Popular Facebook Pickle Surpasses Nickelback

Popular Facebook Pickle Surpasses Nickelback, Remember early February when that Facebook group popped up in your news feed, idly wondering if a pickle could garner more fans than Nickelback? Well, the pickle has officially won: As of this posting, the pickle boasts1,489,737 fans, just ahead of Nickelback's 1,422,984.

The Facebook group's founder, Coral Anne, wrote a lengthy post yesterday answering questions she has fielded in the past three weeks and clarifying that she does not hate Nickelback. "Are they one of my favourite bands? No, but, I didn't make this page to endorse hate. I have to respect Nickelback just like any artist out there in the world, because even though they may not be a band that has helped me with their music, I know there must be people out there who their music has inspired," Anne wrote, adding, "This pickle page is strictly intended for humour. The whole time, I was pro-pickle, more than anti-Nickelback."

Armless Woman Earns Pilot’s License


Yup. She can fly thanks to her fancy footwork.

Jessica Cox was born without arms, but that hasn’t prevented her from becoming the first licensed pilot to fly with only her feet: 

With one foot manning the controls and the other delicately guiding the steering column, Cox, 25, soared to achieve a Sport Pilot certificate. Her certificate qualifies her to fly a light-sport aircraft to altitudes of 10,000 feet.

“She’s a good pilot. She’s rock solid,” said Parrish Traweek, 42, the flying instructor at San Manuel’s Ray Blair Airport.  
www.impactlab.com

Mighty Titan The Most Scary Lovely Dog

Mighty Titan The Most Scary Lovely Dog, Yankees Man is proud owner of The Mighty Titan, a 3 1/2 year old Bordeaux Mastiff (Breed of Turner and Hooch fame). He’s such a docile dog according to his owner, Pictures below show how he expresses himself when he’s playing with his balls.

Don’t forget to check out Titan’s online store at cafepress, at this store site you can find all unique Mighty Titan’s gifts from Shirts, Hat & Caps, Mugs to Thong and more. For more pictures

Google is ready for a faceoff with Facebook.



Google is ready for a faceoff with Facebook. The Internet search leader opened a new social hub in its e-mail service yesterday, seeking to outpace online rivals.
The new Gmail channel, called Google Buzz, includes many features that have turned Facebook into the Web's top spot for fraternizing with family and friends.
The move comes less than a week after Facebook made changes of its own: Facebook now shows a list of friends available for chatting on the left side of the page, similar to where Gmail now displays its chat feature.
The Google Buzz features won't reach all of Gmail's estimated 176 million users worldwide for several more days. A link to the service will appear on the top left of the page, in a prominent position just under Gmail's inbox tab.
Like Facebook or Twitter, Google Buzz will let Gmail users post updates about what they are doing or thinking and share those with the rest of the world, or with only a select group of people.

What is Google Buzz : Launch today

Google has just announced their Twitter competitor, named Google Buzz. The twist--this service is completely integrated into Google's Gmail service. It's basically a new way to connect to your existing contacts in Gmail. Google lists 5 unique features of Buzz:
What is Google Buzz : Google Buzz social sharing service announced
  1. Auto-following. Google Buzz is populated by your Gmail contacts.
  2. Rich, fast sharing experience. Same UI and keyboard shortcuts in Gmail. Special attention to media that users like to share, like YouTube. Buzz has an integrated fast photo viewer, and plays videos in-line with messages. Connects with other web services, like Picasa and Flickr. 
  3. Public and private sharing. Real-time indexing in Google search for public posts. You use a drop-down menu to make posts either private or public. 
  4. Inbox Integration. Buzz is a new item under the "Inbox" link in your Gmail navigation sidebar. It looks like an integration of Wave in Gmail. Any item in Buzz can become a conversation. When you share, and get comments and likes in your activity, you don't just get a new email update. Updates show up in your inbox.  Comments and activity populates your inbox in real-time. 
  5. Just the "good stuff." With the amount of social data going on in Twitter and Buzz, you tend to miss a lot of good stuff. In Buzz, you get updates from a recommendation system, even from people you aren't following. You can *thumbs up* and *thumbs down* posts to teach the system to filter out the "bad buzz." Posts that you aren't interested in get collapsed and hidden. 
 
Next up, Buzz on mobile devices. It won't just be the desktop experience. "Signal relevancy" will be taken into account (ie. increased filtering, location services, etc). 
More than just GPS location, Buzz will include Google's decade-long investment in their location-tracking platform, including turn-by-turn directions. Video

10 Things a Good Boyfriend Won't Ask You to Do

We've all been in relationships where, at times, we've felt more like a mom or a secretary than a significant other. While we understand that healthy relationships require compromises, we've compiled a list of favors that good boyfriends know better than to consistently request. If you're constantly taking on any of the items on this list (especially with any hint of resentment), it's time to get your guy to lend a hand.
#1. His laundry
Pairing your socks isn't exactly our idea of a stay-at-home date, nor does living with you make us a 1950s housewife. A good compromise is for one partner to sort and start the laundry and the other to fold and put it away. Plus, studies show that helping around the house can increase intimacy. So, how 'bout that pile of dishes? If you clean up the sink while we tackle the living room, we'll be more likely to cuddle.
#2. Buy gifts and cards for other people on his behalf
We'll help when we're out with you, but no, we won't make a pit stop at Hallmark and Laura Ashley while we're shopping with the girls. Just because we're women doesn't mean we're automatically adept at figuring out your Aunt Martha's dress size.
#3. Plan an entire vacation without his help
When we ask you whether you'd rather spend our anniversary in Cabo or Vermont, we want you to express an actual preference, not to say, "Whatever, I'm happy with what makes you happy." The same goes for the hotel, the airline, and the restaurant reservations. Letting us take the reins isn't considerate, it's just lazy and boring. Instead, make sure to divvy up the planning. We pick the location and hotel, you plan the activities.
#4. Make him a sandwich
The refrigerator is 10 feet away and your game control has a pause button, so get up, stretch, and slap that ham and lettuce together by yourself. We don't care if you're "in the zone," because apparently, you were out of it long enough to articulate your immediate need for a nibble. Maybe we'll consider it if you agree to break from the game for 20 minutes, put on some coffee, and enjoy your afternoon snack with us.
#5. Change your relationship status on Facebook
We believe our life outside of the Internet should speak for itself. On the off-chance that we break up, wouldn't you rather tell your close friends in person, rather than have that ever-present broken heart appear on 500 people's newsfeeds? Well, we would, so don't even ask us to include our relationship status on Facebook in the first place.
#6. Be his wake-up call
Really, buy an alarm clock. Remembering a man's nap and wakeup schedule should be an occasional favor, not an everyday obligation.
#7. Hang out with his ex
Some women like befriending the ex, and others just want to satisfy their curiosity about her, but don't pressure the ones who would rather keep a distance.
#8. Keep up with his favorite shows
How would you like it if we made you religiously watch Desperate Housewives? Instead, let's pick a show we both like and make sure we follow it together.
#9. Lose weight
We'll tone up for health purposes and for ourselves, but if you're really concerned about the 5 lbs we gained over the holidays, don't flat-out complain that we're getting flabby. Instead, invite us to go biking with you or to take a yoga class together. Treat exercise as a fun activity we can do together instead of something that we should do just for you.
#10. Keep our hair long
Trust us, short hair is cute, fun, and just as feminine as back-length hair. Just look at Halle Berry, Audrey Tautou and Keira Knightley, circa 2005. It's not as if we're going to shave it off or sport one of Rihanna's hairstyles, but even if we did, we hope you'd find us just as attractive..

iPad's iBooks: Give Us The Tools


Apple’s iBooks reader and online bookstore for iPad will revolutionize the way we read electronic content. But so far, self-publishers haven’t been given any direction or tools to exploit the nascent Apple ebook ecosystem.
So the iPad was announced, and there was much rejoicing. Some of usdyed-in-the-wool Apple skeptics and “antagonists” even genuinely applauded the boldness of the device’s entry-level price point while at the same time remain cautiously optimistic despite some shortcomings that are evident in the 1.0 product release. And after the initial luster wore off, reality began to set in.
While many consumers, including myself await the general availability of the iPad and are on the e-mail list to receive notification for when the product can be purchased, there is a glaring lack of information during the product’s ramp-up period for content creators to produce books and optimized websites for the device when it launches.

Yes, Apple has given developers a Software Developer Kit. This is of course extremely important, as applications in the existing iPod/iPhone App Store ecosystem will need to be tweaked to fully take advantage of the much larger display, processing capability and other features not present in the smaller devices.
However, this SDK does not address what is perhaps the iPad’s “Killer App” which is the viewing of content itself, meaning optimized websites and the eBooks that will run in the iBooks application on the device.
First, lets tackle the issue of optimized websites. From what my colleagues who have been working with the iPad SDK tell me, the SDK is primarily for testing native applications which use the iPhone OS APIs in Objective C, not for testing the iPad simulator with websites.
Apparently the implementation of Safari which runs on iPad isn’t part of the current iPad 3.2 SDK in the simulator. This seems like either a glaring omission or that the Safari code for the SDK’s simulator or for the final shipping device hasn’t been baked yet.
While many websites will probably just “Work” with iPad, since the screen dimensions and resolution are closer to a Mac or a PC’s native web browser than an iPhone, any number of UI and usability considerations are going to have to be examined for compatibility to make sure stuff isn’t just broken or if various things need to be tweaked.
The User Agent from iPad’s Safari also needs to be known so that so that web developers can make programmatic changes to our web sites to give iPad users an optimized website experience. We need a Safari simulator for iPad and we need it really soon. I can’t emphasize this enough.
That’s just tweaking websites. From what is known about the iBooks store at initial launch, it will be seeded with eBooks from several large publishing houses. Apple has so far stated that the target format for iBooks will beEPUB. This is a huge validation of that format from Apple, and is a move I genuinely applaud, but that move to support that open format raises more questions than it answers.
First is the issue of authoring tools. Currently, the premier authoring platform for EPUB ebooks is Adobe’s InDesign. Given the current state of relations between Apple and Adobe, I think it’s fair to say that it probably makes sense for Apple to have its own set of authoring tools, or for Apple to Open Source EPUB authoring tools so that small publishers or even self-publishers can get into the game. Right now, e-book production for the independent publisher or author is a huge challenge, and InDesign isn’t cheap.
For example, I’m currently a board member of a not-for-profit organization, the U.S. Strategic Perspective Institute,  which is giving an e-book away, and we want to make it usable on the iPad from day one. The problem is, we have to apply some form of DRM to this book because we don’t want it printed out on paper for free nor do we want people re-issuing it with added text that the author did not intend. So for the moment, we’re giving it out as a locked PDF.
We know PDF will work on the iPad and any number of other eBook platforms, such as SONY’s reader and the Kindle, but we also know we can’t put a PDF on the iBooks store and long term we know that it’s a terribly bloated format for ebook distribution and is only a stopgap.
We have to assume that iBooks will support some kind of DRM on their EPUBs, but Apple does not specify what kind of DRM should be applied to it and EPUB as a standard has no recommended set of DRM formats either.
Almost certainly, it isn’t going to be Adobe Digital Editions otherwise we would have heard about such a partnership during the iPad jamboree. We have to assume it will be something home-grown, that there will be some sort of submission process like the App Store has, but we don’t know what it is yet, or what the expected lead times on book submission will be, or what types of hassles will be involved for the small publisher to get on board with iPad either.
These are questions that Apple needs to answer, and soon, if the iPad is to be successful at launch.
Do we need website-proofing and ebook authoring specifications and tools for iPad as soon as possible? Talk Back and Let Me Know.