Today we’re pleased to announce that we’re (finally) launching a new Google Video feature: video playback of all that great content you folks uploaded to us. Given that we started accepting uploads back inApril, this development is certainly long overdue; we’d like to apologize for the delay and thank you for your newsgroup posts, your emails, your blog posts… oh, yes, and your patience.
Now Showing: Your Video (Google Video Advisor)
Microsoft’s new Chinese internet portal has banned the words “democracy” and “freedom” from parts of its website in an apparent effort to avoid offending Beijing’s political censors. Users of the joint-venture portal, formally launched last month, have been blocked from using a range of potentially sensitive words to label personal websites they create using its free online blog service, MSN Spaces.
Microsoft bans ‘democracy’ for China web users (Financial Times)
Apple CEO Steve Jobs delivered the keynote address at the company’s WorldWide Developers Conference today. Here is a transcript of the portion of his presentation relating to iPods, iTunes, and podcasting, courtesy Voxmedia.org:
“Now I’d like to give you an update on the iPod and our music efforts. You know, the iPod has really entered popular culture in America. You know that when you’re lucky enough to get on the cover of the New Yorker. So we were thrilled with that. And that’s reflected in iPod sales. This is the cumulative iPods sold, and at the end of last quarter, the end of March, we sold about 60 million iPods. And that’s also reflected in the ipod’s market share — of all types of MP3 players, including flash and hard drive, everything, 76 percent market share. So we’re thrilled with that. (more…)
The video blog, or “vlog”, is the fashionable new way for amateur performers to find an internet audience, whether by chronicling their domestic minutiae or wittily parodying mainstream news bulletins. With audiences typically in the dozens or hundreds, the vlogs aren’t yet threatening ratings at the BBC. They are, however, creating a new generation of online stars – from schoolgirls as young as 11 to a bubbly New York actress with a cult international following.
The next big thing: vlogging (The Times of London)
Desperate to reach a more mobile audience, some newspapers are turning to podcasting. A growing number now offer Internet radio programs, sending stories from their pages to iPods and other players. Newspapers have traditionally been slow to adopt new technologies, like the Internet and blogging. Tired of playing catch-up, a small number are now embracing the latest digital media. They’re producing their own Internet radio shows, which are then downloaded and listened to via special subscription software called RSS.