gizmo5

Turns out when we blew up the moon a few weeks ago, we found water! Yay! The bottled water companies are presumably planning their trips now. THIS is how we motivate us to get back to the moon! We also hear more from old man Murdoch on blocking Google from indexing his newspapers, and Dell launches a smartphone. Does anybody want it?

Rupert Murdoch to remove News Corp’s content from Google ‘in months’ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/digital-media/6559694/Rupert-Murdoch-to-remove-News-Corps-content-from-Google-in-months.html… Read more

Google confirmed its intention to acquire Gizmo5, an Internet telephony company, with plans to merge the group into the Google Voice team.

The pending acquisition had been reported earlier in the week by Techcrunch but was overshadowed by the announcement of Google's third-largest acquisition to date--the $750 million AdMob deal--on the same day. Late Thursday Google confirmed that it had acquired the company, although financial terms of this deal were not disclosed.

Gizmo5 is a Web-based VoIP client that lets you make phone calls over the Internet, similar to programs like Skype. It's based, however, on … Read more

A new law in Europe protects all citizens from the evils of cookies. Instead of relying on people to operate their own browsers, Europe now requires all Web sites to notify users that they will set cookies. That certainly sounds annoying. Come on over to our freedom-loving U.S. sites, y'all! We also check in on Motorola Droid sales and find out that the Milestone kicks the Droid in the butt. And Google has a holiday present for you. And it's free!

The Internet is a great big data pipe that can carry a lot of things, including phone calls. Watch our video, then come back here to learn how to use your computer as a phone.

Assuming you have a computer, you'll need three things: the Net, some software, and some hardware.

The Internet

First the Internet connection. The higher the speed, the better. Unlike regular phone service, there's never a direct connection between you and the person you're calling. Like other Internet traffic, your call arrives in packets. The faster you can receive and send those packets, … Read more

Cross-platform and instantly familiar-looking, Gizmo5--also known as the Gizmo Project--is trying to make in-roads against the domination of other VoIP and telephony programs.

Gizmo5's interface is compact and rectangular, with tabs on the top just below the Menu bar and a series of ancillary commands like Chat and Add Contact available at the bottom. There are very few differences between Gizmo's design and its biggest competitor's. A little originality could've gone a long way here.

Also similar to Skype, Gizmo provides free VoIP for computer-to-computer voice chatting as well as text chatting. It also allows … Read more