May, 2011

GWT-based framework that allows you to not only utilize its comprehensive widget library for your application UI, but also tie these widgets in with your server-side for data management.

Expand your brand and drastically improve your conversions with a custom-built ToldYa advertising widget that’s tied directly to your existing offers and offers an unbeatable interactive experience complete with text, images, audio, video, browsing, search and more.

The ToldYa Store™ lets you buy and sell products, services and tickets to events among friends on social networks, blogs and web sites. You can create and copy your store directly to your profiles (such as MySpace, Facebook and others) as well as your own blog or website. And you also get a custom store page here at toldya.com to link to.

Your customizable ToldYa store features an integrated secure checkout system that lets you accept major credit cards for any purchase. And you can personalize and promote your store to help you sell your stuff fast. You can even earn money by telling your friends. And best of all, it doesn’t cost you a penny until your item sells!

A patent application that automatically mines the data built into celebrities faces has been made public.  That’s right – Google want to use spectral analysis and biometric models as a way to automatically recognise the faces of 30,000 celebrities wherever they might appear.

The patent is called “Automatically Mining Person Models of Celebrities for Visual Search Applications“, and was released on May 19 after being lodged in August last year.  The abstract from the patent application reads:

Methods and systems for automated identification of celebrity face images are provided that generate a name list of prominent celebrities, obtain a set of images and corresponding feature vectors for each name, detect faces within the set of images, and remove non-face images. An analysis of the images is performed using an intra-model analysis, an inter-model analysis, and a spectral analysis to return highly accurate biometric models for each of the individuals present in the name list. Recognition is then performed based on precision and recall to identify the face images as belonging to a celebrity or indicate that the face is unknown.

Basically, this new technology works as an automated, internet paparazzi, using special Google algorithms to scan biometric data.  This allows the software to identify people based on their physical characteristics.  Once a database has been fully developed and set up, Google will be able to search and tag celebrity images automatically.  Apparently, the database already includes 1,000 celebrities, including Barack Obama, Sarah Palin, Bristol Palin, and Prince Harry.

However, Google executive Eric Schmidt has recently described the “surprising accuracy” of facial recognition technology as “very concerning”, saying it is “unlikely” that Google will use a facial recognition database, and adding “Some company is going to cross that line.”  Perhaps he has changed his mind since the patent was lodged last year.

However, this is not the first time Google have shown interest in facial recognition technology.  An earlier patent, called “Facial Recognition with Social Networking Aiding”, went to the World International Property Organization on August 6, 2010.

This patent application describes a “facial recognition search system” that has the ability to scan facial images of your friends and return appropriate matches.  Facebook are also apparently working with this kind of recognition technology, and are rumoured to be developing technology similar to that described by the Google patent.

Microsoft are incorporating a number of Facebook features into the Bing search engine, in their latest attempt to out-do Google.  The relationship between Microsoft and Facebook has been developing over the last few months, and we are likely to see even greater collaboration between the two companies in the future.

Since last year, Bing search results have highlighted Facebook content, such as the stories “liked” by your Facebook connections.  While this in itself was a big shift towards the integration of search functionality and social networking, it seems Microsoft have even bigger plans to socialise its search engine.

Social signals from Facebook will be highlighted more frequently and more prominently, with additional “liked” categories from Facebook friends and specific site integration.  Microsoft also have plans to tap into the “collective IQ” of the Internet, by highlighting the articles and topics that Facebook members are liking regardless of the personal connection between users.

One other planned feature is being called “conversational search,” which will allow users to ask friends about online decisions they’re trying to make.  All of these features are part of the shift Microsoft are engineering for Bing, from a simple search engine to a “a decision engine.”

“You use your friends offline to make decisions, in big ways and small,” said Stefan Weitz, director of Bing, in an interview. “Now you can have the same experience online.”

This functionality also has some important commercial implications, as eighty percent of people delay making a decision, such as an online purchase, until they get some sort of positive feedback from a friend.  Advertisers are sure to be happy with these new features, as the lack of personal connection on the Internet is one of the biggest stumbling blocks for online stores.

While Google are also getting more social with the development of their search engine, they lack the close relationship with Facebook like that enjoyed by Microsoft.  However, Google are also integrating Facebook and Twitter social signals, although this integration is not as deep due to restrictions in terms of information access.

Although bitcoin seems like an electricity thief and a bubble currency at first, bitcoin is actually a legitimate cryptocurrency.

Bitp.it is a bitcoin miner, which allows your website(s) to generate virtual money.

The bitcoin miner is quite a treat for bitcoin enthusiasts, and offers an alternative way of earning money from your website.

Some users aren’t as optimistic as to whether placing the miner on a website of yours would actually earn much (a figure appears of 21kk users generating a $100 GPU’s worth of power on the bitcoin forum), but placing the miner on your website doesn’t really hurt you.

Designer Pages is the Architecture and Design trade’s new interactive online connection to the latest design products with up-to-date specifications.

This collaborative community bridges the gap between designers and suppliers so that professionals can spend less time product hunting and more time on their craft. Suppliers post and maintain all product listings, so getting in touch with them is just a mouse-click away.