morad rayyan’s blog

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According to a new study, people at a very high risk of developing psychotic disorders appear less likely to do so after taking fish oil capsules for three months. The study also suggests that taking long-chain omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) could be beneficial for schizophrenia and a range of other psychotic conditions, noting that individuals with schizophrenia may have an underlying dysfunction in fatty acid metabolism.

Full story at Medical News Today.

More on schizophrenia.

Photo credit: Fotolia

Also, it totally helps with hair-falls and avoidance of heart attacks...

Facebook's Plan to Build a Real Email System and Attack Gmail Is Brilliant

Mike Arrington brings us news that Facebook is working on a full-fledged email product, with the aim of eventually killing Gmail, Yahoo Mail, AOL Mail and other web-based email systems.

This is brilliant.

Why?

Because Facebook is ideally positioned to build a gigantic web-based mail and messaging system.  It is much better positioned, in fact, than Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and any other competitor.

Facebook has become the center of the online world for hundreds of millions of people for a simple reason: It's a great way to communicate.  Facebook users already keep in touch with friends via Facebook.  They connect with friends via Facebook.  They share via Facebook. If Facebook users can now use Facebook as their primary address book, email, chat, and VOIP platform, they will build even more of their lives around it.

Contrast Facebook's positioning with the core reasons people visit Yahoo, Google, and Microsoft, none of which have anything to do with communications.  Yahoo is about aggregated content.  Google is about search.  Microsoft is about...well, we're not sure what Microsoft is about, but it's not focused on communications.

Those who don't use Facebook to communicate, moreover, don't use it because Facebook's current communication system can be really annoying.  For example, it forces you to visit Facebook anytime you want to respond to anyone who has communicated with you (fine for core users, annoying for the rest of us).  Building a full-fledged communications platform could bring a much wider group of Facebook users into the fold.

Will it be challenging for Facebook to succeed with an email product?

Absolutely.

If Facebook produces a crappy email system, no one will use it.

If Facebook produces an excellent email system, however, it has a huge opportunity here.

Google has already demonstrated that it's possible to come from behind in web mail.  Google's insistence on doing email differently, meanwhile, has left a gaping hole for a company to do it the way users actually want it. Yahoo Mail, meanwhile, has been deteriorating for years, and the company just doesn't seem eager to fix it. And Microsoft is still mostly concerned with protecting the paid Outlook monopoly.

So email is a great opportunity for Facebook — and a smart way for the company to spend its money.

Image via deneyterrio's Flikr

To be honest, I didn't see this coming at all but it totally makes sense. But here is the thing, I don't think it can take on gmail but definitely take a good share out of it.

Google Mail is well integrated with Google Docs and other services, which Facebook does not offer. But FB Mail will be one of the top out there...

Steve Jobs: Google’s ‘Don’t Be Evil’ mantra is ‘Bullshit,’ Adobe is Lazy →

Wired reports on Steve Jobs’ Town Hall meeting with the employees. Some very interesting questions were answered:

On Google: “We did not enter the search business,” Jobs said. “They entered the phone business. Make no mistake they want to kill the iPhone. We won’t let them,” he says. Someone else asks something on a different topic, but there’s no getting Jobs off this rant. “I want to go back to that other question first and say one more thing,” he says. “This don’t be evil mantra: “It’s bullshit.”” Audience roars.

About Adobe: “They are lazy,” Jobs says. “They have all this potential to do interesting things but they just refuse to do it. They don’t do anything with the approaches that Apple is taking, like Carbon. Apple does not support Flash because it is so buggy,” he says. “Whenever a Mac crashes more often than not it’s because of Flash. No one will be using Flash,” he says. “The world is moving to HTML5.”

This was of course, was ‘privately leaked’ to Wired, so it cannot be counted as a public statement. But that doesn’t mean the war isn’t on!

Meanwhile, MacRumors is building their story on the entire meeting, which includes answers to Bluray, lala, and a mention that the iPhone is getting an “A+ update”.

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This is interesting of what Steve Jobs said in a private meeting. Apparently, there is undeclared war going on between Google & Apple.

The next thing I am guessing Apple will be jumping into, is search & web business. That's all they need to take over the world.

January 18th, 2010

Google sits pretty while Microsoft does damage control

Posted by Garett Rogers @ 11:33 pm

Categories: Uncategorized

Tags: Google Inc., Microsoft Corp., Web Browser, Google Chrome, Chrome, Web Browsers, Internet, Garett Rogers

After China’s attack on Google, it didn’t take long before the news broke that it was actually an Internet Explorer exploit that made it possible. It seems as though Microsoft’s browser has definitely been tagged as “insecure”, even if IE8 is actually better than previous versions. Google Chrome is building momentum, and that could be making Microsoft a bit nervous.

While Google is almost being looked at as a “hero” in this whole China ordeal, Microsoft has been trying to do some damage control by telling people that if they switch from the browser, they are actually putting themselves at more risk. This specific problem only exists in IE6, but even legacy browsers are causing the browser landscape to change.

This is a PR nightmare for Microsoft, and it’s only going to get worse if and when more exploits like this make their way into headlines.

Do you trust Internet Explorer? Do you trust Google Chrome? Let’s hear your take on this battlefield.

Garett Rogers is employed as a programmer for iQmetrix, which specializes in retail management software for the wireless industry. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.

Email Garett Rogers

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Ha! I never saw this coming, but now Microsoft is in trouble trying to save its IE remaining reputation.

Unconfirmed rumors price the phone at $180 with a 2-year T-Mobile plan, or $530 unsubsidized. T-Mobile's monthly contract will run about $80 a month for 500 minutes of talk and unlimited text and Web -- pricey, sure, but not out of line with similarly-equipped smartphones.
And there's the problem. The Nexus One is business as usual, if the reports are true. Where's Google the Disruptive Force we've come to expect? The Nexus One comes across as a fairly conventional consumer product--not unlike the Apple iPhone, Motorola Droid, and other high-end handsets. It's a me-too smart phone, not one that's going to turn the cell industry on its ear.
Why should we expect more from Google? Because the company has built a reputation for stirring up trouble in the tech industry--with consumers reaping the benefits. Whether it's providing free GPS navigation for Droid phones, free airport Wi-Fi for the holidays, free voicemail (and a lot more) with Google Voice, a free office suite with Google Docs, or free public DNS, the don't-be-evil search giant always has something interesting up its sleeve. A bold, consumer-friendly advance in wireless services would be welcome.