When Apple TV was launched four years ago, it bombed - but this autumn, with YouView Apple has one more shot. The new Apple TV is tiny not much bigger than the iPhone and costs just $99 . Its exterior temperature is also far less alarming. The hard drive has been stripped out. To use, it's as simple as a set-top box, with Internet radio, films and your home PC video libraries popping up from a single menu. You can also watch YouTube, although typing via remote is an unbearable fiddle that leaves co-viewers fidgeting. Whatever you're watching though is colourful and clear - although it's 720p, not full HD.

Rival film rental services offered by game consoles largely offfer 'male interest' films packed with aliens and explosions. Apple TV is refershingly uni-sex. And it's far better controlling it using an iPhone app than the finicky metal remote.

3D soundscape

Now, 3D soundscape to updates your Facebook, Twitter. AudioFeeds, software that provides 3D soundscape, could soon be alerting you, via your headphones, to updates on your social network and news feeds. The software announces Facebook updates such as friend requests with watery sounds like drips, bubbles and splashes. Bird calls are reserved for Twitter, while musical sounds such as didgeridoo or wind chime alert you to news stories. It achieves the 3D effect by adjusting the phase, or timing of the sounds delivered to your left and right earphones. The idea is to tell you what is going on in your social networks in a non-intrusive way.

Overall the Apple TV is all about getting the max out of your TV viewing experience.

So tell me if you are impressed and will by one? =)

Wondering about which are the top Twitter lists?, here is the list of the Top 20 Twitter lists:

1.TopBrasil-helphaiti by rafadefine

Twitter has become a big buzz on the web over the last couple of years and here are some facts about it:

1. Twitter was mostly funded through venture capitalists who funded most of the $ 50 million, Twitter is still operating on.

2.Twitter was founded in 2006 and for the first 3 years as a company Twitter made a total of ‘zero’ dollars in revenues.

3. Twitter is expected to make 1.54 billion dollars by the end of 2013 with over a billion users.

4. Twitter has over over 65 millions tweets everyday and that averages to 1000 tweets per second.

5. There are over 70,000 registered applications for Twitter created mostly by people who have no connection to Twitter.

6.The first tweet on Twitter was by Jack Dorsey and the tweet was “Just setting up my twttr” on 21st March 2006.


7.Twitter handles 24 billion search queries a month. Yahoo handles 9.4 billion search queries and Bing handles about 4.1 search queries. This means Twitter is the ranked #2 search engine behind Google which handles about 88 billion search queries.

The New Facebook Groups has arrived and here are 5 things you need to know about it:

Buddies Only

Since only your Facebook friends can add you to groups, using Facebook as a place to connect with people you actually know becomes more important than ever. Facebook is assuming that your real friends won't use this new power maliciously to add you to groups that might embarrass you, according to Search Engine Land.

If you have 1000 Facebook friends, but you actually know only half of them, the chances you'll be added to groups you don't want to be a part of are probably pretty high. This could expose you to malicious links to phishing sites and other types of Facebook malware. Then again, friending people you didn't know was probably putting you at risk for malicious behavior long before the new groups feature appeared.

Power Option

Everyone probably knows a few jokers who might think it's funny to add you to a group with a controversial title. But if there's a trend to add people to joke groups, my guess is these pranks will die off pretty quickly. If one of your friends doesn't cut it out with the joke groups, you always have the option to unsubscribe. In fact, unsubscribing is more powerful than you might realize.

When Arrington added Zuckerberg to the NAMBLA joke group, the Facebook CEO unsubscribed. Not only did that keep Zuckerberg out of NAMBLA, but it also blocked Arrington from ever adding Zuckerberg to another group.

That might be a bit extreme, but it shows that Facebook wants you to make prudent choices about the groups you pull your friends into. Again, however, I have to reiterate there's no question it would be better to opt-in to a new group rather than opt-out.

No Crowd Control

Anyone in a Facebook Group can add their Facebook friends to a group, which could quickly get out of hand if you wanted to limit a group's size. The group administrator does, however, have the power to delete members and even ban them from the group permanently.

When starting a new group it might be wise to lay down the ground rules with other members if you want to minimize its size.

E-mail Buzz

Groups Notifications (click to enlarge)A lot of early critics are complaining that e-mail notifications for a new group can quickly fill up your inbox. By default, you will get an e-mail for every action taken in a group. To change this, click on "Edit Notifications" or "Edit Settings" in the top right corner of the group page. When the pop-up window appears uncheck the box next to "send email notifications to."

You can also control what kind of Facebook notifications appear on your newsfeed page from this window. Choices include receiving notifications for all group posts or comments, only new posts by group members, only posts by your Facebook friends in that group, or only posts that you've written or commented on.

Still some Buggs

In some tests, the new Groups feature had some strange behavior. Adding new members to a group, for example, often produced error messages. Sometimes the person I wanted to add would be added anyway, sometimes they wouldn't.

And there is difficulty in creating new text documents in groups. However, these problems might be due to the fact that the new functionality hasn't actually rolled out to all account yet.

I would love to hear your comments and your experience with new facebook groups so please share them with me =).

1.Gmail goggles

Turn on Mail Goggles before heading out for drinks. The feature, which is a hit with party animals, prevents you from sending out reckless declarations of love or hatred. It makes you do some math before allowing you hit 'Send'. Cant't do the math? You'll need to log off and return tomorrow.

2.Message Recall

Some office mail applications have this option but it only works if the message hasn't been read yet and if the recipient lets you recall it.

3.Facebook faux pas

And finally one for FB, Did your friend upload an unflattering photo of yours and ignore requests to delete it? Click on 'remove tag'. It will still be online but won't show up in your list.

4.No comments

If you made a comment on a public forum and there's no delete option, change your display name so it doesn't show up in search results for your real name.

5.Confidential chat

On Google chat, select "Go off the record" to prevent chats from being saved and reproduced.

Connect, listen, watch, surf and play on five inches of power with the Dell Streak Tablet.

Powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8250 mobile processor, it combines the features of a smartphone and a tablet, and has a built-in 3G HSUPA, Wi-fi and Bluetooth.The Gorilla Glass display on the multi-touch WVGA screen resists damage, and integrated social media apps makes networking easier.

There is also a 5 MP camera with flash, expandable memory, and a Snapdragon QSD8250 chipset with integrated 1GHz processor to make multi-tasking easier. The Android open source lets you access and download Google Android Market's Apps.

And at less than 10mm thickness,the Streak slips easily into a pocket or purse.

Well its a fact that TechCrunch is now in AOL's hands. This is how it all started, according to TechCrunch's Founder Michael Arrington:

"In May I had a chance to interview Tim on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt: New York. After the talk we went to the speaker room for a quick private chat (this happens after most talks unless the speaker has to rush out).

Tim asked me how things were going at TechCrunch. I told him I was exhausted after five years but that a recent move to Seattle made it easier to balance my life. I joked that I was half retired.

“That’s too bad, he said, we’d love to acquire you but we’d need to know you would stick around.”

“Wait. What? Yeah I’m great! Lots of energy, I’m having so much fun! Will probably do this for the rest of my life.” "

As Michael says he stays on(A crucial thing for TechCrunch) and according to him there was no discussion about that thereafter until late july when the discussions started again and the deal came through. The reason why Michael Arrington decided to go for the deal is that he was tired of solving tech issues and engineering issues on the site, he rather wanted to focus only on writing and not breaking his head on solving technical issues.

What it means for 'TechCrunch the Brand'?

The TechCrunch comes under AOL and its blogging network and there is absolutely no worries for TechCrunch on issues concerning the site engineering and they would focus on writing some leg pulling content as they do so often. And to add to that TechCrunch as brand under AOL's Marketing and it should go places.

On a closing note this is what Michael Arrington had to say:

"On a final note, I don’t want to get all teary-eyed here, but the best comment I ever saw on TechCrunch was years ago in response to when I quipped something like “This is my blog and I’ll write what I want” in response to a troll. The response was “No Mike, This is OUR blog. You just work here.” "

Mario is the most identifiable character in the video game history, making innumerable appearances in games that not only see him star as the protagonist, but also as a race car driver, street-fighter, basketball player, snowboarder and all-round brilliant sportsperson. His cameo appearances(often included in games as 'Easter Eggs') are world famous as well.

Created by acclaimed game designer Shigeru Miyamoto back in 1981, Mario would make his debut as a video game character that same year as 'Jumpman', in fact, he would turn 29 this year, but he would make his first appearance as the main protagonist in Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo's NES console only five years later. While Platforming games were not entirely uncommon at the time, they often lacked complexity and depth. Super Mario Bros. would change all of that with a gameplay system whose fundamental mechanics form the basis for platformers of today, a whole 25 years later.

What's new for Mario? Well, with the release of Super Mario Galaxy 2 he has reinforced his position as the video game industry's undisputed champion thanks to a Metacritic aggregate of 97. One of the highest rated games of all time, Super Mario Galaxy 2 develops on the hugely successful Super Mario Galaxy adding features such as co-operative gameplay(a huge hit in New Super Mario Bros. Wii), the ability to ride the dinosaur Yoshi and dozens of new, exciting power-ups. But it looks like Mario is not planning another adventure any time soon. His next appearance will be at the 'Game of the Year' awards at the end of the year, when Super Mario will collect with his trademark non-chalance.

Happy birthday,Mario! and thanks for the number finger-breaking, yet fun hours in front of our TV sets.