I need to take a moment and talk about a new application I have been using for the past couple weeks, that I think you might like. The application is called Digsby.

For years I have used Trillian for all my instant messaging needs. In fact, I paid for the “pro” version within days of first using it. It worked flawlessly for me. I heard rumors from others that it did not work on their systems, it crashed all the time, and they stopped using it. Not me. I had no issues with it, and it worked well for me. Well, it did, until about a month ago.

For some reason it started crashing on me. I know, I know, that’s what everyone kept telling me for years. One day it would crash, and some days I wouldn’t get a message from anyone on my list, and they wouldn’t receive any of my messages. It was time to look elsewhere for instant messaging.

I tried Pidgin. I had a couple issues with it. I didn’t like the interface, and sometimes it wouldn’t connect.

I tried Miranda. I really liked Miranda, except it told everyone I was away or offline no matter what I tried to change on my end.

Then I found Digsby via a tweet from @ponzarelli on Twitter. What makes Digsby different from all the others? Well, let’s see. I will count the ways.

#1 - It connects.
#2 - It shows me I am connected.
#3 - It shows others that I am connected.
#4 - It allows me to change statuses, and lets others see those statuses.
#5 - It does not crash midway through my day.
#6 - It delivers instant messages from me to people on my list.
#7 - It delivers instant messages from other people on my list to me.
#8 - It’s interface is customizable. I can make it look the way *I* want.
#9 - It just doesn’t suck.

and last but not least

#10 - They have a support staff that is second to none. They monitor Twitter and answer every question posed to them. When you have an issue, they work with you to solve that issue, get this, until it is solved.

Oh, and Digsby does more than just instant messaging too. You can monitor your email and social networking sites too. It works reliably, and it’s shiny and new.

When Trillian started acting up and I could not get Pidgin or Miranda working the way I wanted them too, I was really frustrated. I am very picky about the way things work when it comes to instant messaging. The buddy list has to look the way I want, the messages must be formatted the way I want, and most of all, the application has to work as I expect it too.

Digsby meets, and exceeds, all of my expectations.

If you are looking for a good instant messaging client (which allows you to watch your mail and monitor your social networking connections), that works in Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux, then Digsby is the application you should be checking out.

Crossposted at Slobokan’s Site O’ Schtuff.

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Brand new off the shelf and it already needs repairing. Welcome to the big time, Firefox.

The same day Firefox 3 was shipping, Tipping Point, a research organization for vulnerability analysis and discovery, released an upcoming advisory (ZDI-CAN-349) about a new security vulnerability that could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code, affecting Firefox 2 and 3 in their Zero Day Initiative site.

Following their own policies, Tipping Point has not disclosed any details about the vulnerability besides it would require user interaction, while Mozilla works on a patch. Mozilla Security reports that there is no known public exploit for this bug at this time.

Over 8 million people downloaded Firefox 3 on “download day”. No, 8 million people will be anxiously awaiting Firefox 3.01. They’ll truly hit the big time if they need to send us security updates once a month like you know who.

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As far as days go, I was quite let down today. Mozilla let me down.

Mozilla’s big plan on Tuesday to set a world record for downloads with the Firefox 3 browser hit a snag when its Web site would not work properly.

Though the big “Download Day” was set to begin at 1 p.m. ET, Mozilla’s Web site was down or working sporadically all morning on the East Coast, and users still could not download Firefox 3 from the site more than an hour later.

Was it because of their “downtime”? No. Was it because Firefox 3 is no good? Of course not. What was it then?

As of 5pm I was still trying to download a “new” copy of Firefox. You see, I have been downloading the betas and release candidates, so it’s not like I have been “out of the loop”, but I was quite disappointed when I downloaded Firefox the first time today.

Before I started, I wrote down the information on the about screen, and then after the new install had downloaded, I installed it, of course. The first thing I noticed was the end-user license was dated “May 2008″. An easy mistake yes?

After installation, I checked the about screen. Same exact thing. Nothing changed. Here is my post on Slobokan’s Site O’ Schtuff, with the screenshots of the firefox website and installation.

Were there no changes between release candidate 3 and the final release? If not, why the hype today to set a record? Why bother with a “final” release if nothing changed? I just don’t get it.

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With all the excitement about Windows XP Service Pack 3 errors, Yahoo news, and just goofing around on the computer, I forgot to mention that FeedDemon 2.7 was released.

Of course, Nick makes the whole upgrade process so easy it’s no wonder I forgot I had done it.

Just a note, FeedDemon works great on XP pre and post Service Pack 3. Although, it doesn’t work very well with my wine rack. I wonder when that interface will be developed?

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Last Friday, Mozilla released the first release candidate for the Firefox 3 browser. I have been using Firefox3 since beta 2 I think it was. Things were shaky at first, but things have been getting better, slowly but surely.

Mozilla Corporation on Friday released Firefox 3 RC1, more or less the final form of this iteration of the popular open-source Web browser. RC stands for Release Candidate and represents a stage in which the browser’s features are complete and the code is stable enough for public testing. Barring any serious bugs, RC1 will become the official release version of Firefox 3, which is planned for June.

Firefox 3 offers significantly improved speed and memory usage.

Mozilla VP of engineering Mike Schroepfer claims that Firefox 3 is 9.3x faster than Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 and 2.7x faster than Firefox 2 in terms of JavaScript performance. In terms of Gmail message load time, he claims Firefox 3 is 6.8x faster than IE7 and 3.8x faster than Firefox 2. And he says Firefox 3 beats Apple’s Safari, which is also faster than Firefox 2.

The one “hitch” with using beta or release candidate versions is that some extensions do not yet work with the browser software. I usually fix this by modifying the extensions myself, but there are some that I don’t even want to try and mess with. Thnk goodness I am only missing two extensions. I can live with that until the extension authors release an updated version.

I can harldy wait for the full release of FF3. I am almost as excited as I was the first time I got a microfiber mop.

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You might want to take a moment out of your day today and grab a copy of PC Mover. It’s free, today only.

To celebrate its 25th birthday, the good folks at Laplink are offering PC Mover for free, for today and today only.

Valued at $50, PC Mover is one of the most useful utilities
I’ve encountered in recent years. PC Mover is file transfer software unlike any you’ve likely seen before. It doesn’t just move your data files and your program settings from one computer to another, it moves all your applications, too, which means no reinstalling Office, transferring your email software, or even reloading Photoshop. You can move from XP to XP, Vista to Vista, or even XP to Vista. In fact, it supports operating systems all the way back to Windows 95.

I thought you might like to know. The only thing more important than getting something for free is making sure you have your medical jewelry on when you leave the house.

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Yes folks, Service Pack 3 is just another wonderful update from Microsoft.

Users who thought the Windows XP operating system would be more reliable than its younger sibling Vista are being buffeted by reports that the latest update for XP, Service Pack 3, has its own problems.

A variety of complaints about SP3 are being posted on the Web, with users complaining about system crashes, spontaneous reboots, and other issues. On the Windows XP forum at Microsoft.com, for instance, a poster named Doug W. said that, after installing SP3, he had to use system restore “after three attempts, with different configurations each time.” He mentioned that his system has an Athlon chip from Advanced Micro Devices, and other users have reported similar problems with SP3 on AMD machines.

I ran the update the other day and haven’t had any problems. I have an AMD Athlon 64, so I guess I should just shut up and be thankful. It wasn’t like I was trying to install a walk in tub or anything like that.

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While it never should have happened in the first place, it’s good to see Mozilla doing something about this. Then again, with all the different sources of code out there in the hundreds if not thousands of plugins for Firefox, I am surprised we haven’t seen more of this already.

Mozilla warned Wednesday that a malicious program inserted adware code into a Firefox plugin that has been downloaded thousands of times over the past three months.

Because of a virus infection, the Vietnamese language pack for Firefox 2 was polluted with adware, Mozilla security chief Window Snyder said in a blog posting. “Everyone who downloaded the most recent Vietnamese language pack since February 18, 2008 got an infected copy,” she wrote. “Mozilla does virus scans at upload time but the virus scanner did not catch this issue until several months after the upload.”

Mozilla is now going to add additional scans of its software to prevent this kind of thing from happening in the future, she said.

Maybe next time they will send the code to drug rehab before releasing it to the public? The sad part is, they have no idea how many people’s computers might be infected already. Yikes.

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I received an email from Gizmo today. Gizmo5 is a wanna be replacement for Skype that, to be honest, doesn’t work nearly as reliably as Skype. I still receive email from them because I signed up to use their service many months ago when Vinny and I were having trouble with Skype during our podcasts. We ended up sticking with Skype, and I haven’t really given much more thought to Gizmo. To be honest, I didn’t like their service before I received this email. Every call I placed with their service had low quality, and it took several attempts to place the calls in the first place.

Click the image to view it full size.

According to their email, if I install Gizmo5 on my phone or my computer, I can vote 25 times for my favorite American Idol contestant with just one call through Gizmo. Is it me, or are they admitting to gaming the American Idol voting system? If you or I use our phones to call, we register just one vote. How does Gizmo get 25 votes in to the system with just one call? That sounds a little bit fishy to me.

More importantly, however, is the fact that they are actively recruiting international calls, which are prohibited by American Idol. They are actively endorsing cheating while promoting their product.

Do you live outside the United States? Now you can vote too. The show blocks international calls, but by using Gizmo5 your calls will go through and your votes will be counted!

Not only are they gaming the voting system on American Idol, but they are trying to engage international viewers to use Gizmo5 to place their votes and bypass the fact that such calls are prohibited by American Idol. I wonder how the producers of American Idol will view this? I think it’s pretty sad when the only way you can promote your product is to encourage people to use it in an unethical way.

While I find it very natural for any company to try and attach themselves to the American Idol popularity train, I also find it disgusting that they are trying to do so by breaking the rules and encouraging people to cheat while doing so.

It’s clear they are trying to appeal to the international market by giving international users a reason to try their service. It’s also clear where they stand on ethics as a company, and I’m certainly not going to lose any sleep while boycotting Gizmo.

[Crossposted at Slobokan's Site O' Schtuff]

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Six Apart had some interesting news today.

Is it a blog or an advertising network? On Monday, the line between the two got a little thinner at Six Apart, a blogging-software company that offers Movable Type and TypePad, announced a restructuring that includes three new legs: acquiring creative agency Apperceptive, launching its own advertising network and consulting services division, and opening an office in New York.

The company founders call the moves an evolution that marks a return to the roots of the company. Six Apart Services and Six Apart Media will leverage the power of the company’s blogging community to generate new revenue streams.

“Our customers have asked us for complete solutions as their blogging and social-media efforts grow,” said Chris Alden, CEO of Six Apart. “Our mission is to help everyone succeed in blogging.”

Funny. As a long time blogger (over 10 years at my main blog), I don’t see how adding an advertising network to your blogging tool is “returning to your roots”.

I have used WordPress, Drupal, and Movable Type. There’s a reason I am using WordPress, and it has everything to do with MovableType and the fact they have transplanted themselves so many times they don’t even know where their roots are anymore.

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