Ajax Girl

Music Plus Television Network (MusicPlusTV) is what MTV was in the 80’s: fun, young, and actually about music. It is an online music video/concert station that launched in June of 2005. Earlier this week they announced a seven-figure round of funding and licensing agreements that made us take note.

MusicPlusTV is a network of shows, each with its own genre to focus on. It reminds me a lot of D7TV, except D7TV is not music-centered and it is aimed at the mobile market. MusicPlusTV is musical content for your computer screen.

The shows stream live at scheduled times so that viewers can AIM video requests.

“AIM is actually a pretty important tool for our audience participation on just about every show we have,” said Bryan Kim, a spokesperson for MusicPlusTV. “We’ll have viewers IMing, requesting videos, questions for guests, etc. from all over the world, which is a big reason we stream live - for the interactivity.”

Shows are streamed to Windows Media Player within the browser. Kim said that MusicPlusTV’s goal is to broadcast a mixture of new bands and major-label bands. Snoop Dogg recently did a station ID for the company and other in-studio guests have included Jurassic 5, Living Legends, Jon B, Planet Asia, Blackalicious, and more. They also have several exclusive concert footage on the site.

“I would say we lean on introducing more music,” Kim said. “But the main thing is to provide a balance from all the top 40, limited playlists you get at radio stations, and MTV, and the like.”

Kim said that the company is close to seeing one million hits per month but he wouldn’t give an exact user number, nor would he disclose exactly how much funding the company received from Kenai Investment LLC.

On Wednesday, MusicPlusTV announced agreements with Windows Media Guide, Akimbo, Tvext, and Globe7 to distribute MusicPlusTV programs through their respective sites.

This is one of the coolest music video sites I’ve seen but I have to admit none of these genres are my kind of music. I don’t consume content that is nearly this hip but if I did, I would give this site full props because it is well organized, production value is high, the streams are clean, and the shows have plenty of musical content instead of some VJ who wants to chat about their own life. If I were cool, I definitely would say this company is cool.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Source: TechCrunch
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/61666158/

Just recently, we hired a new systems administrator named Mark. He lives in Virginia. That’s six hours off the GMT. One less than the current five guys in Chicago. Two less than Jamis in Idaho. So what?

He was the best of the candidates available, we’d be crazy not to pick him up, no? Well, apparently there are still plenty of “crazy” companies and hiring managers out there. People unwilling to pick the better candidate because of geography.

Jonathan gives us just one example in his an Open Letter to Job Board Advertisers. So I thought this would be a good occasion to get the excuses out there: Why are you not hiring remote workers?

Source: Signal vs. Noise
Original Article: http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/161-why-are-you-not-hiring-remote-workers

If you’re pounding the pavement looking for a Nintendo Wii or Sony PS3, then this should take a load off. We’ve heard from a credible source that Amazon is going to start selling both game consoles “in the coming days.”

Finding a Wii or a PS3 is like finding a four-leaf clover these days. Stores like Best Buy simply cannot keep them on the shelves fast enough and you have to pay through the nose to get one on eBay.

Amazon sold out of the Wii on the first day it was released in less than one minute and has not been able to keep PS3 in stock consistently at all. Our source tells us that they will be ready to take orders for both again soon, although we don’t know exactly when. Both games are available for resale on the site, but for two and three times their shelf value.

As far as we can tell, Amazon has yet to set a price for either console but we suspect that they will sell them for the retail price. It is possible that they will do a similar promotion as the one they did for Xbox in November, although not likely. Gamers can just be happy to have a sure-fire way to purchase these precious machines, rather than stand out in the cold in front of an electronics store, hoping to find gold. Good move Amazon!

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Source: TechCrunch
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/61474809/

Yahoo launched Video 3.0 in beta today. The company sent us the screenshots below to give us a preview of the new video player.

Video 3.0 will have both Firefox and Mac compatibility through flash technology, higher quality video streams, and tailored playlist capabilities. It will also allow users to control the player’s video sequence, much like Yahoo Music Unlimited and, to an extent, LAUNCHcast. There is also a social element in that it will allow for video recommendation between users.

Yahoo will distribute a media alert about the new player on Friday, at which time we will learn more about its capabilities. But we are certainly grateful for the early look!

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Source: TechCrunch
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/61405986/

Zach has picked up on google’s own corner generator.

Google probably doesn’t want this to be a corner service, but for now you can create your own google-esque corners with URLs such as:

http://groups-beta.google.com/groups/roundedcorners?c=999999&bc=white&w=4&h=4&a=tr

The parameter list:

• c - the color, as either a name or a CSS-style hex color spec (RGB or RRGGBB) sans #. The color names are taken from the CSS2 spec and are as follows: aqua, black, blue, fuchsia, gray, green, lime, maroon, navy, olive, purple, red, silver, teal, white, and yellow (thanks, anonymous commenter)
• bc - the background color, same acceptable input as c. One twist: if you leave out the bc parameter entirely, the background is transparent.
• h - height in pixels. If you leave it out, uses a default of 8.
• w - width in pixels. If you leave it out, uses a default of 8.
• a - which corner to generate; tl is top left, tr is top right, bl is bottom left, br is bottom right

Source: Ajaxian
Original Article: http://ajaxian.com/archives/googles-rounded-corner-generator

Jeffrey Sambells has written a nice intro post on Doing it Asynchronously.

If you are new to Ajax and haven’t spent much time thinking about the A part, take a peak through the article.

Source: Ajaxian
Original Article: http://ajaxian.com/archives/doing-it-asynchronously

A while back, we posted the tools we use to run and build 37signals. What tools/software do you use? Link it up.

Source: Signal vs. Noise
Original Article: http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/158-link-it-up-the-tools-you-use

Glam Media, a fashion and lifestyle Web site, has a trifecta of news today. It has received $18 million in Series C funding, CNET chairman Jarl Mohn is joining the company as an investor and strategic adviser, and there is a new partnership with Hearst Magazines to bring articles from their popular magazines, starting with Marie Claire, to Glam.com.

The funding was led by Duff Ackerman & Goodrich Ventures (DAG), with participation from existing investors Accel Partners, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, WaldenVC, and Information Capital. The money will be used to accelerate the growth of the network on the Web and expand the sales and editorial teams.

The Hearst/Marie Claire deal is a major move on the part of the fashion magazine industry. Typically high-fashion magazines horde their editorial content for their print versions. Magazine Web sites are a hodgepodge of advertising and blurbs. Bringing real magazine content to the online network is a smart move that is a long time coming. Glam Media reaches over 7 million global unique visitors per month and is a top 10 women’s property, according to comScore Media Metrix October 2006 reports. So why has it taken so long?

“From a business perspective, print magazines are an incredible place. Whereas all other offline mediums have been declining, print magazines have not been declining,” said Samir Arora, chairman and founder of Glam Media. “They’ve been steady at about 17 percent of advertising over the last five years and most of their focus is on print, as opposed to online.”

Arora pointed out that online advertising has not been geared towards women in the same way that offline magazine traditionally is.

“In 2004, under 50 percent of ecommerce was targeted towards women and in real life, that’s not the case, it’s more like 80 percent,” he said. “But when you go online, these magazines’ Web sites have largely been places to drive subscription to the print magazine. So whenever there is a medium change, it’s rare that someone that is dominating one medium also dominates the new medium.”

That’s what Glam wants to do and the notion that women-targeted networks should be more than short workouts and bathing suit ads is the right way to go about it, which this woman thinks makes the company a good investment.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Source: TechCrunch
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/61346988/

Feedburner

The “ize” have it at Feedburner, which offers a tab called “Troubleshootize.”

YouTube

YouTube’s scheduled downtime screen features a mad scientist cooking up new concoctions.

Gifttagging

Gifttagging gets literal with tags that look like real-life tags.

Got an interesting screenshot for Signal vs. Noise? Send the image and/or URL to svn [at] 37signals [dot] com.

Source: Signal vs. Noise
Original Article: http://www.37signals.com/svn/posts/150-screens-around-town-feedburner-youtube-and-gifttagging-get-clever

Ten Ships has announced AjaxDNS, the latest Ajax based DNS and hosting admin tools.

It includes:

• Live DNS
• Whois Search
• IP Whois
• HTTP Headers
• RBL Search
• Ping
• DNS Traversal

Source: Ajaxian
Original Article: http://ajaxian.com/archives/ajax-dns-dns-tools