lab

MingleNow, one of the first few social networks to promote companies making their own social networking profiles, will be closing up its doors in early January. We wrote about the company at its late-2006 launch, and from the looks of site activity, things appeared to be doing reasonably well. While the company's blog post about the closure is ambiguous at best, a good guess would be that Yahoo (parent company of BlueLithium Labs) did not see much worth in maintaining a social network that directly competed with at least four of its other properties including Upcoming, Flickr, Mash, and … Read more

There's no denying the mobile version of Safari found on the iPod and iPhone Touch offers an above-average browsing experience for a portable device. That said, the software is not without its shortcomings, and one of them is how it handles links found on various Web pages. Depending on how they've been coded by the author, links can be set to open up in a new window or tab, or simply in the same page. Usually you don't find this out until you click on them, which can be a juggle considering the device is only capable … Read more

We've just witnessed a potentially disturbing marriage of basic street crime and the instant worldwide audience provided by video sharing and social networking sites such as YouTube and MySpace.

Criminals have often recorded their exploits for fun, but the ease of online sharing means that almost everyone can now witness assorted muggings, fights, and robberies from the safety of a laptop screen. At the same time, crimes posted to the Web get instant attention from law enforcement and the press, essentially acting as online wanted posters for the perpetrators. A perfect example is a recent subway attack video first … Read more

In an ideal world, there should be a wonder box that does everything under the sun. Perhaps something like Doraemon; a Japanese anime robot cat and his magical pocket with its endless supply of gadgets and tools. That may be light years away but, in the meantime, SE2 Labs has an entertainment super-machine that looks like a mini-computer server.

Dubbed ITC One, it packs an Xbox 360, HD personal video recorder, surround-sound processor, digital audio amplifier, 4.3-inch touchscreen, iPod dock, and remote control system all in a single box, according to Chip Chick. Pricing-wise, you will need to fork … Read more

Grisoft, maker of AVG antivirus and Internet security software, on Wednesday announced the acquisition of Exploit Prevention Labs, maker of the LinkScanner family of safe Web-browsing applications.

Unlike other safe-surfing applications, which tend to rely on databases, LinkScanner uses technology that determines, as the page is downloaded onto your browser, whether it is tainted with malicious software.

In CNET Reviews testing, LinkScanner has detected recent changes on Web pages where other safe surfing applications, such as McAfee SiteAdvisor, has not. One limitation of LinkScanner is its inability to determine whether a page is fraudulent; LinkScanner determines only whether the page … Read more

Over on Dean Takahashi's San Jose Mercury News blog today, he reported on the discovery by a pair of security researchers that it may be possible to steal Second Life users' in-world currency.

That would be a big problem, of course, because the currency, known as Linden dollars, are directly convertible to U.S. dollars.

According to Takahashi's story, hackers Charles Miller and Dino Dai Zovi told him that they have uncovered an exploit that could allow someone to fleece Second Life residents of their Linden dollars.

The exploit is related to Apple's QuickTime software, which is … Read more

Maybe virtual world publishers do belong inside the magic circle after all.

On Sunday I wrote about an interesting situation that arose after the sad and tragic death of one-half of the Second Life fashion design team known to most as the avatar Ginny Talamasca.

In the wake of the designer's passing, Katt Kongo, the publisher of the Second Life newspaper, Metaverse Messenger, proposed having SL publisher Linden Lab designate April 17, 2008 "Ginny Talamasca Day."

But Kongo's proposal, which she made in an e-mail to a number of SL residents, including myself, was followed by … Read more

In September, after the Survival Research Labs show at Amsterdam's Robodock festival, tragedy struck.

One of the group's crew members, Todd Blair, was involved in an accident, and ended up in a coma, where he lay for weeks.

Recently, he's had some improvement, according to a blog chronicling his recovery, but he still remains in very bad shape.

Additionally, his medical bills have added up, and so SRL is hosting a fundraising benefit Saturday in San Francisco.

Called the Blue + Green Ball, the benefit will be at 8pm at San Francisco's SOMArts gallery, the site of … Read more

Every once in a long while, Crave actually has something good to say about the evolution of a product. We're pleased (and surprised) to say that watch phones, while hardly what you'd call wildly popular, have at least made some tangible progress in their designs as they no longer all look like GPS devices awkwardly strapped to the wrist.

To date, however, many of these models have come from manufacturers of dubious origin. But luxury watchmaker Tag Heuer is ready to change all that with its first line of mobile phones from ModeLabs Group, the Paris-based design house … Read more