rock

First take:

Is it worth switching to a new browser? Marc Andreessen never had to force users to ask that question when he built Mosaic in 1993. For most early adopters, it was their first browser.

But now he's backing the development of another browser, RockMelt. This browser is not perfect, but it does show that there's room yet in the market. If Facebook built a browser, it would probably look a lot like this.

This has been tried before. The other social Web browser, Flock, integrates Facebook features. Also, like Flock (at least the new 3.0 version), … Read more

While the Big Five browsers duke it out to see which one can come up with the best mix of speed, compatibility, and add-ons, social networking bruisers Flock 3 (Windows only) and RockMelt beta (Windows | Mac) have taken off the kid gloves to beat each other senseless over Twitter and Facebook integration.

This isn't a fair match by a long shot. Chromium-fueled Flock 3 has been available since June 2010, and claims 500,000 users. (Just as a point of comparison, the Mozilla Gecko-powered version 2 of Flock has 8.5 million users and has been on the market … Read more

Links from Friday's episode of Loaded:

Facebook plans an announcement for Monday in which it may announce a "Gmail killer"

Viacom is selling off Harmonix, maker of Rock Band

Apple teams up with Twitter to promote its music social network, Ping

YouTube claims to have 35 hours of video uploaded to the site every minute

Walmart.com will ship for free this holiday season with no minimum purchase

Microsoft receives a patent for foot computing

Hustler releases an app for Android

If you live and die by Facebook and Twitter, RockMelt has a browser for you. Based on Chromium, the foundation for Google Chrome, RockMelt bakes extensive Facebook and Twitter hooks into the browser interface. Check it out in this First Look video, and you can download RockMelt from CNET Download.com for Windows and Mac.

Is it worth switching to a new browser? Marc Andreessen never had to force users to ask that question when he built Mosaic in 1993. For most early adopters, it was their first browser.

But now he's backing the development of another browser, RockMelt. This browser is not perfect, but it does show that there's room yet in the market. If Facebook built a browser, it would probably look a lot like this.

This has been tried before. The other social Web browser, Flock, integrates Facebook features. Also, like Flock (at least the new 3.0 version), RockMelt is built from Chromium, the same Google-developed open toolkit underneath the Chrome browser.

RockMelt is solid effort and is worth trying. Here are some reasons you will probably like it; and, to be fair, some things that may turn you off:

It's a real social browser RockMelt shows which of your friends are online on Facebook, right in your browser. If you want to share something from the Web, you'll know who's going to see it right away. It makes sharing links and pages more engaging than using Twitter or even Facebook's site. (Downside: you can't scroll the left-hand "Facebar," which is sorted alphabetically, so unless you filter your friends by your RockMelt favorites, you'll always see your "A" friends on your list but you may never see your "Zs.")

… Read more

Little has been known about stealth start-up RockMelt except that it's a browser, specifically (and yet ambiguously) a "Facebook browser," and it's backed by browser godfather Marc Andreessen. Well, now RockMelt has crept out of the woodwork into a limited beta for Mac and Windows, and the world can get a peek at it.

RockMelt is indeed a "Facebook browser," if only because Facebook is the social-media service that's best integrated into it at launch. It's clear that ultimately the browser's team plans to make it more customizable with other services. … Read more

Having a tidy system is important, which is why we're always eager to see updates from our favorite drive wipers. Last week, we took a closer look at CCleaner 3, freeware from Piriform, that hasn't seen many major revisions since it was launched in 2004. Version 3 of the software introduces some major new features that make it worth the upgrade, such as a drive-wiping tool that can wipe all the data from your hard drive. You can see much of the new functionality for yourself in our First Look video.

We also got up close and personal … Read more

It's "Glee" meets BOL! Ok, no, don't panic, there's not that much singing. But it's Brian Tong's first day in the co-host chair, and we are having a good time. Off the rails. In the news today: Facebook app developers were evidently selling your personally identifiable information, which Facebook could barely be bothered to punish them for. Also, group gifting on eBay and a new low in "journalism" junkets. --Molly

With Rock Band 3, music games take a significant leap, adding a level of real-music simulation previously unseen in this genre. Part of it is the two-octave MIDI keyboard that comes with the game, but even more interesting is the optional Pro-level guitar controller. Made by MadCatz and using a licensed Fender Mustang design, the guitar has separate buttons for each string at every fret--102 buttons in all--meaning one can play actual guitar chords on it.

To compare the experience to actual music-making, I whipped out a real guitar (in this case a Fender Telecaster--sorry, I don't have a Mustang) and did a side-by-side run-through. By hooking up this Pro guitar and playing on the hard or expert difficulty levels, the guitar part consists of the actual chords from the song in question.

Unfortunately, the onscreen notation for this was unfathomable to me, with lines of varying heights indicating the fingering, starting with a root note. Fortunately, the actual chord names float by at the same time, and if you stick with those, the effect is very close to real guitar playing. … Read more