KillerApp Sightings

Paltalk is an online video chat community with more than four million members, offering a combination of instant messaging, live voice and webcam video. Members use the site to socialize, learn languages, hold group discussions, sing karaoke and more.

To celebrate the launch of the newest version of its software on December 6, Paltalk is hosting two days of free celebrity chats. Online publisher Arianna Huffington will be joined by radio shock jock Anthony Cumia (of Opie & Anthony), relationship guru Samantha Daniels, investor Whitney Tilson, gossip columnist Flo Anthony and many others, and viewers will be able to see, hear and send messages to them.

The new version of the software that Paltalk is showing off at the launch event features video streaming at near broadcast-level quality, full duplex audio, multiplayer gaming and music. A service targeted to small businesses is also being reintroduced.

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IBM Chairman and CEO Sam Palmisano is shown visiting with researchers in a virtual-world replica of China's Forbidden City. Palmisano's avatar was there to announce a new business unit that will work on applying virtual-world technologies to real life. IBM is already working with customers in virtual worlds to find out how 3D Internet environments can change business and society; it plans to adapt the best of virtual worlds and gaming environments to build a seamless, standards-based 3D Internet as the next platform for global commerce and business operations.

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Have you ever wondered why, when text is so easy to index and search, online videos are still so...well, linear? A Web-based application, Click.TV, aims to change all that. Click.TV, which can be used on any Web page showing Flash videos, allows users to add comments to a video, associate the comments with specific points in the video stream and then search within the video based on the comments. A content owner could create an index of bookmarks -- similar in principle to the scene-selection menu on a movie DVD -- so that viewers can skip directly to the most interesting or important parts of the video, or watch their favorite scenes over and over again. Producers can also add commentary, context, expert opinions or translation to their videos, or let viewers add their own commentary. Both producers and users can insert hyperlinks into their comments.

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Some people just can't get enough of their favorite bands and will watch them wherever they find them. Other viewers find the spontaneous, gritty atmosphere of rehearsals more exciting than polished, scripted performances. Still others are trying to find out how great performances are put together. Rehearsals.com has something to offer all of these groups and more. The videos on the site show recording artists preparing for concerts, television appearances, tours and recording sessions. The rehearsals are recorded by remote-controlled cameras manned by experts watching from monitors inside rehearsals.com's broadcast facility.

The site, which is optimized for high-speed networks, also features video clips showing great performers demonstrating their techniques, music industry news and performances recorded specifically for rehearsals.com.

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Did you ever get a great idea while you're driving? Or learn about an important event when your planner is nowhere in sight? Or try to juggle multiple tasks without the aid of a PDA? A new online service called BrainCast may be the solution you've been looking for.

Now in beta test, BrainCast lets users call an 800 number to record reminders over the phone, mobile or otherwise. The reminders are saved as audio files and delivered to the user's PC via either email or RSS feed.

BrainCast also offers an organizational system for managing messages online. You can tag audio files with descriptive words that facilitate sorting, and add notes to each message. You can also share recordings with friends, family and coworkers via email.

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Today's CT scans consist of thousands of "slices" that can be assembled into 3D images like the one above. But creating the 3D images takes time and specialized skills. Some hospitals and imaging centers are outsourcing their graphics work to companies like Q3D, which receives files directly from the CT scanner, performs the 3D post-processing, and returns the graphics files to the radiologist to review. The service saves time for physicians and also saves them from having to invest in costly equipment.

Because of the size and sensitivity of the image files, Q3D operates its own high-speed, secure network for file transfer.

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How good can Internet video get? Research Channel, a consortium of research institutions, has been trying to find out. Together with the University of Washington, it has been developing an application it calls iHDTV, with the goal of providing wider access to high-definition content. iHDTV, which sends high-definition video over IP networks, was first demonstrated in 1999 and now allows streaming video at speeds up to 1.5 Gbps with very low latency.

The iHDTV project explores how research — and the world in general — might change if studio-quality HD video could be sent over a general-purpose Internet in near real time. Besides entertainment, the technology can be applied to collaboration, telemedicine and interactive visualization.

iHDTV is being demonstrated this week at the SC06 conference, and you can see sample clips here. If you're lucky enough to have very high-speed Internet access, you can watch the stream that's been optimized for 19 Mbps bandwidth.

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The writer Jose Luis Borges once imagined a map as large as the empire it mapped -- a map that was quickly discarded as useless. Now researchers at Canada's Carleton University CIMS Lab have recreated ten city blocks of Montreal's historic Saint-Laurent Boulevard in life-size, ultra-high-definition 3D imagery. But their map isn't useless at all.

The simulated streetscape is detailed down to the mortar between the bricks and the rust on steel columns. Visitors to it are immersed in the street and can move back and forth, walk from building to building and zoom in on the high-definition replica to see image details beyond the capacity of the naked eye.

But the simulation does much more than wow viewers. The project demonstrated advanced visualization and networking technologies that can be used for many other purposes -- reconstructing regions that have been devastated by natural disasters, collaborating securely on engineering projects, rehearsing emergency scenarios in nuclear power plants before they are built, planning for battles in simulated combat areas, making real-time changes in housing designs after "walking through" the plans, creating life-size gaming experiences, experiencing real-time Olympic events or car races in a life-size, immersive environment... the list is endless.

The researchers used IBM’s Deep Computing Visualization technology over Canada's high-speed research network, CA*net 4, to create the simulation.

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If all that video tagging, rating, favoriting and sharing is beginning to seem a bit ho-hum, here's a new trick. Mojiti, a Web site launched recently by a China-based Internet startup, has a facility for adding "spot tickers" to videos. The spot tickers are scrolling banners along the bottom of the screen, synchronized with the video. Placing spot tickers lets you create a narration for the video. You can also place "spotlights," or circles around images within the video, to highlight what it is you're talking about. Sound confusing? Here's an example:

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The city of Wilson, North Carolina connected its municipal buildings with a fiber optic network, and now its investment is paying off. Wilson has five fire stations, and getting all the firefighters together for training sessions would compromise response time if a fire were to break out. So the city set up a videoconferencing system among all the stations, allowing the firefighters to participate in training from their own firehouses. The two-way video connection lets the firefighters ask questions of the instructors. Here's a local news clip about the program (requires Windows Media Player).

Now the city is considering running fiber to all local homes and businesses.

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Brain research cited at online gaming site Happy Neuron has found that mental exercise helps stave off decline. Here's why: Mental workouts create new neural pathways that build up a mental savings account, a reserve to be drawn upon in time of need. Then, when you start losing neural connections (sad, but probably inevitable) you will still have enough left to function with.

You can't just practice the mental skills you're good at, according to Happy Neuron. You need to practice a broad range of skills -- memory, attention, language, executive functions (logic, problem solving, etc.) and spatial and visual skills. The site offers games in each category so that you can develop a balanced workout.

Of course, playing computer games won't do the trick by itself. Happy Neuron says that physical workouts, good nutrition and social interaction are needed, too.

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How do you know when a new medium reaches maturity? Answer: When it has its own awards show. The Vloggies, held for the first time on Saturday in San Francisco, honored the videoblog and online video creators who were winners in 35 award categories.

Winners were determined by the event organizer, PodTech Network, and the vlogging community. Categories ranged from Favorite Vlog to Most Controversial Vlog.

The runaway winner was "Alive in Baghdad" with six awards, including Favorite Vlog, Favorite Group Blog, Favorite Political Vlog, Favorite Interview Vlog, People's Choice Award for Best Group Vlog and Most Controversial Vlog. "Alive in Baghdad" was created by both American and Iraqi correspondents, and shows interviews with Iraqis, daily life in Iraq, and short news segments.

You can see the most recent installment of "Alive in Baghdad" here.

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Last year, two film-loving entrepreneurs went to the Sundance Festival and asked each other why so many films that generated excitement at the festival were never picked up by distributors. The answer, they decided, was that the cost of distributing films was too high, and they determined to create a whole new distribution platform, taking advantage of a lower-cost medium: broadband.

It's here now in beta, it's called Dovetail and it's already (and inevitably) being referred to as YouTube for the artsy set. But even with tags, sharing and other Web 2.0 features, the site is really nothing like YouTube. Not only is the aesthetic different, but so is the technology (peer-to-peer downloading rather than streaming) and the presentation (full-screen high resolution). Because producers have to mail in DVDs of their films, the site won't appeal to spontaneous amateur uploaders. It's targeted at the serious filmmaker who wants to make his or her work available to the public -- and, of course, at the audience for those films. There's even a way to create and promote virtual film festivals and TV shows.

As of now, there's no charge to producers or film-festival organizers, and it appears that the site will be advertising supported.

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a game-film! Descent to the Underworld is an online game based on the Orpheus and Eurydice story and related myths. Players, instead of winning points, win scenes from a film. At the end of the game-play, the scenes are automatically edited and streamed to the player. Because the scenes depend on the direction taken in the game, each game-play results in a different film.

Descent to the Underworld began as a collaborative university project using Internet2 and Access Grid video software to link eight universities around the world, creating a multipoint, multinational production studio. Students worked together in this next-gen online studio to create media files for the game-film. The Access Grid has also been used for large-scale distributed meetings, collaborative work sessions, seminars, lectures, tutorials, and training.

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You no longer need to be a Flash programmer to build your own Flash movies, banners, presentations or e-cards. Toufee.com, a new Web-based application, lets you do all this and more without installing any software or learning Flash. And even if you do know Flash, you may find that using Toufee is a lot faster. The point-and-click editor guides you through inserting images, text, sound and video and using special effects to make the Flash files pop and sizzle. The resulting files are small enough to load quickly.

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