links for 2008-02-22

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links for 2008-02-20

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links for 2008-02-17

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links for 2008-02-13

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MAC WORLD 2008

Yes most people will say it was short and not that full of crazy surprises that we expected, but it did have some great additions. For me personally the product that stuck out the most was the Time Capsule. I love this product because I am tired of wires hooked up to my mac mini and want some space on my desk. With the Time capsule it backs up my Mac with Time Machine, which is included in Leopard. It is a wireless external hard drive and and airport hub. Another great asset to me is the 1 Terabyte of space it includes, which amazes me and makes my job so much easier with all the files I am saving everyday.

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Time Capsule

Automatic backup with Time Machine
Easy wireless networking
Up to 5x the performance, 2x the range
Wireless drive sharing
Print without wires
Strong security and access control
Works with iPhone, Apple TV and more

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Another update was the iphone firmware 1.1.3. Yes this has added functions well needed such as multi person text messages, which should have been added a long time ago. An update to Safari on the iphone makes it able for the iphone user to save web clips to the home screen as an icon, which is also done on the Mac with Mac OS X 10.5 as a dashboard widget. Playing with the home screen, which isn&rsqo;t new for people who have hacked their Iphones already is fun and shows promise of what&rsqo;s to come in February when Apple opens up to outside apps.

Google Maps is also enhanced with a new UI and a cool tracking option. With this option with a click of a button it auto tracks where you are at that moment and you can use that as a starting point for directions. I am happy Apple has stepped it up in these directions, but there is a lot more to do and will happen soon.

Click here for the online video tutorial to learn more.

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A huge buzz before the conference was the fact that Apple was going to reveal a tablet macbook laptop of sorts. When i first heard about this i was just wondering how would it look and function. I figured it would be some sort of tablet based on the Iphone, but with the regular functions of a small laptop. And behold the Macbook Air is here. It is extremely thin and by Steve Jobs pulling it out of an brown office envelope proves it right then and there. I personally wouldn&rsqo;t find use for it since it doesn&rsqo;t have a superdrive installed, it will have to be purchased through an accessory made for the Macbook Air called the MacBook Air SuperDrive and it isn&rsqo;t that fast where I can just buy a regular MacBook with everything. But, it still has a great design and is extremely light and I know that would help to have something light to carry around when I am traveling and etc. Yes this isn&rsqo;t the slimmest laptop ever, but it comes really close. I am not really ecstatic about this new macbook, but only time will tell how well it will be received since it&rsqo;s design and size will be a huge draw in for the product.

The standard version includes an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB memory, 80GB 4200-rpm PATA hard drive1, Built-in 802.11n Wi-Fi2 and Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR for the price of $1,799.00. For more info Click Here.

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The Apple Tv has been enhanced with some great new features, one that includes online movie rental from itunes. Most people are saying this isn&rsqo;t that great of an idea, but I think this will be huge and bring the apple TV to the forefront. To be able to sit there and rent and buy HD quality movies on the fly is wonderful and should have been the idea of the apple TV in the first place. Another wonderful thing about this is that the update is free for all of the customers who bought the apple TV previously thank god. Here are the other updates I picked up from Crave that I didn&rsqo;t mention.

  • Direct onscreen ordering: Previously, video content for Apple TV needed to be ordered on a computer (Windows/Mac) and then streamed from that PC&rsqo;s hard drive to the Apple TV. The updated Apple TV will allow direct access to the iTunes Store, so you can buy or rent movies and TV shows directly–no PC intermediary required. (Music can also be purchased, as well.)
  • Instant streaming: Unlike the “queue-and-view” method listed above, the updated video functionality is said to allow videos to begin streaming within about 30 seconds.
  • Upgraded video and audio quality: We complained loudly about the substandard video quality of existing iTunes video downloads, which were optimized for the small screen of an iPod or iPhone. The new crop of videos are says to be two tiers: DVD and HD quality, with Dolby 5.1 surround sound (instead of the stereo-only soundtracks on earlier content) on the latter.
  • Wider selection of videos from all major studios: Past selections were a scattershot grab bag, but Apple has lined up content from every major studio (Disney, Fox, Warner Bros., Paramount, Universal, Sony, Miramax, and Lionsgate, and their respective subsidiaries). Apple is promising more than 1,000 movies, available 30 days after the DVD release.
  • Movie rentals: In the past, movies could only be bought on iTunes, at prices around that of DVDs. As of today, iTunes is kicking off movie rentals: $2.99 for catalog (older) movies and $3.99 for new movies, plus a dollar more for the HD versions of each. You have 30 days to start watching a movie, and 24 hours to finish it once you start. In addition to being available on Apple TV, rentals will work on Macs, PCs, and all current iPods and iPhones (though it&rsqo;s unclear if movies rented directly on the Apple TV will be transferrable to any of those other devices).
  • More photo options: The updated Apple TV will allow access to online Flickr and .Mac photo galleries. That&rsqo;s in addition to pulling photos from networked computers, as it does now.
  • music and TV show purchases: Music and TV shows can be purchased directly on Apple TV, and both will be synced back to the iTunes software running on your computer.

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My Fav Web Sites!

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Every Now and then I see a few websites that I love and just study them to see how the designers did their magic. I found Two websites that are the shh!

The first web site is located at http://infinityart.ro/. This site is for Infinity Art Studio. They are a Interactive design studio in Romania. Their site was an idea of turning their info and showcases of design into a huge pirated signal. The visitors of the website are blown away by illegal channels that would appear and etc. To me this site is simply amazing so check it out.

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Another amazing website is :http://markez-models.com/index_e.html . This website is for a Switzerland train model company. It was designed by Heavyform.com
and it is a great use of flash and a small world concept. It resembles worlds like sims and etc. And I think you guys will find the intro music catchy and entertaining. So to my coworkers BADABOW! Check it out!

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Flickr Stats!

For all of you Flickr Pro users welcome to STATS!

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Email Standards

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Everyday at work my coworkers and I have to deal with crappy problems that occur while making email blasts and newsletters. I know most people can care less, but as web designers and developers it definitely matters. For one with the improved standards with web design it has created wonders and shaped the way we all should design with the new implemented rules and etc. Now we can welcome Email Standards.

I came across email standards looking through bloglines as usual and I am extremely happy people are taking this seriously and bringing it to the forefront. They cover issues with different email clients like how the horrible Microsoft outlook 2007 isn&rsqo;t standards approved and does things like not being able to read background images within tables, floats, clears, margin and padding. With all of these similar issues within other popular email clients such as Google&rsqo;s Gmail we are forced to strict straight forward, boring designs for these emails blasts and newsletters.

With this team of developers and designers working together to get all of these email clients to be standards savy soon enough we will be able to implement CSS within these designs and make our jobs a lot more easier. You never know.

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links for 2007-10-29

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JOOOOST!!!!

I know I haven&rsqo;t blogged in a while, but things have been hectic lately. One thing that has been great for the past month is that my fav online TV company Joost is live and kicking. Which means it is free to the public and any of you guys can join. Most of my fellow designers and tech savy people already know about it, but I usually write this for my associates and friends who aren&rsqo;t up on things like this. After freelancing for Joost I realized how great of a product they are offering and think its great to see how far they have come design wise of their new website and how great the new beta versions of joost are functioning.

Anyway back to Joost they are now offering loads of new channels (FOR FREE)
They are: 15,000+ TV shows, 250+ Channels
From Adult Swim to CNN they got it covered.
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So get to downloading and test it out trust me you wont stop using it.
for more info hit up joost.com & joost.com/blog for all the latest updates and etc.

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