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Inquisitor has reported that the nemesis to Twitter, Plurk is about to announce the release of an API.
What’s the big deal? Perhaps not, but the API would enable third party application development, taking Plurk to the larger population, allowing development of apps that show Plurk in a Twitter like style (perhaps a Mobile Style as well). And this is where the BIG DEAL comes in; this would allow Plurk to gain popularity, with users moving over to Plurk instead of the ever coughing and tumbling Twitter.
The API is not an official Plurk API and has been developed by Ryan Lim and has therefore been called RLPlurkAPI (God save me from re-typing this huge name!).
But that is not an issue of concern as long as the APIs let Plurk takes forward plunges to enhance the service, making it far more effective and user friendly.
Has Plurk earned its respect already? Well based on its similarity to Twitter (in terms of service) has attracted a lot of Twitter users and its different layout is pretty catchy; given the colors of the box and texts, the third party apps will bring about speedy changes as developers get a chance to bombard their ideas over and make Plurk an experience.
So what is the fuss about Plurk when we already have Jaiku, Pownce grappling at a similar service (forget Twitter for the time being). The reason is Plurk’s blast ever since its launch, it had over 15,000 users within a week and the user base continually increasing. I personally think that the hype Plurk struck when the iron was hot and has tactfully capitalized on that.
On a personal note I would recommend that Plurk takes the APIs seriously and let the developers do what they do best. Make BIG out of the freedom they have.

At the request of its SharePoint and Office product development teams, Microsoft ’s Office Labs operation has created and is testing a prototype of an internal social network that can provide employees with feeds and updates about their colleagues. Chris Pratley, general manager of Office Labs , is slated to disclose details of the prototype — called TownSquare — Thursday at the Enterprise 2.0 Conference in Boston. He spoke to Computerworld about the project, which was launched in January and has already been used by about 8,000 Microsoft employees.
With a layout that is strikingly similar to Facebook.com’s (in which Microsoft invested $240 million in October 2007), TownSquare is fueled by enterprise news feeds that use Web services to query SharePoint for public information, such as promotions and company anniversaries, about an employee. TownSquare also notifies users when a document or file is modified. Users can customize their feeds and monitor who is receiving information about them.
In early January, Pratley’s group told 100 Microsoft employees about the network. Since then, 8,000 employees who learned of TownSquare by word of mouth have visited the network at least once, Pratley noted. About 700 use it daily. Some Microsoft customers, which he declined to name, are testing the TownSquare network for use in their companies.

View: Full Article @ InfoWorld

Apple took us into a dramatically lit back-room to check out the new iPhone 3G. Here’s what you need to know:

• We did a quick data test — at our location we went from 104Kbps on the EDGE iPhone to 215Kbps on the 3G model. 2x ain’t bad, yo.
• The enable/disable 3G setting is real, and buried a few menus deep. There is no automatic switching, Apple just assumes you’ll leave 3G on, and that the iPhone has the juice to support that usage.
• It’s tri-band 3G, as we reported the other day. This same phone will ship worldwide.
• WiFi is still 802.11b/g, no support for n yet.
• Yes, that GPS is A-GPS, just as we mentioned.
• Geotagging photos is a thumbs-up. We were deep indoors though, so native GPS wasn’t working and we couldn’t get a clear idea of satellite acquisition time.
• The screen looks exactly the same — maybe a tiny bit brighter, but the unit was new, so it’d be negligible.
• The camera is identical to the first — 2 megapixels. No front-facing camera (of course).
• It’s certainly thicker feeling, but they rocked it Treo-style and really tapered those edges, so it just doesn’t feel that different. But because of that curved back, it’ll dance around on your table a little more than your completely-flat original iPhone.
• The plastic back didn’t feel too cheap. In fact, it felt pretty solid. It’s very glossy, so it’ll pick up fingerprints just as well as the glass up front (yay).
• It comes with a ridiculously, absurdly small power adapter. It basically looks like a tiny square with a USB port on one side, and power prongs on the other. It will power any other iDevice (iPod touch, 1st gen iPhone, etc.), and sell separately for those that want a smaller adapter.
• The dock (now sold separately) and adapter (if you want an extra) will both go for something like $29, although that price is not yet confirmed.
• No mention was made of copy/paste, MMS, etc.
• It doesn’t look like this thing is going to fit in your old dock. The new dock does look smaller and more sculpted to the new iPhone’s curves.
• The headphone jack is flush, as mentioned. It’s still 3.5mm, so if you don’t like the out of box phones (which won’t stay in our ears), bring your own, no problem — and no adapter needed!
• Yes, original iPhones are totally gone, you won’t be seeing those made anymore. Long live the aluminum back!

It looks like they took an amazing device and made it significantly better. If the battery life is as good as they claim, we think this will steamroll the competition in the enterprise space. And even if it doesn’t, at $199 it’s going to be extremely hard for people to resist.

Source: http://www.engadget.com