901am

New Media News Every Morning

Torvalds likens Linux development to a social network

By

linux.gifLinus Torvalds, the Linux project coordinator who has written 2% of the Linux code, compares open source development to social networks where trust and relationship are the primary drivers of development process.

In an interview with the CEO of Linux Foundation, Jim Zemlin, goes beyond technological capabilities of its members. He said:

“What happens is people know. They’ve seen other people do work over the last months or years, in some cases decades, and they know that, ‘OK, I can trust this person. When he sends me a patch, it’s probably the right thing to do even if I don’t understand quite why’ — and you kind of build up this network.

While Linux development is current confined in the US and Western Europe, it does not mean that people around the globe do not appreciate open source. Rather, there are several stumbling blocks such as language barriers, cultural difference and online connectivity.

And just any regular social networking site like MySpace and Facebook, connections really matter. If you have a huge following, it can easily help fast track the development and send the message to community quickly.

Via Computerworld

Originally posted on January 15, 2008 @ 8:32 am

Ribbit is not just another phone company

By

ribbitRibbit, Silicon Valley’s first phone company and a new platform for developing Web-based voice applications, has formally launched today.

Combining the power of Web-based VoIP and open development platforms, the company boasts its superiority among other companies in the market.

“The world doesn’t need another phone company,” said Ribbit cofounder and CEO Ted Griggs. “What it needs is a new kind of phone company, one that liberates voice from its current confines — devices, plans, and business models — and more readily integrates into the workflow of our professional and personal lives.”

Ribbit SmartSwitch is the core technology behind this startup company. It is a sophisticated multi-protocol soft-switch that bridges the worlds of traditional telephony with next generation networks and protocols.

It works well from any location with an Internet connection and with any Flash-enabled browser. Compared to existing VoIP operators, users can receive and place calls without downloading any soft-phone application.

Ribbit supports other Web-based services including Skype, Google Talk, and MSN. It can even transcribe voicemail to text messages similar to what other paid services like SpinVox and Simulscribe do.

Via NewsFactor

Originally posted on December 18, 2007 @ 12:18 pm

Yahoo! commits to Apache Software Foundation as sponsor

By

apachelogo.jpgYahoo! Inc. announced that it has become a platinum sponsor of The Apache Software Foundation (ASF). Continuing its dedication to open and collaborative computing and research, Yahoo!’s financial sponsorship of the non-profit, volunteer-run foundation will help provide much needed working capital, hardware infrastructure, and support resources required to serve the ASF’s industry-defining projects and incubating initiatives.

Yahoo!’s support of the ASF stemmed from its work with the Apache HTTP Server and Lucene projects. Today, several members of Yahoo!’s development teams are active, long-term code contributors to Apache Hadoop, the open source platform that makes it possible to efficiently process vast amounts of data on a cluster of commodity hardware.

Yahoo! joins current ASF sponsors Google, HP, Covalent, Tetsuya Kitahata and Two Sigma Investments.

Originally posted on December 13, 2007 @ 10:42 am

Plaxo helps open up social graph

By

plaxo1.jpgAs part of its ongoing support for the open social web as an alternative to walled gardens, Plaxo released to open source the code for an important new piece of software, an Online Identity Consolidator. The new software contributes to the community effort to create a public, user-controlled “social graph,” by leveraging the linkages people are publicly-asserting between the various social web applications they use, such as blogs, social and business networks, and photo/video sharing sites. In addition to releasing the Consolidator code, the company added features based on the technology to its recently-launched next-generation social network, Pulse, and published a Consolidator implementation site for developers.

A debate has been heating up within the Web 2.0 community over whether the future of the social web will be defined by openness, with users in control of their data, or by walled gardens, in which corporations assert ownership of their users’ personal information and relationships. The call for a user-controlled approach to consolidation of online identities gained momentum with the recent publication of a manifesto by Brad Fitzpatrick (in collaboration with David Recordon), entitled “Thoughts on the Social Graph.”

Today’s announcement is part of a broader strategy in support of the open social web, and follows recent moves by Plaxo to implement and endorse important open standards, including: SyncML, iCal, OpenID, and microformats.

Originally posted on August 29, 2007 @ 9:32 pm

HP’s WebOS Now Open Source

By

Hewlett Packard’s exit from the tablet market was quite a jolt even though a lot of people already predicted that it was inevitable. One of the fallouts of HP’s move was that the operating system that they bought from Palm for $1.2 billion, WebOS, was suddenly placed in limbo. HP finally addressed the issue when it announced that it has decided to release WebOS as an open source software.

HP’s decision to turn WebOS to the public was a bit of a shock. Most people were speculating that the company will just sell it to recoup some of its investment. Others thought that HP will just totally mothball the OS. HP’s decision leaves many to conclude that it still believes in WebOS and that it will benefit from open source development. [Read more…]

Originally posted on December 12, 2011 @ 9:41 am