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Digsby links all IMs with e-mail, Facebook, MySpace

If you're the type of person who communicates with friends, co-workers, relatives, and such via several different IM services, e-mail, and Facebook--and you know you are--software could soon offer you one of the cleanest ways ever to link them all together.

The software, called Digsby, went into private beta Tuesday, and its goal is to give people a way to organize their contacts from Yahoo Messenger, AOL IM, ICQ, Google Talk, Jabber, and Windows Live Messenger, as well as e-mail, Facebook, and MySpace.com into a single client.

According to Jeff Hester, who runs instant message community site BigBlueBall.… Read more

Google Apps aims to move companies to the cloud

Just like rogue employees in the 1990s forced instant messaging into corporations, the new Google Apps Team Edition being launched on Thursday offers a way for workers to slip a hosted apps service into the enterprise.

This could help Google in its efforts to lure more people off desktop applications sold by Microsoft and onto the mostly free Web-based apps Google offers.

Google Apps Team Edition is a free service that lets people within the same e-mail domain collaborate easily with Google Apps, a package that includes Docs, Calendar, Talk, and Start Page.

Unlike IM applications, which open communication to … Read more

Google Maps Mashup list offers something for everyone

I bet you didn't know there's an easy way to see what terrorist or suspicious activities are happening around the world, on a map. Are you curious as to where there have been UFO sightings? How would you like to map your photos or, even potentially more useful, find a public toilet near you?

Mike Pegg over at the Google Maps Mania blog has created an entertaining and handy list of 100 things you can do with Google Maps mashups.

The options range from the very convenient, such as how to find cheap gas in your area or … Read more

Microsoft's Yahoo bid raises more congressional eyebrows

Here we go again.

Not content to be outdone by a rival committee, which promptly announced a February 8 hearing into the antitrust implications of Microsoft's $44.6 billion bid to swallow up Yahoo, another U.S. House of Representatives committee said it is planning to hold a hearing sometime this spring. The subject of the hearing will be the "tough competition and consumer privacy issues that have been and will be raised" by the potential deal. Yahoo, for the record, has not accepted Microsoft's offer.

"The recent announcement by Microsoft demonstrates that consolidation of … Read more

Google offers security and compliance services for any e-mail system

Google is using its Postini acquisition to offer security features for any e-mail system.

The company is set to launch several new security products on Tuesday that are part of its Google Apps platform but are targeted at organizations that aren't using Gmail and other Web-hosted applications from Google.

The Powered by Postini services are message filtering with spam and malware filtering, for $3 per user per year; message filtering plus enhanced virus detection, content policy management, and other support to stop e-mail data leaks, for $12 per user per year; and message discovery, which adds one year of … Read more

Google shares fall below $500

Maybe a roller-coaster ride is just the distraction Disneyland-bound Googlers need to get their minds off the company's falling share price.

Google's shares closed Monday at $495.43, the first time they've closed below $500 in about six and a half months. The dip follows news that Google's two main competitors could possibly merge. It also comes as employees take a company trip to the Southern California amusement park.

Google's shares had been sailing to what seemed like never-ending heights, hitting a record high of $747 last November. However, they have lost 30 percent since … Read more

Microsoft's top strategic initiatives for 2008? More of the same

Microsoft doesn't appear to have much ambition left in the tank. But if I had multi-billion dollar monopolies in desktop operating systems and office productivity suites, I might not venture too far from home, either.

Steve Ballmer recently outlined Microsoft's top strategic initiatives for 2008. If they sound eerily similar to what Microsoft has traditionally focused on, that's because they are:… Read more

Microsoft is "committed to openness," snickers its general counsel

Wow. Microsoft is nothing if not brazen. When you think of Microsoft you normally don't think of these words, at least not together, yet these words came from Microsoft's general counsel, Brad Smith, in response to Google's complaint that a Microsoft and Yahoo! tie up would be bad for the Internet:

Microsoft is committed to openness, innovation, and the protection of privacy on the Internet.

Microsoft? Committed to openness? Microsoft has been committed to destroying openness over the years, and Brad Smith has played an integral role in that strategy, defying the US Justice Department and the world's consumer. I think highly of Brad, but I find this guile to be galling in the extreme.

Google is exactly right in calling out Microsoft's cheek:… Read more

Open source is mainstream. Is it the only stream?

The obvious answer to my question above is, "No." But sometimes the obvious is, well, not so obvious.

InformationWeek's Serdar Yegulalp writes:

If open source continues to vigorously gain traction as a business model amongst software developers, Microsoft and its ilk will suffer one of three fates in the long run: a slow death where they are whittled down by competition not restricted as heavily by onerous licensing and costs; a trimming-down -- either slow or fast -- where they adopt open source as a way of life; or they somehow remain lone holdouts by dint of offering something that, for whatever reason, people still want to pay for.

This is already happening. Ask VCs what they're investing in and you'll find few traditional, proprietary software companies. The only companies who seem to continue to make a living in this fashion are the behemoths who leave customers little choice but to buy from them.

For now.… Read more