Mario Mansour Blog

It looks like the Google Buzz feature roll out has been a great success for Google as they are applying once again the same strategy on Google Voice: Just Stuff it in Gmail.
It really makes sense to use such a large loyal user base for mass roll out at the same time without the need to fill applications and get familiar with a new platform from the end-user side.

As of today, you can call any phone from within Gmail. You will need to install the voice and video plug-in

According to Google, calls to the U.S. and Canada will be free in 2010 and low rates on international calls ($0.02 per min to major european countries including the U.K., France, Germany as well as China and Japan. You can check the complete Google Voice calling rate here.

Intel takes the “Connected Car” concept to a completely new level. A group of cameras and sensors connected to a built-in platform capable of storing driving behavior from steering, braking, speed even the way you honk. This information is extremely valuable for insurance companies and the police.
From a laptop or smartphone, the car is capable of receiving commands like:

• Start Engine
• Adjust Seat Temperature
• Lock doors
• Get Car Location (displayed on the map)

Read more…

It’s been hyped for the last 15 hours all over the internet about Justin Bieber song U Smile getting slowed down 800% resulting in a 35 min epic music. What’s the big deal?
Even Shamantis, the author of this music work, is not fascinated by what he did, not claiming “to be any sort of MY OWN talent resonating. All I did was put the song through Paulstretch. Anyone can do that” as he posted on soundcloud

and here’s the original version

The slowed down version went viral with over 500,000 plays in less than one day, but there are actually 2 other players in this story that got hyped even more.
Of course, Justin Beiber himself because it’s obvious that one would want to listen to the original song and since most people haven’t heard about it earlier so you can image the number of hits and searches.
The other player happens to be PaulStretch, the open source software which was used to create the slowed down version.
Here you can see the trend