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Industry News
ICANN approves new ‘.xxx’ top level domain
Mar 20th
On Friday the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) approved a new ‘.xxx’ top level domain (TLD) that will be operated by the ICM Registry. The ‘.xxx’ TLD will join the ranks of other TLDs like ‘.com’, ‘.co.uk’, ‘.org’ and so on. The intended use for the ‘.xxx’ will be adult websites, but it will not be compulsory for sites containing pornographic content to use that TLD. At the time of writing over 284,000 domains have been pre-reserved.
The introduction of the new TLD has met a lot of opposition from a wide range of factions. Conservative groups have opposed the introduction of ‘.xxx’ as they believe it legitimises the production and publication of pornographic material, whilst figures in the adult industry have opposed the TLD as they believe it could lead to legislation enforcing ‘.xxx’ on pornographic websites, effectively ‘ghettoising’ adult websites on the internet and leading to censorship of all websites under that domain. They are also frustrated that they will have to pay out to protect their brand by reserving their website domain again under the new TLD.
Proponents of the new TLD have been keen to point out its advantages, namely the protection of minors from More >
Microsoft releases Internet Explorer 9 to the masses
Mar 15th
Microsoft have released the final build of their Internet Explorer 9 web browser in an attempt to stem its steady loss of users to alternative browsers like Firefox and Chrome. IE9 features an enhanced user interface with the removal of unnecessary toolbars and the amalgamation of the address and search boxes into one field and the alignment of the address/search bar and tabs into one row. The new browser also offers impressive speed improvements and also great leaps in support for web standards like HTML5. Web standards are a common set of guidelines offered by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) that browser vendors and web developers are expected to adhere to to ensure a consistent experience across all software. Internet Explorer has been notoriously poor at this in the past, and Microsoft has sought to rectify their previous errors.
The improvement in web standards support will be welcomed with open arms by web designers such as us at Areatrade as it means less extra code is needed to ensure compatibility in all software. Microsoft has recently been calling for the small minority of users still stuck on version 6 of the software to upgrade to a newer version. Many IT departments have More >
The Japan Tsunami Appeal
Mar 13th
Most people will have heard by now about the horrific disaster which struck Japan over the weekend. We would like to urge our followers to donate to the British Red Cross appeal if they’ve got any spare change – people are desperately in need of rescue and shelter at this very moment.
It has been interesting to see the usage of social media in relief efforts. News of the disaster spread quickly across Facebook and Twitter and videos of the event appeared almost instantaneously on YouTube, Japan being such a well connected country. The phrase ‘Text REDCROSS to 90999′ was trending on Twitter worldwide to encourage users to make an instant $10 donation to the appeal (though this only functioned for American users.)
Google have also set up a version of their ‘Person Finder’ tool, the technology of which was used extensively as part of operations in Hurricane Katrina and the Christchurch earthquake. The tool allows users to search for information about someone they are trying to find or upload information about the whereabouts and state of someone to be found by others. The tool uses a standard, open format to allow different organisations to collate data in one place – reducing the More >
Facebook adds ‘in a civil partnership’ relationship setting
Feb 18th
Facebook has rolled out the capability to set the relationship status on your profile to ‘In a civil partnership’ after the feature was increasingly suggested by users. The Facebook communications manager Andrew Noyes stated that “This has been a highly requested feature from users … We [Facebook] want to provide options for people to genuinely and authentically reflect their relationships on Facebook.”
The changes have been rolled out today in the UK, North America, France and Australia, with the options available specific to the territory of the user.
Microsoft to launch final Internet Explorer 9 on March 14th
Feb 18th
Technology giant Microsoft is to release the latest update to their well-used web browser Internet Explorer on the 14th of March at the SXSW (‘South by South-West’) conference in Austin, Texas. The Release Candidate version of the browser has impressed many in the tech community with its superb speed and standards-compliance. This means that web developers will have an easier time creating websites that function as expected in all browsers.
You can try the Release Candidate preview yourself by downloading it at http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/, but be warned that as a non-final version it may be susceptible to a few remaining bugs and security issues.
Google increases emphasis on social search rankings
Feb 18th
Google has announced an upgrade to its social search features. A feature has been available for some time that shows links related to your search at the bottom of the results page that have been shared by your contacts on social networks.
Now Google will be further integrating this feature by moving the social results higher up in the rankings. This feature is only available to users signed into a Google account that is attached to social networking accounts.
What does this mean for people optimising their websites for promotion on Google? It seems clear that a strong social networking presence is becoming a increasingly important component of an effective online promotion campaign.
Apple bring the App Store dream to the desktop
Jan 13th
Apple have opened their new ‘Mac App Store’ for business. For those of you who use an iPhone or any similar smartphone, you will know that the ‘App Store’ is a marketplace for the quick purchase and download of mobile applications. It would seem the quick and easy process of purchasing new software has proven very profitable for Apple, as they have now brought the concept to their Mac desktop operating system.
After running a software update, Mac users will find a new App Store icon on their Dock. The Mac App Store is already quite well populated, with the most prominent offers being the Apple iLife and iWork suites. iLife consists of photo organisation, music production and video production software, whereas iWork is an office suite which provides word processing, multimedia presentation and spreadsheet software. Previously you would have to purchase each suite in its entirety, costing upwards of £60. But the App Store allows users to download the components of each suite separately for £9-12, depending on the software – a bargain!
Other popular items on the App Store include the official Twitter desktop client, ‘Twitter for Mac’, and a desktop adaptation of the popular mobile game ‘Angry Birds’.
Users may More >
UK government proposes nationwide filtering of adult websites
Dec 23rd
The Culture Minister Ed Vaizey has proposed cutting off access to pornographic material at the ISP level in an interview with The Sunday Times. The government has been in talks with internet service providers (ISPs) to implement a system to filter access to pornographic content. Under these proposals, customers would have to contact their ISP to have the block removed.
Proponents of the proposal have noted that easy access to pornography can be damaging to children who view it. Miranda Suit, chair of the Safer Media organisation referred to a report compiled by the US-based Witherspoon Institute – “Children are becoming addicted in their teens to internet pornography. They are being mentally damaged so they cannot engage in intimate relationships.”
ISPA, the industry body for ISPs, has responded to the government proposal: “Ispa firmly believes that controls on children’s access to the internet should be managed by parents and carers with the tools ISPs provide, rather than being imposed top-down.”
Critics of the plan have noted that filtering systems tend to be extremely indiscriminate and with alarming frequency block access to important material such as sex education resources. Civil rights organisations have also noted that the classification of which material is More >
Apple remove unofficial WikiLeaks iPhone app from App Store, claim it is “harmful”
Dec 22nd
A developer who created an unofficial app that accessed content from the controversial whistle-blowing website WikiLeaks has had their app removed the iOS App Store by Apple. The cheeky developer was charging $1.99 for access to the US embassy cables being issued by WikiLeaks, which can be accessed free of charge online through various ‘mirror’ sites.
Apple have released a statement saying the app was pulled for not complying with local laws and not ensuring that individuals and groups were kept out of “harm’s way”, possibly referencing allegations by the US government that the leaks are endangering American diplomats and military services around the world.
This move comes after PayPal, everyDNS, Bank of America and Amazon have all terminated services they provide to WikiLeaks, prompting controversial online organisation ‘Anonymous’ to mount DDoS cyber-attacks against some of their websites.
Julian Assange, the leader and founder of WikiLeaks, is on bail in the UK and appealing against extradition to Sweden for rape allegations. You can find out more about the story so far in the special report on the BBC News website. See our other posts about WikiLeaks here.