Picnik, which makes an online photo editor, announced on its blog Monday that the company is being acquired by Google.
The editor works directly with online photo libraries like Flickr, Facebook, and Picasa Web Albums. Users can also upload files to the service and download them again when they are done. The editing capabilities it offers are a natural complement to a Picasa, even though the technology appears to be a mismatch: Picnik works in Flash, while most advanced Google apps use the slower JavaScript. (Google, however, is working to improve JavaScript performance with its Native Client technology.)
Neither Picnik nor Google provided financial terms of the deal in their blog posts.
Flickr uses Picnik by default. It will be interesting to see how Yahoo, which owns Flickr, deals with the new owner of its preferred photo editor.
Picnik is a Webware 100 winner. It competes with Pixlr, Fotoflexer, and Aviary.
Picnik brings photo editing to the browser.
Source :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10461627-2.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Entertainment, Google, Internet, media | 
Tags: Google, Picnik, Web-based photo editor | 
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As the four biggest record companies wait to hear more about a proposed iTunes cloud music service, word comes now that Google has kicked the tires on a start-up specializing in cloud media.
Google has showed interest in possibly acquiring Los Angeles-based Catch Media, a company that intends to help make it simple for consumers to enjoy their digital movies, music, and books across numerous different hardware and service platforms, according to sources with knowledge of the negotiations. It’s unclear whether talks between Google and Catch have gone beyond informal discussions.
Google CEO Eric Schmidt (left) and Universal Music Group CEO Doug Morris prepare to shake hands at the Vevo launch party two months ago.
(Credit: Greg Sandoval/CNET)
If Google did acquire the company, it could help the search giant keep pace with Apple’s expected efforts to take iTunes to cloud computing. Last month, CNET reported that Apple has spoken to the top labels about plans to offer a streaming music service free of charge to consumers. Before agreeing to any new licensing deals, the labels are waiting for Apple to supply more information.
A Google spokesman responded to a request for comment by writing: “While we’re always talking to various people about various things, we don’t comment on rumor or speculation.” A representative from Catch declined to comment.
Catch doesn’t offer or store content. The company wants to be to digital media what Plus, Cirrus, and ATM networks are to the banking industry. Catch has developed a technology that helps hardware companies and service providers register, track, route and clear digital media as it moves across different platforms.
If Catch has its way, consumers will one day access media from different vendors and devices as easily as people withdraw money from any available ATM.
Founded in 2003 by brothers Boaz Ben-Yaacov and Yaacov Ben-Yaacov, Catch is focused on cloud-based music at this early stage in its development, sources said. In order to enable the cross-platform accessing of songs, Catch has licensed music from all four major record labels: Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, and EMI Music.
Conceivably, Catch is one way Google could equip Android cellphone owners with a means to access their iTunes music libraries.
Google’s interest in a start-up focused on cloud music has sparked speculation within the recording industry about the search engine’s music plans.
According to a December story in The Wall Street Journal (subscription required), Google was attempting to buy Lala, but Apple won out.
In December, Apple paid more than $80 million to acquire the company, which enables users to store a copy of their music libraries on the its servers and then access those songs from anywhere they can connect to the Web.
Barely two months prior to Lala’s acquisition, Google made news by partnering with the streaming service on a music-search deal. One music industry source said Google began circling Catch soon after losing Lala.
Because Google was pursuing an acquisition of Lala, some in the music industry see the search engine’s interest in Catch as part of a larger effort by Google to go deeper into digital music.
According to music sources, the industry would welcome a new music venture from Google CEO Eric Schmidt with open arms, sort of like how the chiefs of three of the largest labels literally welcomed Schmidt to the Vevo launch party in December.
Google’s YouTube has already become one of the Web’s biggest music outlets. Music videos at YouTube and Vevo, a site created by three top labels with YouTube’s help, attract millions of viewers each day.
The music industry has said for years that it would prefer an iTunes rival to emerge. As Apple and Google’s businesses increasingly begin to collide, who better than to face down Jobs and Apple than Schmidt and Google?
Source :
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-10455535-261.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Apple, Entertainment, Google, media, Mozilla |
Tags: Apple, Catch-Media, Google, iTunes, movies, multi-media, Music |
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RSS technology makes it possible for anyone to keep up with fresh content without having to visit the site in question. Now the same holds for webpages without RSS thanks to a new Google Reader feature.
Today Google has rolled out a subtle change to Google ReaderGoogle Reader
that lets you create custom feeds to track pages that don’t already have them. So you can subscribe to updates for any webpage simply by typing the URL into the “Add a subscription” text box.
Should you put the new feature to work, you’ll start to receive short snippets for any updates made to the pages, and GoogleGoogle asserts that it’s committed to improving the quality of these tiny blurbs over time. On the flip side, webpage owners can choose to opt out by adjusting a few lines of code.
So when might this come in handy? While most companies have their own blogs, receiving automatic notifications any time there’s an update to the homepage or product pages of a business of interest could prove to be vital. For example, with Apple releasing a “new product” and potentially news about the iPhoneiPhone
on Wednesday, you bet that I’m going to create some custom feeds.
Source :
Posted in Entertainment, Google, Google Reader, Internet |
Tags: Google, Google Reader, RSS Feed |
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I created a magazine called HEY OLIVIA that was made 100% with you, the fans, in mind. I hope you like the shoot and spread (gonna be at least 15-page spread).
I’m going through the last selection of the pics now and then we’re done with it and goin to print!!!
Click HERE to buy it!
Posted in Entertainment, Olivia Munn |
Tags: behind the scenes photoshoot, Hey Olivia !, mymag, Olivia Munn |
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Mozilla’s open-source Firefox browser has gained 30 million users over the past eight weeks, as it continues to gain on Internet Explorer.
Chief Executive John Lilly revealed the increase in user adoption in a Twitter post on Monday, and Tristan Nitot, president of Mozilla Europe, confirmed it to ZDNet UK on Tuesday.
“We’ve seen a significant increase in the number of users for Firefox,” Nitot said. “Firefox checks for new versions every 24 hours, when it’s running, and when it checks, it pings the Mozilla server. We count the number of pings.”
Read more of “Firefox gains 30m users in eight weeks” at ZDNet UK.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10384402-2.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Posted in Communication, Entertainment, FireFox, Internet |
Tags: browser, FireFox, Internet, Mozilla |
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