Archive for September, 2006

Internet media company Revision3 has relaunched within the last 48 hours. They have recieved a large amount of funding and have a brand new website among other things. They are marketing themselves as a on-demand media website. Where you get visual on-demand content for free (with ads).

They have an original enough idea, however to do this properly they need good content and right now they don’t have good content. Diggnation which features two guys drinking and reading stories off Digg.com is not the best entertainment choice in my personal opinion. Nor is a ex-cable host ranting and swearing with his friends. If they want to be taken seriously they need to create content that is mainstream and not niche which is what they are currently offering. After watching some of their content, some is borderline illegal and the rest looks like drunk-20 year olds mucking around. Not something I want to watch nor something the mainstream wants.

Another tech orientated network TWiT.tv is facing some heat after including ads in their podcasts and website. They now ask for donations and advertisers. I mean my opinion is pick one, I would not donate again now because they have advertisers (and I mean Leo does earn enough). Whats the point? Some people are starting to think maybe TWiT and the network have jumped the shark.

PARIS – A French regional newspaper quoted a French secret service report on Saturday as saying that Saudi Arabia is convinced that al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden died of typhoid in Pakistan last month.

L’Est Republicain printed what it said was a copy of the report dated September 21 and said it was shown to President Jacques Chirac, Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and France’s interior and defense ministers on the same day.”According to a usually reliable source, the Saudi services are now convinced that Osama bin Laden is dead,” the document said.

“The information gathered by the Saudis indicates that the head of al Qaeda was a victim while he was in Pakistan on August 23, 2006, of a very serious case of typhoid which led to a partial paralysis of his internal organs.”

The report, which was stamped with a “confidential defense” label and the initials of the French secret service, said Saudi Arabia first heard the information on September 4 and that it was waiting for more details before making an official announcement.

Source.

A new article reports that debates are going on right now about the Australia domain name “.com.au”. It is the .com for Australia and is currently only available for Businesses with a ABN number (A Business Number). Some people would like to see it opened up to the world for anyone to purchase. However some claim this would mean spam, spyware, search and porn sites could overtake the second level domain name.

Britain also protects its domain names in a similar way according to Australian newspaper The Age. I personally would like to see it opened up but only to people inside Australia. How they would regulate that I have no idea. However I do not want to see the Australian domain names taken up by the rest of the world. I have my eye on mikebeckham.com.au, for how long that is the question. New domains being considered are shop.au, law.au.