Archive for November 17th, 2007

Update On AdultFriendFinder Acquisition - Penthouse May Be The Buyer

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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More on the acquisition rumor from yesterday - another source now says they were acquired by Penthouse Media Group, and the price was closer to $500 million. While the buyer and size of the transaction are still somewhat vague, it seems clear from multiple sources now that Various, Inc., the parent company to Adult FriendFinder and other sites, has been acquired.

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/~3/186388508/

$5 Million For Synthasite

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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Well I guess Synthasite wasn’t all that desperate after all. The South African company has raised a $5 million round of financing to support their easy-to-use web page builder from Compagnie Financière Richemont’s subsidiary, Swiss-based Columbus Venture Capital.

We first covered the company in late 2006.

Loading information about Synthasite…

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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/~3/186373568/

Nokia’s Viral Web 2.0 Video

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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Well, the song is catchy, I’ll give them that. Thanks for the tip Orli.

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

Source: TechCrunch
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/186368482/

“A fast guy in tights and a movie about Coffee”

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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Dilbert on Ajax

Source: Ajaxian
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/ajaxian/~3/186331196/a-fast-guy-in-tights-and-a-movie-about-coffee

23andme: Evil Or The Way Of The Future?

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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23andme.jpg23andMe, the genetics company founded by Sergey Brin’s wife Anne Wojcicki will launch Monday with a service that will bring science fiction into reality.

23andMe will offer a genetic screening service for $999. The short story is that 23andMe will administer a test (presumable a swab) that will take your DNA and screen it. In return you will be told your genetic history including whether you are likely to suffer from a range of diseases or similar life altering events, including heart disease.

I cant help but think of the 1997 Ethan Hawke/ Uma Thurman movie Gattaca where “during this time society analyzes your DNA and determines where you belong in life;” 23andme is the first step towards that vision. If you thought Google’s already considerable power was of concern, consider that Google invested $3.9 million in the company in May; I’m not suggesting that Google is about to commence an index of the planets DNA, but well…no one really knows why Google invested in the company aside from Brin’s marital relationship.

I’m sure we all want to know what diseases we might end up with in the future, and in the development of human knowledge the accessibility of 23andMe’s product is a step forward..but I still cant help but feel a little concerned.

The below video is an interview 23andMe’s founders Linda Avey and Anne Wojcicki did with Wired.

Loading information about 23andMe…

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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/~3/186220080/

3D Canvas in Opera

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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Tim Johansson is talking about Opera’s support for a 3d Canvas which differs from Mozilla’s in that it doesn’t map directly to OpenGL, which they did because:

  • It makes it easier to implement on non-OpenGL platforms (such as D3D)
  • We wanted to have some form of collision detection available

What can you do? Here is the interface that you get to work with:

JAVASCRIPT:

  1.  
  2. interface CanvasRenderingContextOpera3D {
  3.  
  4.   // state
  5.   void save(); // push state on state stack
  6.   void restore(); // pop state stack and restore state
  7.  
  8.   // scene/frame
  9.   void beginScene(); // start rendering a new frame
  10.   void endScene(); // finish rendering of the scene and present the result
  11.  
  12.   // transformations
  13.   void translate(in float x, in float y, in float z);
  14.   void scale(in float x, in float y, in float z);
  15.   void rotateX(in float rotation);
  16.   void rotateY(in float rotation);
  17.   void rotateZ(in float rotation);
  18.  
  19.   // rendering operation
  20.   void drawTriangle(in float x1, in float y1, in float z1, in float tex_s1, in float tex_t1,
  21.       in float x2, in float y2, in float z2, in float tex_s2, in float tex_t2,
  22.       in float x3, in float y3, in float z3, in float tex_s3, in float tex_t3);
  23.   void draw3DModel(in Canvas3DModel model);
  24.  
  25.   // create objects
  26.   CanvasTexture createTexture(in Image img);
  27.   Canvas3DModel create3DModel();
  28.  
  29.   // collision detection
  30.   string checkIntersection(in float x, in float y, in float z, in float radius, in Canvas3DModel model);
  31.  
  32.   // rendering state
  33.   attribute CanvasTexture texture; // current texture or null for no texture, default is null
  34.   attribute string color; // current color, default is transparent black
  35.   attribute float fov; // field of view of the scene in degrees, default is 45
  36.   attribute float nearPlane; // distance to the near clipping plane, default is 0.1
  37.   attribute float farPlane; // distance to the far clipping plane, default is 100
  38.   attribute string ztest; // "none", "less", "lessequal", "greater", "greaterequal", "equal", "notequal". Default is "lessequal"
  39.   attribute string blend; // "replace", "add", "srcalpha", "multiply". Default is "replace"
  40. };
  41.  
  42. interface Canvas3DModel {
  43.   void addVertex(in float x, in float y, in float z, in float s, in float t);
  44.   void addTriangle(in integer vertex1, in integer vertex2, in integer vertex3);
  45. };
  46.  
  47. interface CanvasTexture{
  48. };
  49.  

And, here is an example of a rotating cube (which you can see if you are using a new Opera build).

HTML:

  1.  
  2. <canvas id=”canvas” width=”200″ height=”200″>
  3.   Canvas not supported!
  4. </canvas>
  5.  
  7.   var canvas;
  8.   var context3d;
  9.   var rotation;
  10.   var texture;
  11.   var cube;
  12.   function render(){
  13.     context3d.beginScene();
  14.     context3d.translate(0,0,-5);
  15.     context3d.rotateY(rotation);
  16.     context3d.rotateX(rotation);
  17.     rotation += 2;
  18.     context3d.color = "white";
  19.     context3d.draw3DModel(cube);
  20.     context3d.endScene();
  21.   }
  22.   function onTick(){
  23.     render();
  24.   }
  25.   function onload(){
  26.     canvas = document.getElementById("canvas");
  27.     context3d = canvas.getContext("opera-3d");
  28.     if (!context3d)
  29.     {
  30.       alert("3d canvas not supported");
  31.       return;
  32.     }
  33.     logo = new Image();
  34.     logo.src = "operalogo.png";
  35.     texture = context3d.createTexture(logo);
  36.     context3d.texture = texture;
  37.  
  38.     cube = context3d.create3DModel();
  39.     cube.addVertex(-1, 1, 1, 0, 0);
  40.     cube.addVertex(1, 1, 1, 1, 0);
  41.     cube.addVertex(-1, -1, 1, 0, 1);
  42.     cube.addVertex(1, -1, 1, 1, 1);
  43.     cube.addVertex(-1, 1, -1, 1, 1);
  44.     cube.addVertex(1, 1, -1, 0, 1);
  45.     cube.addVertex(-1, -1, -1, 1, 0);
  46.     cube.addVertex(1, -1, -1, 0, 0);
  47.  
  48.     cube.addTriangle(0,1,2);
  49.     cube.addTriangle(2,1,3);
  50.     cube.addTriangle(4,5,6);
  51.     cube.addTriangle(6,5,7);
  52.     cube.addTriangle(0,4,2);
  53.     cube.addTriangle(2,4,6);
  54.     cube.addTriangle(1,5,3);
  55.     cube.addTriangle(3,5,7);
  56.     cube.addTriangle(0,4,1);
  57.     cube.addTriangle(1,4,5);
  58.     cube.addTriangle(2,6,3);
  59.     cube.addTriangle(3,6,7);
  60.  
  61.     setInterval(onTick, 10);
  62.   }
  63.   document.onload = onload();
  64. </script>
  65.  

Source: Ajaxian
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/ajaxian/~3/186216954/3d-canvas-in-opera

Whoa: Adult FriendFinder May Have Been Acquired For $1 Billion+

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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The world’s basest online dating site may have had a major liquidity event. Palo Alto based Various, Inc., which owns AdultFriendFinder and scores of other sites, has been acquired, says a source with knowledge of the deal. This is a single source rumor, but the quality of the source suggests, as it has in the past, that the rumor is accurate.

The company, which was founded by Andrew Conru, is rumored to now have revenues in excess of $300 million annually. The acquisition price is said to be 3x revenue, or around $1 billion.

We’re digging now for confirmation of the deal, and to find out who the buyer is. There’s a recent article on the company with deep background information here.

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/~3/186189117/

eBay Not Afraid To Promote Unlocked iPhones Outside iPhone Territories

Written by on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 in Ajax News.

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Since the first time Apple’s iPhone was unlocked there has been a thriving market internationally for unlocked iPhones. The practice itself is legal in many countries, but it’s a practice Apple will not be pleased about, and may well try to argue is a breach of their terms and conditions in some way or another.

eBay has long been the best place for anyone outside of the United States to buy an unlocked iPhone, but today eBay has taken their unlocked iPhone selling to another level by using iPhones as a major promotional tool as this screenshot from eBay Australia demonstrates:

ebay.jpg

Clicking on iPhone image above on ebay.com.au takes you direct to iPhone listings.

iPhones in Australia at least are no longer making the four figure sums they once were on eBay. An unlocked 8GB iPhone today averages around AUD $700 ($628), still a reasonable premium on the $399 ticket price + sales tax.

Apple won’t be pleased, but there isn’t a lot they can do. Importation of iPhones is legal in Australia, as is unlocking them. The warranties are void, and it’s hard to get any sort of support for them locally; I visited an Apple reseller yesterday who told me that they’re not allowed to even talk about the iPhone, let alone suggest an FM transmitter that might work with the iPhone I had in my pocket.

The eBay prices may sound a lot, but to buy a high end Nokia outright (ie not on a plan) is actually more expensive, so they become an appealing item with a reasonable price. Unlocked iPhones are now readily available in ever increasing quantities around the globe; the longer Apple holds back on international expansion the lesser market they will have when they eventually expand supported iPhone territories.

thanks to Bryce for the tip

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

Source: TechCrunch
Original Article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/186173752/


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