Sociolatte

Liveshare: How does it work

2012-01-27T20:32:00.000-08:00

There are many destinations on the web for you to upload your photos and share with family and friends. You have Picasa, Flickr and even Facebook, these sites allow you to upload your photos and then share it with family friends or specific people. Liveshare does all this for you with one big difference, it allows real-time sharing. This means you can create a stream and invite your friends to join-in, in that stream. Let's say you are your pals are on vacation and all of you, can together keep uploading photos or videos to that stream. The photos or videos show up real-time and is available for all to see. So there is one photo or video stream but many contributors. These stream can either be public or private. So while all of you'll are uploading photos or videos people in that stream can check it all out at once, like one big giant album. There is no need to go to each friends profile (Think Facebook) to check out their personal collection of the holiday photos.

You can create either private or public stream. If you create public streams, like when you go for a concert, you can invite everyone at the venue to feel free to contribute to the stream. This way you get a whole lot of people at the concert to add their photos and videos and this really generates a crowd-sourced album for all to check out and enjoy. If you create a private stream you can share it with a few people and only show them photos or videos you want them to see. All of this is synced with the cloud so you and your friends can view stream no matter where you are. There is an iOS app and so your photos can be uploaded from your iPhone or iPad. There is also an Android App available. You can views photos and albums using any modern web-browser.

To get started

Visit Liveshare on the net

click on upload photos

select photos to upload (works real quick)

Name your stream

choose private or public

Share with friends

That's it - real fast and fun

Liveshare
Liveshare iOS App
Liveshare Andriod App
Live Share is brought to you by Cooliris

Twitter to withhold Tweets if requested by a country

2012-01-26T22:50:00.000-08:00

Twitter has given itself flexibility to withhold and censor Tweets if requested by a particular country. The micro-blogging service made this announcement as they expand into many more countries. Twitter is becoming important and more and more governments are wanting to have a say in the micro-blogging service. There are also country specific rules that might apply to the service in various countries. Which means they will need to comply. Till now if a Tweet had to be removed it was done globally. Now Twitter will withhold the that Tweet within a geographical area and it will still be available elsewhere in the world. This is good as it would still be legal in other countries. This flexibility is a good thing and ensure that tweets don't disappear globally. Which also means for those who are Techie, a workaround is always possible. Good for Twitter for coming up with something so brilliant. There are also others who are criticizing this move by Twitter saying that it is loosing its will to ensure Free Speech on the service. What Twitter has done for sure seems a better alternative than fighting with governments around the world. At least the Tweet is still available but just not in some countries.
Read more at the Twitter help section on this subject

Bitcasa promises infinite storage on your Desktop for $10/month

2012-01-25T22:41:00.000-08:00

Bitcasa is promising unlimited storage on your Desktop. The service is still new and if you do not have an invite, you will need to add your mail ID and wait for an invite. It is all the talk of the town because Bitcasa is promising infinite storage capacity on your desktop. What this means is that once you install the desktop-app, you can create a folder and add all your files to this folder. This is the Bitcasa folder and you can store movies, music, photo albums in this folder it all gets uploaded to the cloud and no memory is used on your Hard-drive. The added advantage of sharing your files easily with your friends and family. Once you share the link they can watch that movie, listen to music or view your photo albums without having to download the files.

Bitcasa: How does it work
1. Once you sign-up for the service you can then download the app and use it as another folder available on your computer
2. You can add all your files to this folder - music, movies, pics, software and just about anything
3. Once uploaded to the cloud it is all stored in the cloud and does not take-up any of your disk-space locally.
4. You can also cloudify your USB, Pen Drive and external hard-drives and store them in the cloud. This way all your info is available to you to use even if your external hard-drives are not with you.
5. All the files you upload are stored in the cloud
6. The app will use a local cache and you can adjust the size of this cache. This is needed so even if you connection drops your file remains.
7. There is also a web interface for you to access all your files online from anywhere
All data is encrypted and transferred securely
8. Available for Windows and Mac
9. Price: $10/month for unlimited storage with is pretty decent.
Bitcasa

Google Doodle for the Republic Day of India

2012-01-25T17:37:00.000-08:00

Jan 26, is celebrated in India as Republic Day - the day when India got its constitution. 2012 marks the country's 63 Republic Day. The constitution came into force replacing the Government of India act of 1935. It is also one of the three national holidays in India. Each state in India celebrates the anniversary in varying forms for in the capital Delhi, the main parade takes place in front of the president. A Day that is celebrated all over India.

Google has a new Doodle out for Jan 26 and it it known as 'Republic Day of India'. The doodle is not animated but an image that when clicked leads to more general information of Republic day. The image however is interesting as it has three elephants dancing along in a parade with happy kids sitting on top, with a umbrella found on top of elephants. The umbrellas have the colors of the Indian national flag. Google Doodles are special Google Logos created to mark specific and special events and birthdays that happen around the World. wishing all Indians a Happy Republic Day!.

Facebook Timeline Guide

2012-01-24T22:03:00.000-08:00

Image Credit: Facebook

Facebook launched Timeline last year with the option for users to try it out, test it for 7 days before it goes live on their profiles. Over the next week whether you are ready or not it is coming to you, once you see the announcement on top of your homepage, you will have 7 days to check it out and delete or remove or add stories to your Timeline. This is going to take many uses by surprise and the rush is going to be on as to how on earth do you get it ready before friends can see your Timeline.

We have a few guides to help you get started and we have them listed below. If you require further guides and lists do let us know in the comment section below.

1. How to delete old posts on Facebook Timeline

2. How to limit the audience of past posts on your Timeline

3. How to upload videos to your Timeline

4. How to add apps to your Timeline

5. How to get Facebook Timeline right now
6. Difference between delete and hide post on Timeline

A lot of the adjustments you will make will be through the activity log

1. What is the activity log and how does it work?

2. how to allow, feature or hide posts on Timeline using the activity log.

Blog Post by Facebook announcing the Timeline now being available globally can be found here.

Google+ hangouts: Best for free professional, personal and group online meetings and video conferences

2012-01-24T17:53:00.000-08:00

Source: Google+

Google+ hangouts are turning out to be the best service online for you to have your video chat and online meetings. It is totally free and all you need to have is a Google+ account. You can invite any number of people to the hangouts, but once the number reaches 10, others will be told that the hangout is now full. The good thing about using Google+ hangouts for professional purposes is because they have recently added document sharing and screen sharing. Known as Google+ hangouts with extras. They also have a really wide-screen. You can read more about it at the company post here. To know more about how Google+ hangouts work you can read more at our Google+ hangouts guide.

So the next time you want to conduct your business meeting for free online, or simply want to hangout with friends and video chat for free, Google+ hangouts is the coolest place.

How to use Google+ hangouts with extras

Once you start your Google+ hangout you should see a link that appears at the bottom saying 'Hangouts with extras'. Click on it and your done.

The Business application of Google+ hangouts are amazing for small business meetings and if you want to have a meeting with your clients. It is easy to set up and you can be ready to run in a minute. make sure the people you want to video conference with are all in your specific circle. Once you do that you can invite only those people to hangout with you.

India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh joins Twitter

2012-01-24T00:04:00.000-08:00

Source: Twitter

Amid all the scares happening in India with ministers threatening popular social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and Google with legal actions if they do not censor content that could hurt religious sentiments. The Prime Minister of India has joined Twitter. The reason given by his office being that he wants to reach out to younger people and especially the online generation. The work done by him and his office has been substantial and he would like to use Twitter to bring it to the notice of young Indians. The first three Tweets from his office has to be with the 'National Bravery Awards' and a picture of him sitting with the young bravehearts. The Prime Minister has been known to keep his silence on many a burning issue but we hope he will be able to open up more using the micro-blogging's 140 characters at a time.

The Prime Minister's Twitter handle is @PMO which stands for prime minister's office. Indians on Twitter however have not lost an opportunity to poke fun at the account, saying it will mostly stay silent and 140 characters is too much. Others see this as a step forward and the PM now has over 8 thousand Twitter followers. You can expect this to grow over the coming days as more and more people are just finding out about it. Way to go Mr.PM.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Twitter

Don't Be Evil Bookmarklet: How does it work

2012-01-23T23:42:00.000-08:00

When Google launched 'Search Plus Your world' (SPYW), users were told that this new feature will help them get better results when they search Google. There were other things that users were not told, results from Twitter, Facebook and many other sites were being omitted. The reason Google gave was that Twitter and Facebook did not allow the search engine access to information, as much as it needed to. You therefore get a whole lot of Google+ profiles in your search. Most of these profiles are not even updated regularly and the same person's Twitter profile would actually be much relevant, but Google choose to ignore it. They would like to have people forcefully sign-up for a Google+ Profile.

Don't be evil: Is the philosophy Google built their business on. Show results keeping the user in mind and not the company. So no one results gets precedence over the other. With SPYW this does not seem to apply at all.

A few engineers from Facebook, Twitter and MySpace have decided to fight back and prove to everyone that Google can sometimes be evil and manipulate search results. The result - a Bookmarklet that can be used on Chrome, Firefox and Safari. It does not work on Internet explorer.

How to get the Don't be evil bookmarklet, add-on or extension now and try a more relevant Google search.
1. Head over to their site focusontheuser.org

2. Click on Try a more relevant Google

3. Click and drag 'Don't be evil' to your bookmark bar. If it is not visible change your settings to make it visible and then drag and drop.

4. Now go to Google and search for anything
5. when you get the results click on 'Don't be evil' bookmarklet located in your bookmark bar

You can also get the Chrome App (Extensions) for the same in the Google Chrome Store and add the App. What the app does is it Modifies Google's hardcoded Google+ search results and replaces them with real social media results.
Don't be evil App for Chrome.

YipIt: How does it work

2012-01-20T22:51:00.000-08:00

YipIt the new start-up is slowly earning a name for itself. YipIt operates in the daily deals space, which features giants like Groupon. YipIt however does not offer any daily deals of its own, this is an aggregation service and bring to you everyday the best deals available for you locally, based on your interests. Daily deal and coupon sites are springing-up everywhere. There seems to be no end of them, you find a new one in every city you visit. Now most of them offer only one or two deals everyday. Most of these deals might not even suit your fancy. Enter Yipit.

YitIt how does it work?
Based on your city YipIt will aggregate all the deals available from over 805 services and serve you only the best based on your predefined likes and interests. The service is currently email based and there is an iPhone App as well. The service is currently available in the US and Canada and you would need to check to see if your city is available.

The purpose of YipIt is to bring to you the best deals based on your interests. So if you are receiving multiple mails from various daily deal providers. You can stop that for now and start receiving only one email a day from Yipit, the daily deals, sales and coupon search engine. Use it to get the best of all deals available in your city or search for deals available across the country
Yipit

What is LOIC? and how does it work?

2012-01-20T21:40:00.000-08:00

With the Feds shutting down popular locker storage site Megaupload, hacktivist group Anonymous quickly sprung into action to take revenge. They targeted the FBI and Department of Justice websites including Universal music, Warner music and other popular websites. Once they targeted these websites with DDoS attacks. A DDos (Distributed Denial of Service) attacks works on the logic that if enough number of hits go to a popular website it will shut down under its own weight. So when a DDoS attack is on, a particular websites will get so many hits that it begins to crumble becoming slow and unresponsive.

To do this Anonymous uses a popular javascript based program developed by 4chan affiliated hackers called LOIC ( Low Orbit Ion Cannon). Group members used this program as well as directing other internet users who support their cause to download and use the program. So once downloaded on a users computer the program will keep sending requests to a particular website and when thousands of people do this all at once. That website can go down.

LOIC is available for Windows, Mac and Linux. The Windows version of LOIC has something know as a Hivemind. How this works is that once it's downloaded lets you point your copy at an internet relay chat server and once that is done, you can allow someone else to pint your attack to a particular URL, IP or website address. So one mastermind can collectively control thousands of computers. Ensure that all the attacks are being directed at a single website.

Another way Anonymous has been tricking users into targeting website servers is by distributing links via Twitter, Tumblr, pastebin and other popular social sites. Once you click on the link you are automatically part of the program to target websites. (Here's a link to the Twitter search, just don't click the PasteHTML link. Source)

Will you be prosecuted if you download and use LOIC?
It is unlikely as investigators would conclude that all the computers that were used during the attack might have been part of a compromised botnet. cnet covered this aspect is more detail and you can read more here. Gizmodo says that there is little risk to the user because the attack knocks out servers and the log files do not actually log anything. Plus there is no proof that you computer was not a part of a compromised botnet.

Poe Toaster - Nevermore

2012-01-19T22:47:00.000-08:00

A tradition started as far back as the 1940's has now come to an end. The famed toaster would arrive on the night on January 19 - the birth-date of Edgar Allen Poe and leave 3 red roses and a half empty bottle of cognac. he would be dressed on a black frock, black wide-rimmed hat and a white scarf. This has been happening at least from the 1940's and fans of the tradition would arrive to watch the spectacle. Poe House and Museum Curator Jeff Jerome said that die-hard fans waited hours past the arrival time of the toaster but he failed to show, thus ending a long tradition. Jerome also said that one tradition might have does but a new one might have started. With fans coming to the graveside monument to read tributes. The Grave is located at Baltimore's Westminster Hall and his wife, cousin and object of his literary ardor, Virginia, is placed near him as well.

US Gov shatters Megaupload, Anonymous strikes back takes down FBI and DOJ sites

2012-01-19T17:53:00.000-08:00

In what is being described as one of the largest attacks by the Hacktivist group collectively know as Anonymous, Their DDoS (Distributed Denial of service) attacks on Government websites and sites related to the Music and Movie industries are being taken down one by one. This comes soon after it was reported that popular file storage site megaupload.com was taken down by the US government and it's top bosses have been arrested. The Justice Department said in a statement said that Kim Dotcom, 37, and three other employees were arrested on Thursday in New Zealand at the request of U.S. officials. The site and it's owners have been accused of making $175 million while causing a loss of above half a billion dollars in copyright infringement. The site was among the top 20 internet sites and was being used to store large files with the ability for other users to download it. The more downloads the more points an uploaded got, this way a lot of TV material and movies were being distributed.

Anonymous took it upon itself to protect the internet and launched #opmegaupload and #megaupload on Twitter. Soon afterwards sites associated with the take down were targeted and taken down.
Sites that have been attacked till now
1. fbi.gov (Still Down)
2. justive.gov (Still Sown)
3. MPAA.org (was down but back up again)
4. Universal Music (Still down and out)
5. Riaa.com (Was down but now is up and about)
6. Warner Music Group (Back up again)

To keep track of sites that are falling down due to the DDoS attacks you can follow the hashtag #Tangodown on Twitter.

Elton John vs. Madonna

2012-01-18T23:30:00.000-08:00

Image Credit: inquisitr

After the Golden Globes 2012 the world was left with words from Sir Elton John and his husband David Furnish. Both of them criticized Madonna. This spat has been going on for some time now. In fact from 2004. Elton John had said, 'Madonna winning the award - no f---ing chance. when she did win the award for best original song. Elton John did not look too pleased. In fact David Furnish took to his Facebook page to post this as his status update. "Madonna. Best song???? F**k off!!!" it did not stop there as he continued - "Madonna winning Best Original Song truly shows how these awards have nothing to do with merit. Her acceptance speech was embarrassing in it's [sic] narcissism. And her criticism of Gaga shows how desperate she really is." Check the video out below for more.

Facebook Timeline: How to find and add Apps

2012-01-18T21:40:00.000-08:00

Facebook has launched 60 new apps to be made use of your Facebook Timeline. Up until now users were able to share what they were reading or the music their were listening to. This new release now changes everything. Users can now share using apps from from Foodspotting, Foodily, Ticketmaster, Pinterest, Rotten Tomatoes, Pose, Kobo, Gogobot, TripAdvisor, and others. So if you love to cook you can share using Foodily, if you like to travel you can use TripAdvisor to share your travels and other travel related info. No matter what your interests are there is an app for you. Whether your like snowboarding, gardening, hiking knitting, collecting stamps. There will eventually be an app available for you.

How to add apps to your Timeline
1. Login to Facebook
2. Click on this link to see a list of Apps you can install and use on your Facebook Timeline. If you want to full URl here it is http://www.facebook.com/about/timeline/apps
3. Once you find an app you would like to add click on the 'Install' button.
4. You Done.

Once I install or add an app how do I decide who sees my sharing activity.
1. You can either do this while the app is being installed on Facebook. But if you want to change the settings later you can go here to change settings of each individual app.
2. You can also do this:

Click the at the top right of any Facebook page and click Privacy Settings
Under the Apps and Websites heading, you would need to click Edit Settings
Click Edit Settings next to Who can see posts and activity from this app on Facebook?
Click the drop-down button to choose between friends, public of custom

Save your settings and your done.

Google+: How to generate internet memes

2012-01-18T17:13:00.000-08:00

An example provided by Google+

Google+ will be rolling out a new feature in their photo sharing tool. The ability to add a ordinary photo and then using their meme generator add some text. The font will be the same that most memes use and therefore will have the look and feel of any meme that has been generated over the internet. Once you create your photo meme you can then send it to all your pals and maybe you will be the next person responsible for generating that raging meme that sweeps across the internet.

Unlike the popular meme generator site that Reddit uses make use of. Google+ does not provide any photo templates, which means you will have to get your own photos and templates which are anyway available on the internet. The meme generator tool however will help you add text and it will look like any other popular meme found online.

How to create a meme using Google+
1. Sign-in to Google+
2. Access the photo you want to convert into an internet meme
3. Drag and drop the photo into your Google+ sharebox
4. Click the 'Add text' button

That's all that needs to be done you new meme is ready to be shared with all your pals and circles on Google+. You can read more about this roll-out which will be coming to all users over the next few days, the announcement was made by Colin McMillan from the G+ team. A meme is a popular and easy way to draw attention to a particular topic or event that might be calling for attention.
Source: Colin McMillan from Google+

Video: Lady Gaga joins Google+

2012-01-17T23:37:00.000-08:00

Mama Monster has taken her time coming to Google+. The good news though is that she has landed. Now that mama monster has come, will her little monsters also arrive. After all it is her little monsters (her followers) who made her reach the top-spot on Twitter with over 18 million followers. She has over 46 million Facebook likes and her YouTube channel has over 2 billion views. Impressive numbers on Google+ though she has now been added to only a little over 18 thousand circles. Compare that to Google+'s most followed users. Britney Spears has been added to over 1 million circles on Google+. Google+ has been know to have a lot of Tech people and therefore growth has been slow among teens and young adults. With stars like Lady Gaga coming. Things are set to change, after all it was celebrities who drove up the popularity of other social networks. Starting from earlier social networks like 'MySpace'. Myspace has as of now been lost in Cyber Space but the batter between Facebook and Google+ has been heating up. This is why when celebrities like Lady Gaga arrive things usually change a little bit. A few days more and we can gauge the attention this star brings to Google+. You can add Lady Gaga on Google+ circles here.

Google Adsense Chrome Extension

2012-01-17T21:36:00.000-08:00

This new Chrome Extension lets Adsense publishers check their earnings right from their Chrome browser. Without having to sing-out and sing-in again with your Adsense account. For security reasons many publishers do not use their primary Gmail ID as their Adsense account. This extension comes in handy in that sense, because once it is installed you can keep doing your work using whichever email ID you use. While working if you feel you would like to check how much you have earned in your Adsense account. You can just click on the extension's icon in Google chrome and a summary of you Adsense earnings pop out.

What is the summary displayed by Adsense Summary Toolbar by Google.
1. A summary of how much you have earned so far during the day
2. How much you earned yesterday
3. How much you earned the last month
4. How much you have earned this month so far
5. You top custom channels
6. Your top URL channels
7. Lifetime revenue

How to install Adsense publisher Toolbar.
1. Please follow the link below and click install
2. If you have logged-in using an email account that is not your Adsense account. Sign-out and sign-in with your Adsense account.
3. Allow access and your done

Now when you want to check your earnings a small icon is installed

Google Adsense Chrome Extension by Google

How to use Facebook to generate revenue and make money

2012-01-12T22:45:00.000-08:00

There are many ways too use Facebook to generate revenue. This post will especially be directed to bloggers and site owners and offer a few helpful hints on how to make money using Facebook. Most blog owners and website owners are ad supported. which means the more number of page-views you have the more money you are able to make. The most popular ad platform being Google's AdSense. The more number of people who visit your blog or site means the more probability of people clicking your ads you and making money. There is no point of using AdSense and other ad platforms if you do not have enough traffic to actually benefit from all this. exposure is the key and the more number of people visiting your site means the larger number of clicks you are able to generate.

How to generate traffic to your ad-supported site.
This will benefit you if you have Google keywords generating high click fees.
1. Set up a Facebook page for your site or blog
2. use the advertising option on Facebook to get a large number of people to click on like your page.
3. Generate content that is relevant and start posting it to your Facebook page
4. People who find it interesting will start clicking these ads and landing on your site
5. Make sure you site has been optimized well with your ads and this leads to a high click-rate
6. Use Facebook's advertising platform with Adword's keyword tool to find interesting and profitable topics.

If you can get it right you stand to make a lot of money using Facebook as a tool. Marketing is the key and the more you work on it the better you get. Online marketers cannot do without Facebook. Remember this is hard and diligent work and will not work as a get rich quick kind of thing. Please share your views and thoughts and if you have other ideas do let us know in the comments section below.

Facebook Listen with friends: How does it work

2012-01-12T22:01:00.000-08:00

Facebook has launched a new feature using its open graph initiative, called 'Listen with', allowing all Facebook users to listen to music with their friends. This is a real-time feature and if when your on your Timeline and you see a music icon next to a friend's name in the chat sidebar. You can click on that icon and listen to music with your friends. You can also chat about the song as it's playing. This is a brand new feature and gives people connected to each other to listen to music together and enjoy the song at the same time.

How to listen to music together with your friends on Facebook?
1. Login to Facebook
2. Look for the music icon next to your friends name in the Chat Sidebar.
3. Hover over their name in the chat sidebar or the story appearing in ticker
Click the Listen With (Friend's Name) button that appears beside their name with the speaker icon
If you haven't already opened the same music provider as your friend, click the Open button on the next window. Currently only Spotify and Rdio is being supported.

Important Q&A
1. How do I share the music i am listening to on Facebook
You will need to authorize the two apps that are being supported right now to post and share the music you are listening to right now on your Facebook Timeline.

2. What music sharing apps and players are currently being supported.
Spotify and Rdio

3. How to control who can view songs I am listening to on Facebook
You will need to go to your Apps setting page on Facebook and set your privacy options to either public, only friends, me or customize it further and the songs you listen to will appear only to people you have selected. To adjust your Music Apps privacy settings please click here.

4. How does the app decide which songs to post to my Timeline.
When signing up for the app only posts you share on your Timeline will be visible. So only when you give an app permission to share on your Timeline will the songs you are listening to right now appear there.

5. How to remove songs from my Facebook Timeline
This can be done by accessing your activity log and removing it from there. Once removed it will no more appear on your Timeline.

read more at the Facebook Blog

Google results: how to add authorship to your content

2012-01-11T22:38:00.000-08:00

By now you are used to seeing the faces of people on Google search results. The reason you are seeing this is because this is the Author's face and Google has been smart enough to attribute the authorship rights to that person. Now there are various way to get this done for yourself but in this post we are going to talk about a simple way to do this, which would require no programming knowledge at all. You do not need to follow any code and is especially good for people who cannot be bothered with adding code to their site. You can add authorship to material you write on the web using Google+. With this option you will be able to get your content displayed as an author of authority on Google search results. This is because Google have launched 'Search Plus Your World' which does one thing that no blog or website owner can ignore. It displays results from people who are recognized as Authors on Google+. This way you can also get more people to add you to their circles.

How to add authorship to your content using Google+
1. Sign-in to Google+. If you do not have a Google+ account please create one now.
2. Click on Profile. The icon with the face in the middle
3. Click on edit profile
4. Click on 'Contributor to" and enter the name of your Website, Blog, YouTube Channel, Facebook Page or profile or Twitter feed anything goes and you can claim what's rightfully yours.

5. Enter the name of your Content
6. Add the URL or site address

7. Click on Save
8. You're done

Google Search Plus Your World: How does it work

2012-01-11T22:00:00.000-08:00

Google has released a new product that it has begun rolling out to all users. If you do not have it already you certainly will over the next few days. To explain this new concept briefly it would be: Google has now integrated Google+ much more deeply in its search results. So when you now perform your regular search on Google. You will be shown results from Google+ and people you are connected to. So when you search for say images of elephants. You will be surprised to see pictures of elephants either which you or your friends have shared on the web. Especially shared on Google+ and Picasa. This means a lot of the recommended search results from Google will have a personal touch to it. This personal touch is not theirs but yours. People you are connected to on Google+ will become a part of your search results. So when you search, results will incorporate pages, post, images and videos shared by people you already know. This is 'Search Plus Your world.

In addition when you search for friends of yours, you will get their personal profiles popping up and not the wrong people. which means if you search for your pal 'Ben Smith', only his profile will show up and not all the other Ben Smiths in this world. In addition you will also get recommendations of highly ranked authors on Google+. If you want to be a person whose writing is recommended on Google+. You will need to join the Google+ Authorship Pilot Program.

Important Q&A
1. Can I toggle or switch between normal Google Search and Google Your World
yes you can do so by click on the human figure and world icon found on the top right-hand side of your screen. Clicking on the figure will give your 'Google Search Plus Your world Results'. Clicking on the world icon will give you results without personal recommendations.

2. Why is Twitter so upset with Search plus your world.
Because Twitter and Facebook have been omitted. Twitter says that the latest news breaks first on Twitter and not on other social networks. It is therefore unfair that results from Twitter are not show first.

3. What is Google's response?
Allow us access and we will show results from Twitter and Facebook. There is no deal now between these companies and therefore Google seems to be making good with what the have access to.

4. Can search plus your world surface public content from across the web?
Matt Cutts answers this by saying 'surface public content from sites across from the web, such as Quora, FriendFeed, LiveJournal, Twitter, and WordPress'.

5. How deep is Google+ integration with search plus your world.
It is very deep and this is incentive enough for people who are into SEO (Search Engine Optimization), Blog owners and website owners to make sure they get onto the Google+ bandwagon real quick.

If you have already tried it and when you do get a chance to experience it please let us know what you think in the comments section below.
Read More: Google+ Blog

Zooshia: Create your own widget using your YouTube, Facebook and Twitter feeds

2012-01-10T23:06:00.000-08:00

Zooshia is a web app that lets you create your won widget. If you are a website or blog owner you know that each social site has its own feed and if you want to share your Facebook feed from with your profile or Facebook page on you site. You will need to download the Facebook widget to get it to show and run on your site. The same thing would apply to Twitter and YouTube. With Zooshia you can add up to 10 different feeds from your Facebook, Twitter and YouTube accounts. The service does not support other social sites and you will need to be content with these three. So you can combine up to 10 different feeds from these services and display all of them in one widget.

The widget you create is not static and so if you have a large feed and a lot of conversation going on the widget keeps moving. The advantage of this is that people like widgets and a widget which keep updating attracts more eyeballs. The widget once created has a neat look and can be further formatted if you have a little coding knowledge. Once you are happy with the widget you can then embed it in your blog or site and you're good to go.
Zooshia

Rome2Rio: Travel search engine helps you discover how to get to anywhere from anywhere

2012-01-10T22:21:00.000-08:00

Now this is one fantastic web app and for more than one reasons. With Rome2Rio you can discovery how to get from one place to another anywhere on the Globe. You can search for how to get from New York, US to Delhi India. You will be given all the various routs you can use including how to get from the train station to the airport. Once you land how to get transport to the nearest bus or train station. How much time your entire journey is going to take and all available flights. This does not have to be used for international travel only. you can use the app for domestic and local travel as well. It has fantastic Google Maps integration and local knowledge of travel options available can be pretty awesome.

In addition to travel details which include flights, train and bus travel. The site offers some amazing eye-opening prices on your travel. By choosing when to fly and checking on the prices you get to see a comparison on the total amount you are going to spend. You can then decide which route you want to travel to reach your destination. You can also check if a direct flight is cheaper in comparison to maybe an alternate route. Sometime the route you choose to reach your destination can be a lot more expensive then some alternate routs show by Rome2Rio. This web app is not new and has already been around for a little while. It is highly recommended as it brings a lot of value and insight and helps you plan your travel while saving money and time. Also adds a little more adventure by offering you various routes to get to your destination. So try it now to learn how to get from anywhere to anywhere in this world. You get complete travel instructions on how to reach your travel destination including what to do when you reach the airport and what shuttle services are available to get you to where you want to go locally.
Rome2Rio

Extract images from Word, Excel, PowerPoint or eBooks

2012-01-10T21:54:00.000-08:00

There are a lot of apps out there that help you to extract images from Office documents and eBooks. This free to download and use app, lets you extract images from all Office Docs, eBooks and now Apple iWorks. There are many reasons why you might want to save images you find interesting on documents that you download from the web. Some of them are stunning and some have Tech imagery that you might want to study later. This freeware App is useful as it is able to extract images in a few simple steps and save it to your computer/hard drive. The images are stored in their original formats and hence no loss of picture quality.

Trying to extract images from Office documents can be laborious and might result in the loss of picture quality. Hence this app - Office Image Extraction Wizard supports over 40 common file formats and offers you the choice of storing the extracted images into a folder you specify. Some of the formats supports apart from Word, Excel and PowerPoint are Apple iworks (.pages) and eBooks (.pub). Office does not need to be installed for this app to run.
Office Image Extraction Wizard

How to create a screencast online with Screencast-O-Matic

2012-01-09T23:22:00.000-08:00

Web App Screencast-O-Matic is a Java based program that lets you capture video of your screen easily. Since it is a web based app there is nothing to download and you don't need to sign-up for an account. Simple access the app on the web and click on 'Start Recording' wait for 1.2.3 and you're good to go.

This is one app that is showing a lot of promise and is very easy to use. Once you start recording you can move the recording windows around you screen and continue recording.

Screencast-O-matic: How does it work?
1. Access the site on the web
2. Click on 'Start Recording'
3. Once the window opens you will need to adjust the volume of the mic you will be using for the recording.
4. Click the red button to start and once your finished click done.
5. You can now save your file to Screencast-O-Matic, upload to YouTube or save a copy on your local system. You can also choose to have it saved in HD, and formats available are MP4, Windows Media, Flash and animated image. You can also add captions and notes to your video.

The makers of the app say that it is being used by teachers, How-tos Tech support, students and 10,000s of YouTubers. Since the program is free, it is built using Java, meaning it will work on all browsers and most platforms. There is also a paid version of the App if you're interested. You would need to note that when using the free version. A Screencast-O-Matic logo will appear on the bottom left-hand corner of your screen. To get rid of it you will need to opt for a paid version of the app. There are many apps out there for you to use but this one seems by far the most simple and easy to use. Less clutter and straight forward - click and record.
Screencast-O-Matic