Is Lowyat.net hacked? The most visited technology forum in Malaysia tonight (at GMT 10:55pm9.00pm) greet its visitors with simple dark background, an image of a rabbit, and couple of text. Whoever did this, also include a chatbox at lower-fold of the page.

Update #1: Site recovered at 11.50pm

About 3 months ago, we mentioned about Mygazines – a site that allows you to upload, share and read almost any magazines online. However, the site is now officially offline due to insufficient of funds to sustain the business. That’s a pretty bad news. If you happen to visit Mygazines.com, the team has put up a brief explanation and apology of the close down.

Any Alternatives?

Yes, thanks to Richard. Digi-Zines is a site similar to Mygazine where you get to read range of magazines for free, online. You might also want to check out our previous post on free e-books:

• 20 Best Websites To Download Free EBooks
• 20 Best Websites To Download Free E-Books, Part II

It seems pretty much like a fact already, that more and more people are relating the term ’search’ with ‘Google’. I bet you’ve heard dialogues in movies that sounds like these, ‘Let’s Google it’, ‘I found this in Google’, etc. No doubt Google has done a terrific job in their search engine, but have you ever wonder, how intelligent will Google’s search engine be in the next few years to come?

Folks at The Vacationeers has a clue. Check out these funny video clips, demonstrating how sophisticated and intelligent Google search engine has evolved.

Google Maps

Google Moon

Google My Maps

Google SMS

Here’s a quick heads for those who missed the 9rules submission last May, you should be aware that tomorrow is the 2nd round of 9rules’s intake. These folks only have 3 rounds on intake this year, respectively 7th May, 6th August (tomorrow) and 5th November. The submission period for tomorrow’s submission starts midnight EST 6th August 2008 and the submission only last 24 hours.

About 9rules | More about joining 9rules

Here’s a heads up for you guys who read and deal with PDF files on regular basis. Folks at Adobe has just released the latest version of their PDF reader, Adobe Reader version 9. The new release comes with sets of interesting features, amongst is the capability to work with Acrobat.com (beta). That means you can go directed to Acrobat.com, create some PDF files or even share your screens with Adobe ConnectNow.

Here’s a full set of new features in Adobe Reader 9, you can grab more details here.

• Work with Acrobat.com (beta)
• Interact directly with Adobe Flash® software
• Realize more secure document workflows
• Get more done with a simplified user interface
• Search single or multiple PDF files
• Complete forms online as well as offline
• Leverage CAD and geospatial functionality

Click here to download Adobe Reader 9

Thanks for the heads up Anne

Are you using yourname@gmail.com by Google? If you are, chances are you might be interested in grabbing yourname@ymail.com by Yahoo! too. Yahoo! has recently released 1 new mailbox – ymail.com. it’s new fresh so if you’d like to get yourname@ymail.com (especially if it’s a common english name like Sarah, Mark, etc) you better do it quick.

Apart from ymail, folks at Yahoo! are also releasing @rocketmail.com, a company they acquired way back in 1997. So to sum things up, Yahoo! now offers free mailbox in @yahoo.com, @ymail.com and @rocketmail.com.

Is Google AdSense testing out new formats again? Folks at Technospot spotted a different AdSense block on the blog and this time, it’s nothing to do with positioning, instead, it’s a different font.

We all know AdSense allows ads customization. Publishers get to change the ad text colors but never the font type. A large rectangular AdSense block with Comic Sans font type was displayed earlier in Technospot today. Comic Sans is amongst standard font type that most platforms will have. Other examples of font type that can be properly displayed cross platforms are Arial, Helvetica, Georgia, Century Gothic, etc.

Is this a sign that Google AdSense will allow font type customization in future? Well, if they do it’d certainly be something really interesting. Imagine a blog using Georgia throughout with AdSense blocks using Georgia font type – a perfect blend. There’s no news yet from folks at Google AdSense, but we’ll be watching.

If you prefer to blog with your iPhone, you now have another good alternatvive. Typead, the developer of Blogit, a software that allows you to post blog entry to Twitter, Feedfind, Facebook, etc has just released a Blogit for iPhone. This is a web application, so no installation is required. Just point your iPhone to this URL – http://blogit.typepad.com

Steve Job announced the highly anticipated iPhone 3G as expected yesterday in WWDC. So basically the new iPhone comes powered with 3G, slimmer, better connection speed and a slight twist in the back cover where they’ll be using glossy black plastic instead the current aluminum. The new iPhone will be launched on the 11th July, exactly 1 month from now. Starting with $199 for a 3GB, $299 for the 16GB. But where can you buy it?

Apple will be launching iPhone to more than 70 countries worldwide but only 22 countries will get the taste of the iPhone 3G on the 11th July. The rest, well, maybe end of the year (but at least you are in the list).

Here’s the few countries to launch iPhone on the 11th July:

Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK and the United States.

Check out the full list here.

Singapore will be among the other countries in the ‘coming soon’ list but you can now order if you are Singaporean (or in Singapore). Wait a minute, where’s Malaysia? Not again! Anyway, I’ll be be Hong Kong middle of July and will definitely check out the new iPhone 3G.

The Google design team took more than 100 approaches before they came to this simple ‘g’ favicon. However nothing is final yet, and if you think you know how a Google favicon should look like, Google is inviting you to design one.

Requirements

• resolution: 16 pixel x 16 pixel image
• format: .png, .gif, or .ico
• size: 5 KB
• transparency: 32 bit alpha transparency

And here’s where you can submit your favicon.

via Google blog

WWDC is tonight! (or moning, wherever you are) and if you want to get live update on the event or being the first to cheer and get all excited when Steve Job announced what’s new in Apple product line, here’s few sites you can logged on to, where live news/blogs on the event will be provided.

Event: Apple’s annual WWDC conference

Day: Monday

Time: 10 a.m. PDT

WWDC live update on

• MacRumors Live
• MacWorld
• The Apple Blog
• CNet
• Gizmodo
• Engadget
• TechCrunch
• Popular Mechanics

Just one more thing, don’t rely too much on Twitter tonight, I got the feeling it will crash, just like the previous few events :-)

If there’s any cell phone out there (currently before the WWDC) that will make me abandon my iPhone for, it has got to be this – HTC Touch Diamond. For Malaysians who live in KL, you should know that there’s now a HTC concept store over at Low Yat Plaza. ground floor. So if you are interested in knowing more about this cool mobile phone or just wanna touch and feel it, I urge you pay the shop a visit.

Now your YouTube video can be more interactive. These guys have added Video annotations, commentary feature sort of, into YouTube videos. As an uploader, you can create stories, descriptions or just simple dialog at any scene of the video. The video above is an interactive video with annotations.

Add annotations to videos

Too add annotations to your existing videos, simply go to Account -> My Video and click on the ‘Edit Annotations‘ on the right. Video owner can add unlimited numbers of annotations, that gives you an idea how fun your video can be.

Turning Video Annotations off?

So what if you are annoyed by these annotations that keeps on popping up, or you wanted to add some on your videos but fears viewers might get irritated? You can switch the video annotations off by clicking on the last button on the menu.

Read more about YouTube video annotations.

Touch systems have been long used in kiosks, ticketing systems or even amusement park game machines. These are not rocket science but somehow a year back when Apple launches iPhone, it gains popularity and also increases the interest of end users towards multi touch system/devices. Also a year ago, Microsoft showed off their Surface computing technology, which I find it pretty convincing, and if they were to put on mass production it will be dominating. So gadgets like phones are touch’ed. The next big thing would probably be implementing them operating systems. Although non of us have a clue when technology like this will be make available in our neighborhood computer stores, but we have at least have an idea that – it definitely will, and I got a feeling it’s near.

The video above, is a Windows demonstration of their version of Multi touch, powering Windows 7 platform at the back. Again, it’s yet another exciting technology we want to have in our living room and offices.

Earlier today, folks at Adobe released 3 applications of the Creative Suite 4 (CS4) line-up, respectively the Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Soundbooth. These applications are available for download and test drive over at Adobe Lab. For Dreamweaver and Fireworks, you can enjoy full version for at least 2 days, and for existing customers you can request a serial number to activate the respective beta for the duration of the prerelease period. For those who are interested in Soundbooth beta, you can request for a beta serial number, provided that you have a legit copy of CS3 product (Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Fireworks) serial number.

Download these CS4 beta at Adobe Lab now.

Earlier today we mentioned about Starhub and MDA banning Singaporeans from video sharing porn sites, and if you are accessing these sites directly from your browser you will be directed to a dedicated landing page. We also point out that accessing these sites are still possible with proxies but reader Jialat point out a simpler way to bypass the restriction set by Starhub.

May I say Starhub has rather an unusual (or perhaps unprofessional) way to restrict home users from access these sites? No doubt it you type in the full url of the banned site (i.e www.domain.com) you are stopped and directed to their dedicated landing page, but here’s the interesting part. If you type the url without ‘www’, you are in! My guess is, they just blatantly banned the full domain URL instead of the IP, now that’s really silly.

Starhub, one of the largest ISP in Singapore recently added 2 video sharing porn sites to their ban list. According to Asiaone, if you are accessing these sites with a Starhub home account, you’ll land at a Starhub notice page, saying the site has been restricted by Media Development Authority (MDA) Singapore.

Jason Hoong, MDA Senior Assistant Director says the reason they have these two sites blocked is because they delivers free hardcore contents and are easily accessible by the youths. Neither MDA nor Starhub has mentioned which were the two sites, but Asiaone did mentioned these sites were among the 19th and 33rd most popular sites in Singapore (according to Alexa). So out of curiosity, I did a quick look up on Alexa, and here they are.

Is this move efficient in blocking the young ones getting exposed to the pornographic material? I certainly don’t think so. There are tons of sites like this, and they are really easy to get to. Come on, we are talking about the World Wide Web here. Banning two of the most popular will just lead the desperate crowd searching for more alternatives out there. I mean how many can you ban? Besides, the banned sites can be easily accessed with proxies, if one knows how. In my point of view, this measure taken by MDA and Starhub might be successful in banning 2 porn sites, but what about the rest out there?

As I was running through some old articles, I noticed my AdSense large rectangular unit showing something rather odd. There’s total of 4 ads in grid of 2×2 format. It looks weird at first, but if Google were to confirm this format, I think there’s a lot of potential of blending this style. Notice that the ‘Ads by Google’ on only appears on the bottom right; that makes the 1 column’s ad units look really like content. With good placement, this unit can certainly blend well.

One month ago, it was still a rumor but today it has been confirmed. SingTel, the largest telco in Singapore will be the one among their rivals (Starhub, M1) to be shipping iPhone into the island. This announcement has been made official on the SingTel website but not much details has been given.

Aside from Singapore, Bharti Airtel, Globe and Optus have also signed agreement to bring iPhone to their respective countries, India, Philippines and Australia. Btw, where’s Malaysia?

According to ComputerWorld, Microsoft Corp warns Windows users that once Service Pack 3 is installed, the option to uninstall IE7 will be grayed out in the Control Panel and apparently this is done on purpose. Here’s the reason explained by IE program manager:

If Microsoft had allowed users to revert back to the pre-SP3 version of IE6 — the one saved on users’ PCs when they upgraded to IE7, and what was used until now to back out of the newer browser — Windows would have ended up in a “mixed file state

This looks like a measurement taken to move users towards IE7? How long can you stay with Windows XP SP2 and below. According to W3School, IE6 (30.1%) is still the biggest market after Firefox (37%) with IE7(21.9%) about 10% away. The peak of IE6 days were somewhere around November 2006, where it dominates about 70% of the browser market. It has been greatly reduced over the years. Anyway if you really want to avoid all these SP3 un-downgradable to IE6 thing, why not just stick with Firefox?

via computerworld