At 200 million users, Facebook is:

• Twice as big as the largest number of people who have ever watched a Superbowl game


• Twice as big as YouTube


• Twice as big as Skype


• Bigger than the number of people who own gaming consoles in their homes (190m)


• Bigger than the population of all but 4 countries in the world. (Just passed Brazil, next in line is Indonesia and then the US.)


• Twice as big as eBay.


• Four times as big as the number of people in the US who run on treadmills.


• It's twice as big as the number of malnourished people in India. Another way to look at that is to imagine that half of the people on Facebook were malnourished and living in one place.

These numbers can't be directly compared with any real meaning, but we think it's interesting for context. It's still cooler to live in France than it is to have a Facebook account, even if it is only 30% as popular.

YouTube first introduced annotations last June, but starting today, Google's popular video sharing site is making it even easier to add text comments into your own videos. Whereas before you had to go into a relatively complicated annotations editor to add your comments, you can now just click on a spot in the video during playback and the annotations editor will open automatically.

Google has also made it significantly easier to add links to other content on YouTube into your annotations. Now, when you watch your own videos on YouTube, a crosshair appears on the screen and you can start adding annotations by simply clicking anywhere on the video without having to go into the annotations editor. The new linking options inside the comments now allow you to point to another video, channel page, playlist, group, or search query. You will not be able to link to content outside of YouTube, however.

The YouTube team also highlights the possibility of linking to a video response page to gather feedback from your audience. Is This a Good Thing? The question, of course, is if this is actually a good thing. Too often, users already overuse the annotations to advertise some of their other videos or to remind us that the video is also available in HD (a note that also pops up when you are already watching the video in HD, by the way). Even Google seems to be aware of this, as they provide a help page with instructions for how to turn these annotations off for embedded videos. Omnisio We can only assume that this is the first part of the integration of Omnisio's technology into the core YouTube service. Google acquired Omnisio last July, though it is important to note that the service did a lot more than just video annotations.

Apple has enabled users to upgrade previously purchased tracks to DRM-free iTunes Plus format one song at a time, rather than converting entire libraries.


When Apple announced at its final Macworld Expo that it was revamping iTunes to enable variable pricing and offer every track in DRM-free AAC format, it also created a bit of a problem for long-time (or big-spending) iTunes customers. Apple would let customers upgrade their existing DRM-protected iTunes tracks to DRM-free iTunes Plus format for $0.30…but it would only enable customers to upgrade their music libraries in one fell swoop. So, if a user has 100 DRM-protected tracks, the only way to upgrade to DRM-free iTunes Plus versions would be to spend $30.00 all at once—and for many users, that kind of up-front charge is more than they want to spend at iTunes in one go.


However, today Apple has enabled a la carte upgrades to iTunes Plus DRM-free format, meaning users can now upgrade selected music tracks to DRM-free format one at a time. The one-at-a-time upgrade feature also applies to albums and music videos: videos cost $0.60 to upgrade, and albums cost about 30 percent of their original purchase price.

Apple still offers the library-wide "Upgrade to iTunes Plus" feature, but no doubt hopes the song-at-a-time upgrade possibility will encourage users to spend additional money for music they've already purchased. Of course, the flip side is that users will also have the option of not upgrading DRM-protected material it turns out they don't care about anymore.

Apple's DRM-free iTunes Plus music tracks use 256-bit AAC encoding. Apple expects to have the entire iTunes music selection available in DRM-free format by the end of the first quarter of 2009.

MAINGEAR, a boutique PC builder that makes machines targeted at creative professionals has just announced their newest creation, the Remix Cretaive workstation PC. Here is what this beast gets its power from:

The latest in Core i7 45nm chips from Intel

Nvidia Quadro FX or Nvidia Quadro CX (with plugins for Photoshop CS4) graphics cards

M-Audio sound interface cards

liquid cooling from CoolIT Systems

up to 12GB DDR3 RAM

dual RAID storage

This monster of a machine will look pretty nice too, being available in 6 colors with the option of custom branding.

But as expected this thing will cost you a pretty penny. The base price is $1,999 or $3,999 with the Nvidia Quadro CX. So start saving up.

Here is the full release:

MAINGEAR Launches Remix™ Creative Workstation PC

MAINGEAR Extends Lineup of Award-Winning PCs to Creative Professionals

Remix Features NVIDIA Quadro CX, M-Audio Interface Cards, and Liquid Cooling from CoolIT Systems

Union, New Jersey – January 29th, 2009 – MAINGEAR Computers, award-winning builders of high performance custom computers for PC Enthusiasts, announced the availability of the next generation of workstations in the market. MAINGEAR will be arming enthusiasts in photoshop, graphic design, video production, pro audio and other creative professions with the new high performance Remix Workstation.

“With Remix, we’ve leveraged years of experience in high performance computing in the PC Gaming and Enthusiast market and are extending that same level of performance, value and service to creative professionals everywhere with a workstation PC capable of handling even the most rigorous computing tasks” said Wallace Santos, CEO and Founder of MAINGEAR.

Optimized for Photo/Graphics/Video Enthusiasts – By integrating NVIDIA® Quadro CX®, MAINGEAR is offering the fastest creative workstation designed and optimized for Adobe® Creative Suite® 4. This will provide professionals with the tools, performance and reliability needed to maximize creativity. Harness the power of the Remix to encode H.264 video up to 4x faster with the NVIDIA CUDA™-enabled plug-in for Adobe® Premiere Pro CS4*. All this extra performance shaves hours off your encoding and rendering time, offering the power and flexibility needed to be creative during critical crunch times. This powerful system with NVIDIA’s latest graphics technology maximizes a number of visually intensive functions, including:

Bring unprecedented fluidity to image navigation. The Remix enables real-time image rotation, zooming, and panning, and makes changes to the view instantaneous and smooth. Also, on-screen compositing of both 2D and 3D content, ensuring smoothly anti-aliased results regardless of zoom level. Brush resizing and brushstroke preview, 3D movement, high-dynamic-range tone mapping, and color conversion are also accelerated.

Accelerate a variety of creative effects, making it easier than ever to add graphics and visual effects to video, which allows the artist to quickly move from concept to final product and speeds up the workflow. Effects accelerated include depth of field, bilateral blur effects, turbulent noise such as flowing water or waving flags, and cartoon effects. The Remix with the Quadro CX takes advantages of these workflow enhancements.

Accelerate high-quality video effects such as motion, opacity, color, and image distortion. The Remix also enables faster editing of multiple high-definition video streams and graphic overlays and provides a variety of video output choices for high-quality preview, including DisplayPort, component TV, or uncompressed 10-bit or 12-bit SDI.

“NVIDIA specifically designed and optimized the Quadro CX graphics card to significantly enhance the performance of Adobe CS4,” says Tyler Worden, Market Development Manager, Professional Solutions, NVIDIA. “By offering the Remix systems equipped with Quadro CX, MAINGEAR is offering its creative professional customers a complete solution that will have a transformative impact on the quality, image manipulation and processing speed of all Adobe CS4 applications.”

Enhanced for Audio Editing – MAINGEAR Remix’s advanced sound insulation makes it the perfect workstation choice for audio editing in the studio. Remix offers an array of some of the best PCI Audio Interfaces in the industry from M-Audio that offer the fullest range of audio editing capabilities designed to handle the needs of the most demanding project and professional studios.

Reliable and Feature Rich - The MAINGEAR Remix is built to meet the most meticulous specifications and supported by the best team in the industry. The most cutting edge features enable the Remix to deliver performance when you need it.

Studio quality sound insulation – Advanced insulation materials keeps the noise in and dense mesh air filters keep the dust out
Powerful components - Latest technology from NVIDIA, Intel, M-Audio put Remix at the cusp of cutting-edge technology

Skillfully hand-built in the USA - Backed by the best in-house support team in the country
Advanced Liquid Cooling – MAINGEAR partnered with CoolIt Systems to equip the Remix with advanced Liquid Cooling for the quietest, most reliable work experience available to date in a workstation
“The computing demands for creative professionals rely heavily on their processor firing on all cylinders” said Geoff Lyon, CEO of CoolIT Systems. “By incorporating Domino Advanced Liquid Cooling technology from CoolIT, the Remix ensures that Intel Core i7 runs cool and achieves optimal performance so that no task is ever too tall for today’s creative professional.”

Creative Professionals can purchase the MAINGEAR Remix at MAINGEAR’s website www.maingear.com or order by phone at (888-MAINGEAR). The base price for Remix is $1,999.99($3,999.99 with NVIDIA Quadro CX) and is available in Black, Silver, Electric Blue, Inferno Red, Alpine White, and Speed Yellow. The MAINGEAR Remix will also offer the option of custom branding.

Times Internet (Indiatimes.com) in association with Israel-based Unicell Advance Cellular Solutions has launched Active Search, a multimedia search engine that enables mobile phone users to search and download multimedia content like wallpapers, ringtones, games and animation and also read the latest news and gossip about their favourite film stars, cricketers and celebrities.

According to Times Internet, Active Search can be accessed either by typing the URL ActiveSearch.mobi on the WAP browser or by sending an SMS [Active SearchKeyword] to 58888. The service is available across all operators on SMS as well as GPRS.

Active Search does not require fixed keywords or codes. Users can use normal text messages to search content. The tool analyzes the keyword, understands it, and then generates the best possible result from premium content, mobile content and web. Another important feature of Active Search is that it will only display results that are mobile specific and can be accessed from the mobile phone.

“This is also an excellent platform for third-party content providers, advertisers, and affiliates to promote their services directly to the end users,” Times Internet has said. “Each time the user types a search keyword, the screen will show a contextual advertisement for a few seconds, till the search results are generated. This is a business opportunity for content providers, advertisers, and affiliates to promote their services or products.”

TechCrunch is reporting Saturday night that Twitter may have signed a term sheet with one or more venture capital firms that would value the microblogging company at $250 million. Although it did not provide specifics, the report cited "a source with knowledge of the deal."

Last fall, Facebook was said to have made an offer to buy Twitter worth as much as $500 million. "Rumor is Twitter hit up more than a few venture firms to pitch the $250 million valuation, and got more than one 'no,'" TechCrunch wrote Saturday. "But someone's bit, perhaps encouraged by Twitter's breakneck growth and the interest from Facebook. That means Twitter gets a new cash injection and time to figure out its business model at an even more leisurely pace." That certainly would be a boon for Twitter, which until now has not shown signs of a viable business model. Though it is growing rapidly and has millions of users, no one knows how the company could support itself. Some have worried that while it is increasingly useful to the many people who rely on it, it might not be financially viable over time. If the TechCrunch report is accurate, however, it would be a signal that Twitter has managed to show investors enough of a structure of a business model to loosen up the cash it needs to get over that hump. Given today's general economic crisis, that would be a notable accomplishment.