Blog

Leopard, more readers online, Facebook Ads, Digg for sale.

News from the IT world doesn’t come any bigger this week, here are some of the top stories:

Apple Launches Leopard, no kitten!
I won’t review the new features here, other than to say the new version at $150 bux is well worth the coin, in terms of personal efficiency you can’t beat Time machine for keeping your info safe, Quick Look for speeding up review of files, Mail improvements for bringing your to-dos into line, Spaces for keeping your various work roles split neatly, Boot Camp for running those pesky Windows apps. But in addition its the little things like having wikipedia entries linked to your dictorianary (apple click any word anywhere to gain clarity) or being able to quickly google map an address book entry. While some criticize the update as being a service pack, I’m here to say Apple are still the leaders in inspired software development.

NY Times says: More readers trading Newspapers for Web Sites
That’s right, treehuggers should be happy to note that newspaper sales are on the decline while online readership is on the up. Now if only I can get a raise.

Facebook Ads – Having your cake and feed your friends too.
Big news on the Facebook front, with the social media company announcing an ambitious new ad infrastructure that will allow advertisers to target specific demographics whilst presumably (it will be launched tomorrow morning our time) allowing a brand-based referral network. While social referral isn’t new, the notion that the estimated 25 million daily users of facebook be presented by brand messages from their trusted friends offers a new and potentially highly profitable revenue stream, akin to Google Adwords or YouTube’s embedded ads. This morning, there’s already a backlash

Digg, the online news ranking site close to sale
One of the internet’s more popular blog ranking site is close to a US$300-$400m sale to a ‘major media player”. Rupert? Is that you?

– Ben Prendergast