Category: News

News

Second Life woos corporations – too little, too late?

2008/04/04 / / 0 Comments

Just recently in the news, Linden Labs (the creators of Second Life) and IBM have announced that they will allow corporations to run isolated portions of the Second Life universe on their own administrated servers to cater their business needs.

I used to work at a company that was exploring the business uses of Second Life. Sad to say the subject has been so dead over here in Europe that this all seems a lot like something that should have been ready during the hype 2 years ago.

Not to mention, this whole setup sounds all to familiar to the way in which ActiveWorlds works; and a lot of good it did that.
For years, Linden Labs has argued that its sole hosting of the Second Life universe was a unique selling point, something that made it more secure, more reliable than its competitors.

Sorry Linden Labs, you really have lost me.
I’m ready to jump aboard the OpenSim, Croquet and Multiverse projects!

See: NY Times Article “Second Life: Tamed for Corporate Consumption”.

Moving on…

2006/10/30 / / 0 Comments

It’s been a hectic few days for me: I was just about to leave my currentemployer for a major ICT service contractor (already having signed my newcontract) when I was offered the position I’ve wanted ever since I graduated.

As of January, I’ll no longer be the stressed out and overworked servicetechnician but the stressed and worked out web developer! Yeah.

Seriously, I’ll no longer be fixing broken websites, taking customers inquiries about what they did wrong in their CMS etc. What a relief!

From January onwards, I’ll be joining the Marketing-Communications team at Tam Tam. There I’ll be working on new and enterprising website projects. Building websites with Microsoft Office SharePoint Services 2007, ASP.NET 2.0 and the like. I can’t wait.

And as I grow from code hacker to code builder to who-knows-what, I intend to blog more often and more in depth as I get to grips with this new technology and programming in general.

Watch this space!

: P

Soapbox – Microsoft’s attempt to rival YouTube

2006/09/19 / / 0 Comments

Microsoft has just launched Soapbox.

This is a new beta they are using as a testbed for an Atlas-powered alternative to the plethora of video sharing sites on the web.
In normal speak: Microsoft wants a piece of the YouTube/Google/Yahoo video pie ;).

MSN Soapbox

On the homepage, you see nothing but a loading screen until youactually log in with your Microsoft Passport account. Then, you aretreated to another rendition of a nerd in an MSN butterfly suit (an MSNbeta wouldn’t be complete without it!).

The service is open to a select group of users (invite only), although you are encouraged to request access too. Luckily the boys at CNet have a had a quick browse through the working version of the site.

One word of caution: when signing up for the beta you are very strongly advised to read the legalese. The most significant thing that caught my eye: entire chapters devoted to payed placement of content and how the billing works. I”l be interested to see if this approach can help build the content library!

I always enjoy taking a website apart and seeing how i can have at the assets. Sadly, I’m new to Atlas and AJAXin general, and I gave up after skimming through the 6 or sojavascripts and 4 flash movies full of ActionScript. Maybe that will beone to return to in the future.

Links:

Help! Unqualified, incompetant Bush cronies!

2006/02/09 / / 0 Comments

I just came across so zillionth article about the mess that GW Bush’s adminstration seems to cause:

It turns out that a junior spokesman at NASA’s Washington headquarters was implicated in altering scientific releases from NASA to better communicate his christian-conservative viewpoints.

The New York Times reported that the 24-year-old George Deutsch amongst other things softened articles about global warming and "lobbied NASA colleagues to refer to the Big Bang as a "theory"in their communications with the public because NASA could not discountthe role of "intelligent design" in the formation of vast star systemsand planets".

Where could this unethical behaviour have been learned?
Well, for one, his résumé falsely claimed an undergraduate degree in journalism from Texas A&M University, even though he never graduated.
So he didn’t finish it completely. Fine. But lying that you have a degree, that’s just wrong.
I guess his lying is what got him places: he had joined NASA after working on President Bush’s re-election campaign.

Is there no end to Brownie, DeLay, and who knows what else?

Thankfully, he was fired more quickly than most.

link to the article

The Times – Who is Flourishing Under Labour?

2005/04/01 / / 0 Comments

This bit of info porn really hit me: something that seems like a pipedream to us in Holland.

Graphic: Who is flourishing under Labour? (JPEG Image, 770×771 pixels)

The UK poor are really getting a better deal and those who can afford it, pay the bill.

With the f** rich right (VVD, CDA) the current Dutch governement continues to estrange the people they need the most: the masses!

When will they learn that the elite do nothing for the economy: they are a brain drain, export their wealth to foreign banks and investments and then have the audacity to say that without them our economy would collapse.

Grr.

Even though Labour is far from perfect, I sincerely hope that the Hague takes note of Labour’s good RESULTS.