…And we’re back! As you might have noticed, we have been a bit “preoccupied” as of late. Because of this, we have let a few “newer” services fall by the wayside. So obviously, there is only one thing that we can do to rectify the situation: Have a Showdown! So sit back, relax, and enjoy this massive, two-day journey through the new and scary.

App #1: Yahoo Meme

Website: http://meme.yahoo.com/home/
Developer: Yahoo
Type: Web service
Speciality: Microblogging
Why We Consider It to Be New: The service itself was released early last August. The API was released yesterday.
First Impression: “It’s cute. Not as cute as Plurk, but cute nonetheless.”
Potential Roadblock: English language users seem to be in short supply at the moment.

App #2: hi5

Website: http://www.hi5.com/
Developer: hi5 Networks
Type: Web service
Speciality: Social network
Why We Consider It to Be New: Hi5 has undergone what some might call a “gimmick change.” Instead of being a straight social network, hi5 now puts much of its focus on casual gaming. (Note: We here at the Free Line hate the terms “casual games” and “casual gaming.” From this point forward, all games of that nature will be referred to as “fidget games.”)
First Impression: “I love me a good fidget game.”
Potential Roadblock: None at the present moment. The Showdown is still young, however.

App #3: CNN Mobile

Website: N/A
Developer: CNN Interactive Group, Inc.
Type: iPhone Application
Speciality: News app
Why We Consider It to Be New: …Because it is. According to the iPhone app store, version 1.0 was released on September 24th. That seems pretty darn new to me…
First Impression: “This … Is (the iPhone-centric, mobile version of) CNN.”
Potential Roadblock: One can only take “so much” of cable news before going completely off of his or her rocker.
Note: I will be judging the app itself, not the reporting that lies therein. The Free Line is roughly 99.995% “politics free,” and I plan on keeping it that way.

App #4: iDrudge

Website: http://www.drudgereport.com (Original site)
Developer: Joseph Nardone
Type: iPhone Application
Speciality: News app
Why We Consider It to Be New: Again, it is. Version 1.2 was released at the beginning of October.
First Impression: “Why did the program close just now?”
Potential Roadblock: The program seems to be a tad “touchy,” as they say.
Note: Remember the disclaimer to the CNN app? The same exact thing applies here. As far as this blog is concerned, the app is everything.

App #5: Photoshop.com Mobile

Website: N/A
Developer: Adobe Systems Incorporated
Type: iPhone Application
Speciality: Photo editor
Why We Consider It to Be New: It’s five-days old.
First Impression: “It’s free?! I wonder what’s wrong with it…”
Potential Roadblock: This isn’t the original “Photoshop” that we’re talking about here. It’s Photoshop.com. Remember our last go around with Photoshop.com? If you do, then you know firsthand why we consider this to be a roadblock.

Despite what your friends might be telling you, not everything worth using is a mainstream attention grabber made by Google. Sometimes, the best programs and webapps are the ones that sit just below the surface. That is about to change. On this action packed, two-day edition of the Showdown, we will be giving (yes, ten) of these semi-obscure marvels the patented “Free Line once over”  that you have come to expect. With that said, on with the introductions!

App #1: Evernote

Website: http://www.evernote.com/
Company: Evernote Corporation
Specialty: Note taking
Program Types: While Evernote is primarily a webapp, a separate download version is available for many of the major platforms, including Windows, the iPhone, and the Palm Pre.
Competes With: Namely Microsoft OneNote.

App #2: TurboCASH

Website: http://www.turbocash.net/
Company: Pink Software
Specialty: Finance
Program Type: Windows download
Competes With: All of the major players in the accounting market — Peachtree, Quickbooks/Quicken, DAC Easy, GNUCash, etc.

App #3: Lavabit

Website: http://lavabit.com/
Company: Lavabit LLC
Specialty: Email
Bold Claim Ripped Directly From the Site Itself: “…A system so secure that even our administrators can’t read your e-mail.”
Program Type: Web service
Competes With: Gmail, AOL, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc.

App #4: First Page 2006

Website: http://www.evrsoft.com
Company: Evrsoft
Specialty: Web development
Program Type: Windows download
Competes With: Adobe Dreamweaver

App #5: Adventure Game Studio

Website: http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/
Developer: Chris Jones
Specialty: Programming, with a special focus
Program Type: Windows download
Full Disclosure: Angela the product tester is a huge fan of this program.
Competes With: N/A

App #6: Runecats Explorer

Website: http://www.runecats.com/
Company: Runecats
Specialty: Web browser
Program Type: Windows download
Rendering Engine: Trident (Internet Explorer)
Competes With: Other web browsers — IE, Firefox, Opera, etc.

App #7 Theora

Website: http://theora.org/
Company: Xiph.org
…You Might Remember Them From Such Codecs As: OGG Vorbis
Specialty: Video
Program Type: Open source video codec
Fun Fact: The codec in question is named after Theora Jones, Edison Carter’s highly talented “partner in crime” on the short-lived Max Headroom television series. Hmm …  Max Headroom … That name sounds familiar, but I’m not sure why…
Competes With: Divx, XViD, H.264 (The kind of files you would find on iTunes), etc.

App #8: aTunes

Website: http://www.atunes.org/
Company: The aTunes Team
Specialty: Media player
Program Type: Multi-platform download
Competes With: Mainly iTunes and Songbird.

App #9: Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware

Website: http://www.malwarebytes.org/
Company: Malwarebytes Corporation
Specialty: Malware removal
Program Type: Windows download
Competes With: Anti-virus programs of all shapes and sizes.

App #10: QQ

Website: http://www.imqq.com/
Company: Tencent
Specialty: Instant messaging
Program Type: Instant messaging service
Fun Fact: QQ is easily the most popular instant messaging client in mainland China, with roughly 318 million citizens subscribing to the service.
Note: The official QQ client is considered by some to be low-level adware. Because of this, we will be accessing the network using the Pidgin third-party app. If we have a last second change of heart, or if we find that the nasty “ad problem” has been fixed, we will definitely let you know.
Competes With: AOL Instant Messenger, Live Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, ICQ, etc.

There are some stories, concepts, and rumors that seem to live on blogs like this one. Most of the time, these stories deserve the “star status” that they have been given. Every now and then, however, you run into a”Brett Farve” — a report that used to be interesting, but has been driven into the ground so much that it has become downright annoying. So on today’s episode of the Free Line, we are going to take a look at five of these stories, keeping a close eye on what exactly went wrong.

5. The “Twitpocylyse” – As you might have noticed, there has been one word on the lips of every mover, shaker, and outgoing athlete in the past year: Twitter. But for every one story about the insanely popular service, there seems to be two talking about its eventual end. According to some, the end is going to come when the number of users exceed 4,294,967,295. When this happens, the sites say, many Twitter-based programs will simply stop working. Interesting? Yes. Scary? Well yes, if you’re a Twitter addict. Still, there is one small problem with this theory — it was supposed to have happened once before. See, June 12th was supposed to bring about the end of all Tweets as we know it. The actual result? Two programs stopped working, but both were fixed within twenty-four hours. Maybe take two will bring about the end. We can only wait and see.

4. Google Makes the Greatest Things Ever – If there is one thing that everyone can agree upon, it’s Google’s track record. They make good products, plain and simple. Unfortunately, that sort of reliability has the tendency to be overblown by us in the press. Chrome isn’t a promising browser and/or operating system; it’s the one-two combination that will send Microsoft into bankruptcy. Android was being called a “sure fire iPhone killer” months before anyone even saw a screen shot. The latest program on the bandwagon is Google Voice, which is supposedly poised not only to take down Skype, but Apple and AT&T as well. Praise is great, but sometimes, it can go a bit too far.

3. The Demise of… – We are all familiar of the pop culture phenomenon known as “the backlash” — an odd social  movement in which a celebrated musician, trend, or celebrity goes from hero to “public enemy number one” seemingly overnight. This happens in the tech world as well, only in a slightly different fashion. Instead of mocking the offending tech product on talk shows and the like, we talk about how the company is on the point of death. Yahoo, MySpace, and eBay have all been subject to the “web services death watch.” While all of the companies mentioned have seen better days, the suspicious timing of these articles, and well as the dubious suggestions on how to right the proverbial ship (e.g. “Do what the competition is doing … it’s not ripping them off at all!”) , have us rubbing our collective temples in frustration.

2. Is Biz Stone Going to Sell Twitter? – For media outlets such as ESPN and Sports Illustrated, the aformentioned “Brett Farve watch” is a bonafide dream story. They can spend hour after hour and page after page sitting out on the man’s lawn, hoping that he will eventually come out and say “yes, I am coming out of retirement to join the Minnesota Vikings football team.” And if he doesn’t, who cares? The simple fact that he didn’t make an appearance is a fine little story within itself. The tech crowd has their own “Farve Watch,” but it has nothing to do with “sticking it” to the Green Bay Packers. No, ours involves the looming sale of Twitter by Biz Stone. Like Farve, Stone knows exactly how to play the media to his liking. All he has to do is drop a few key words into an interview — “monetize,” “Yahoo,” “Microsoft” — and the tech crowd is talking about it for a week. No matter when or if Stone decides to set his prized creation adrift, we can almost guarantee you that like Brett Farve’s third comeback attempt, the reality of the situation will not live up to the hype.

1. Fun With Microsoft and Yahoo – Everyone loves a good “will they, or won’t they?” story. In the 1970’s, we had Satuday Night Live’s lampooning of Fransisco Franco’s deathbed drama. (Spoiler: Franco is still dead.) In the 1990’s, we had the ongoing love affair between “Friends” Ross and Rachael. In the new millennium, we have the ongoing merger talks between Microsoft and Yahoo to keep us guessing. It seems like everything is going well, but oh no! Then-Yahoo president Jerry Yang has shot it down! Everything appeared to get back on track, but then Microsoft head Steve Ballmer announced that his company wants “absolutely nothing to do” with Yahoo. Things went on … and on … and on … like this until last week, when the two companies finally worked out a search deal. While it’s great that Yahoo has gotten their company in order, we sort of wish that they wouldn’t have “teased” us for so long.

…And there you have it. On behalf of everyone here at the Free Line, good night and have a pleasant tomorrow.

As you probably have heard by now, Yahoo Search is no more. In a move that totally surprised no one everyone, Yahoo has decided to jettison the “search” end of the business in favor of Microsoft’s shiny new Bing engine. The folks at Redmond, in return, will receive complete, unfettered access to the likes of Yahoo BOSS and Search Monkey. Despite the grumblings of a few “disgruntled” stock holders, the big brass at both companies actively welcome the change, calling it “a complete game changer” and “a great day for Yahoo.” If all goes well with the government, expect to see Bing in a Yahoo search bar near you within eight to nine months.

This isn’t the first time a major tech firm attempted to play nice with another massive corporation. Anyone who remembers running Microsoft and IBM’s OS/2 operating system on their brand new desktop featuring an Intel-branded AMD 286 processor knows exactly what I’m talking about. Still, our story isn’t about the manufacturing of microprocessors or the internal bickering between Bill Gates and Big Blue. No, today’s story involves a search engine, a cartoon mouse, and a web portal that time — and the majority of the Internet – has forgotten. And what is this portal that we speak of? Go.com.

Once upon a time, the site now known as Go.com was once a search engine called “Infoseek.” Started in 1994 by prolific inventor Steve Kirsch, Infoseek was one of the first engines to actively allow users to incorporate Boolean modifiers into their searches. Because of its sheer willingness to try something a bit off kilter, “Mr. Kirsch’s pet project” became the talk of the town, both online and off . It was so popular in fact, that the company felt the need to create “Ultraseek,” an engine designed specifically for enterprise users. This success lasted until 1998, when the folks at Disney — yes, that Disney — swallowed the company whole. On the surface, the deal appeared to be a match made in heaven for everyone involved. Disney now had a world class search engine at their beckoned call, while Infoseek had a proverbial “800 pound gorilla” backing them up. The merger of the engine with the newly acquired Starwave development house helped to excite users all the more. Within months, both companies were gone. In their places sat Go.com, a web portal designed to bring the so-called “House of Mouse” into the Internet Age. The days of Infoseek were officially no more.

Needless to say, the entire project was a failure of epic proportions. Within four years, the search section was gone for good. In its place sat a box for its new “search partner,” a little site called Yahoo. (Funny the way the world works, isn’t it?) While Go.com does still officially exist, it is now little more than a host site for the likes of ESPN and ABC. The Infoseek name is still used in both Japan and Australia, but these sites have little to do with the “engine that Steve Krsch built.” (The former is run by Japanese shopping kingpins Rakuten, while the latter is controlled by design firm Orange Digital Media.) The only technology to make it out of this entire debacle alive was Ultraseek, which is still trying to deliver enterprise search to the masses. As for Yahoo, well … you know.

…And there you have it. Be sure to tune tomorrow for part two of our “Summer Travel Showdown.” Until then, we bid thee a fond adieu.

Okay gang, it’s time for yet another highly popular round of “ask me a question.” So without further adieu, let us get to it.

Where is part three of “Web Programming for Smart Phones?” – Part three, tentatively entitled “The Waiting Is the Hardest Part,” will be hitting a web browser near your within the next few days. the series is very important to us, but honestly, we also wanted to establish our other concepts as well.

Oh? Such as? – Building our own mobile site, for one. High class, high quality mobile sites should not just be limited to the likes of million dollar computer firms or folks whose personal wealth rivals that of Scrooge McDuck. We intend to prove that it is possible to build, maintain, and most importantly advertise, a mobile site without spending a ton of cash. We are so confident that we can make this happen, that we set our design budget to an unthinkable, unheard of sum of zero dollars American. That’s right. We will have a top shelf mobile headquarters, and it will not cost us a dime. And the best part? A site like this can be yours as well. It’s all about smart design, forward thinking, and a great ad campaign.

Wait … I thought you said you were for tailoring your existing site to fit the needs of mobile users. What gives? – We still are. Still, it doesn’t mean that we cannot explore other options.

Will this be programming intensive? I hate programming. I have guys who do it for me. – Nope. This will be about theory, content, advertising, marketing, and overall presentation. Not one line of code will be printed in this blog. I assure you of that.

Works for me. How’s the text advertising project coming along? – As we said last Friday, it usually takes a little while for this kind of thing to register. Ask us again in a few days.

I hate the “geek” stuff. More advertising news, stat! – We hear you. We here at the Free Line promise that there will be more talk about marketing your site and/or product in the future.

Great. Do you have anything that I can check out right now? – I do, actually. For those interested in the emerging world of mobile advertising, I highly suggest reading “Mobile Marketing Without Being Annoying” by Chris Crum. Essentially an expanded interview with Yahoo’s Tom Foran, the article explains the ins and of out of advertising on the so-called “mobile web” without being too confusing or geeky. While some of his suggestions and tactics are not exactly “free,” the piece is still worth the old “once over.”

…And there you have it. Until tomorrow, we here at the Free Line bid you all good day.

Remember the email clients from Monday? Let’s see how they are holding up four days later.

Client #1: Evolution

Positives: The account setup wizard is surprisingly intuitive. All you have to do is enter your POP3 and SMTP settings and the program does the rest. Specialized ports? Evolution detects them. Security settings? It picks them up as well. It also runs pretty quick for a program that isn’t a fan of Windows 7.
Negatives: First and foremost, the “included” spam filter simply does not work. If you want spam to “disappear,” you have to program it in yourself. Another thing: the automated “email check” is apparently broken as well. While it might not seem like a big deal, it can be bothersome to a person who routinely forgets to press that dreaded “send and receive mail” button. (If you haven’t guessed already, I am definitely one of those people.)
Overall: 3; “It’s alright, I guess. Could be better though.”
Worth a Download?: Sadly, no.

Client #2: Thunderbird

Positives: The ability to load add-ons is a big plus. Nothing says “try me out” quite like the prospect of total customization. The aforementioned setup is also a nice touch. While it isn’t the easier setup we have run into thus far — that award goes to, of all programs, Evolution — it does make life a bit easier.  And since it’s made by a subsidiary of Mozilla, complete and total compatibility with Firefox is a given.
Negatives: Aside from the much lauded add-ons, Thunderbird comes off as rather “basic.” Yes, it checks, writes, and sends email, but that’s all it does … without modification, of course.
Overall: 7; “It’s nice and stable.”
Worth a Download?: Yes.

Client #3: Zimbra

Positives: Unlike the rest of the clients on this list, Zimbra is more than just a simple “email client.” It’s actually a highly diverse desktop system, designed to eliminate the need for Google Apps a variety of third-party freeware (and in some cases, shareware) applications. Zimbra also gets a few extra points for presentation. As cliche as it might sound, the simple fact that it “looks” nicer than the other clients does wonders for this little underdog.
Negatives: It’s a bit on the slow side starting up. Although the plethora of extra features are nice, they have a tendancy to “get in the way” from time to time.
Overall: 8
Worth a Download?: Yes

Client #4: Sylpheed

Positives: Wait … give us a moment. There has to be something in this program that can be construed as a positive … [Pause] There it is! Sylpheed is the only program that, to our knoledge, allows you look at the source code of your messages. We’re not exactly sure as to why you would want to do that, but it’s always nice to have the option.
Negatives: The words “extremely basic” were bandied about more than once. Furthermore, the following “standard” features are not available in Sylpheed: A spam filter, automatic mail check, the ability to view messages in an HTML format, the ability to send emails at all … I think you get the idea here.
Overall: 3; “Outlook Express 4 that was bundled with Windows 98 First Edition can do more things than Sylpheed.”
Worth a Download?: No

Anyone who has been reading the Free Line in the past few days knows of my love/hate relationship with Evolution. But how exactly does it stand up to other “free” mail clients? We are about to find that out. And before anyone asks, no. We have not forgotten about our “web app” tests. These things take time, after all. Expect to see the results some time within the next two weeks.

Client #1: Evolution

Website: http://www.dipconsultants.com/evolution/
Developer: The Gnome Project (Original program) and Tor Lillqvist (Windows port)
License: GPL
First Impression: “Where did it go? It likes to randomly disappear from time to time.”
Setup: Easier than most, thanks to the built in setup wizard.
Note: We here at the Free Line believe that the following is required reading:

“…Putting the little “browser snafu” behind me, I found myself heading to Wikipedia to research GPL email clients. Thankfully, the choice here was simple: Evolution. For those unaware, Evolution is the email companion to the Linux-based web browser (and Free Line favorite) Epiphany. About a year ago, the folks in charge of the client, along with higher ups at Novell, decided that it was a good idea to port the system over to Windows. While their intentions were  good, the result was anything but. Users who wanted to try Linux’s “best kept secret” had to compile everything themselves from scratch. Extensive knowledge of the DOS prompt was also required, as the newly installed program required it to be running at all times. Not happy with this turn of events, Novell programmer Nat Freidman hired famed Linux-to-Windows programmer Tor Lillqvist to create an easy to use installation file  for people who dislike compiling their own programs. People just like me.

Installing the program was easy: just click a few buttons and I was on my way. Setting up my various email accounts was easy as well. In many ways, Evolution was actually easier to work with than that brand new copy of Windows Live Mail Desktop that I had been previously using. Everything was going fine, until I accidentally closed the program. This is where my troubles truly began.

Before I go into detail, I think it’s only fair to detail the operating system I use. Like our fantastic product tester/guinea pig Angela Smedley, I work with a system that is dependent upon Windows 7 RC 1. Instead of having your open programs displayed in a long, somewhat annoying row like in previous editions of Windows, Windows 7 puts them all in “button” form next to the start menu. If you wish to have access to these programs after you have closed them, all you have to do is right click on the icon and select “pin to the taskbar.” Simple, elegant, and much easier to deal with than the traditional “long bar/quick launch button” combination. Most programs respond well to the new system. Evolution did not. Here comes “Excedrin headache #10” again…

As I stared at the strange, DOS-based error message, I thought about the steps that brought me to this point. Closing the message, I instantly decided to start the program from the shortcut on my desktop instead of from my taskbar. Although the ominous message was gone, I still didn’t have access to my email accounts. Undaunted, I right clicked on the shortcut and chose the “run as administrator” option. Success! After a few more minutes of “administrator-level” tweaking, I finally have things working properly. The shortcut that is currently pinned to my taskbar still isn’t completely functional, but it doesn’t matter. At least I still have access to my email.”

Client #2: Thunderbird

Website: http://www.mozillamessaging.com/thunderbird/
Developer: Mozilla
License: Mozilla Public License (MPL), Lesser GPL (LGPL), and GPL
First Impression: “Hey look! Add-ons!”
Ease of Setup: Three words: Intuitive setup wizard.
Layout: It wants to be Outlook Express in the worst way possible — icons appear up top, file folders on the left, letters on the top right hand side, and the actual letters show up at the bottom. It isn’t “bad,” but it can get to be a tad boring.

Client #3: Zimbra

Website: http://www.zimbra.com/
Developer: Zimbra Inc. and Yahoo
License: Yahoo Public License (YPL)
First Impression: “This one has some neat stuff in it. I sense that they really want to be Google here.”
Setup: Instead of implementing a tabbed system like Outlook Express or a wizard ala Thunderbird, Zimbra prefers the “one lengthy page” approach found in many web email services.
Layout: It’s as if Outlook Express and Google Apps had a baby. The physical mail client appears to be an almost carbon copy of Outlook, with the “standards” appearing in all the right places. Click on the tabs, however, and the user is taken to a Google Docs style text editor, a link to Flickr, and a feed reader respectively. While it doesn’t necessarily add to the “email experience,” the added features are nice to have on hand.

Client #4: Sylpheed

Website: http://sylpheed.sraoss.jp/en/
Developer: Hiroyuki Yamomoto
License: GPL and LGPL
First Impression: “I don’t see anything that really ’sticks out’ about it.”
Ease of Setup: Simple. Just plug in all of your inforation and the program does the rest.
Layout: A tad dated compared to the likes of Thunderbird and Windows Live Mail, but nothing really to write home about.

What do cherries, Microsoft, and the Irving Berlin classic “White Christmas” all have in common? Despite what you might be thinking right now, the answer is not ice cream sundaes, anti-trust suits, or Danny Kaye. It’s Bing. For those unaware, Bing is Microsoft’s new “do it all” search portal that will supposedly change the way we look at search portals. Does it live up to the hype? We are about to find that out.

First Impression: “Why does the welcome picture have little ‘hot spots’ in it?”

Search (Term: “Open Source Browsers”)

Number of Hits
Bing: 57.2 million hits
Google: 62.6 million hits
Yahoo: 35.8 million hits

Search Quality
Bing: Although devoid of both repeating links and blatant advertising, Bing seems to be focused on one thing and one thing only: Chrome. Out of the ten links on the first page, four deal with Google’s controversial browser. Mozilla and Firefox, meanwhile, are left out in the proverbial cold.
Google: Google results seem to be a bit more diverse than that of Bing. Chrome, for example, only appears once, while Mozilla makes its presence felt twice.
Yahoo: Yahoo’s results are a tad more redundant than both Bing and Google, but it’s not anything to really write home about. Mozilla appears only once, while Chrome isn’t mentioned at all.

Video Search (Term: “Photoshop Tutorials”)

Number of Hits
Bing: 34,700
Google (YouTube): 73,600
Yahoo: 6,215

Search Quality
Bing: Every video on the first page actually corresponded with the keywords in question. While the difficulty and intended audience might differ from one clip to another, the overall theme remains steady.
Google (YouTube): Same as Bing, only with less links.
Yahoo: A few of the links seem to go a bit off-topic, but most stay on-point.

Bing On…
News: When you first arrive, you will notice a few videos sitting at the bottom of the screen. Those videos can be turned on by either clicking the link (as per tradition) or running your mouse over the “play” button. While it isn’t suited for watching whole stories, the Bing News mouse over feature makes grabbing a “sneak preview” as painless as possible.
Maps: For the life of us, we just could not get the map feature running properly. Instead of getting a map full of roads, rivers, and landmarks, we received a desolate beige blob full of orange arrows. After a little while, we were able to turn the beige blob in a grid similar to the one found in the science fiction film Tron. The actual turn-by-turn directions, however, are a completely different story. Every set we tried were incredibly detailed and extremely easy to read. We especially appreciate the “if you see ___, then you’ve gone too far” note that appeared at the end of every page. It makes exploring new places a bit less taxing.

Final Thought: While it isn’t exactly perfect, it’s much better than we expected. Microsoft supposedly put a ton of time and effort into this project, and it shows. Yes, it’s still “rough around the edges,” but it isn’t just a rebranded “Live Search” either. In short, Bing just might be the “web portal powerhouse” Redmond has always wanted. Whether it actually lives up to hype, however, remains to be seen.

Anyone who has been on the Internet for more than three minutes are familiar with the information-filled media smorgasbord known as the “portal site.” It seems as if every major Internet firm has one, from Microsoft, Yahoo, and AOL to Comcast, Disney, and NBC Universal. But what about companies that live outside of the United States? They must obviously have something to talk about, right? That’s exactly what we are going to find out. On today’s trek, we make our way up north to Canada, take a pit-stop in Quebec, and spend a few minutes within the heart of Japan. With that said, here we go…

Site #1: Canada Online Explorer (aka CANOE)

Website: http://en.canoe.ca/home.html (English) http://fr.canoe.ca/ (French)
Parent Company: Quebecor Media
Launch Year: 1996
Language: English and French
Subject Matter: CANOE is teeming with news and sport topics that modern Canadians clamor for, from the National Hockey League and the Canadian Football League to the Parliament and the Toronto Stock Exchange.
Special Features: It’s odd in this day and age for a major league web portal such as CANOE to have an entire section dedicated to professional wrestling. Aside from the usual array of show recaps and rumors, the Slam! subsite also features columns by a slew of well-known Canadian wrestling personalities, including Don Callis and former world champion/national hero Bret “The Hitman” Hart. Other “distinctly Canadian” touches include a subsite dedicated to curling, articles about in-country vacationing, and an ever-present currency converter.
Drawbacks: The  overall design of the English-language site looks rather dated compared to its Acadian counterpart.

Site #2: livedoor

Website: http://www.livedoor.com
Parent Company: livedoor
Launch Year: 2004
Language: Japanese
Subject Matter: Livedoor is designed to be the “final word” in Japanese media and culture. Want to blog? They have their own blogging platform. Want to work on a wiki? They have one of those as well. Need to get to Gmail or YouTube? Thanks to a deal with Google, both services have links displayed prominently on the main site.
Special Features: Japanese businesses, especially large ones such as livedoor and Yahoo, try their best to do a bit of everything. Because of this, livedoor has features and services that normal portal sites usually lack. Think about it: how many other sites own a ticket service, a baseball team (called, appropriately enough, livedoor baseball), ISP, and have been involved with two independent puroresu wrestling promotions?
Other Notes: Livedoor found itself in the middle of an Enron-level accounting scandal in 2006. In the past three years, several major board members have either been sued, are awaiting jail time, or have committed suicide. Despite enduring popularity of livedoor, the company is still in second place behind the online behemoth known as Yahoo Japan.

- The world of Top-Level Domains has yet another superstar name on its hands — .ME Originally designed for the Eastern European country of Montenegro to signify its independence from Serbia, the fledgling TLD has become a hit with users who wish to give their sites a “personal touch.” According to industry site WebProNews, the relatively new .ME domain has been registered roughly 250,000 times since the initial “sunrise period” last year, and is only continuing to grow in popularity. The .ME TLD is available now through several registrars, including GoDaddy, Afilias, and the Montenegro-based Me.net.

- Despite rumors to the contrary, advertising will not be coming to a Twitter account near you anytime soon. In a post on the official Twitter blog, co-founder Biz Stone says that running banner ads “have always been low on our list of interesting ways to generate revenue.” Still, he’s not quite ready to close the door on ads just yet. Writes Stone: “We say traditional web banner advertising isn’t interesting to us which is true. However, to say we are philosophically opposed to any and all advertising is incorrect… [F]acilitating connections between businesses and individuals in meaningful and relevant ways is compelling. We’re going to leave the door open for exploration in this area.”

- The search engine known as Kumo might be making a public appearence sooner than anyone has ever expected. According to those close to the situation, Microsoft is planning to unveil the much anticipated replacement for Live Search as early as next week. In addition to the new name, Kumo is expected to bring a few much needed “enhancements and innovations” to the table, including the ability to group search results by category. The folks at Redmond reportedly have high hopes for the new engine, which could conceivably put them in the same elite category as Google and Yahoo. Microsoft is currently third in the “search engine arms race” with a disappointing 8.2% adoption rate.

- Cable network ESPN has struck a content deal with YouTube. According to the terms of the agreement, the sports giant will provide the online video megastar/Google subsidiary with original, ad-sponsored material designed to “compliment” the network’s programming. All of the videos in question will be available on the base YouTube site, but will feature a video player designed especially for ESPN. No live games or programming events are currently planned, but many believe that content from the broadband network ESPN 360 will be added in due time. A solid launch date is as of yet unknown.

- Popular music service Pandora has received a major upgrade. Called Pandora One, the new strategy is designed to “reward” paying customers while not “punishing” those who prefer the free-to-use player. Aside from the total annihilation of both banner and audio advertising from the site, the “pay service” has one major thing going for it — a desktop application powered by the Adobe AIR runtime environment. Thanks to the app, users can now stream their music at a higher bitrate (192 kbps), fill that space left by the advertising with fully customizable backgrounds, and more. Critics  point out that while the program does improve the overall desktop experience, Pandora’s penchant for repitition makes long-term use difficult. Others say that the app’s price ($36) might be a bit too steep for many users. Still, there is one thing that almost everyone can agree on: despite its faults, Pandora One is a nice little antidote to the predicable, sanitized nature of most FM broadcasts. Pandora One is available now for all paying customers.