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What Facebook and Skype Integration Would Mean For You

September 29th, 2010 UGM Social Media Marketing

Facebook and Skype integration! That’s the rumor. But beyond the intermingling of two major tech companies, the important question is: how’s this going to affect you?

Video Chat With Facebook Friends From Skype

Just to be clear: this wouldn’t mean that you’d be able to Skype video chat through Facebook. Not yet, anyway. Instead, when this supposedly goes live in a few weeks with Skype 5.0, you’d be able to connect with your Facebook friends list through Skype. Still pretty handy! And in-browser video chat is apparently seen as a “logical progression” to the partnership, meaning it could well happen down the line.

And Text Them, Too!

According to the WSJ, the deal would also include SMS, which definitely wouldn’t get annoying after a while.

Facebook Phone’s Own FaceTime?

Facebook denies that they’ve got a phone in the works—much less two—but that’s a product that would definitely benefit from deep Skype integration. Skype’s currently only available on Verizon phone

A Google Voice Alternative

Specifically, an alternative to making calls in Gmail. That’s not to say that a Facebook/Skype VoIP solution would be better, necessarily. But if you for some reason want to break free of big G, or don’t have a Google account to begin with, you’d have a viable alternative. Choice is good!

You’ll Actually Use Skype

As wonderful as Skype is, less than a quarter of its 560 million members are active. When they add what’s arguably your most comprehensive Rolodex—your list of Facebook friends—you might be tempted to actually use other parts of the service once in a while. And eventually maybe even cut that cellphone voice plan loose.

The New Xbox Software Is Here and It’s Better

September 29th, 2010 UGM Social Media Marketing

The Fall 2010 Xbox 360 dashboard update brings some sports, some Zune integration and a fairly sizable UI change. Here’s how it works.

The video above gives you a good tour of what the updates bring. There’s the changed UI to match the flatness of Windows Phone 7 and Zune HD, the ESPN and Zune video features, Netflix searching and Zune music.

Other than the UI tweaks, there aren’t a lot of changes to the core functionality principles of the dashboard itself, other than perhaps the improved Xbox Live party chat and tweaked Avatars. The additions mostly focus on bringing other services to Xbox to beef it up, which is apparently where Microsoft thinks it needs to go to differentiate itself from Sony’s offerings.

But overall, we like the change. Stuff is better and more visible! You can watch things! Everyone gets it. The public preview starts today for people who were chosen for the beta.

How to Pick an Android Smartphone – September 2010

September 29th, 2010 UGM Social Media Marketing

How to Pick an Android Smartphone - September 2010The last few months have been phenomenal for Android fans, with Samsung’s Galaxy line hitting all four carriers and Verizon getting a few, new, better Droids for their customers. But which should you pick? It’s actually an easy decision.

Nasa Warns Of Super Solar Storm 2012

August 8th, 2010 UGM Social Media Marketing

NASA scientists warned recently that high-energy electric pulses from the sun could cripple our electrical grid for years, causing billions in damages. In fact, the House is so concerned that the Energy and Commerce committee voted unanimously to approve a bill allocating $100 million to protect the energy grid from this rare but potentially devastating occurrence.

The sun’s activity usually ebbs and flows on a fairly predictable cycle. Typically, a cycle lasts about 11 years, taking roughly 5.5 years to move from a solar minimum, a period of time when there are few sunspots, to peak at the solar maximum, during which sunspot activity is amplified.

The last solar maximum occurred in 2001. The latest minimum was particularly weak and long- lasting.

The most recent solar eruption is one of the first signs that the sun is waking up — and heading toward another maximum.

Solar Flare 2010 – Solar Flare Storm or Solar Tsunami to Hit Earth [old]

August 8th, 2010 UGM Social Media Marketing

Sunday, August 1 a solar flares storm began and triggered a coronal mass ejection, and it is expected to hit the earth Tuesday and Wednesday night, August 3 and 4, 2010 and light up the northern skies.

Northern states (Oregon, Montana, North Dakota, etc.) in the US should be able to see the lights in the sky weather permitting. A solar flare is large explosion in the sun’s atmosphere that releases energy.

A “solar tsunami” eruption of plasma on the surface of the sun will lead a shower of ionized atoms to strike the Earth Tuesday or Wednesday night.

The satellites will not be able to work properly and it would result in a number of problems. The mobile service would become a bit slow and to some extent unresponsive. The other communication like transfer of live TV transmission and other stuff related to satellites shall be slowed down. Even the people who use cable TV shall also suffer some problems in their transmission as the cable service is also connected to satellites.

SOLAR BLAST JUST MISSES EARTH

August 8th, 2010 UGM Social Media Marketing

PERSEID
METEOR UPDATE: “The Perseids are booming
here in Alabama,” reports astronomer Bill Cooke of the
Marshall Space Flight Center. “Although the
peak of the shower is almost a week away, we saw five
Perseid fireballs last night (Aug. 5-6). It’s a good sign
that this year’s shower will be a good one.” [live
meteor radar] [2009
Perseid gallery] [2010
meteor counts]

SOLAR
BLAST JUST MISSES EARTH: On August 7th (1825
UT), magnetic fields around sunspot 1093 became unstable and
erupted, producing a strong M1-class solar flare. Several
amateur astronomers caught
the
active region in
mid-flare, while NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded
an extreme ultraviolet movie of the entire event:

Note:
A close-up movie
is also available.

The eruption hurled a coronal mass ejection (CME) into space,
just missing a direct sun-Earth line. Forecasters expect the
cloud to deliver no more than a glancing blow to our planet’s
magnetic field when it billows by on August 9th or 10th–not
be a major space weather event.

Future eruptions could turn out differently. Active region
1093 is rotating toward Earth. By the end of this weekend,
we’ll be in the line of fire if its magnetic fields become
unstable again. Space
Weather Phone subscribers will be the first to know.

EXTRA! SOLAR RADIO BURSTS:
The flare produced intense radio bursts detectable by ordinary
shortwave receivers on Earth. In New Mexico, amateur radio
astronomer Thomas Ashcraft picked up strong emissions around
21 MHz. “Listen
to some of the sounds than came out of the loudspeakers,”
he says. “This was a complex flare and very exciting.
Yet it is still small stuff compared to what is coming in
the future as Solar Cycle 24 intensifies.”

SUNSET
PLANETS: When the sun goes down tonight,
step outside and look west. You might see something like this:

Babak Tafreshi sends the picture from the Alborz
Mountains of Iran. “Venus, Saturn and Mars are in triple
conjunction,” says Tafreshi, “and they will be at
their most beautiful in the nights ahead.”

Next week, on August 12th, the trio will become
a quartet when the crescent Moon joins the planets for an
amazing four-way conjunction. Even more amazing, it happens
on the peak-night of the Perseid
meteor shower. Astronomy doesn’t get much better than
this!

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