Internet & Websites News - Page 71

The latest and most important Internet & Websites news - Page 71.

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Microsoft claims Google users are getting 'Scroogled' by not using Bing when shopping online

Daniel Perez | Nov 30, 2012 11:43 AM CST

Microsoft has been directing the majority of its marketing campaigns lately directly at Google with its recent campaign pitting Bing directly against Google in blind tests comparing the two services. This week, the company has launched another campaign, this time, going against Google's Shopping search results.

According to Microsoft's new "Scroogled" campaign, it's suggesting Google users are getting the short end of the stick when they search in Google's Shopping section as those results are paid for and not based on relevance of what users are searching for.

"They Scroogle you by defining relevance as how much they're getting paid. Don't get scroogled, you may be missing out on the best prices and highest quality products."

Continue reading: Microsoft claims Google users are getting 'Scroogled' by not using Bing when shopping online (full post)

Twitter CEO to users: "By the end of the year you'll be able to download the archive history of your entire tweets"

Trace Hagan | Nov 26, 2012 8:32 PM CST

Most Twitter users know that they can't download all of their old tweets, nor can they readily access them if they need to. CEO Dick Costolo has already promised to provide users a way to download a copy of all of those tweets so that they could be archived, searched, or turned into a collage, if that's your thing.

Well, he has once again promised that feature, but this time he has put a date on it. In a talk at the University of Michigan, his alma mater for those who care, he doubled down on the feature and told the audience that the engineers may be mad at him, but they should have the ability to download an archive copy by the end of the year.

So if you wanted to do a search against our user database ...it would slow down the rest of the real-time distribution. So what we're doing to enable users to download the entire archive history of their tweets is, as you can imagine, creating a different kind of archival system for these tweets. We're in the process of doing that now.

Continue reading: Twitter CEO to users: "By the end of the year you'll be able to download the archive history of your entire tweets" (full post)

Google Type is the new tool for making ransom notes, uses Google Images to generate fonts

Trace Hagan | Nov 26, 2012 6:27 PM CST

Here's a fun new website to mess around with: Google Type. Google Type uses Google's image search engine to create a custom "font" from images found around the web. It manages this feat by using a quirk in Google's image search. If you type in just a letter into Google Images, it will return a bunch of pictures that are that letter.

For instance, above I used Google Type to make TweakTown out of letters found around the internet. While you can't really use this as a font, it could just become the next tool for making ransom letters. No longer will I have to scrounge around newspapers and magazines for letters to cut out and glue into a message. After all, this is becoming increasingly difficult as papers go out of business.

Google Type comes from a group called the Internet Club, which is composed of web developers from Brussels, Belgium. They go by the tagline "Because Internet gave us so much we decided to give back." It's good to see them doing something for the benefit of the web--well, sort of--rather than the detriment.

Continue reading: Google Type is the new tool for making ransom notes, uses Google Images to generate fonts (full post)

Updated: GoDaddy has DNS compromised causing some site visitors to get infected

Trace Hagan | Nov 23, 2012 7:03 PM CST

GoDaddy is having more trouble with their DNS. After a major outage took down a large portion of the internet, they are again facing issues. This time, DNS records of websites hosted on GoDaddy are being modified. The modification adds subdomains that point to infected websites under the control of malicious users.

Once a computer is redirected to the malicious IP, the server attempts to exploit the system using the Cool Exploit kit. Because of the record being modified at the DNS level, the URL and site look to be legitimate. If a user becomes infected, the computer is locked down via ransomware and the user is made to pay to unlock it.

It's the typical ransomware setup--it uses local currency and information to make it look as if local law enforcement are the ones who locked it down. Affected webmasters should check their DNS records to make sure that they don't have these rogue subdomains and users who have been affected should contact a virus removal expert.

Continue reading: Updated: GoDaddy has DNS compromised causing some site visitors to get infected (full post)

Facebook looking to create official external advertising network

Trace Hagan | Nov 23, 2012 6:06 PM CST

Facebook has a lot of data about you. They know what you like, you who know, and what you post and they use all of that information to allow advertisers to target you while you're surfing Facebook. But what if that information could be used to target you when you're running around the rest of the web?

Well, it looks as though we'll soon find out. Facebook is reportedly looking to start up an external advertising agency. This means that Facebook would allow advertisers to use Facebook information about you to target ads at you as you surf around the net. The whole reason Facebook would want to do this is because it would bring it lots of revenue.

One estimate says that they could double their current revenue by doing this. Increasing revenue is an important thing for Facebook as they are now a publicly traded company. The model would be similar to Google's AdSense, something that has proven popular and effective. Facebook, if they do this right, could possibly compete with Google's advertising, something that has previously been unobtainable by anyone.

Continue reading: Facebook looking to create official external advertising network (full post)

Google's search dominance continues, approaches 70% market share

Trace Hagan | Nov 21, 2012 7:31 PM CST

Google is an unstoppable force. The company's search market share has practically continued to increase month-over-month and it saw its highest ever market share this past October. Coming in at 66.9 percent, it beat out its previous record of 66.8 percent, which it achieved in both June and July of this year.

Looking year-over-year, Google's search dominance has increased 1.5 percent. Bing, too, is increasing in market share, though it has a long road in front of it if they hope to reach anywhere near what Google has. Sitting at a mere 16 percent this October, they have grown only 1.2 percent year-over-year.

Yahoo managed to get 12.2 percent of search traffic, down from 15.2 percent year-over-year. Ask pulled in a mere 3.2 percent and AOL managed to get 1.8 percent, both absolutely tiny in comparison to Google's results. These numbers come from comScore, who measures desktop searches. This means searches executed by mobile devices aren't included.

Continue reading: Google's search dominance continues, approaches 70% market share (full post)

Facebook looking to end users' right to force a vote on policy changes

Trace Hagan | Nov 21, 2012 2:12 PM CST

Facebook has sent out an e-mail to all 1 billion users informing them of the proposal to modify governance of the site. The proposed changes look to take away the users' right to force a vote by getting more than 7,000 comments on the proposed changes. Instead, Facebook would like to make sure they get high-quality feedback on proposed changes.

To prevent Facebook from taking away this right, users will need to comment on the proposal and then vote, if the proposal comments number in excess of 7,000 after the 7 day period is up. In all likelihood, this change will probably go up for a vote and then not get enough votes to go anywhere.

Facebook requires a 30 percent vote, either yes or no, to make it binding. So even if vocal users get the 7,000 comments, the likeliness of 300 million users voting to block the changes is a pretty slim chance. Instead of voting, Facebook is offering up a way to ask the Chief Privacy Officer questions and they would also have the CPO hold livestreamed webcasts, during which questions would be asked and answered.

Continue reading: Facebook looking to end users' right to force a vote on policy changes (full post)

Facebook slowly transferring all users to more secure HTTPS connections

Anthony Garreffa | Nov 19, 2012 1:36 AM CST

I've been using HTTPS to access Facebook ever since the social network offered it, but with over one billion users - having it by default is a much better way of keeping your users' data more secure.

Facebook has used HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) to protect users when they submit their username and password to login - which prevents someone from diving in and accessing your username or password when typing it. But, in January of 2011, the social network starting offering users to opt in for all of their Facebook browsing to fall under the more secure HTTPS umbrella, at the time warning "Encrypted pages take longer to load, so you may notice that Facebook is slower using HTTPS."

Facebook also said that "We hope to offer HTTPS as a default whenever you are using Facebook sometime in the future." We're finally here, and they're about to press the GO button on this more secure way of browsing. A few days ago, a Facebook Developer Blog post hinted that "this week, we're starting to roll out HTTPS for all North America users and will be soon rolling out to the rest of the world".

Continue reading: Facebook slowly transferring all users to more secure HTTPS connections (full post)

The Butterfly Effect, a short CG film powered by the Unity 4.0 engine

Anthony Garreffa | Nov 16, 2012 5:30 AM CST

Earlier today we posted news that the Unity 4.0 engine had been released, but now there's a short CG animated film from Passion Pictures called "The Butterfly Effect", based on the engine.

The CG short is incredible, with the engine pushing out some seriously slick animation. The story is of a guy who drags himself out of bed to go to the corner store in San Francisco to buy some milk and from there, it gets incredibly destructive. A great video.

The engine looks incredibly powerful, and I would love to see a AAA game based on the title. Imagine a next-gen game powered by this engine, PC-exclusive. It would be incredible. What did you think of The Butterfly Effect? Leave a comment!

Continue reading: The Butterfly Effect, a short CG film powered by the Unity 4.0 engine (full post)

Google Fiber installation begins in Kansas City

Daniel Perez | Nov 14, 2012 11:30 AM CST

Google Fiber is an idea Google has been kicking around for the past couple of years as it aims to become an Internet Service Provider that will offer customers in the U.S. the speeds they deserve at a reasonable price. Earlier this year, they announced Kansas City would be one of the first to receive Google Fiber promising 1 gigabit download and upload speeds for only $70. Today, Google has announced its Google Fiber installation has officially kicked off in Kansas City.

If you live in Kansas City, specifically in Hanover Heights, and see a new box on the side of your home and a sticky note on your door indicating your home is ready for Google Fiber, Google will be contacting you by phone or email within the next couple of days to schedule an appointment with you.

Google Fiber customers will receive a Network Box, which is a gigabit router with Wi-Fi built into it. If you're a Google TV subscriber, you'll also be given a DVR called the Storage Box as well as a Google Fiber TV box for each TV you want connected. Best of all, the remote control Google will give you isn't one of those "universal remotes" that you'll just throw in a drawer somewhere. Instead, it's a Nexus 7 tablet, which I'm sure will cost a ton in rental fees, especially if you accidentally drop it.

Continue reading: Google Fiber installation begins in Kansas City (full post)