Author: Toby Leftly

On Thursday several rumor sites posted an article about Plex, a Mac-based media center solution, with some hype about an update on September 1st. Whether they knew it or not, they inadvertently built up some additional rumors about some kind of collaboration with Apple, since their big annual media event is also due September 1st. Well, it turns out that isn’t the case – Apple didn’t buy Plex, Plex didn’t buy Apple and Apple TV isn’t becoming Plex TV. It’s still exciting though – Plex Nine is the new version, rewritten for Mac and with a $4.99 version for iPhone and iPad. Plex sums up the new version…

The new Digg has had quite the time settling in. There was always a concern with Digg that stories could be manipulated to reach the front page, that not all stories were organically equal. That feeling has intensified, and one beneficiary has been fellow news site, Reddit. At one point yesterday, five of the top ten stories on Digg originated from Reddit. Was it malice, coincidence or are Digg users simply migrating to a competing service to show their displeasure? Paradoxically, this seems to have intensified now that discussions have formed on both sites about the so-called ‘gaming’ of Digg…

As someone who is under 60 and has used the internet at least once, when I hear the name Rupert Murdoch I get a little angry. Murdoch has long railed against any efforts to move any form of media into the digital age, and seems hell bent on keeping his old school media network intact at any cost. So it seems strange to me that NewsCorp, Murdoch’s company is behind Apple’s proposal to offer 99c TV episode rentals. Every other content provider has flatly refused to budge, preferring the current model of selling episodes either by the season for a lump sum or at around $2.99 per episode. Murdoch has stated…

It’s been 18 years since AutoCAD ran on Macs, but now they’re back – and boy are they back. After a short period of existing only within the Windows realm, Autodesk is bringing their CAD software back to the Mac. Not only will the new version run on Macs, there will be an iPhone and iPad version too. In what might appear to be a gloomy announcement for Windows 7 and Windows Phone 7, Autodesk is finally acknowledging that a large segment of the high end computer market isn’t choosing the Microsoft route. With the Mac consistently growing it’s market share, it was finally time for a big software name to return…

Let’s face it, even in a world where spam is a daily occurrence, we still receive a load of email that isn’t spam, but might as well be. For example, thanks a bunch Facebook for introducing a messaging system that functions half as well as email AND sends email notifications to alert me to new messages. Google wants to help, and as usual they’re doing it for no other reward than for the joy it will bring their users. The new feature, dubbed “priority inbox” aims to separate our important communications from the stuff that isn’t spam, but might as well be. When an email reaches your inbox, Gmail decides…

The big news announcement of the day is that MPEG LA, license holder for a number of high profile video standards has declared all h.264 video will be royalty free, so long as the video is provided to the end user for free. The technical implications of this are lengthy, dull and tedious. The short version? You can now watch porn on any device you want without any additional plugins (cough.. Flash). With an upsurge in mobile devices, the web has been calling out for a standard movie format to call its own without having to rely on third party codecs or plugins. With no open source formats available, each…

The tech world is a heated place, with cutthroat competition and backstabbing commonplace. Microsoft has been known to be as harsh a competitor as anyone out there, particularly now that the CEO position is occupied by the sweaty blob rather than the nerdy philanthropist. The one company that hoped it would get a break and some cooperation and collaboration from Microsoft is.. Microsoft. But apparently that’s not the case. Google has had push capability on iOS since v3.0, and embarrassingly for Microsoft, it came courtesy of their ActiveSync technology. Now finally, that same technology…

Two big studios have joined forces to tackle a problem facing the industry. Which is great news, except they’re working on the wrong problem. Warner Bros and Disney have teamed up and are working together – not to provide a better product in a better way to the eager paying customers the music and movie industry has failed and continues to fail, but to attack an advertising company known to work with pirate sites. The target is Triton Media, an advertising consultancy firm alleged to have worked with up to nine websites the studios consider “one-stop-shops” for movie piracy. The ongoing problem…

Google’s new calling feature, typically poorly named and chucked out there to exist somewhere between Google Chat and Google Voice is a hit compared to, well, Google. The service launched on the 25th of August, and in just 24 hours one million calls were placed. The new feature takes aim at Skype, already offering cheap calling over the net with their dedicated client, but another rumored target is Facebook. Google’s Buzz might be fizzling, but Facebook can’t compete with Google when it comes to communications. It remains to be seen if Google will rethink it’s product line, since they appear to…

If you hate Facebook, mark the date September 15th in your calendar. The guys from Diaspora, the anti-Facebook, have announced that their product is ready to ship and will be open sourced in mid-September. The software began life as a Kickstarter project looking for $10,000 and ended up pulling in $200,642, allegedly including a donation by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Various alternatives to Facebook exist, but none provide the same full circle of social connectivity. Diaspora has the lofty goal of capturing what people love about Facebook while completely alleviating the security and…