RIP GeoCities: a loss for fluro text, animated GIFs and endless Midi filesToday, Yahoo is finally euthanising GeoCities, the original free, design-you-own webpage service where many netizens got their first taste of web mastery and popped their HTML cherries. Vale.
The Internet
The (Dis)Information Age: how the internet is making us stupider
Despite the rhetoric of “openness”, the internet is actually making us more narrow-minded by allowing us to filter what we read to suit our own viewpoints, says a new book by academic Cass Sunstein. How else can you explain the absurd ideas of the “birthers” gaining a foothold?
The real-time web: a Brave New World or hideous dystopia?
Sitting at a Weezer concert, next to Twitterati who’ve never heard of the band, where everyone is too busy blogging about the show to actually watch it, Paul Carr wonders whether the real-time web isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
MySpace surrenders to Facebook
MySpace has officially given up in its battle for social media supremacy with Facebook, the the company’s CEO now claiming it is far more interested in becoming “an online hub for music and entertainment.”
The internet is totally .GAY
With a whole bunch of new top-level domain names on the way (i.e. other than just .com .org and .net) a host of high-profile folk are getting behind a push to approve .gay, which will then be monetised to fund gay rights campaigns.
Microsoft vs. Google: who’s winning the social media search wars?
Yesterday, both Google and Microsoft announced deals with Twitter to add tweets to their search results. But which company scored the better deal? And which will do a better job? The blogosphere weighs in.
Not so fast, Microsoft: Google scores a Twitter deal of its own
Just hours after Microsoft announced its big coup in inking a deal with Twitter to include tweets in its search results, Google has announced its done one too. Close, Gates, but no cigar.
Arrr! Prepare ye landlubbers for book piracy
With the arrival of the Kindle around the world, the publishing industry is preparing for an onslaught of black-market e-books, as people share them illegally online. Will it be the mp3 wars all over again?
The great Twitter coup: how the users took control
“There may be some 50 people officially working at Twitter, but it’s more like 5,000 people work for Twitter,” says founder Biz Stone, explaining how third parties and users have out-innovated Twitter with their own product.
Why I kept playing: confessions of a video game addict
Sure, it’s funny to laugh at the geeky online gamers spending hours (or days) glued to their screens, but for some, it’s a serious addiction with serious consequences. One such gamer has written an excellent piece detailing the destructive toll his addiction to EverQuest took on his life.
leaked 
The new-look Facebook
Mashable has gotten its geeky little mitts on leaked details of Facebook’s latest redesign. (Spoiler: it looks a whole lot like the current Facebook.)
Are independent political blogs dead?
With the leading political blogs increasingly backed by big media outlets, are the days of needing only a PC and an opinion to be an popular online pundit over?
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Which browser works best?
The performance of the top 5 major web browsers are have been tested, compared and compiled into this handy chart. Which program is leading the pack? You might be surprised…
WWW creator apologises for the forwardslash backlash
World Wide Web creator Tim Berners-Lee says he regrets including the two forwardslashes in Web URLs (“http://www”), admitting he could have designed it without the punctuation marks. “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”
MySpace is now worthless
A few years ago, Rupert Murdoch purchased buzzing social network site MySpace for the bargain basement price of $580 million. How much is it worth these days? Next to nothing, estimates Henry Blodget.
Crikey Clarifier: Why do all these celebrities keep ‘dying’ in New Zealand?
Zach Braff is not the only celebrity to have been the subject of death rumours in recent times. He is also not the only one who has supposedly fallen to their death from the Kauri Cliffs. So what’s going on here? Elly Keating investigates.
Facebook stalk your way to your dream job
Stop stalking your ex, start stalking your potential employers. The more information you know about them — from Google, Facebook, Twitter, etc — the more you can use that info to your own advantage in an interview.
Reports of email’s death are greatly exaggerated
On Monday, the WSJ declared that the era of email is coming to an end, as people increasingly turn to social media to communicate. But a slew of commentators have hit back, arguing email isn’t going anywhere soon.
The end of email?
The WSJ has declared email’s reign “over”, with real-time services like Twitter and Facebook increasingly becoming the preferred method of communication. After all, who has time in this modern world to wait for email responses? It can take minutes!
VIDEO: Mark Zuckerberg: How I invented Facebook
He may still look a bit like a geeky teenager, but 25-year-old Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has transformed the little online project he started in his dorm room into a $6-billion company. He tells Business Insider how.
How to avoid an email phishing attack
Thousands of private email usernames and passwords were released online this week after a phishing attack on Hotmail. But what the phrig is “phishing” and how can you avoid being the next victim?
YouTube might actually make some money
Media companies are finally realising that their attempts to keep their content off YouTube are futile, and are now putting videos up themselves, allowing the video site to sell ads along with them and gasp! potentially earn some actual money.
Bye-bye Borders: the Kindle finally comes to Australia
Amazon’s heavily-hyped e-reader, the Kindle, has finally released an international version and will be available in Australia this month. Why would you want one? Imagine buying, downloading and reading a new-release book, without getting out of bed. Exactly.
Revealed: the most common Hotmail password
After examining more than 10,000 Hotmail passwords that were leaked this week, a bit of research has revealed the most popular password of choice. And surprisingly, it’s not ‘password’.
