Gadgety News

The UK based Twit Or Fit has now launched!

Think a mash-up of Twitter and Hot Or Not.

Basically you rate the appearance of people displayed on a scale of 1-10.

Why has this happened?  Well, it could be something to do with HotOrNot being sold recently for a rumored $20 million!

TwitOrFit relies on Twitter members and therefore has little inherent intellectual property so it’s therefore doubtful that it will attract a similar buy-out.  But it is attracting a lot of users.

Go vote for me and increase my score please! Twit Or Fit

Remember my announcement of the INQ1?

Well, the 3 Social Networking phone has now had its official launch.

OK, so it’s a phone that is neither that fancy or revolutionary.

However, its integration with Skype (just like 3’s Skypephone), Facebook, and a handful of other consumer-friendly apps is something worth taking note of.  Also that Open Source OS.

The socially charged slider will come in black and silver and probably cost under £99 with no contract.

hiptop3.com have written themselves an apparent exclusive.

They report that T-Mobile is working on a site (probably http://www.sidekick.com/shells) where you can create your own shells for your SideKick.

 Complete with a flash interface you will be able to upload your own images to help customise your communicator.

By the sounds of things the actual shells are going to be made by skinit.com. 

You’ll also be able to browse around and see what other people have created and vote on the design in a true social site stylee!

If only this could roll out to other phones.

Fully customisable N96, iPhone or Crackberry anyone?

If you love all this social networking carry-on you’ll probably know FriendFeed.

FriendFeed is a social network feed aggregator and links up various sites so you can keep an eye on who’s poking who and when the next club night that everyone is going to is happening.

FriendFeed has now released a new version of its site optimised for the iPhone.

FriendFeed was known for having a basic/uncluttered design but the standard version was difficult to read due to tiny fonts.

This new version has increased the font size, and has further tweaked link placement and picture sizes to make the site more accessible to mobile users.

Rah!

The site also includes a new “Post photos from your phone” link that will let users submit photos to FriendFeed straight from their iPhone.

Each user is assigned a unique email address (e.g. Jay+fake666addy@mail2ff.com).

To submit a picture you send a snap from photos chosen from the iPhone’s integrated photo viewer to the assigned address.

The only draw back I can see so far is that you have to tap in the email address each time.

There’s no obvious way to save the addy to your address book - if you know different please share!

The official announcement can be found here.

Nokia has recently announced that it has reached an agreement to acquire the context-aware social-activity mobile phone service - Plazes

“This acquisition helps Nokia to accelerate its vision of bringing people and places closer together, in line with our broader services strategy”, said Niklas Savander, head of Nokia services and software.

“In addition to the key assets, through this acquisition Nokia will bring on a visionary team with an advanced understanding of social-activity services, as well as the technical ability to further develop this area.”

Nokia are excited as Plazes adds the elements of “place” and “time” to social networking through features that allow people to alert friends of their activity and location.

Users are able to review their own and others’ past activities; share their experiences and make plans with friends, who are then able to respond with comments and suggestions as well as their own location information.

This acquisition falls in line with Nokias vision of social networking tools and the development of their handsets to this end; although it also sounds pretty good for any potential stalkers out-there so I’m hoping that there is adequate security on this.

The agreement is subject to the usual conditions and is expected to close in the third quarter 2008 after which Plazes will become part of Nokia’s Services & Software unit.

Get ready for yet another Facebook Group - the “Give Us Back The Old Layout” group!

Possibly something to do with the reported fall in visitors to the social networking site, Facebook is soon to roll out some major changes to its layout.

The revamp to member’s profile pages will mean that you won’t be able to see a member’s entire profile on one screen, but you will have to click through tabs to see different sections.

I can only guess that this is a bid to boost page clicks because personal information will be on one tab of a profile, whereas the “wall” will be on a separate tab while a third tab will link to photos and so on.

Extra tabs will be customisable and members will be able to create them for their favourite applications.

“As more and more information is available on Facebook - more photo albums, more applications, and more history - we’ve realized that Profiles have become cluttered and slow as a result,” Facebook says.

“We’re trying to make profiles more simple and relevant, while still giving you control over your profile and how you express yourself.”

I wonder if they can also stop having to add 50 of your friends before you receive your answer to “What 80’s Hit Are You?” and “What Type of Balloon Would You Be?” tests?

From The BBC
Singer Kylie Minogue has launched her own social networking website for her fans to communicate with each other. The KylieKonnect website enables fans to create personal profiles and upload images, as well as “keep up to date with all the very latest on Kylie”.The launch coincided with claims that the 39-year-old had shelved plans for a 2008 world tour to promote new album X.The reports have been denied by record company Parlophone, who said a tour had not been scheduled in the first place. “There never was a tour,” a spokesman told the BBC News website, echoing an earlier comment made by the singer’s Australian publicist.