∞ A Flickr Founder’s Gaming Start-Up to Release Glitch
From NYT.com :
Stewart Butterfield helped found Flickr, the popular photo site later acquired by Yahoo, as a backup. Originally, he had set out to build an online video game, but then detoured when he failed to find investors.
Now, six years later, Mr. Butterfield, made wealthy by the sale of Flickr, is back to video games. Tiny Speck, his start-up, is testing its first game, Glitch, with more than 5,000 users.
Glitch is what gamers call a massively multiplayer game, which lets many people play online at once. In Glitch, characters, or avatars, appear onscreen in a fantasy world, inspired by and wood block illustrations, that includes giants, chickens and underground mines.
∞ Yahoo! may embrace full OpenID everywhere
This would clearly be a big news if Yahoo! adopted OpenID on its whole network. Not sure how things would work out for Yahoo! Mail though. However the media strategy could clearly be boosted if well implemented.
From the official Flickr FAQ :
Can I use my Google account to login to other Y! services?
In the Yahoo! network only Flickr currently supports Google/OpenID login. If you sign-in with your Google account it’s not possible to use other Yahoo! services with that ID but may be in the future.
∞ UAE unblocks photo site Flickr
From Press Association :
“The United Arab Emirates has restored access to Flickr after years of blocking the popular photo-sharing website.
The decision this week to ease restrictions on the Yahoo-owned site comes amid a debate over digital freedom in the Gulf nation ahead of a planned block on BlackBerry smart phone services.
Yahoo Middle East executive Ahmed Nassef calls it a positive development. He says in a statement on the company’s regional website that Yahoo is working with authorities to unblock a feature known as Flickr Groups that’s still off-limits.
The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority, which blocks access to hundreds of websites deemed morally offensive or a security risk, did not respond to a request for comment.”
