Webby News

Google is currently hosting its I/O conference in San Francisco, showing off new Googley things like Google Web Elements, the new blog widgets we wrote about earlier. Of course, plenty of techies have taken along their videophones or video cameras to live stream the whole thing over services like Qik and Ustream.

But livestreaming site Justin.tv has gone one better: they’ve elicited the services of roving robots, called “Anybots“, to drive around the show floor and livestream the conference to the web.

The live video stream is embedded below, and Mashable’s Ben Parr is on the scene and will perform any actions you request of him in the comments of this post (we propose dancing with the robot).

PS. I notice Justin.tv is now serving popup ads on their pages - bad move, guys.

Watch live video from Experience Telepresence on Justin.tv

Tags: anybots, Google, google io, robots

The year 2008 and economic downturn have changed the way companies are going about their daily business. In response to the current recession in Europe, businesses are seeking new ways to stay productive while significantly cutting costs with the help of Web 2.0 solutions. From lower-cost versions of enterprise applications, to utilising cloud computing, ‘crowd sourcing’ business owners are taking advantage of what Web 2.0 has to offer.

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Depending on what you’re searching for, Wikipedia can be a great information resource for learning more about people, places, events, and topics. You have to admit, though, Wikipedia hasn’t done much of anything to spruce up their article pages over the years.

Taking articles to the next level is new site, Navify, which launches in public beta today and is essentially just an alternative interface for visualizing Wikipedia content. The kicker is that Navify not only includes article content, but also displays related images, videos, and comments associated with the original article.

Here’s how it works: just visit Navify and do a standard Wikipedia search (no account required). Results are returned in tabbed form and include the full article itself, an images tab complete with photos added by Wikipedia or Navify users and those automatically discovered on Flickr, and a video tab that works exactly the same way, but pulls related video from YouTube. Navify is also supporting article comments by Disqus, so anyone can add their thoughts to Navify article pages.

Navify is not hoping to replace Wikipedia, just enhance it. It’s built on Wikipedia’s platform, so the informational text all comes straight from the source. It’s the display of related video and images that can be seen on site that makes Navify a pretty cool way to interact with Wikipedia articles.

We believe Navify’s approach to adding a visual layer to Wikipedia content makes it a great search utility to see what you’ve previously been missing. Plus, it’s potentially a huge time saver. Like what you see? Try it out and let us know your thoughts in the comments.

More Visualization Resources from Mashable

- 6 Unique Twitter Visualizations

- Data Visualizations: 5 Beautiful Social Media Videos

Reviews: Disqus, Flickr, Wikipedia, YouTube

Tags: images, navify, Search, video, visualization, wikipedia

We’re here in the press room at Google I/O for the follow-up press event to the Google Wave unveiling today during the keynote. The initial audience response to Google Wave was huge; there was a standing ovation the likes of which I haven’t seen at a tech event, including the Apple events in recent years.

We spoke with the creators of the service, brothers Lars and Jens Rasmussen and Stephanie Hannon yesterday, but it should be interesting to see and hear from them following the initial reception. Find our live notes below and the live Qik stream below that. The creators are here along with Vic Gundotra, Google’s VP of Engineering.

Whether you like the name Microsoft picked for its shiny new search engine or not, Bing has got tongues rolling and keyboards rambling.

One of the funniest takes on this we’ve seen today comes from Fortune columnist and author Stanley Bing, who is ‘moderately outraged’ over the new name but is not considering legal action at this point.

Sure, Bing’s doing his best to get some free publicity out of the carefully planned preview of the new search engine, but his sense of humor is spot on, so enjoy the read.

Apple’s Steve Jobs appears to be in good health, if you believe statements made today by Apple cofounder and recent Dancing with the Stars contestant Steve Wozniak. Jobs is due to return to Apple next month after 6 months leave for a health problem, but his condition is unknown.

Woz’s testimony to a WSJ reporter today isn’t exactly watertight, however: he merely spoke to Jobs (On a call or in person? The WSJ doesn’t say), and didn’t ask him directly about the Apple CEO’s health. Rather, Woz simply states that Jobs “doesn’t sound like he’s sick”:

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak said Steve Jobs sounds “healthy, energetic” a month before the CEO is expected to return to the company.

On the sidelines of the All Things D conference, Mr. Wozniak said Mr. Jobs “doesn’t sound like he’s sick,” nor did he seem to be in a health crisis. Mr. Wozniak said, however, he has never directly asked Mr. Jobs how he is.

Mr. Jobs, one of the highest-profile CEOs in the tech sector, went on medical leave in January, saying in a letter to employees that his health issues “are more complex than I originally thought.”

This really gets us no closer to understanding whether Apple’s charismatic leader is fighting fit or simply giving the outside appearance of it. We’ll know the answer next month: perhaps with a cameo appearance at the upcoming WWDC conference, or simply his scheduled return to work.

Tags: apple, jobs, steve jobs, woz

Hulu, which continues to see strong growth, has been a web-based video site since day one. As more and more premium content has made its way to the site, now with Disney even in the mix, more and more users have turned to Boxee for consuming that content in a desktop application or via an AppleTV hack.

Now Hulu seems to be throwing down the gauntlet, and today they’ve launched their own shiny new desktop application, Hulu Desktop, that brings all the joys of Hulu to your PC or Mac and works with Apple and Windows Media Center remotes. In fact, they’re even touting it as the “lean-back” way to view Hulu video.

As a whole the application is top notch. You can expect a slick user interface centered around video watching. In fact, it’s hard not to notice that there are elements of Boxee’s sophisticated UI and navigation elements in the new offering. Suffice to say, though, if you’re a Hulu lover, you won’t be disappointed.

Hulu Desktop can be downloaded and used with or without an account, but if you do login you’ll get access to your video queue, subscriptions, and viewing history. You can also customize playback quality and tweak additional custom settings in the preferences menu.

Hulu’s play for your desktop is a pretty interesting and newsworthy move, especially given their contentious relationship with Boxee (who’s only fault was enabling you to engage with the same content in a similar fashion) and the recent demise of Joost’s desktop app.

Also interesting to note is that Hulu seems to have designed the desktop app not to play well with the Boxee app. If you have Boxee running, you might even see the “conflict” message above (though if Boxee’s not running, everything should work smoothly).

For more on Hulu Desktop, watch this video:

Reviews: Boxee, Hulu

Tags: boxee, hulu, hulu desktop, ONLINE VIDEO