Bit.ly Pro goes free, custom short domains and analytics for all

 Bitly has moved its Bitly Pro service out of beta and straight into its core offering, now providing domain shortening and link analytics completely free of charge.

 All that a user needs to do is change the DNS settings to point to Bit.ly’s servers and then sign up for the service in account settings.

the users will not only  get a short domain, they will be able to register for tracking statistics, allowing users to check how their content is performing on social networks including Twitter and Facebook. Any Bitly link that points to the same domain will also be tracked in the dashboard.

All of these features require an account, so if you haven’t signed up yet then sign up for a new account like twitter or any other account of your choice and setup the features.

JELLY BELLY OFFERS SWEET CASES FOR YOUR DEVICES!

Did you ever imagine that a candy company that makes jelly belly will ever make sweet scented cases for devices such as iPhone, iPod, and Blackberry---but thats true!
These cases are made of durable TPI platsic and scented with the jelly belly smell, where you can choose from five different flavours--- Strawberry, Cheesecake, Very cherry, Blueberry, Licorice and Berryblue.
These jelly belly cases for iPhone, iPods, Blackberries and headphones are available at various retailor, retailing for $14.99 a pop.

Google live streams lunar eclipse!

The great lunar eclipse of 2011 is happening right now. A phenomenon that occurs when the sun earth and moon are aligned exactly, or very closely , with the earth in the middle.

So people who are afraid that they're going to miss today's lunar eclipse, google has a solution for that. Google homepage is using it as its google doodle showing the eclipse almost in real time. The picture says "google" , updates every 2 minutes. The images were provided by Slooh, an astronomy website that did the sky images for a layer of google earth!

So dont miss it.... click here to see the latest google doodle



FB denies losing users

 

Facebook has denied that it is losing customers, saying it is “pleased” with growth.
Figures from Faceboook monitoring site Inside Facebook suggested that during May, Facebook lost six million users in the US and 100,000 in the UK. But the social network, which does not usually comment on third party statistics, questioned how it arrived at this figure. Other net measurement firms said they had seen growth over the same period. “From time to time, we see stories about Facebook losing users in some regions. Some of these reports use data extracted from our advertising tool, which provides broad estimates on the reach of Facebook ads and isn’t designed to be a source for tracking the overall growth of Facebook,” the firm said in a statement. –BBC

Light Touch projector makes any surface a touchscreen

A previously little-known company from the UK called Light Blue Optics has demoed a projector at CES which allows users to interact with the light image as if it were a touchscreen.

The Light Touch throws a 10-inch image at WVGA resolution at incredibly short distances thanks to the holographic projection technology involved. At the same time the infra-red touch sensitive system allows users to interact with social networks, multimedia sharing and any other applications that can use the Wi-Fi or Bluetooth support in the device to connect to the Internet.

It comes with 2GB of onboard flash memory, a microSD card slot for expanding the storage and the battery life will last 2 hours. Expect to hear more from this one on the OEM front as interest grows.

Australian guy builds himself a hoverbike. A hoverbike! | DVICE

Australian guy builds himself a hoverbike. A hoverbike! | DVICE]

TRANSPARENT PHONE

Here’s an official concept phone this time,  created by Aston Martin and Mobiado, the famous luxury gadget designer. It is a transparent phone running Android and these are all renders, right now. Dubbed the CTP002, this phone is a big sapphire glass surface with titanium edges.
The glass is in fact a capacitive touchscreen and Mobiado hopes to also implement a SIM card slot, a chipset and a battery on this gizmo. Mobiado CTP022 is supposed to connect to the car and its display, with the latter showing a map of local venues and friends from the Foursquare network. Turns out that the camera in your car can snap a photo and post it on Facebook letting everyone know you own an Aston Martin.

This is all daydreaming if you ask me, but the concept of the device will be shown at BaselWorld in Switzerland, so feel free to drop by, if interested.

 

iPhone 5 in Final Testing, Due in September

Right on schedule, we are now hearing from 9to5Mac that the iPhone 5 has reached the final testing stage and should be ready in time for a September launch. 

for more details : click here

How blogging gives student journalists an edge in the job market

At an event in London late last year, three young journalists discussed how blogging helped to kickstart their careers. As reported at the time by Journalism.co.uk, Guardian technology and media reporter Josh Halliday stated that “The most important thing I did at university, including my degree, was to blog and get online. That’s what got me the job.”

The growing list of student bloggers who have found their way into good ‘pro’ jobs also includesHannah Waldram, who founded the Bournville Village blog, ended up taking to professional local blogging as the Cardiff ‘beatblogger‘ for The Guardian’s now mothballed Local project before becoming a community coordinator for the same newspaper, and Dave Lee, who founded The Linc newspaper and website in his university town of Lincoln before moving on to a varied career that currently sees him covering technology news for the BBC.

So, is blogging the perfect way for student journalists to get a foot on the ladder? Paul Bradshaw, leader of the MA Journalism course at Birmingham City University and Visiting Professor at City University London in the UK, believes so. “It’s definitely something I’ve been encouraging my students to do for a few years now,” he says.

“I think students entering the marketplace who have never run their own news website are at an increasing disadvantage,” explains Bradshaw. “Pretty much every employer I talk to says that they would ask serious questions about why an applicant was not already doing their journalism on some sort of online platform. There’s also a new opportunity for students to build assets – a URL, a network, a reputation – that employers will be looking for.”

The ability for anyone to set up a blog in minutes, at no cost, makes it a no-brainer that someone wanting to find paid work as a journalist would want to cut their teeth with some form of news blogging.

read more : original article

Nomura: Samsung to become world’s largest smartphone maker this quarter

Samsung will become the world’s largest smartphone vendor in the third quarter of 2011, replacing beleaguered mobile manufacturer Nokia, which has held top position for the past fourteen years,according to Nomura

“In 1996 Nokia launched the Communicator and the smartphone market that it has led in unit terms ever since. After about 14 years at the top, Nokia looks set to relinquish its smartphone crown,” Nomura analysts said in a research note.

Nokia has lost initiative in the smartphone market to Apple’s iPhone and Google Inc’s Android devices, and at the lower end, to more nimble Asian rivals.

Overall, Nokia still makes more cellphones than Samsung due to its strong position in basic cellphones and its wider distribution network in emerging countries.

The company is switching to Microsoft Corp’s software from its own Symbian platform as part of an overhaul of its phone business set out in February by new Chief Executive Stephen Elop.

On May 31 Nokia abandoned hope of meeting key targets just weeks after setting them, raising questions over whether its new boss can deliver on the turnaround he promised.