Straight from the hardware blog and apparently written by Dan Odell, Certified Professional Ergonomist. Microsoft is all about ergonomics with their hardware, good thing their next operating system looks to be mostly touch based. It’s always baffled me why Microsoft made hardware like keyboards and mice, especially when they retail for such a low price. While the 128-bit encrypted keyboard Microsoft announced recently, these products aren’t very different than what you get with a standard desktop unit. I’m all for options in the marketplace but perhaps we could do without a $20 keyboard. Had Microsoft produced a trackpad like Apple did for desktop, then we’re talking. In a nutshell odd shaped keyboards and mice with cords are very last century.

Stay tuned for our investigative report on what exactly a Certified Professional Ergonomist actually is….

source: Microsoft Hardware Blog

Google isn’t evil, except to tech reporters. Just when we finish writing about what they unveiled last week they give us something new this week. Just seems like Sunday when they were announcing Google Wave – and it seems like Monday they were canceling it. So what did Google give us today? Well they gave us Voice Search for Desktop, Instant Pages and Search by Image. First lets dissect Voice Search -

Am I the only ones who forgot you can voice search with the Google Mobile app? It seems that after I downloaded it and played with all the nifty features for twenty minutes I disregarded pretty much everything about the app including the voice search. Do people really voice search? Are folks sitting in the lobby of the doctors office talking to a search engine asking “Where can I buy carrots?” (only for the search engine to come back with results to buy ferrets). Now, I talk to my computer all the time. Whether I’m editing something or writing something I’m constantly yelling and cursing and saying sweet nothings to my desktop. Do I really want to ask it search questions? I suppose people will find a way to use it in their workflow, and I’m sure someone will make a Chrome extension that will make it actually usable versus what Google publishes – does anyone actually go to Google.com to search? Answer, no they use their browsers search in the corner.

This next bit, I’m actually excited about – Search by Image. It’s somewhat astonishing that in 2011 search by image hasn’t been unveiled by Google. I mean, we’re only four years away from the Hoverboard for God’s sake. Anyway, Search by Image seems pretty remarkable:

Seems pretty straight forward and super awesome. But, being the unbiased writer I try to be I have to ask the question. Is Google caching my image and will that picture be stored in some draconian database beneath the Rocky Mountains so the government will eventually come knocking down my door only to throw me in one of those FEMA camps? Legitimately though, what’s happening to that photo I upload? I think if there’s crystal clear documentation regarding that I think people will really love that feature. I think photographers will like the ability to search by photo so they can find out what websites are stealing their work and can toss out cease and desist papers.

The last big of search technology that Google unleashed upon the world today was Instant Page search within Google Chrome, and it’s half cool half fortune teller-ish:

As you can Google Chrome will preload in the background the site it believes you’ll visiting starting with the top hit from the search. After I spent twenty minutes trying to figure out how Google knows where I’m going to go before I do, I realized this is going to be a great feature for heavy content publishers they will get some extra help with their sites loading faster. It seems pretty apparent that Google is committed to providing end users with the best web search experience and these three new innovations to their search functions are yet another step in that direction.