I thought about family networking sites when i wrote the article on “Family-ed Social Networking” . I did a quick search and was astonished to see that one such network is already up & running. I didnot expect what I blogged to happen this fast!! (:P)

It’s a Japanese site in English. (Yeah!, we’ve got to agree that English rules!!)
www.piqniq.jp

They Say:
“Piqniq is a social network for English-speaking families living in Japan. Our goal is to create a Japan-specific online community and information resource to help you and your family get things done in a country where simple tasks can easily become complicated.”
“Use Piqniq to discuss…

* Raising kids in Japan
* Babysitters or daycare centers
* Schools and activities for kids
* Doctors and dentists
* The ultimate family getaway
… all in English!”

Marvellous, isn’t it?

Eventhough, it is intended for the Japanese, to get the feel myself, i signed up. It was a less-than-a-minute-process followed by an email confirmation.

I got a not-so-warm-welcome aboard. That is negligible considering that the service is only in the early stages.
The Sections Are:

Blogs
(as you know, members can write and post anything they need to say or share)

Members
Member Listing with an awesome search featuring filters like: “Living In”, “From”, “Family Info”, “About Me”

Japan Directory
Each and Every service in Japan, listed.

Forums
The Life of the site

Jobs
A very interesting section that offers Jobs straight away to Japanese.

Now, that’s piqniq.jp - really a nice,clean family picnic spot. We all love to see our national counterparts, isn’t it? I really love to see an Indian CounterPart. I feel very deeply inspired too. Soon, we’ll witness these for sure.

I wanted to know more about the new .asia domain and did a little bit of research on it. I have posted an article on it already.

New Top Level Domains (i.e. the last part of an Internet domain name; that is, the letters which follow the final dot of any domain name) keep coming to the web.The launch of a new top level domain is a lenghty process involving several sub periods. Let’s take a glimpse at this interesting process.

A new Top Level Domain Name release involves these steps:

1. ICANN’s approval
2. Sunrise Period (again subdivided into Sunrise2, Sunrise2A etc)
3. Landrush
4. Go Live!

**ICANN’s Approval
A new top level domain must be approved by ICANN (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICANN) before it could be launched.

**Sunrise
The Sunrise Registration is an exclusive period of time prior to General Registration when the owners of
Intellectual Property, such as Trademark holders, have an opportunity to register their desired names
in the new Top Level Domain.

**Landrush
Landrush is a shorter period comapared to Sunrise, at the start of General Registration(public registration without any trademark or something)
during which individuals or organizations may register their new domain name through a registrar at a premium price.
It is a service provided to protect the rights of the owners of Intellectual Property.

**Go Live!
Go Live! is the launch of “first-come-first-served” registration (Ongoing Registration) service for the general public.
Then, the registration process continues indefinitely.

For Example, the various phases in the launch of .asia domain is illustrated below:

The new top level domain: “.asia” is all set for launch this month.

Asia is home to more than 60% of the world’s population who speak 30 different languages, and is currently experiencing economic growth on a massive scale. The .ASIA domain was proposed to ICANN to represent the unified Asian market, much like .EU has done for the European Union. The DotAsia Registry was approved by ICANN on December 6th 2006 and is now actively promoting its services to the 73 Asian countries it covers.

DotAsia Organisation announced today that a total of 473,633 domain registration applications were received within the 3-week Landrush period. Including Sunrise and .Asia Pioneer Domains, the number of applications totals to over half a million: 505,838. .Asia registry will Go Live on March 26, domain names will be available on a First-Come-First-Served basis.

“.Asia opened great opportunities for AsiaDNS. Even with high expectations, our results nearly doubled our expectations! We were able to attract new customers from around the world who understands the value of a .Asia domain.” said Frederick Schiwek, EVP of AsiaDNS.

Verdict: The domain is a stunning success and has got a bright future

Statistics show that Firefox is gaining huge popularity among the browsers.
In 2005, 23.6% people used it and now 37.2% people use it. No other single browser has a usage percentage more than this. But, it’s a fact that IE5, IE6, IE7 when taken together account for the majority; 54.7% (1.5+32.0+21.1)%. I have switched to firefox (powered with extensions) and i now stick to it. But, at times, i am forced to use the “good-old” IE at times. The Online Applications of some of the indian colleges could be filled and submitted only using IE. Ignoring this minute incompatibilities, it could be undoubtedly stated that, Firefox is the best web browser out there.

What makes it tick is the hyper-active community and myriad of extensions (on which there are already millions of posts), and also, the “Spread Firefox Campaign”.

So, if you haven’t switched yet, it’s high time to. I am sure you will, if not visit here and here. These will make you go for the most robust, efficient and ultra-customizable web browser which doesn’t compromise on security either.

Click on the following link and you’ll understand (:P) :
http://www.tylerm.info/this_page_crashes_ie.html
(as the page title says: This page will crash IE)

For more browser statistics, Go Here

[poll=3]

Recently, to be precise, on March 3rd, TechCrunch published a survey analysis on “Blogging and social life”. The finding was that,

“people felt they had better social support and friendship networks than those who did not blog”

Again,
the study found that some “potential bloggers” start from a less socially integrated position. Professor Susan Moore told the ABC:

“We found potential bloggers were less satisfied with their friendships and they felt less socially integrated, they didn’t feel as much part of a community as the people who weren’t interested in blogging,” Ms Moore said.

“They were also more likely to use venting or expressing your emotions as a way of coping.”

“It was as if they were saying ‘I’m going to do this blogging and it’s going to help me.”

All the above findings are true in my case, too. I was looking for some way for a venting and chose blogging as i was immensely interested in web, internet & computing.

You can read the full article at TechCrunch Here

This is a simple way around to have almost every song you need or to record a streaming music from a online radio station or something.

I needed some songs, which i did not had in my HDD. I then thought about the legal “all-music-playing-sites” like listen77.com raaga.com dishant.com smashits.com etc. These sites are HUGE (yeah, i mean it) databases of almost all songs.

But, i needed those songs as a mp3 or wav so that i may edit, cut and mix it with other tracks..But, those sites dont allow DOWNLOADING

I decided to take a way around and was successful with the following way.                                                                              (Please Note that this can be achieved through many other softwares too. But almost all of them are paid software; i am illustrating the tutorial using an efficient freeware.)

==>

Get yourself the free, open source AUDACITY.

Download: http://is.gd/18L

and U MAY need Lame mp3 encoder to export as mp3 from Audacity; get it here:
DOWNLOAD: http://is.gd/18M

Logic 
Simple. We are about to record the sound that is playing through our speakers.

Now, the method.
••Install Audacity and Launch It.

••The main Audacity window will open

••At The top you’ll see two volume sliders (if you dont, go to View menu and select it)

••This is the important part. Next to those sliders, you’ll see a drop-down box to
select the recording input. Click on it and select “Wave Out Mix”.

••After selecting the “Wave Out Mix” the input volume slider will go to ‘0.1′. Dont increase it, KEEP IT LIKE THAT else get ur ears blown…Itz the appropriate level for our job.

First part is over, Second Part>>

••(example)go to www.raaga.com >> Enter a channel (select a language) >> Search for your favourite song(the search bar is there at the top) >> From the search result, click on the song title (of the song u want to record) and now, another browser window will open that is the song player

••At first, you’ll hav to wait a seconds (for buffering) and after that you might probably hear an ad or your slected song will start to play.

••SO, BEFORE CLICKING ON THE SONG TITLE , go to Audacity.

••In the Control Buttons in audacity Click the record button (RED) and it will start to record anything that plays thorugh the speakers..Now click on the song title and let the song play. After the song is completed, Stop RECORDING in audacity.

••Close the browser Window and we’ll do some final touch.

••Remove the extra silence or gap in the beginning of the track by just selecting that much portion and press DELETE on the keyboard. Do that until the waveform looks perfect without any gaps/silence.

••All u hav 2 do now is 2 xport it. Click File >> Export as mp3(or wav) >> Save IT.
(while xportng mp3s for 1st time you may b requird to locate the lame_enc.dll (the file u downloaded earlier)).

And Thatz all….Juz play the song and dance to the tune…

Cast Your votes in the “WebWare 100′ 2008″ polls.

http://www.webware.com/html/ww/100/2008/index.html

The Voting is open now. There are 10 categories with a total of 300 finalists. You get to choose 3 for each category. No need of registering. It’s a public poll. Voting will run until March 31. Winners will be announced on April 21,

The results of this poll will define the new web. It will showcase the all new innovations and ideas that clicked. These poll results will be of immense value as it will draw a crystal-clear sketch of the Web 2.0 market. The Voters are real netizens and are not reviewers i.e. the result shows what the customers think. This is gonna be interesting; I am sure.

Why wait, go vote. And come back for an analysis of the winners !!