~TECH-BYTES~

Among the wackiest technologies that I’ve seen during this election night is CNN’s hologram technology — something that was predicted back in the Star Wars era.

There’s not much info as to exactly how this stuff works, other than what USA Today has reported:

CNN will have 44 cameras and 20 computers in each remote location to capture 360-degree imaging data of the person being interviewed. Images are processed and projected by computers and cameras in New York. There’ll also be plasma TVs in Chicago and Phoenix that will let the people being interviewed see Blitzer and other CNN correspondents. Bohrman says the network can project two different views from each city so Blitzer can appear to be in the studio with two holograms.

Jessica Yellin was the first CNN reporter to be “beamed” to the New York newsroom, where Wolf Blitzer interviewed her — and she reported that there were only 35 cameras pointed at her, and that “talk to the cameras in New York.” Apparently representatives in the Obama campaign in Chicago and the McCain campaign in Phoenix will be interviewed as holograms later in the evening.

It’s still unclear who makes this hologram technology, nor how much it costs, nor how exactly it works.

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You can now search Google profiles to find people who entered some information about themselves in their public pages. Google shows a thumbnail and a snippet from the profile, but you can’t restrict the results to a certain location or to people who worked for a certain company.

To make your profile more findable, Google recommends to “add information about yourself on your profile so people can find you when they search by keywords associated with your profile. For example, include details such as the name of your hometown, your job title, where you work or go to school”. In addition to this specialized search engine, profiles can be indexed by any search engine and Google makes this easier.

MORE…

The AOL mail blog published this sarcastic letter suggesting that Gmail copied various features from them.

Happy Halloween Gmail! We knew you would have the best costume at the party, and who can blame you? We think it’s great that you’re using this holiday to pay homage to the one who started it all, who got 35 million people online at once, gave them all email, great content and messaging capabilities, and even created a forum that encouraged them to speak in emoticons.

That costume is fabulous…clearly, the devil is in the details… and what’s that you’ve got there? An “experimental” instant-messaging feature built right into your mail service so people can use it to send text messages to their contacts’ phones? We love it – that was such a hit when we first introduced it so many years ago. We tried to make it easy: telling users to simply open the AIM panel in their email type “+1 and the 10-digit cell phone number” into the To: Screen Name box. It’s kind of fun, too – good choice!

And those sidebar options – talk about getting it right… Adding gadgets to email that allow people to manage their calendars, access their favorite content and best Websites? Nice work. The idea of adding a side panel like that was one of our best. Giving people the ability to get to their favorite places on the Web, manage their schedules and IM right from their email home page tripled the convenience of our service. We’re sure you’ll get lots of compliments.

Finally, is that an “attachment warning” popping up on your back? Nice touch. We know nothing is more embarrassing than having to send an email twice because you forgot the attachment. Our users love this little reminder, and they have been praising it since we first implemented it back in 2007.

They say imitation is the best form of flattery, so Gmail, we thank you and we are indeed very flattered. Putting together a costume that is so dead-on could not have been easy, and you’ve got it down pat. Trying to convince all the other kids at the party that the only thing to use is Gmail and putting out a press release every time you add a new button to the service is just so 1998. We’re telling you – this outfit brings back memories!

Here’s a tip though… the Web’s getting more personal, and people are really savvy at customizing their own services. When you don this same costume next year, make sure you check outwww.tunome.com first and add some third party services (see our new Yahoo! plug-in) – you can’t be all Gmail all the time any more – it won’t be such a big hit next year!

Happy Halloween!

Although AOL mail team tried it level best to mock Gmail with this but they forgot the fact that they were the past and Google is the present and hopefully the future…

here are some of the comments of their own readers:-

Hey, you might have some good ideas, but if you don’t implement them well, they mean nothing. It’s like having good intentions… Oh, I *meant* to get you a great present for your birthday, but… 

Seriously, AOL will always have a place in Internet history, but the present, and likely the future, belong to Google.

Gmail was free first, more intuitive, more customizable, and better at communicating new features than AOL mail.

This is ridiculous. You’re soooo behind the curve, all the time. If it was in your control, none of the web would have even been possible, but just small networks a la Compuserve or the first MSN shit. What a shame. Go cry somewhere else, kid.

I don’t know any serious internet users who have @aol.com as their email. The overwhelming majority are people who are Internet neophytes.

The time you spent crying to the public to “Look at me..look at me,” would have been better spent studying Google and learning a thing or two about service, reliable products, and ease of use.

Gmail is about to introduce a new feature that will let you send SMS messages to your contacts from the US, announces InformationWeek. Google explains how it works:

You can send SMS messages to your contacts’ mobile phones using Gmail Chat. To do so from Gmail:

1. Enter your contact’s name in the ‘Search or invite friends’ box in Chat, and select Send SMS from the box of options that appears to the right of your contact’s name. Or, if you already have a Chat window open for this contact, just click Video & more, and select Send SMS.
2. In the dialog box, enter a phone number in the ‘Send SMS messages to this number’ field. For now, this feature works only on United States phone numbers. If you’re outside the US, you can still use it, but you won’t see the SMS option in Chat until you enable it manually in the Chat settings page. 
3. Click Save.
4. A Chat window appears. Just type your message as you would normally. When you hit Enter, the message will be sent to the phone number you entered.

If your contact replies, the text message response will appear as a reply in Chat. These conversations are stored in your Chat history just like regular chats (but keep in mind that you can’t go off the record while communicating via SMS).

The nice thing about Gmail SMS is that each user gets a virtual phone number that facilitates replying to messages. “To write back, reply to the message as you would any other text message, and your message appears as a Chat message in your friend’s Gmail account. If you don’t want to receive any SMS messages from Gmail, reply with the command STOP. If you’d like to block the person who sent you the message, but still be able to get Gmail SMS messages from other contacts, reply with the command BLOCK,” informs Gmail’s help center.

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The black and white days of text-based emails have had their day. Following the evolutionary path blazed by colored labels, we present, in all their technicolor glory, emoticons in your mail.

No more will you have to settle for a when you can have a. Out with the “XOXO” and in with the. And of course, when the bad news smells really bad, transcends all words.

So raise yourand welcome in the colorful new world of Gmail

P.S. For those of you who love our chat smileys, 
Google also added a whole new set for your enjoyment.

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