Credit card offers in-game World of Warcraft rewards: it's real now
Link (via the-inbetween via Makezine via Joi Ito) 
Monday, May 07, 2007
Attack of the Advertising Widgets
Two more are coming this week. Tonight Silicon Valley-based Tumri is announcing a new product called Tumri Publisher, and Seattle’s Mpire will announce an advertising widget later this week.
Tumri Publisher, which is described here, allows users to create highly customizable widgets that promote specific products on their websites, in exchange for an affiliate or other fee. Tumri has twenty or so direct relationships with ecommerce sites like Overstock, Walmart, Shop.com and others to promote their products. Most advertising pay on a purchase, although at least one partner pays a on each click to their website.
Tumri splits revenue from the advertising 50/50 with advertising, and they say they’ll pay up to 70% of proceeds to larger publishers.
The widgets are javascript powered; the company says Flash versions are coming soon.
Tumri was founded in 2004 and has raised $6.5 million in a Series A round of financing from Shasta Ventures and Accel. They are currently closing a second round. They have 31 employees (16 in India, 15 in Silicon Valley).
Friday, May 04, 2007
Copyscape.com – Detect plagiarism on the internet
from KillerStartups.com - published startups by rachsig
Copyscape is a site that aims to get rid of a big problem: the ease with which work can be plagiarized on the internet. You can register your content with the site and put their banner on your article, proclaiming to all that your work is protected by Copyscape. Then you enter the url address of your article on the Copyscape site to see if anyone has written something that is similar enough to have been copied. The site uses a Google API to search for similar word content, so that you can see if anyone has cited your work or even copied you.
The service is free, and Copyscape also offers a Premium service which has more accurate and advanced search options as well as unlimited searches. To use the Premium service, you pay by search. Each Premium search costs $0.05. Search credits are purchased in advance and can be bought as and when they are required.
In their own words:
"Copyscape is dedicated to defending your rights online, helping you fight against online plagiarism and content theft. Copyscape finds sites that have copied your content without permission, as well as those that have quoted you.
* The free Copyscape service makes it easy to find copies of your content on the Web. Simply type in the address of your original web page, and Copyscape does the rest.
* The powerful Premium service provides professional grade coverage, plus an unlimited number of searches. You may also copy and paste to search for copies of your offline content. Copyscape Premium includes integrated case tracking to manage your responses to multiple instances of online plagiarism.
* The advanced Copysentry service provides ongoing protection for your entire website. Copysentry automatically scans the web every day and alerts you to copies of your content. It also includes integrated case tracking.
• The Global Web Rights campaign provides the tools and information you need to defend yourself against content theft and copyright violations on the web."
Why it might be a killer:
The site is a logical companion to anyone who blogs or posts content on Wikipedia and so on. Even if your content isn't actually copyrighted, it is still good to be able to know when others are using it.
Some questions:
Five whopping cents for a search is not going to add much to the site's revenue (which comes from ads), and it may turn off users who don't want to bother with the time or the small cost
Solar power plant looks heavenly
David Pescovitz: This 40 story tall tower just outside Seville, Spain is actually a new solar thermal power plant. Operated by Solúcar Energía, the facility uses 600 mirrors on the ground to tightly focus the sun's rays on water pipes at the top of the tower. The heat converts the water into steam that drive turbines to generate electricity. It's the photo of the reflected solar rays hitting the tower that really impresses me though. As ForteanTimes.com editor Alistair Strachan pointed out to me, the scene "looks strangely religious," like a bad biblical illustration. From the BBC News:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6616651.stmThe tower looked like it was being hosed with giant sprays of water or was somehow being squirted with jets of pale gas. I had trouble working it out. In fact, as we found out when we got closer, the rays of sunlight reflected by a field of 600 huge mirrors are so intense they illuminate the water vapour and dust hanging in the air. The effect is to give the whole place a glow - even an aura - and if you're concerned about climate change that may well be deserved.
Improve your photos with classic painting color palettes
Mark Frauenfelder: How to use Photoshop's "Match Color" tool with classic paintings by the old masters to make your digital photos pop.
I keep a directory of about 30 of my favorite paintings and anytime I need to do color correction, I just scan through them to find the one that gives the photo I'm working on the best look. This technique can be used in other ways. For example, use the color from a scanned-in 1970's Kodachrome snapshot to give a recent photo a vintage look. Need to make a picture more menacing? Use the color from a picture of a storm.Link (Via Lifehacker)
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