A few months ago, the Google Open Source team had an offsite in our Chicago office, and we were looking for something fun, social, and geeky for the teams to do during informal discussions. Before that, my colleague Aza had shown me a cool new thing that he was making called Bloxes -- interlocking cardboard boxes that were something like giant legos that connected on all six sides. They were actually invented by Aza's father, Jef Raskin (who started the Macintosh project at Apple), and were originally intended to be used to build flexible workspaces (like easily morphable cubicles). Having...
This week, we've started to feature another layer in the Google Earth Gallery, showing several thousand panoramic views provided by 360cities.net. This layer contains exciting 360 degree panoramas from a variety of great photographs taken all over the world!Do you want to explore some beautiful spots in Central Park, or be impressed by the beautifully illuminated Kremlin at night as seen from the Red Square in Moscow?These amazing panoramas from 360cities.net will provide you another way to browse user contributed pictures and information in addition to our Panoramio and Wikipedia layers. Are you also an enthusiast taking panoramic views? It's...
Dustin Moskovitz, a Facebook co-founder who had overseen engineering, is leaving the social networking start-up to form another. Moskovitz launched Facebook with Mark Zuckerberg, its chief executive, while they were students at Harvard. Moskovitz will leave Facebook in about a month with Justin Rosenstein, an engineering manager who joined Facebook from Google. Rosenstein and Moskovitz, who couldn't be reached for comment, are joining forces to build software they hope will be "to your work life what Facebook.com is to your social life," according to a note on Rosenstein's Facebook page. Moskovitz recruited Rosenstein to Facebook, and the two have been...
With the upcoming debut of the 2010 Ford Mustang at the LA Auto Show, the existing enormous slate of special-edition Mustangs will be wiped clean, ready for a new crop. But not before a couple more special editions come out, like the Saleen Dark Horse. Only 25 of the 620 HP, supercharged, shaker-hood-scoop-intake-wearing Dark Horse Mustangs will be available, and above that, in a livery Henry Ford would approve of: black only. That black gets dropped over a full body kit with matte-black stripes tossed in for good measure. Your daily recommended allowance of "special edition" Mustang details below. SALEEN...
Cal Henderson, Flickr’s Engineering Manager, closed out the first day of DjangoCon with a very funny talk entitled Why I Hate Django. Despite the fact that he claims to be working on “yet another fucking blogging engine” built with Django, Henderson professed, tongue planted firmly in cheek, that he hates Django. Of course, mind you, Henderson doesn’t hate Django nearly as much as he hates smug Rails developers, but nevertheless, he has some issues with Django: Django team does not have beards = not serious Django team = boy band Verbose template syntax makes people cry (Henderson demonstrated how...
Does this picture remind you of your boss a little too much? It may be time to check out the latest job listings on CrunchBoard. Here’s a sample from the last week: Software DeveloperZillow - Seattle, WA Product ManagerInternet Start Up - Manhattan Beach, CA Web Client Software EngineerGotuit - Woburn, MA Senior Interactive Flash DesignerModea - Blacksburg, VA Web DeveloperSlideShare - San Francisco, CA Social Computing ResearcherXerox - Rochester, NY Fulltime Senior Dev Lead / Engineering ManagerDriverSide - San Francisco, CA Product Manager, Tools and Support InfrastructureYelp - San Francisco, CA Director, Online Communications/WebmasterBroadcast Music - New York, NY...
Google has finally launched Lively to try to lure some of those Second Lifers away. The site utilizes avatars and 3D graphics like the other virtual game, and meeting rooms for characters. After the download, you can also display YouTube videos on virtual TVs and show photos in virtual frames. Engineering Manager Niniane Wang wants subscribers to create their rooms in their own interests. “If you enter a Lively room embedded on your favorite blog or website, you can immediately get a sense of the room creator’s interests, just by looking at the furniture and environment they chose.” Note...
Google is going into the virtual world business today as it unveiled “Lively by Google,” a product that lets users create highly personalized 3-D virtual rooms on the web. Users can create their own custom characters, or avatars, and interact with friends through text chats or animations. The long-awaited move has been expected by rivals such as IMVU, Habbo, WeeWorld, and Gaia Online – all of whom offer virtual rooms and avatars targeted at young people. Lively by Google users will be able to embed videos or photos in the walls of their rooms. And the Lively rooms themselves can...
As if Google didn't have a strong enough hold on the planet already, today it's launching its own world -- a virtual world, to be exact. Lively, which Google likes to call a "virtual experience," allows you to create an avatar, decorate your own virtual room, invite friends to your room and do things you've always dreamed of, like blow up oil barrels on a deserted island. Unlike popular virtual worlds such as Second Life, Lively doesn't require you to download new software. All you need is a browser plug-in. The service is also more distributed than Second Life: Its...
Posted by Niniane Wang, Engineering ManagerA while ago, I looked around the social web and wished that it could be less static. Sure, you can leave a comment on a blog or write a text blurb on your social networking profile. But what if you want to express yourself in a more fun way, with 3D graphics and real-time avatar interactions? I started asking this question as a 20% project, and I'm excited to announce today's release of Lively by Google - a 3D virtual experience that is the newest addition to Google Labs.The Lively team wants to help people...
