Ultrinsic is a website that allows college students to put a wager on their grades in a course or a semester to provide motivation for performing well academically. The student chooses a target grade and how much of an incentive they want. They then complete the semester and if they met the goal, they'll win their payout. There's nothing wrong with the concept (gambling aside) … [Read more...]
Archives for 2010
Set Windows File Type Associations With assoc Command
Last week was a bit more stressful than it should have been. A problem arose for some computers which tried opening RealPlayer .ram files unsuccessfully with VLC after it had updated. The computers used to use Real Alternative to open .ram files, which opened them successfully, and I needed to switch them back to doing so. I tried changing the File Type extension through Folder … [Read more...]
In Less Than 24 Hours, Netflix Offends Canadians and Americans Separately; Apologizes
September 22nd was a bad day to be Netflix. In all reality, it should have been a good day because Netflix launched their streaming service in Canada. More customers means more chances for revenue. Instead, Netflix managed to insult Canadians and Americans during this single launch event. They called Americans self-absorbed and tried to persuade Canadians to subscribe by hiring … [Read more...]
Facebook Suffers Worst Outage in Over Four Years Today
Facebook, the social networking site which had just recently surpassed Google as a web destination where people spend more time, suffered an outage today that made it extremely slow or unavailable to people for almost 2.5 hours. Facebook Engineering apologized for the downtime and explained in detail the cause of the problem. The short version: An automated validation of … [Read more...]
More Instant WebApps
I covered Google Maps Instant and YouTube Instant previously as new apps taking advantage of APIs and being inspired by Google Instant Search. Courtesy of Jonathan Bouman, here are even more instant apps including a playlist-minded YouTube Instant, PubMed instant search, an instant dictionary, and an instant-powered Wikipedia. ListandPlay.com List and Play is a different take … [Read more...]