Software
Domino's mobile: When the noms hit your iPhone like a big pizza pie
It's Friday, you've had a hard week of checking out Crave's informative and entertaining features -- it's time you kicked back with a slice. We tried out Domino's new iPhone site at www.dominos.co.uk/m, as powered by Vexed Digital.
Pizza in your pocket
Like Papa John's mobile site, this is an iPhone-optimised version of the Domino's site, rather than a standalone app. Non-iPhone users can use the text-ordering service, but that requires fiddly setup.
While it will spot you're on an iPhone, the site doesn't automatically grab your location from your GPS. Instead, you have to type in your postcode. Registering allows you to go straight to the nearest branch, and save your details. Each store has a direct link to phone up, or a Google Maps link. Continue reading...
Twitter vs the world: Ten scandals that set Twitter alight
2009 has been the year of Twitter. The number of users has exploded, and where there's people, there's people getting brassed off about something. From the Hudson river crash to the Bombay bombings, Twitter has seen users tweeting from the heart of the news. But the site also allows for instant, spontaneous mass reaction to events. We've picked ten of the scandals, shocks and controversies that have got our knickers in a knot and tweets in a twist over the past year. Continue reading...
Digital Economy Bill confirms copyright proposals, turns Mandelson loose
The government unveiled the Digital Economy Bill today, confirming tortuously complicated proposals to combat copyright infringement by to-ing and fro-ing between ISPs, rights holders, Ofcom and the courts. It also paved the way for business secretary Lord Mandelson to rewrite copyright law.
The bill implements the proposals of the Digital Britain report. There are no big surprises, but not much in the way of specifics either. Minister for Digital Britain Stephen Timms announced that Internet service providers will be forced to send cease-and-desist notices to customers they suspect of copyright infringement. Continue reading...
Firefox coming to PlayStation 3?
"Firefox? In my PS Triple? Sacre bleu!"
That's what you should be saying right about now. Tipsters have been fingering keyboards towards the PlayStation Insider blog, which we'd never heard of until Engadget linked to it, and apparently "sources very close to Sony" say Mozilla might be porting the Firefox Web browser to the PS3. Continue reading...
Sony Online Service: iTunes rival attempts to Save Our Sales
Sony has announced an online store selling music, films, games and ebooks. The iTunes rival is tentatively titled Sony Online Service and aims to recue Sony's struggling finances. SOS is an apt name.
BusinessWeek reports the intiative was announced at a management strategy meeting in Tokyo today. As well as selling content, the store will allow users to upload pictures and videos to personal accounts. Continue reading...
Google demos Chrome OS: Out late 2010 
Netbooks running Google's own operating system -- Chrome OS -- rather than Windows, yesterday took a giant step forward as the company released the underlying source code to the developer community.
At a conference in the US, Sundar Pichai, Google's vice president of product management, announced the lightweight operating system is about a year away from release. He also promised it would ship pre-installed on Chrome OS-optimised netbooks, rather than be provided as a free download for anyone to install on any computer. Continue reading...
Mandelson in fresh attack on Web rights: Seeks powers to rewrite copyright law
Unelected, twice-fired business secretary Lord Mandelson is asking to be allowed to rewrite UK law to give himself and his mates powers to investigate and punish copyright infringements. According to the Guardian, Mandelson has written to ministers asking for the power to amend the 1988 Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, and confer powers on copyright holders "for the purposes of facilitating prevention or reduction of online copyright infringement".
Mandy's plan is to create new punishments for copyright infringement, such as the three strikes and you're banned from the Web plan, or even prison. He proposes to do this means of what's called a 'statutory instrument', which sounds like a medieval torture device, but means the amendment will not be debated in Parliament, passing into law through a vote the government will pass if it can muster its full majority.
Continue reading...
Camino 2.0 tested: The Safari alternative you've been waiting for
Camino has been one of the simplest and cleanest Web browsers for Mac OS X for a while. It just hit version 2.0.
Camino is developed exclusively for Mac, so its development focuses solely on making use of OS X technologies and APIs, such as Cocoa, to integrate the browser into the OS as well as the default Safari browser. You get full integration with the Mac keychain, spell checking using OS X's dictionaries, session save and support for AppleScript.
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Bebo and CEOP push the button on suspect behaviour
Social network Bebo has added a button for users to report suspect behaviour. The CEOP Report button was developed with the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre.
Gawd bless the Daily Mail and the Sun, branding the CEOP button a "paedo panic button". The actual function of the button is less hysterical: clicking on it gives you access to help, advice and links from services such as Childline and Beatbullying. The button also allows you to report suspect behaviour to special police units. Continue reading...
NatWest, RBS and Ulster Bank for iPhone: Cash machinery
Sometimes an app comes along that makes you think, "Yes! This is why I bought an iPhone!" That's what we thought as we downloaded the app that lets you log into your bank account from your phone. There are dedicated apps for NatWest, RBS and Ulster Bank customers. Accounts can also be added for Alliance & Leicester, HSBC, first direct and Lloyds TSB. Early teething troubles as customers rushed to get the app have now been resolved, so we took it for a spin.
What does it do?
The app allows you to check your balance and view mini statements. There's a lengthy but straightforward sign-up, in principle to ensure security, culminating in you receiving a confirmation text up to 24 hours later. Once setup, you need to enter a PIN each time you open the app, and that's it. The app will time out after a short while, but the features are so basic you're unlikely to be spending a long time in the app anyway.
Continue reading...
