Blue Security Introduces Free Spam-Fighting Solution for Gmail

Blue Security, Inc., developers of the Do Not Intrude Registry(TM) solution to eliminate unsolicited e-mail spam, has released a new version of its Blue Frog software that allows webmail users to automatically report spam from their e-mail accounts. The new release, which is free to new and existing Blue Security members, is designed for Mozilla Firefox Web browsers and supports popular webmail applications such as Gmail, Yahoo! and Hotmail.

Click Me!

The new version of Blue Frog works seamlessly with webmail applications, allowing users to actively fight spam by reporting unsolicited e-mail messages to Blue Security. Complaints are automatically posted on Web sites advertised by spam, encouraging spammers to stop further solicitation. Messages can be reported manually or automatically when entering a supported webmail application, quickly removing spam and helping to prevent its return.

"Webmail users have never had appropriate protection from the increasing threats of unsolicited e-mail messages," said Eran Reshef, founder and CEO of Blue Security. "Spam filters are not enough. For the first time, Blue Frog allows webmail users to actively fight spam by automatically reporting the messages from their webmail application, without the fear of exposing themselves to further solicitation or retribution."

Blue Community members register their e-mail addresses in the Do Not Intrude Registry and install the Blue Frog application on their machines. After messages are reported to Blue Security for analysis, the Blue Frog posts 'opt-out' requests on the sites advertised by spam, asking spammers to remove registered addresses from their mailing lists and stop sending unsolicited e-mail to Blue Community members. The Do Not Intrude Registry empowers users to exercise their right under the CAN-SPAM Act, to securely and automatically opt-out of spam.

Since the launch of the Do Not Intrude Registry in the summer of 2005, nearly 100,000 e-mail addresses have been registered in the Do Not Intrude Registry. Preliminary results of the Beta service have users reporting 50 percent or greater reduction in the amount of spam they receive, indicating that a number of spammers already comply with the Registry and avoid sending spam to Blue Security customers.

The Blue Frog recently became an open-source project, allowing users and developers to contribute to the development effort by creating tools, adding features, providing feedback and offering recommendations to the company to enhance its software or adapt it to other platforms. The Blue Security developer community had already contributed a spam reporting tool for the Thunderbird e-mail application and assisted in creating a version of the Blue Frog for Linux users. Developers who wish to contribute to the Blue Security community can visit http://dev.bluesecurity.com.

Consumers and organizations can download Blue Frog and join the Do Not Intrude Registry by simply registering their e-mail addresses or their entire e-mail domain at http://www.bluesecurity.com/register/pr.

About Blue Security, Inc.

Blue Security is a pioneer in fighting spam and unsolicited e-mail. The company's unique, active and community-based approach empowers members in the Blue Community to exercise their opt-out rights safely and securely while encouraging spammers and legitimate business owners to stop sending spam to its members. Blue Security's Do Not Intrude Registry is a ground-breaking solution for proactively fighting spam and enabling users to restore their e-mail to a safe, efficient and effective form of communication. To learn more about Blue Security or join the Blue Community, please visit www.bluesecurity.com.

About the Technology

The new version of the Blue Frog integrates with the popular Firefox browser and appears as a toolbar in webmail applications such as Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail. When entering the application, Blue Frog automatically reports messages that have been placed in the 'junk' or 'spam' folder. Users can also choose to report selected e-mail messages as spam to Blue Security, as well as define follow-up actions after messages have been reported: delete, move to another folder or take no action

Source: TMC Net

Adsense - 7 Required Steps to Mega AdSense Profits

The Google AdSense program is like finding money in the street.

Kids in High School are making thousands of dollars a month with Adsense… Housewives, Retiree’s, Mom and Pop’s who’ve never made a dime on the Internet have created full time incomes by simply placing AdSense Ads on their web site or blog.

Then you have the “Super AdSense” earners. We have all heard of them… the Elite few who are on track to make half a million dollars a year or more promoting AdSense sites. Do not be mistaken though… these people are not building like your Mom and Pop’s do. They have systems in place that create sites for them… people who build sites for them… they have outsourced much of the tedious tasks such as posting to blogs and searching for keywords.

While most people cannot emulate everything these Super AdSense earners do… many of them you can.

Here are 7 Required Steps you can implement today to copy their success.

1) Starting today… treat your AdSense business like it is a REAL business and track what you do.
Begin tracking what you are doing that works… as well as what you are doing that does not work. This will keep you from making the same mistakes over and over, and you can repeat the steps that have worked in the past. As simple as this step seems… most people do not know the reason(s) to their success or failure.

2) Utilize the latest tools and software available.
The Super AdSense earners are not any smarter than your average person. I know many people think they are… but for the most part, they are regular non techie people. They are smarter in one respect though… they use the latest tools available to them to automate most of the tasks involved with researching and creating sites. They use the latest keyword, site creation and search engine optimization tools available. The tools they use are their secret weapons.

3) Quit chasing the Mega Dollar keywords.
You cannot compete with the search engine experts who create sites for the $80 payout keywords. You may get lucky for awhile… but in the long run, you are better off building sites for the low to mid range payout keywords. The competition is less and your chance of success is much higher over the long term.

4) Choose broad niches and break it down.
Choose a broad subject as your main theme (lets use computers for an example). From there… break it down into as many sub niches as possible. Using Computers as the example… you could build sub niches/sites like laptop computers, computer hard drives, computer keyboards, etc, etc. You could literally build hundreds of sites around one major theme and stay totally focused. Once you have exhausted every possible sub niche of that major theme… choose another main theme and repeat the process.

5) KISS
Keep your sites easy to navigate and forget the fancy graphics that distract your visitors attention. Unless you are just building AdSense sites for the fun of it and to impress your friends… the purpose of having the site is to have people click on one of the ads, right? Then keep the site layout simple… dump the scrolling banners, dancing chickens and colored scroll bars… they are distractions.

6) What is the purpose of your web site?
Your web site cannot be everything to everybody. If you have a full fledged ecommerce site, with products for sale… links to other products, it is not a good site for AdSense. If the primary focus of the site is to sell products… let it do that. Do not distract or confuse your visitor with to many options or choices. The best AdSense sites are AdSense only content sites that sell nothing. They are sites that “Tell”… not “Sell.”

7) Be consistent.
This is not one of those deals where you build one site and you are done. Refer back to Step #4. You must continuously build in order to be successful. Think of it as planting a crop that you will harvest in a month or two, and the sites you build are seeds. Once the seeds have grown and matured… you will reap the harvest. The more seeds you plant… the larger the harvest.
To sum it up… utilize the tools available to automate as much of the process of building sites - doing research and building keyword lists as you can. This alone will help keep you organized and on track. Be consistent in building… treat it like the business it is and you will reap the rewards of your harvest.

Source: Adsense Trials

Chinese users ‘prefer’ Google to Baidu

Google, the US search company, has beaten Nasdaq-listed Chinese rival Baidu.com in a customer experience survey of internet users in China to be unveiled on Wednesday by online business consultancy Keynote Systems.

The results of the structured survey of 1,200 internet users suggest vulnerability in the market lead established in China by Baidu, which was given a strong reception by investors when it listed on the Nasdaq last August and has enjoyed high valuations since.

Keynote said its survey, which had hundreds of users separately try a number of searches using each service, showed that Chinese consumers exposed to Google generally preferred it to local competitors Baidu, Yahoo and Nasdaq-listed portal Sohu.com.

“It clearly came out that Google had the best user experience overall,” said Jeff Kraatz, Keynote’s vice president and managing director. “All things being equal, through time, people will shift from a less happy experience to a better experience. This is a lead indicator of how market share could change in China.”
Search market data is scarce in China, but local research firm Analysys International found that Baidu accounted for 37 per cent of Chinese searches in the second quarter of 2005, compared with 23 per cent for Google and 21 per cent for Yahoo.

Google’s success in the Keynote survey – where it won the highest user ratings in 11 of the 13 categories including general search, news search and image search – comes despite a relatively late arrival in China.

However, Google is now determined to expand its presence in a market that has been drawing enormous interest from global search companies and international investors.

Yahoo last year handed over US$1bn and its Chinese portal and search business for a 40 per cent stake in Chinese e-commerce venture Alibaba.com.
Alibaba/Yahoo and Baidu were both “close competitors” with Google in more than half of the 13 categories, Keynote said.

Baidu, which declined to comment on the Keynote survey results yesterday, came first in music search.

Alibaba/Yahoo’s search service won the top customer satisfaction rating only in the Keynote survey category for “help and instructions”.

However, Porter Erisman, Alibaba vice-president, said the survey was done just a month after the relaunch of the Yahoo search service and before many improvements had taken effect.

“It’s a good snapshot of the first mile in what is going to be a marathon,” Mr Erisman said. “We expect both Google and Yahoo will be taking further market share from Baidu in the future.”

Souce: MT.com

Google Talk Federation

Delivering on its commitment to user choice and open standards, Google today announced that its Google Talk service is now fully interoperable with other communications services that support the server-to-server XMPP protocol. This open interoperability, also known as federation, enables any communications service provider to connect to Google Talk so respective users can talk to each other.
Many service providers worldwide support XMPP federation today, as well as thousands of active XMPP-based communications services run by major corporations, ISPs, universities, and individual users. Some of these service providers supporting XMPP federation include Jabber.org, Earthlink, Sipphone's Gizmo Project, Chikka (Philippines), MediaRing (Singapore), Tiscali (Italy), and Netease (China).
Email is an example of a federated network that enables people to communicate with one another, regardless of their email provider. Open interoperability is the first step towards bringing a similar level of openness and user choice to instant messaging and VoIP, and with today's deployment of open server-to-server federation, Google Talk is enabling millions of people worldwide to communicate with each other instantly.

Source: Google Press Center

Google amazes — but for how long?

Google on the wall, who is the fairest of them all? For once, you won't need to look at a search engine for an answer because everyone already knows it.

The world's favourite search engine was even more favoured by online shoppers this year (taking 11 per cent of December site traffic, a 27 per cent rise on last year) and is the darling of Wall Street as its share price heads for the stratosphere.

It has just unveiled yet more goodies — Googlepack (free software for PC newbies) and a point-and-click site to view and buy videos on demand.

By any standard it is the most astonishing company on the planet, the 21st century's version of the philosopher's stone, turning the useless ones and noughts of computer code into shareholders' gold and consumers' enlightenment.

It is also evident that The Force of creative energy has moved to Google's headquarters from Redmond, where it once resided. Microsoft is left battling to save what the courts found to be an illegally maintained monopoly while Google is dispersing knowledge as it works out ways of putting a Trojan Horse behind Bill Gates' battlements.

Among the shoal of rumours swimming around the web, the one I like most is that Google will offer computer manufacturers a free version of Linux to bundle into their machines alongside Windows, as well as a stake in any profits made from revenue arising from Google advertisements in future. Cool.

I should declare an interest. I use Google and other search engines (some seem almost as good); I use Google's customised newspaper; and I am even typing this using its beta email service, Gmail (invitation needed from existing users), because it provides all I need from a word processor without the maze-like complexity of you-know-what.

Beneath all this, Google remains a slightly dodgy long-term proposition. Although it is diversifying in all directions, it remains essentially a one-product company. Just as Google, a second mover, dislodged AltaVista a few years ago, so a newer, better search engine could do the same to Google.

Also, its existence is predicated on most of its sources allowing Google to search their information for nothing. If the content providers were able to devise a payments system when their data was trawled by a search engine, Google's revenue would not be so attractive.

But for now that doesn't matter because Google's mission statement, to make all possible information available to everyone who has a computer or mobile phone, is mind bogglingly important. Taken with the falling cost of computers, there could be a real opportunity to close the digital divide — within countries and between them. And if Wall Street investors get rich on the back of providing free knowledge, who cares?

When Francis Bacon coined the phrase "knowledge is power", books were confined to a few rich, literate people. If Google succeeds then all knowledge about anything will be available to practically anyone. But success also breeds hubris. Google has started to do unGoogle-ish things, such as caving in to censorship demands in China (along with other companies such as Yahoo! and Microsoft).

Take care Google, because we will be watching you. Maybe you should put on your desktops that axiom of Lord Acton: "All power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Or, as W.B. Yeats might have said: "Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams."

Source: The Age

Google’s Most Popular Top Level Domains

Bill Slawski has outdone himself this time with an amazing list of the number of top level domains Google has indexed for almost every single TLD (.com, .org. edu..etc.). Bill thought of the task after reading an article about the amount of .cn top level domains being registered and when a Cre8asite forum member asked about .info domains.
This led Bill to find lists of country and generic top level domains and perform searches in Google for the number of sites indexed for each TLD : “For example, a search for “site:.com” without the quotation marks might show me approximately how many pages appear in Google’s index that are on sites using a ‘.com’ top level domain.”
The results are a list of the 20 top level domains with the most page results in Google, 20 top level domains with the least page results in Google, and page amounts from all of the top level domains looked up in Google. The only numbers that Slawski seems to be missing here are the number of coffees and bottles of Visine he downed while putting these lists together.
Bill’s post on SEO by the SEA, Google’s most popular and least popular top level domains, is a masterpiece and I hope that he put together some sort of program script to generate new Google domain index numbers on an ongoing basis.

Source: Search Engine Journal http://www.searchenginejournal.com/index.php?p=2758

Google Personalised Page Goes Mobile

Google is expanding its mobile offerings with the announcement of Google Personalized Home for mobile devices, a new service that enables users' access to their personalized Google homepage on their mobile phones and PDAs. With Personalized Home, users on-the-go can view the information they access most frequently from one screen on their mobile device. For example, business travelers can keep up with their personal stock quotes while they're on the road, and news junkies can stay on top of their favorite headlines when they're away from their desktops and TVs – all without having to search multiple web pages from a mobile device. Google Personalized Home provides at-a-glance access to information such as Gmail, customized news headlines, local weather, stock updates, hand-picked RSS feeds and more. Information is optimized for the smaller screens and slower bandwidth of most mobile devices and is presented in a format that reduces the need to click multiple links. Users who have already set up a personalized Google homepage on their PC can simply visit google.com through the web browser of their mobile device, select the "Personalized Home" link, and then sign in with their Google account username and password.

The next time they visit google.com on their phone, they will automatically see the same customized content modules that are featured on the web version of their Google personalized homepage. Users who do not yet have a personalized Google homepage on their PC should first google.com/ig from their desktop computer and select the content to be added to their homepage. Google Personalized Home is available for free to mobile users and works with any phone that contains an XHTML-capable web browser. Users should check with their carriers on their data service plan to determine if there are additional charges for web access.

Source: Geekzone http://www.geekzone.co.nz/content.asp?contentid=5727

Google Video Store

It's a blurring of the distinction between the TV screen and computer monitor, and yet another blow to free viewers from the tyranny of network schedules.
Google and CBS are partnering to peddle programs online in a landmark deal announced earlier this month.
The arrangement is the latest in a flurry of technology deals by traditional networks. They are wooing the consumers they're losing over the air by making content available through new technology, such as Apple’s new video iPod and Comcast’s on-demand service.
The Google-CBS marriage is significant because it represents the first time a major Web site has teamed with a major broadcast network to make current hit programming available.
“Ultimately, we will be living in a world of the smart television ... where you can do anything from the television or the PC via one device,” said Robert Routh, a media analyst at Jefferies & Co. “This is the first step in the convergence that has been talked about for years by major media companies.
“I think it’s going to be much sooner than people expect,” Routh said. “All of these technologies, with the exception of digital television, have come dramatically faster than anyone anticipated. ... Cable modems were ubiquitous in a matter of no time.”
Friday’s announcement at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas does more than bridge the 350 miles from Silicon Valley to Hollywood.
It is the latest development heralding a not-so-distant future in which appointment viewing, the notion of rearranging one’s schedule just to watch a particular TV show, could become an anachronism if not downright quaint.
It’s also a tacit acknowledgment that not all future TV viewing will be done on TVs, as programmers chase after viewers they appear to be losing to the Internet and elsewhere.
“Making our programming accessible to the Google Video Store guarantees our shows significant new exposure to millions of users who are likely to access this Web service and who may not be traditional TV viewers,” CBS Corp. president and CEO Leslie Moonves said in a statement.
The Google Video Store – at video.google.com – will offer episodes from CBS’ prime-time lineup and library, National Basketball Association games, Sony BMG music videos, news and archival material from ITN, interviews by Charlie Rose, cable programs and content from independent producers.
“For video producers and anyone with a video camera, Google Video will give you a platform to publish to the entire Google audience in a fast free and seamless way,” Google co-founder Larry Page said in a statement.
The involvement of CBS, which will sell commercial-free reruns at $1.99 a pop and share revenue with Google, is the latest entrepreneurial move promising to alter the relationship between TV viewers and TV networks.
The advent of digital video recorders that automatically snag programs their owners might like in addition to good old fashioned video cassette recorders already have empowered viewers to establish their own schedules and blow past the commercials that pay the freight.
One media executive questioned how many consumers would pony up $1.99 to watch a show they can see for free on broadcast television.
“I would love to see these guys try an ad-supported model as well,” said Tracey L. Scheppach, a vice president at media buying giant Starcom USA.
The Google deal follows a string of recent announcements from various media companies hoping to exploit new distribution platforms to reach viewers willing to pay to watch what they want, when they want it, where they want it and how they want it.
Disney, which owns ABC, and later NBC Universal cut deals with Apple to sell previously televised programs through its iTunes site for use on its video iPods and other portable devices.
CBS, through Comcast, arranged to sell its already broadcast programs on demand to digital cable subscribers in cities where the network owns stations, such as Chicago. And NBC has an agreement with DirecTV, enabling some satellite subscribers to download just-aired reruns to a video recorder for a fee or watch them on a pay-per-view basis.
Google rival Yahoo! announced Friday at the Consumer Electronics Show that it is offering a service that connects users to Yahoo! through their TV, computer and mobile phone.
Viacom’s Comedy Central cable service just this week became the latest to announce it will offer content for mobile phones. And Liberty Media’s Starz Entertainment Group, which has Encore and Starz pay-cable services, is introducing Vongo, a $9.99-per-month service allowing subscribers to download movies from the Internet for viewing on computers, hand-held video players and TV sets.
“It’s going to take a while for consumers who are used to a living room experience to adapt to watching television or entertainment programming - non-interactive content is what we call it - on a screen that they’re used to sitting two feet away from,” analyst Routh said.
“But ultimately,” he said, “with more and more of these flat screens that are computer-enabled being purchased by consumers, the convergence will happen and eventually there will be seamless integration between the two.”
Programs available on Google through the CBS deal include “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation,” “The Amazing Race” and “Survivor,” as well as vintage shows from the company library such as “The Twilight Zone,” “I Love Lucy” and “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.”
Routh dismissed the idea CBS or other networks would be cannibalizing their viewership through alignment with an online site. “From a revenue perspective, an eyeball’s an eyeball,” he said.
“I wouldn’t be surprised to see more (deals) involving the other broadcast networks and the other Internet companies as they all realize that this is a potential long-term revenue generating opportunity that they don’t want to miss,” Routh said.

by Phil Rosenthal

Source: College Times http://www.ecollegetimes.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/01/12/43c543a48188a

Google Unwraps the Google Pack

Free Software Package Offers Users One Stop to Discover, Install and Maintain a Wide Range of Essential PC Programs

CES, LAS VEGAS, Nev., January 6, 2005 – Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) today announced Google Pack beta, a free collection of safe, useful software from Google and other companies that improves the user experience online and on the desktop. In just a few clicks, users can easily discover, install and maintain software to surf the web faster and safer, communicate better, and effectively manage information.
"We've heard from countless new computer owners that it can take days or weeks to install all the software they need to make their computer useful," said Marissa Mayer, VP of search products and user experience at Google. "We developed Google Pack to give users a way to painlessly install all the essential software they need - pre-configured in a sensible way - in a matter of minutes. Better yet, users don't have to keep track of software updates or new programs – we maintain and update all the software for them."
Google Pack offers programs that meets Google's high software standards and are considered best in their class, including:
Adobe Reader 7
Ad-Aware SE Personal
GalleryPlayer HD Images
Google Desktop
Google Earth
Google Pack Screensaver
Google Talk
Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer
Mozilla Firefox with Google Toolbar
Norton AntiVirus 2005 Special Edition
Picasa
RealPlayer
Trillian
Google Pack also includes Google Updater, a new tool that intelligently downloads, installs and maintains all the software in the Google Pack. Google Updater alerts users when updates and new programs become available and ensures each program is always up-to-date. Google Updater can also be used to monitor the status of installation, run software that's been installed, or easily uninstall software.
Users can easily select which programs they want to install. For programs already installed on a computer, Google Updater checks whether the latest version is running. If not, Google Updater will install the latest version.
Every program included in the Google Pack is free, has earned a reputation for excellence, and was evaluated to ensure it meets Google's Software Principles. Google respects users' rights to control their own computers and does not include software that is spyware, generates pop-ups, or that is difficult to uninstall. Additional information on Google's Software Principles is available at http://www.google.com/intl/en/corporate/software_principles.html.
Google Pack beta is available in English, runs on Windows XP, and supports Firefox 1.0 and higher and Internet Explorer 6.0 and higher. More info on Google Pack is available at http://pack.google.com.
About Google Inc. Google's innovative search technologies connect millions of people around the world with information every day. Founded in 1998 by Stanford Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google today is a top web property in all major global markets. Google's targeted advertising program provides businesses of all sizes with measurable results, while enhancing the overall web experience for users. Google is headquartered in Silicon Valley with offices throughout the Americas, Europe, and Asia. For more information, visit www.google.com.

Source: Google Press Centre http://www.google.com/press/pressrel/pack.html