Okay, so my earlier story about how Amazon is messing with International Kindle users made a bit of a splash. Quite a few things came up in my investigations before and after the story, but the basic fact remains: Amazon will add a fixed $2.00 surcharge to most items (which may or may [...]]]> Filed under: Business

Okay, so my earlier story about how Amazon is messing with International Kindle users made a bit of a splash. Quite a few things came up in my investigations before and after the story, but the basic fact remains: Amazon will add a fixed $2.00 surcharge to most items (which may or may not be a “roaming charge”) if you’re an international customer, even if you’re using a WiFi-only device.

But I’ve now discovered something interesting enough to warrant a follow-up: It turns out that if you go to Amazon’s Manage My Kindle page, you can simply set your country.

I think you must specify a valid address in your destination country (I supplied a valid one in Canada), but Amazon then simply takes your word for it.

As soon as I switched my country from Israel to Canada, the extra $2.00 per book simply disappeared. I could also suddenly subscribe to the NYT. I didn’t actually try to do it, but it appears to be possible. Another side-effect was that Michael Pollan’s Food Rules was suddenly unavailable, whereas before I was actually to buy the title for $7.20 (when my location was listed as “Israel”).

What’s interesting is that in talking to four different Amazon reps, not a single one has mentioned this option. Also, Amazon can easily verify your actual location in two different ways - IP address or billing address. Yet, for some interesting reason, they choose to let you specify the address manually, and then take your word for it.

To me, this feels like a legal work-around they’ve had to take due to content restrictions and distributors insisting on various deals. Could it be that this shifts the legal responsibility to the customer rather than leave it with Amazon? Maybe I’m completely off-base here, but I think such weird complications are often lawyer-induced.

Note that I still don’t have the device itself, so I can’t fully guarantee that this works, and for all I know, they might plug this hole tomorrow. What I can tell you is that right now it does change the pricing and availability of many Kindle items.

International Kindle users: change your country to avoid additional fees originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 02 Sep 2010 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Despite what you may have heard in the last two weeks, Digg is not dead. It is, however, a very different service than when it started. What used to be a great place to find interesting links and hilarious commentary has become, for almost all intents and purposes, [...]]]> Filed under: Features, Social Software, web 2.0, Lists

Despite what you may have heard in the last two weeks, Digg is not dead. It is, however, a very different service than when it started. What used to be a great place to find interesting links and hilarious commentary has become, for almost all intents and purposes, a Twitter clone.

Digg isn’t about to shut its doors, but I do get the feeling that regular, loyal Diggers are looking to take their custom elsewhere. Judging by the ‘Reddit incident‘ on Monday, where Digg users revolted in favor of Reddit, it looks like a mass exodus might already have begun.

So, if you’re a disenfranchised Digger, or if you’re just looking for the best of the rest when it comes to social news aggregators and content discovery, take a look at this list of alternatives!

StumbleUpon

In my opinion, StumbleUpon is actually the most similar service to Digg — at least if you’re an end-user, rather than a ‘Power Digger’. StumbleUpon is, without a doubt, the best way to discover the Web’s hidden gems. In any given ’stumbling’ session you can (and will) discover innumerable sites and pictures that make you go ‘ooooh’.

The other great thing about StumbleUpon is that it learns from your browsing habits. By simply filling in your interests, and by processing which sites you thumbs-up or thumbs-down, SU tailors what kind of sites you’ll be shown while stumbling.

There’s also commenting, though they take the form of ‘reviews’, and there’s no meta moderation — just a raw stream of how much users love or hate a given website.

I’ve heard tales of people losing whole days to stumbling sessions. It’s a little too easy to pop open a new tab and hit the ’stumble’ button on the toolbar.

Reddit

Ah, Reddit. It’s almost like a rags-to-riches story, with Reddit playing the role of Cinderella and Digg the ugly step-sister. Both services launched around 2005, but Digg has always received all of the riches and glory. Digg’s new overhaul could mark the end of its supremacy, but I don’t think Reddit is the natural ‘next stop’ for Diggers.

Reddit is completely different from Digg, but in a good way. You will still find a lot of fun and cool links on its home page, but it’s actually more of a forum than anything else. You can post pictures, links or simply begin a discussion thread. Just like Digg, meta moderation is a key aspect of Reddit posts and comments, so funny and insightful commentary always bubbles to the top.

What sets Reddit apart is its huge list of boards (or categories). Check the right-hand list — and also note how you can tailor your front page to show only the categories you’re interested in. I love how each category, no matter how esoteric, has an even mix of text-only discussion and fantastic website links. It’s a bit like a meta moderated 4chan…

As a crowning cherry, Reddit is also incredibly lightweight in terms of layout and interface. Page load times are, as a result, very fast.

Slashdot is, in many ways, the father of all modern news aggregators, and is actually a blog. News is submitted by users, and then Slashdot’s authors pick and choose which items make it onto the site itself, sometimes adding their own commentary. The comments are where things really kick off, though, with some stories seeing more than 10,000 comments — and of course, there is meta moderation, so you can choose what kind of comments you want to see; funny, insightful, informative or interesting.

If you like a more ‘curated’ news source, Slashdot is definitely the one for you. It’s often not as ‘bleeding edge’ as Digg or Reddit, but in many cases, who cares if you hear about a technology breakthrough a day or two later?

Twitter

Don’t hurt me! Yes, really, Twitter is a fantastic alternative to Digg.

I think we can all agree that Twitter is by far the best option when it comes to timeliness, but how do you sort the cream from the cruft? Twitter lacks meta moderation, so your best bet is follow twitterers that have already done the filtering for you.

It’s pretty damn hard to sort tweeters by quality, but with directories like WeFollow and the lists at Listorious you can hit the ground running. It will be a bit hit and miss, but having the ability to curate your own news stream made from excellent, insightful and timely tweets is unbeatable. Be brutal with your unfollowing — and follow lots of new people too! — and you should have a veritable Ganges of cool content to sift through.

And of course, with millions of potential commenters, Twitter can be a goldmine for contemporary commentary too.

Yahoo! Buzz

To finish, I’m including a service that is, basically, old Digg. Yahoo Buzz, launched in 2008 (well before Google Buzz!), is almost completely derived from Digg. From what I can tell, the only real difference is slight editorial control over what appears on the front page.

As you’d suspect from Yahoo, Buzz is slightly more mature than both Digg and Reddit. A lot of the story submitters are just random Yahoo users (and thus, many of the popular stories are written by Yahoo!), but there’s plenty of content from across the World Wide Web. You won’t find any funny cat pictures or infographics, however!

Yahoo Buzz also has an editor-maintained site called The Buzz Log, which provides a great overview of the world’s most important and interesting news.

Finally, there are localized versions of Buzz, with the top stories from UK & Ireland, Brazil, Mexico and so on.

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5 great content discovery sites which aren’t Digg originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If we’re to believe this new job posting over at Valve, reports of Steam for Linux’s death may have been greatly exaggerated. As you can see, Valve is on the hunt for a senior engineer who can port Windows games to Linux.

If you recall VP Doug Lombardi’s actual words, he never said [...]]]> Filed under: Games, Linux

If we’re to believe this new job posting over at Valve, reports of Steam for Linux’s death may have been greatly exaggerated. As you can see, Valve is on the hunt for a senior engineer who can port Windows games to Linux.

If you recall VP Doug Lombardi’s actual words, he never said Steam for Linux was dead — only that they weren’t currently working on it. Maybe that’s because they just hadn’t found the right man or woman for the job yet. As Sebastian pointed out to me, this doesn’t necessarily mean “Steam for desktop Linux” — it could just as easily have to do with embedded gaming.

Whatever the case may be, the news is certainly a bit more encouraging than Lombardi’s interview.

[via Tech Drive-In]

update: as Kaushik points out (as do a few of our friends at Reddit) this one’s a tad on the old-and-moldy side. Linux gamers, return to your pining…

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Renewed hope for Steam on Linux: Valve job boards looking for engineer to port Windows games originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 02 Sep 2010 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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I recently went on a search to find a good color picker for Windows that was both portable and fast so that I could stop making the trip to Photoshop whenever I needed to find a color value.

After trying a number of different applications, I was delighted to find ColorPix (an app from [...]]]> Filed under: Design

I recently went on a search to find a good color picker for Windows that was both portable and fast so that I could stop making the trip to Photoshop whenever I needed to find a color value.

After trying a number of different applications, I was delighted to find ColorPix (an app from ColorSchemer, who is the developer behind the previously mentioned ColorSchemer Studio 2).

ColorPix has an interesting lock and unlock mechanic for selecting the color that you want to find. While the application is active, hitting any key will unlock the picker, which you can then move anywhere on your screen. Once you’ve found the color, hitting any key again will lock it in so that you don’t accidentally nudge the mouse while clicking to make your selection. It also includes a magnifier window to help with pixel precession at several different levels of zoom.

Once you’ve locked in a color, you can click anywhere on the RGB, HEX, HSB, or CMYK values and copy the individual color for the mode that you’re working in directly to the clipboard. If you want the HEX value, you can use the Ctrl+C shortcut to get it even faster.

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My typical workflow consists of hitting Alt+Tab (to make ColorPix active), hitting Space to unlock the picker, finding the color I want, hitting Space again to lock it in, using the Ctrl+C shortcut to copy the HEX value, and then pressing Alt+Tab again to go back to the application that I’m working in. The grand total of time that I’m using is usually less then 15 seconds.

The only two features that I’d love to see added would be support for the HSL color mode and an option to change the RGB scale from 0-255 to 0-1.

ColorPix weighs in at about 600 KB and doesn’t require an installation; that makes it perfect for storing on Dropbox so that it is readily available whenever I need it.

Apps like ColorPix make my workflow a little faster and my life a little easier. It’s become one of my favorite productivity boosters that I use any time I’m doing design work. If you do a lot with color, it’s definitely worth a download.

ColorPix is a fast, free Windows color picker originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 02 Sep 2010 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sure, Apple’s been stealing most of the blog headlines this afternoon, but Microsoft has some pretty big news of their own. Today, Windows Phone 7 was officially released to manufacturing — and the boys in Redmond are pretty stoked about it.

Microsoft’s Terry Myerson certainly sounds pumped in the official blog [...]]]> Filed under: OS Updates, Windows Mobile

Sure, Apple’s been stealing most of the blog headlines this afternoon, but Microsoft has some pretty big news of their own. Today, Windows Phone 7 was officially released to manufacturing — and the boys in Redmond are pretty stoked about it.

Microsoft’s Terry Myerson certainly sounds pumped in the official blog post. “We’ve had thousands of independent software vendors and early adopters testing our software and giving us great feedback. We are ready.”

As the Engadget crew points out, devices are unquestionably on their way — but we’re more interested in seeing some kick-butt apps and games… Which are also no doubt just around the corner.

Windows Phone 7 goes RTM originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 16:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Mac-loving engineers and architects, get excited: AutoCAD is finally coming to the Mac, and iOS devices, too. The last time AutoCAD ran natively on a Mac was well before OS X, before iPhones, and possibly before time itself: 1992. Let’s not revisit those dark times, though, let’s think about what [...]]]> Filed under: Utilities, Macintosh, Productivity, iPhone

Mac-loving engineers and architects, get excited: AutoCAD is finally coming to the Mac, and iOS devices, too. The last time AutoCAD ran natively on a Mac was well before OS X, before iPhones, and possibly before time itself: 1992. Let’s not revisit those dark times, though, let’s think about what this means for the future: no more running Windows on Parallels or Boot Camp just so you can have your Mac at work!

The Mac interface will be the same familiar AutoCAD everyone is used to from the Windows version, but it’s been Mac-fied with Cover Flow and Multi-Touch pan and zoom. It uses AutoCAD’s standard DWG document format, too, so it will play nicely with the Windows version (and some other CAD software.) The iPad version could be pretty amazing for presentations or changing a design on the fly, though. I can see the iPad becoming a stable in many architects’ offices.

AutoCAD finally arrives on Mac — iPad and iPhone, too! originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Apple has finally unveiled iTunes 10, and it comes with Ping, a built-in social network for music. Based on Steve Jobs’ demo, Ping looks just like a Facebook/Twitter hybrid. The social graph connects the same way Twitter’s does — with a “follow” system, and a single on-or-off privacy [...]]]> Filed under: Audio, Web services, Apple, Social Software

Apple has finally unveiled iTunes 10, and it comes with Ping, a built-in social network for music. Based on Steve Jobs’ demo, Ping looks just like a Facebook/Twitter hybrid. The social graph connects the same way Twitter’s does — with a “follow” system, and a single on-or-off privacy setting — but the activity stream is very reminiscent of Facebook. Posting photos and comments and “liking” things are all part of the package.

The music side reminds me of a third social network: last.fm. It uses iTunes data to create custom charts based on the people you follow. Bands can have their own Ping accounts, too, where they can be followed and interact with fans. If you follow a band, you’ll get alerts when they’re playing shows near you, and you can click a button to indicate that you’re going. Of course, it’s all pulled off with Apple’s typical visual slickness.

The new iTunes 10 logo might be the bigger topic of controversy amongst design nerds. We all knew it was time for the CD to go (iTunes downloads now outsell CDs, anyway), but what do we think of the new glowing blue circle?

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iTunes 10 introduces Ping social network for music (and a new logo!) originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 14:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Twitter - Facebook - Apple - Steve Jobs - Social network
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In the latest Chrome Canary update, Labs has [...]]]> Filed under: Google, Browsers

About:labs lands in Google Chrome — brings tab overview to Mac, side tabs to Windows originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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With so much continued competition surrounding the HTML5 video and canvas tags, one of the other major additions to the HTML5 specification has been all but forgotten by the media: HTML5 audio. Fortunately, the bearded magicians at Mozilla have slightly more foresight than we blood-seeking bloggers, and as a result Firefox [...]]]> Filed under: Audio, Mozilla, Browsers

With so much continued competition surrounding the HTML5 video and canvas tags, one of the other major additions to the HTML5 specification has been all but forgotten by the media: HTML5 audio. Fortunately, the bearded magicians at Mozilla have slightly more foresight than we blood-seeking bloggers, and as a result Firefox 4 has a very cool new addition: the Audio Data API.

If you don’t have Firefox 4 installed, or if you just want a quick overview of what you can expect from the next generation of HTML5 Web apps, watch the video above. If you have a nightly build of Firefox 4, play with the demos yourself! The ‘beat detectors’ require WebGL, which is easy enough to install.

As I discuss in the video, HTML5 audio has some really exciting applications. Combined with WebGL, in-the-browser, standards-compliant (cross-browser!) games become a reality. We’ll soon see a YouTube Web app that lets you edit both video and audio — you’ll be able to normalize sound, play with individual channels, cut, splice and so on. How about TV-to-the-browser, with the end-user retaining complete control over the audio stream and its playback? Or, best of all, volume normalization — imagine an HTML5 add-on that simply turns down the volume on really noisy pages. Bliss.

Finally, if you’re a developer, or if you just want to play around with HTML5 audio, Mozilla already has some JavaScript libraries that make the development process both easy and fast. If you need proof, right click and view the source code behind the demos — most of them use just a few lines of code!

I can’t believe we’re now able to write music with JavaScript… what a crazy and wonderful world we live in.

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Check out some awesome HTML5 audio demos with Firefox 4 (video) originally appeared on Download Squad on Wed, 01 Sep 2010 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Mozilla - Firefox 4 - Mozilla Firefox - HTML5 - WebGL
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