Well, this is pretty cool. Linksys is offering a phone that also does Y!Messenger. Best thing is that unlike many other VOIP phones, this one also handles your traditional land line too, meaning that when your net connection goes away, you can still order pizza.
Very handy.
The Next Generation of video game consoles is just about here --- or, in the case of the Xbox 360, has been hanging around for a year waiting for its competitors to show up --- and the good folks at Yahoo! Video Games are doing their darnedest to keep you on top of the happenings. In addition to having their standard platform tabs available for the Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, and PlayStation 3, they've also put together an in-depth article comparing the consoles and a full Nintendo Wii microsite that stylishly brings together photos, Q&A, news, and more.
Alright, yes, this post is also an opportunity for me to gush about the fact that I had a chance today to test-drive a Nintendo Wii through a game of tennis, via Wii Sports. *grin* It was very fun, and using the Wiimote was much more intuitive than I would have thought. Anyone else planning on buying one?
As the Pope might have said, "Hey! I can see my house from here."
Congrats to the Maps team for releasing the new international maps including:
and major coverage (mostly major cities, railways, etc.) for:
(quite a laundry list, no?)
They've also improved the satellite imagery for most of the European cities, and I hear tell there may be a few more Easter Eggs lurking about.
Big Congrats, Alan and the rest!
Ah, the Holidays. A time for many things. Most of which seem to involve an airport.
Still if you're waiting for that special someone or just like figuring out what flight number that was cruising by, you can always go to the Yahoo! Travel flight checker.
Me? I'll be one of the many headed across this great land at 30,000 feet wondering just how many cows there are down there. I'll wave if I see your house.
Ah, the Holidays. The day we all look forward to overcrowded malls, fighting for parking, pushy shoppers, and finding out that they just sold out of the perfect gift. Ok, so maybe everyone else isn't like me and doesn't enjoy taunting mall-goers by taking my fumbling with my keys next to random cars.
Granted, I can happily incur the wrath of overstressed luddites in Hummers because I've already got my holiday shopping well under control, thanks to the Y!Tech Gift Guide.
Sadly, there are a few glitches in it (like limited inventory of items to suggest, not really sure how to save items to the list the Save for Later feature is horribly broken, and less than useful celebrity wish lists), but it's better than the mall.
Keep an eye on it anyway. I'm sure that it's going it has to improve.
Ok, having just used some of the new features, I can say that this was launched too early. I'm sorry for having mentioned it. While the Y!Tech page does provide a nice add-on layer to the Y!Shopping page, the Holiday Gift Guide has too many problems for a GA product. I've already brought this to the attention of the folks responsible, and hopefully it will re-launch soon.
My apologies.
I find it equally entertaining that the the same day the US has it's elections, there's an equally notable horse race going on. The main difference being, that horses don't buy up every available commercial in the days preceding their race.
Wherever your interests lie, may the best one win.
Just a quick note to point out that the Yahoo! Autos Feedback page has been recently been given a fresh coat of paint and polish.
On somewhat interesting note, I'll pass along that this page was created in one of our Hack Days by some of the Autos engineers and is getting quite a bit of traction inside the company. Hopefully we'll be rolling this out to other properties soon.
Yahoo! 360°, our rockin' blog service, has a particular feature called a Blast, which basically lets you throw up a short message and link to something interesting at the top of your blog page. It's basically a place to highlight any "hey, this is kinda neat" moment that you come across in your everyday life, ideally associated with a URL that describes said neatness in greater detail. Could be anything --- an interesting article, a funny picture, or maybe some awesome MP3 that you want to Blast to your friends. Hey, hold on, don't we have some sort of inline MP3 player?
If you don't have your own 360° page to play with, a) you should totally get one, and b) you can check out my Blast here. Oh, and hey, don't download that song that I'm Blasting. Weird Al says so.
And they're green! Who? Yahoo! Autos, obviously, with their recently launched Green Center. At the Green Center (devoted to alternate fuel and environmentally-friendly cars), you can find an extensive list of vehicles that scored well in our exclusive Green Rating (created in conjunction with Environmental Defense), which takes factors like fuel mileage, emissions, and manufacturing pollution and packages them together into a single, statistically reassuring number. To satisfy your inner Captain Planet, you can read about all of the major technologies currently being used to reduce the environmental footprint of our automobiles and explore related news stories, del.icio.us links, and questions on Yahoo! Answers. If you're not into any of that darn environmental stuff, you can also just bask in the very pretty page design. Oooh. Clouds.
And if you're like me and you're already killing the planet with an inefficient gasoline-powered car, you can at least enjoy these basic tips for improving your gas mileage. My tires, I am going to pump...them...up! *flex*
I'll admit that one of the things that used to annoy me about Yahoo! Answers was going through some list about optimizing PHP and seeing a question like:
Y do boiz h8 mee?
While one can guess that HappyKiTTee_8192831's personal issues could be attributed to a lack of literary skill, one could equally assume that she would not get the answer that she expected.
Not surprisingly, the Yahoo! Answers folks picked up on this as well and decided to use the Context Engine to help solve that problem. Right now, after you ask a question and before it gets posted, your question is scanned for appropriate points of context and you're helpfully pointed toward more appropriate sections.
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