Download Squad

Having knowledge of more than one language (and to be clear, this is about spoken and written languages, not programming languages) is an increasingly important and valuable skill. The problem is of course, the older we get, the harder it can be to pick up another language.

This is why the Internet is so awesome. It can make the challenge of learning a new language or even picking up a few key phrases much easier and more intuitive.

In that vein, last week, Tokyo-based Cerego launched content creation tools for its open language platform, iKnow! to the public. These tools allow users to create learning modules in 188 languages of study and then collaborate with other users to make corrections, add additional items and discuss the process.

iKnow! isn't just about lists of words and phrases, flash card style. It also leverages the semantic web and lets you "remix" the web. You can add content from Google, Flickr and YouTube to supplement the items you are studying -- a picture from Flickr to represent a term, a video from YouTube to help show something in use -- making the process more engaging. There is also text to speech translation, so you can hear how something sounds and then select the correct context and usage.

There are also courses, although right now they are limited to English and Japanese, that let you study terms. You select what level language you are and what format you want to use and a number of items to study. The web app will then show you words, let you hear them, define them and then move on. After a few words, you will be asked if you "know" a word and you are quizzed and asked to choose what a word means and what it means in the context of a sentence. Very cool stuff.

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OpenID is a really great concept. The ability to use a single digital identity across the web and avoid having to sign up for yet another user account is a real productivity boon. More and more high profile sites and services are adopting OpenID, but the project still hasn't gained the traction that many of us think it deserves. This is partially because it still isn't easy to use OpenID -- or even find out if a site supports OpenID -- on all services. MySpace, Flock and Vidoop think they've come across a solution: let the browser handle it.

Back in June, MySpace announced support for OpenID and also became an OpenID provider. In order to help users more easily manage their online identity across other sites and services, MySpace teamed up with Flock and Vidoop to create OpenID for Flock, available today at https://extensions.flock.com. OpenID for Flock is an open source plugin, part of the larger Identity in the Browser (IDIB) project which is focused on having the browser, not the user handle, authenticate and mange multiple user identities.

I had the chance to demo the plugin yesterday and it is pretty cool. Essentially, once installed an OpenID icon appears on the right of Flock's chrome bar. The extension scans a page for OpenID compatibility, and if a site supports OpenID, the icon starts to glow. You can then automatically choose to populate the OpenID fields with your designated OpenID URL or associate that site with a specific OpenID account. You can manage all of your OpenIDs, choose what sites to associate certain profiles with and view the login history and OpenID-to-site-relationship with each site.

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Do you still use your Pownce account? I stopped using mine months ago. I don't even know if I remember the password. If you do still use Pownce, the Twitter-like microblogging service that just never seemed to capitalize on its early hype, start preparing to migrate to something new. Today, Six Apart, the company behind Movable Type, TypePad and Vox, announced that it has acquired Pownce and will be shuttering the service in two weeks. Lead Pownce developers Leah Culver and Mike Malone will continue on at Six Apart, where presumably some of Pownce's features will be rolled into Vox.

Hey, at least there is Twitter! Seriously though, Pownce's failure is proof that hype alone will not make a product or company a success. As our own Nik Fletcher pointed out, Pownce is the perfect example of how NOT having a useful API at launch or soon thereafter is a huge mistake. Especially if you are trying to do the whole microblogging thing.

Not to get all Valleywag, but didn't Six Apart just lay off 8% of its staff, like three weeks ago? I don't know the particulars of either situation -- but simply on the surface, that's cold. Did something miraculously change or was this part of the plan the whole time?

If you are worried about losing your messages once Pownce powers down its service, the Pownce team has created an export tool which will generate a file (I'm guess its XML. I haven't had a chance to look at it) that can then be imported into Vox, WordPress or TypePad.

Fittingly, the discussion of Pownce's demise is much more active on Twitter and Friendfeed than on Pownce itself.

Welcome to Googleholic, your weekly fix of everything Google!

In this edition:

• Google SearchWiki lets you customize results
• Google adds new features to BlackBerrys and iPhones
• LIFE Magazine's photo archive comes online
• GrandCentral App comes to Mac
• Google plans to work with OEMs to pre-install Chrome
• Access Google Docs within Gmail

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Last month I wrote about mufin.com's music discovery engine. Unlike traditional music discovery services like last.fm or the Genius Mode in iTunes 8, mufin analyzes the actual musical structure of a song. This is great for music lovers because it can really open up more opportunities to discover new bands.

Co-developed at the Fraunhofer Institute (the creators of the MP3 format), mufin uses audio recognition technology to analyze the actual musical characteristics of a song. Mufin creates a unique "fingerprint" for each song, using 40 characteristics like tempo, instruments, rhythm structure and sound density. Then, when you search for a song in mufin's database, an alogrithm compares the fingerprint of that song against the database and presents you with results of songs that are similar in structure.

Today, mufin is officially entering public beta. If you missed out on the private beta, you can now sign up for the service and give it a whirl. Even better, mufin's public beta now supports both Facebook and iTunes.

Mufin for Facebook is pretty similar to the existing mufin widget for MySpace. You have access to the mufin discovery engine and song catalog from within Facebook and you can add your discoveries to your profile or share them with friends.

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