Category: Websites
Learn, or teach, a language online with Myngle
It’s tough learning a language. It’s easy to start, but it takes a loooong time to become proficient, and if you’re not using it every day it’s difficult to keep it in your head. If you need to learn a language, for work or just for fun, then Myngle might be for you.
The language-learning service has just hit 100,000 unique users a month, and left beta status. It allows anyone to learn or teach a language from their computer. The latest stats say that students from 152 countries are learning a language from teachers in 62 countries. Languages offered right now include Arabic, Kazakh, Finnish, Sanskrit and Cebuano. If you know where Cebuano is spoken, then give yourself a pat on the back.
If you want to find out more then there’s a delightfully cheesy infomercial style video here, or just click over to the website and look around.
Related posts: Voxswap social networking site could help you learn a new language, launches today | Google Translate adds new language conversion features to web searching
GMail adds yet more functionality – this time it's SMS
GMail’s really blitzing new features out at the moment – yesterday it became an OpenID provider, and earlier in the week they rolled out gadgets for Calendar and Docs, but today’s new feature is SMS.
If you’ve got phone numbers stored with your contacts then if they go offline when you’re talking to them, your messages will be sent as SMS instead. Best of all, it’ll give the person you SMS a number that they can email in the future to get messages to your GMail account.
The functionality hasn’t arrived over this side of the pond yet, but it’s a lovely little bonus feature, so I hope it shows up soon. It’s yet another reason why you should use GMail over Yahoo or Hotmail.
GMail (via GoogleWatch)
eBay Nutcase of the Week: Man launches "ObamaAuctions.com" to help fund Barack's push
Your old Nokia 3310 could help Barack Obama become president of the United States of America. We bet you never thought that would happen when taking out the contract in 2001, did you?
That’s the idea behind the alarmingly short-sighted ObamaAuctions.com, a site where users can sell their stuff and pledge a proportion of the funds to the Obama campaign. You could, if you want, buy this anti-cellulite cream – and relax in the knowledge that 75% of the cash raised will go to support Barack’s bid to move into a very nice house in Washington for at least the next four years…
GMail becomes an OpenID provider
Google has joined Yahoo! and Microsoft in the ranks of being an OpenID provider. Anyone who has a GMail address can now use it to log in to any site that accepts OpenID logins, like Zoho and Plaxo.
The list of sites that accept OpenID doesn’t include Microsoft, Yahoo! or Google, you might notice, despite the fact that they provide IDs. That’s because they’ve just signed up to the movement as a ‘provider’, not a ‘relying party’. That’s a shame, because now that everyone probably has two or three OpenIDs, it’d be nice to have somewhere to use them.
The OpenID movement is a decentralised service that’s supposed to provide you with one login for every website. It doesn’t work quite as well as that in practice, but it’s a very noble concept, so Google gets a small round of applause for providing them. A far bigger round of applause would be gained if they supported it themselves.
OpenID (via TechCrunch)
Related posts: No Facebook app on Android – not until Google does it for them | GMails adds gadgets for Calendar and Documents
If the world could vote in the American election, who would they pick?
Given that the American presidency is the closest thing we’ve got to a “President of the World”, people around the globe care dearly about who gets elected to the White House. If you’re stuck in another country without a vote, you can only pray that the independent voters of America choose to endorse the same candidate that you like.
To give you some sense of participation, however, a website’s sprung up to try and find out who would win the election if the entire world could vote. It’s called, appropriately, “If the world could vote!”…
Bluetooth social network allows the shy to ask "so do u come here often?"
A new bluetooth-based social networking has launched today and looks set to rival “actually talking to people”, which is the older, more established method of social networking with those within a 10 metre radius.
“Bluehoo” is an application that will run on mobile phones and Windows Mobile and will scan for other users who are also running the application – who they insist on referring to as “hoos” – over bluetooth. Apparently when you find someone else you’ll be able to view their profile and stuff.
GMails adds gadgets for Calendar and Documents
Just a quick one, this, but enormously useful. Google has added gadgets to GMail that allow you to view your calendar and your documents in little boxes to the left of your window. If you’re anything like me, then you have your Gmail window open at all times, so this is an enormously useful addition to the web app. To turn them on, go to the “labs” section, by clicking the volumetric flask in the top right…
Amazon launches brilliant "WindowShop" website
The value of a great interface is underrated. Many online shops look more like a spreadsheet than a pleasurable retail experience (I’m looking at you, iTunes). That’s why I’m really excited by a new front-end Amazon has created for their site, called WindowShop…
Jeeves is now a Porn Star
Way back in 2006, the eponymous butler behind Ask Jeeves was retired so that the site could rebrand as “Ask.com”. The site blogged about the change, but they also set up a page called Jeeves Retirement Journal, linked from the homepage, where Jeeves, the fictional character, could post about what he did in his retirement, where he went, what he enjoyed, etc…
Terrorists on Twitter? The US Army seem to think so…
A draft Army intelligence report reckons that terrorists might be able to use popular microblogging service Twitter to co-ordinate attacks against the United States. It follows fears that World of Warcraft might be used for the same purposes both stories beg the question: haven’t the US army got anything better to do…?
