Swedish search engine Twingly announced Tuesday that it has launched a new microblog search that will allow users to find information and users on sites like Twitter, Jaiku, Identi.ca, and others. Twingly's search service includes a widget that can be embedded into a blog. The company's executives say verbs like "save, retweet, reply, comment should be implemented in the search result."
WeFi, a company that provides information on where to find Wi-Fi hot spots, announced Tuesday that it has launched an online directory to find over 1 million different hot spots. More compelling, the company also announced that users will now be able to send a text message with their location to WeFi, and it will return a complete list of nearby hot spots. Unfortunately, the service charges 50 cents plus standard text-messaging rates. It's available now.
TechCrunch is reporting that online photo sharing site Flickr hasn't been serving ads properly over the past few days. When an advertisement is clicked, it's displayed in a frame inside the window instead of redirecting the user to the advertiser's site. Flickr has yet to comment on the issue.
Yammer, an enterprise microblogging solution, announced Tuesday that it has raised $5 million in a Series A round of financing that was led by the Founders Fund and Charles River Ventures. Yammer executives hope to use the funding to expand its presence in the enterprise space.
Online streaming service Ustream has launched its iPhone app that allows users to watch streaming Ustream channels from Apple's mobile device. The free app requires a Wi-Fi connection to work. It was launched in tandem with the presidential inauguration so users could watch all the festivities on their iPhone.
Not every social networking concept strikes gold, even when the coalescing factor is the common interest of finding a good Internet cafe. In the case of WeFi, a hot-spot-finding application with a social community tacked on, various CNET editors have raised a collective eyebrow at some of the more intense methods of attaining human connection, but largely agree that being able to chat with verified friends or nearby Internet surfers adds a useful dimension to the search for reliable Wi-Fi access in comfortable coffee shops.
This First Look at WeFi for Windows laptops and WeFi for Pocket PC tours WeFi's easy-to-use interface and automated hot-spot-sniffers from two Internet-thirsty devices.
Privacy--who needs it? The creators of WeFi don't seem to think much of it, although that might not be a bad thing
Today the company, which offers up a pretty svelte little replacement for Windows' clunky Wi-Fi manager, is launching two new items: a mobile application for Windows Mobile users (which could soon be SideKick users too), along with a Facebook application to help users track people using the service. Oddly enough, in all its news release bravado the company failed to offer up a link to said Facebook application, and it's not in the directory--so I can't get my hands on it.
The Windows Mobile application is similar to the desktop version--letting users discover and log Wi-Fi spots, as well as add them to a central database which can searched and referenced. Think of it a little bit like Wi-fi Hotspotr (review), but integrated at a system level.
What's interesting here is the new Facebook application, which like Whereboutz (review), will let users track Facebook friends if they're using WeFi. This all happens in real-time, meaning if a friend is at the local coffee shop and they decide to check their e-mail using a Windows Mobile smart phone, WeFi users will see them pop up on a map. Users can even get these status alerts to show up in the Facebook news feed.
WeFi has had a similar program going through Twitter, letting members automatically note where they are grabbing Wifi via a WeFi-marked access point. To some this might be a little more information than they're comfortable sharing. I'm hoping that WeFi has setup the application to limit who can see the information using Facebook's default privacy settings, or at least let users pick out who gets to see what off a short list.
I'll update with links to the Facebook application when the WeFi folks get back to me. In the meantime check out the service in action here.
Related: Two ways to geolocate your dog
Check out local Wi-Fi hot spots or add your own. Wefi's desktop, mobile, and Facebook application let you find hot spots, and show others where you are in real-time.
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