Microsoft Double Whammy

March 1st, 2010
Two interesting stories about Microsoft have emerged this week and both about their browser Internet Explorer. From today if you have IE installed as your default browser and automatic updates turned on, you will presented with large message : “An important choice to make, your browser”. You will then be offered the choice of downloading one of 12 browsers including Internet Explorer. If you choose to keep IE you will be prompted to download the latest version (if you don’t have it. This interestingly leads onto the next story.
It seems that, much to the relief of countless web-developers and web-designers, support for Internet Explorer 6 is finally going to be dropped. Why is it hated so much? Well, not only is it buggy, but it’s also lacking in any kind of compatibility with modern web standards, not to mention it’s age (it was released in 2001) . Just last year a group of frustrated developers got together to form www.ie6nomore.com.
How will this happen? Basically from 1st March Google announced that it no longer supports it, youtube are thought likely to drop support on the 13th … and these two players pack a punch. Of course Google has a good reason to want shot of IE6 – it was a flaw in the security of this browser that allowed hackers to get into the Gmail accounts of  Chinese human rights activists….
If you’d like to pay your last respects to the browser, a web design agency in Denver have set up a rather nice website:
http://ie6funeral.com/

microsoft_ie-logo
Two interesting stories about Microsoft have emerged this week and both about their browser Internet Explorer. From today if you have IE installed as your default browser and automatic updates turned on, you will presented with large message : “An important choice to make, your browser”. You will then be offered the choice of downloading one of 12 browsers including Internet Explorer. If you choose to keep IE you will be prompted to download the latest version (if you don’t have it. This interestingly leads onto the next story.

It seems that, much to the relief of countless web-developers and web-designers, support for Internet Explorer 6 is finally going to be dropped. Why is it hated so much? Well, not only is it buggy, but it’s also lacking in any kind of compatibility with modern web standards, not to mention it’s age (it was released in 2001) . Just last year a group of frustrated developers got together to form www.ie6nomore.com.

How will this happen? Basically from 1st March Google announced that it no longer supports it, youtube are thought likely to drop support on the 13th … and these two players pack a punch. Of course Google has a good reason to want shot of IE6 – it was a flaw in the security of this browser that allowed hackers to get into the Gmail accounts of  Chinese human rights activists….

If you’d like to pay your last respects to the browser, a web design agency in Denver have set up a rather nice website:

http://ie6funeral.com/

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The Shield Guarding Company

February 23rd, 2010
We were approached by The Shield Guarding Company, one of the leading companies in the provision of quality security solutions, to totally redesign and revamp their website. With a design brief to to create a stunning website that made their company stand out from the crowd, we came up with a striking design utilising a continually changing, and updateable,  ’monitor-bank’ image viewer, and visually arresting navigation system. The site is updateable through bespoke content management system.
The Shield Guarding Company have recently been awarded the Security Guarding Company of the Year award and now have a website which shows off their expertise to the full.
“This mix of high-end design, jargon free simplicity and efficient delivery makes Viziononline a company that we would not only use again but would happily recommend to others.”
David Paxton – Shield Guarding Company
Visit the site at: http://www.shieldguarding.co.uk

sh

We were approached by The Shield Guarding Company, one of the leading companies in the provision of quality security solutions, to totally redesign and revamp their website. With a design brief to to create a stunning website that made their company stand out from the crowd, we came up with a striking design utilising a continually changing, and updateable,  ’monitor-bank’ image viewer, and visually arresting navigation system. The site is updateable through bespoke content management system.

The Shield Guarding Company have recently been awarded the Security Guarding Company of the Year award and now have a website which shows off their expertise to the full.

“This mix of high-end design, jargon free simplicity and efficient delivery makes Viziononline a company that we would not only use again but would happily recommend to others.”

David Paxton – Shield Guarding Company

Visit the site at: http://www.shieldguarding.co.uk

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Buzz-Off!

February 15th, 2010
Last week saw the launch of the hotly awaited new service from Google – Google Buzz. Seen by many as their ‘Twitter Basher’ the service is the latest to wade into the Social Media arena offering status updates, photo sharing, link sharing, pretty much everything that Twitter does (only on a somewhat more inflated manner)
It’s not that Google haven’t tried this before – their Orkut system caught on in Brazil and India but never really managed to get started elsewhere and it’s taken them a good couple of years to get to Buzz.
If you have a Gmail account, then you’ll have Buzz by now. The service is integrated into googles flagship mail system. It’s fairly similar in it’s outlook to Twitter – you can ‘follow’ people, search for people, post messages, photos, links etc. It’s just you’re not limited to 140 characters! Also replies are integrated into original messages which means that you’re more likely to form a ‘conversation’ than you are in twitter.
There’s integration with other services too. Naturally Googles other offereings work well, Picassa for images, Googlereader for news and Gmail. But you can also see your tweets in Buzz (only your though – not your friends and you can’t post a buzz to twitter…)
It remains to be seen whether Buzz will dominate. The jury seems out on both social media streams,  personally we feel that yet another social network to work with brings even more fragmentation to an already widely spread market place.
Time will tell – we’re keeping our eyes on Buzz and will report back when it’s been running a while longer.

buzz
Last week saw the launch of the hotly awaited new service from Google – Google Buzz. Seen by many as their ‘Twitter Basher’ the service is the latest to wade into the Social Media arena offering status updates, photo sharing, link sharing, pretty much everything that Twitter does (only on a somewhat more inflated manner)

It’s not that Google haven’t tried this before – their Orkut system caught on in Brazil and India but never really managed to get started elsewhere and it’s taken them a good couple of years to get to Buzz.

If you have a Gmail account, then you’ll have Buzz by now. The service is integrated into googles flagship mail system. It’s fairly similar in it’s outlook to Twitter – you can ‘follow’ people, search for people, post messages, photos, links etc. It’s just you’re not limited to 140 characters! Also replies are integrated into original messages which means that you’re more likely to form a ‘conversation’ than you are in twitter.

There’s integration with other services too. Naturally Googles other offereings work well, Picassa for images, Googlereader for news and Gmail. But you can also see your tweets in Buzz (only your though – not your friends and you can’t post a buzz to twitter…)

It remains to be seen whether Buzz will dominate. The jury seems out on both social media streams,  personally we feel that yet another social network to work with brings even more fragmentation to an already widely spread market place.

Time will tell – we’re keeping our eyes on Buzz and will report back when it’s been running a while longer.

http://www.google.com/buzz

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Say it with a Luv Song

February 12th, 2010

luv

Vizion online’s latest design project is live!  www.luv-songs.co.uk is a unique service where you can send your loved one a love song on their mobile along with a personalised message. Choose from the ever changing list of songs and there’s something for everyone from R’n'B, soul, pop, rock, urban, jazz or reggae. Not sure what to send? Check from favourites, the most popular or latest editions. The site uses the latest mobile techonology and is compatible with most mobile phones, the service is simple and quick to use.
With competitions, offers and a blog there’s lots to see on the site, why not surprise your loved one with a song? Don’t forget that this Sunday is St.Valentine’s day – so why not treat your loved one to a unique and different gift?

Vizion online’s latest design project is live!  www.luv-songs.co.uk is a unique service where you can send your loved one a love song on their mobile along with a personalised message. Choose from the ever changing list of songs and there’s something for everyone from R’n'B, soul, pop, rock, urban, jazz or reggae. Not sure what to send? Check from favourites, the most popular or latest editions. The site uses the latest mobile techonology and is compatible with most mobile phones, the service is simple and quick to use.

With competitions, offers and a blog there’s lots to see on the site, why not surprise your loved one with a song? Don’t forget that this Sunday is St.Valentine’s day – so why not treat your loved one to a unique and different gift?

www.luv-songs.co.uk

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The Third Way

February 1st, 2010
As suspected Apple launched their ‘tablet’ computer on Wednesday. Named the iPad the first thing that strikes you is that it looks like an over sized iPhone. Apple are convinced that this is a ‘new’ area for technology. It’s not a phone, it’s not a netbook or laptop, it’s something else. And they might just be right.
It’s very portable. 1.51bs less than half and inch thick, 3G, wifi and Blue Tooth connectivity and with a battery life of 10 hours it certainly seems capable. It has up to 64Gb of flash memory and with iPhone style touch screen, no keyboard or mouse.
As a piece of hardware it has access to some great software – pretty much everything in the app store at the moment will run on it, plus there are new apps being designed specifically for it. It will hold music, photos and the latest addition to apples online stores – books. The iBooks store will allow you to download and read books instantly – with the iBooks app mimicking the way a book appears even down to ‘flipping’ pages.
It’s an impressive looking piece of kit and apple hope to retail in the states starting at $499 which makes it very competitive.
It remains to be seen whether there is actually a market for this type of product, but from where we’re standing (and drooling!) it looks likely…..
More at : www.apple.com/ipad

safari_hands_20100127

As suspected Apple launched their ‘tablet’ computer on Wednesday. Named the iPad the first thing that strikes you is that it looks like an over sized iPhone. Apple are convinced that this is a ‘new’ area for technology. It’s not a phone, it’s not a netbook or laptop, it’s something else. And they might just be right.

It’s very portable. 1.51bs less than half an inch thick, 3G, wifi and Blue Tooth connectivity and with a battery life of 10 hours it certainly seems capable. It has up to 64Gb of flash memory and with iPhone style touch screen, no keyboard or mouse.

As a piece of hardware it has access to some great software – pretty much everything in the app store at the moment will run on it, plus there are new apps being designed specifically for it. It will hold music, photos and the latest addition to apples online stores – books. The iBooks store will allow you to download and read books instantly – with the iBooks app mimicking the way a book appears even down to ‘flipping’ pages.

It’s an impressive looking piece of kit and apple hope to retail in the states starting at $499 which makes it very competitive.

It remains to be seen whether there is actually a market for this type of product, but from where we’re standing (and drooling!) it looks likely…..

More at : www.apple.com/ipad

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You-rent-Tube

January 25th, 2010
Last Friday saw the Youtube take a step into a new business arena when five movies went live for ‘rental’. Google (who own youtube) see this as a major development to the site and at the end of the day see it as a way to make money through the site. The first films to be shown come from the 2009 and 2010 cult Sundance Film festival although it can only be a matter of time before the big studios get into the act.
Of course, this is nothing new. Hulu is a a joint venture of NBC Universal, News Corp and Walt Disney and proving very popular – there’s also Apple’s Itunes, Amazon and X-box Live.
In other news this week, Spotify we’re being bigged up by the recording industry and it looks like things are going well over in Sweden for them. It seems that they are almost at their required 10% of subscriptions levels to make the system a viable commercial success.
The way we receive our entertainment is changing rapidly. In ten years time we might be saying bye bye to all those DVDs and CDs as we access all our music and films online.

youtube-logo

Last Friday saw the Youtube take a step into a new business arena when five movies went live for ‘rental’. Google (who own youtube) see this as a major development to the site and at the end of the day see it as a way to make money through the site. The first films to be shown come from the 2009 and 2010 cult Sundance Film festival although it can only be a matter of time before the big studios get into the act.

Of course, this is nothing new. Hulu is a a joint venture of NBC Universal, News Corp and Walt Disney and proving very popular – there’s also Apple’s Itunes, Amazon and X-box Live.

In other news this week, Spotify we’re being bigged up by the recording industry and it looks like things are going well over in Sweden for them. It seems that they are almost at their required 10% of subscriptions levels to make the system a viable commercial success.

The way we receive our entertainment is changing rapidly. In ten years time we might be saying bye bye to all those DVDs and CDs as we access all our music and films online.

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Expectation

January 20th, 2010
There’s always excitement around when Apple sets up an event yet this time around for “Latest Creation” this seems to have reached fever pitch. We’re all expecting three major things from the guys in San Fran. Firstly updates to iLife … nothing especially interesting here. Then there’s iPhone 4.0 – this is a major upgrade to the iPhone operating system which is said to put the iPhone back in the top spot as more and more devices come to threaten it’s position, the update is meant to make the iPhone more like a fully-fledged computer more than any phone to date.
Of course what everyone is really waiting for is the worst kept secret (by Apple mostly) – the Apple tablet computer. Most interest seems to be on what it’s going to be called – the iSlate, the iTablet, the iPad? We think it’s going to be like a big iPhone ….
Watch this space for what really happens….. the apple “Latest Creation” will be on 27th January and we’ll be reporting here to you…..

apple-logo1There’s always excitement around when Apple sets up an event yet this time around for “Latest Creation” this seems to have reached fever pitch. We’re all expecting three major things from the guys in San Fran. Firstly updates to iLife … nothing especially interesting here. Then there’s iPhone 4.0 – this is a major upgrade to the iPhone operating system which is said to put the iPhone back in the top spot as more and more devices come to threaten it’s position, the update is meant to make the iPhone more like a fully-fledged computer more than any phone to date.

Of course what everyone is really waiting for is the worst kept secret (by Apple mostly) – the Apple tablet computer. Most interest seems to be on what it’s going to be called – the iSlate, the iTablet, the iPad? We think it’s going to be like a big iPhone ….

Watch this space for what really happens….. the apple “Latest Creation” will be on 27th January and we’ll be reporting here to you…..

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Put Your Glasses On

January 11th, 2010
There’s one big thing making a buzz at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas and that’s 3D TV. Most of us have made the transition to digital TV and even to HDTV – and the market is worried about what they can sell us now. Well, they think it’s 3D. Most of the big players were showing 3D TVs at the show and are pegging their hopes for large sales and huge public take-up. Although this might sound like wishful thinking on their parts, 3D TV does have one big advantage, which is that consumers can really see the difference. It was tricky for the maufacturers to persude us about High Definition as sometimes it was hard to see the difference – but with 3D there’s none of that – it’s instantly amazing.
The plans at the moment are for most film releases to be made available in 3D and so you’d view these on the TV’s via traditional and blu-ray DVDs. But there are talks for broadcast TV to be in 3D (The Discovery Chanel are believed to be preparing for this) and things will get really interesting then.
Of course the big problem that we can see is that you still need to were those silly glasses – although they are looking seriously cooler now than the old fashioned paper numbers with sweet wrapper lenses.
Watch this space. In 3D!
Check out the show at:
http://www.cesweb.org/
13871
There’s one big thing making a buzz at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas and that’s 3D TV. Most of us have made the transition to digital TV and even to HDTV – and the market is worried about what they can sell us now. Well, they think it’s 3D. Most of the big players were showing 3D TVs at the show and are pegging their hopes for large sales and huge public take-up. Although this might sound like wishful thinking on their parts, 3D TV does have one big advantage, which is that consumers can really see the difference. It was tricky for the maufacturers to persude us about High Definition as sometimes it was hard to see the difference – but with 3D there’s none of that – it’s instantly amazing.

The plans at the moment are for most film releases to be made available in 3D and so you’d view these on the TV’s via traditional and blu-ray DVDs. But there are talks for broadcast TV to be in 3D (The Discovery Chanel are believed to be preparing for this) and things will get really interesting then.

Of course the big problem that we can see is that you still need to were those silly glasses – although they are looking seriously cooler now than the old fashioned paper numbers with sweet wrapper lenses.

Watch this space. In 3D!

Check out the show at:

http://www.cesweb.org/

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Resolutions

January 4th, 2010
Happy new Year to everyone from Viziononline. The New Year is a great time to make new plans, possibly to move – well to day sees the opening of the world’s tallest building – how about a penthouse in  Burj Dubai?
The building is almost twice the height of the Empire State building and rises an impressive 800m tall which means it can be seen almost 95km away! It’s an architectural and engineering masterpiece. It’s location means that it need to be resistant to geological faults and incredible winds – during it’s construction it’s been hit by lightning twice and also has to suffer an earthquake which it’s stood up to with ease.
In terms of cost – well the figures are staggering – the whole project cost a cool $1.5bn and what’s more impressive in these financial times is the the developer has actually made a profit!
Find out more and see some stunning photos at:
http://www.burjdubai.com

Dubai-BurjDubai

Happy new Year to everyone from Viziononline. The New Year is a great time to make new plans, possibly to move – well to day sees the opening of the world’s tallest building – how about a penthouse in  Burj Dubai?

The building is almost twice the height of the Empire State building and rises an impressive 800m tall which means it can be seen almost 95km away! It’s an architectural and engineering masterpiece. It’s location means that it need to be resistant to geological faults and incredible winds – during it’s construction it’s been hit by lightning twice and also has to suffer an earthquake which it’s stood up to with ease.

In terms of cost – well the figures are staggering – the whole project cost a cool $1.5bn and what’s more impressive in these financial times is the the developer has actually made a profit!

Find out more and see some stunning photos at:

www.burjdubai.com

Posted in Technology, design, science | No Comments »

FaceBook’s Xmas Number One

December 21st, 2009

totp
It’s that time of the year again when the old traditions start to kick in. Mistletoe and Wine,  The Christmas party, the goodwill to all men, decorating the tree, moody, inexplicable, perfume ads taking over TV and of course the ‘best’ of all the X-Factor number one Christmas Single. Lovely Joe McElderry ….. but hang on! What’s this – Rage Against the Machine??

Well it seems that Jon and Tracy Morter had had enough of the annual X-Factor event and started up a Facebook group to try and get “Killing In The Name” to the number one spot. It’s not their first attempt at this – last year they tried (unsuccessfully that time) to get Rick Astley to number one.  It seems this year they’ve learnt from that failure.

It just goes to show the power of the internet and how it can mobilise people.

Of course it hasn’t gone un-noticed by the cynics that both Joe McElderry and Rage Against the Machine are signed to companies ultimately owned by the recording industry behemoth Sony …. Viral marketing anyone?

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