Firefox Goes For The Record

With the release of Firefox 3, Firefox is attempting to set a world record for most downloads in a day. As I type the Spread Firefox site is registering 7,303,823 downloads with a few more hours to go, pretty impressive considering the target was 5 million! CNET news is reporting "Firefox 3 is spreading fast, claiming more than 4 percent of the share of Web browser usage less than 24 hours after its release." Being the curious sort that I am, I wondered what the current record was and to my glee Firefox has had the foresight to guess that I might ask... "This is the first record attempt of its kind so there is no set number. We'd really like to outdo the number of Firefox 2 downloads on its launch day, which was 1.6 million. Let's shoot for 5 million--the sky is the limit!" So when will we know if the record is set? "This will take approximately a week after our attempt date. Our judges and Guinness World Records™ need to review our download logs and validate our record attempt."

UK Hacker Facing Extradition To The US To Face Charges

Gary McKinnon aka "Solo", a Glasgow-born systems analyst is facing extradition to the United States to face charges that he gained access to 97 US military and Nasa computers from his London home in 2001 and 2002. Lawyers working on McKinnon's behalf say that US authorities had warned McKinnon that he faced a life sentence rather than a couple of years in jail unless he agreed to plead guilty and to extradition. McKinnon has never denied accessing the networks saying he was motivated by curiosity. I guess it's not really a question of guilt but rather can he receive a fair trial in a US court? BBC story here.

Spore Creature Creator

If you are anxiously awaiting the release of Spore, as I am, you may be interested to know that you can get a bit of a leg up on your would be competitors. Electronic Arts has just released the trial version of the Spore Creature Creator tool, it's downloadable on both Mac and PC and enables you to create creatures for use within the game - when it's released in September. Check out this tutorial...

EA is also allowing you to pre-order at a number of retailers or at the EA store.

eBay To Open Up Code To Developers

"We are opening up the eBay site to help developers and sellers make more money, which is what this is all about," Max Mancini, eBay's senior director of Platform and Disruptive Innovation, said in an interview. Following the lead of Facebook with it's 24,000 applications developed outside of the company, eBay is hoping to inject some new life into online auctions and sales. "Rather than having eBay try to build every feature, we should open up the platform and integrate others' work," Mancini said. "We have realized that we need to allow sellers and developers to get together a little bit more easily." The company plans to begin testing the project, dubbed "Project Echo", later this year. More here at Canada.com.

AVG 8 Runnig Up Numbers On The Web

The Register is reporting that the latest edition of AVG's antivirus software is running up page counts all over the Internet. AVG 8 includes a new malware scanning service that checks links returned by search engines and advises users whether or not the site is safe to visit. According to this article, AVG estimates that 20 million machines have upgraded to the new version of the software and those users are racking up a pile of hits, "traffic has spiked as much as 80 per cent on some sites." "A situation like this where there is in effect false traffic, where something is generating what is bogus data, leads to wrong budget decisions and marketing activities," says Barry Parshall, director of product management at WebTrends, a popular web analytics firm. "I completely get the value proposition [of Linkscanner], but it would be responsible of them to identify themselves, with agent code or whatever it might be, so legitimate businesses can serve their customers properly."

The Innoventions Dream Home

Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif. unveils it's latest attraction today, the Innoventions Dream Home a collaborative effort by Disneyland, Microsoft, HP, Life|ware and home-builder Taylor Morrison. Located in Tomorrowland, the Dream Home delivers on Walt Disney’s vision for showcasing cutting-edge technologies that make life better and easier. “We’re constantly visualizing how tomorrow’s software will transform how we’ll work, play and communicate,” says Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy officer at Microsoft. “By partnering with Disneyland, we can show people how technology can enrich our lives today, and offer a glimpse of the technologies that will revolutionize homes in the future.”

According to this Microsoft Press Release, the Innoventions Dream Home features such innovations as:

	Magic Mirror: A mirror projects different clothes, accessories and hairstyles onto each family member’s image when they stand before it. The clothes not only morph to the contours of the body, but also sway as the person in front of the mirror moves.
	Kitchen of Your Dreams: The kitchen recognizes ingredients as a family member sets them on the counter, suggesting recipes for those items and providing instructions once a recipe is selected.
	Story Time: Visit the child’s room to be transported to Neverland. Read “Peter Pan” aloud to absorb a full multimedia experience, as cues in the story set off lights, sounds, colors and video.

RoboGames 2008

Laughing Squid has posted a couple of videos, like the one below, along with some great pics of RoboGames 2008 from San Francisco. RoboGames is, according to the website, "the world's largest open robot competition (even the Guinness Book of World Records says so!) We invite the best minds from around the world to compete in over 70 different events. Combat robots, walking humanoids, soccer bots, sumo bots, and even androids that do kung-fu. Some robots are autonomous, some are remote controlled - but they're all cool! As an open event, anyone can compete - this means you." Of course it's too late for you to get involved this year but put your thinking caps on, 2009 is just around the corner.

MLB Contemplates Instant Replay

Major League Baseball, the pro league instant replay holdout, is considering joining the likes of the NFL, NBA, and NHL and could enforce video replay as early as August according to the Associated Press. After a month that has seen a number of blown calls by umpires, the league seems serious about instituting instant replay on disputed home run calls. "It's all still premature," MLB spokesman Rich Levin said Friday. "A final decision has not been made." Fact is that the league will require an agreement with it's umpires' union before it can take action. Umpires, however, are adamant that they do not want video replay to be used to review close plays on the bases or ball-and-strike calls. Seems fair.

US Congressman Claims Computers Hacked By Chinese

Representative Frank Wolf, a Republican from Virginia, said Wednesday that the FBI found that four of his government computers have been hacked by sources working in China. Wolf is a long-time critic of China's human rights record and a spokesman for the congressman said the four computers were being used by staff members working on human rights issues. “I think this is very bad because you have the Chinese compromising and gaining access to computers of any number of members of the House and a major committee of the House,” Wolf told The Associated Press. “We don't know how many others.”

The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs had no immediate comment. Last week, China denied accusations that it's officials had secretly copied the contents of a US government laptop during a visit to China by Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and used the information to try to hack into Commerce Department computers.

Globe and Mail story here.

Google - Yahoo! Sign Non-exclusive Advertising Agreement

Google announced on Thursday a non-exclusive advertising agreement that will provide Yahoo! with access to the AdSense for search and AdSense for content advertising programs on Yahoo!'s U.S. and Canadian web sites. They also intend to work on enabling interoperability between their respective instant messaging services which is aimed at allowing users broader communication online. In a post on the Official Google Blog, Omid Kordestani, Senior VP, Global Sales and Business Development says that Google has been in contact with regulators about the deal, and that they expect to be working closely with them to answer questions about the transaction. "Ultimately we believe that the efficiencies of this agreement will help preserve competition." It seems as though Google is preparing it's defense in anticipation, check out the bolded text of Kordestani's post...