“Saturday Night Live” Really, Really Likes Facebook

Here’s the Saturday Night Live “Your Mom’s on Facebook” sketch I told you about last night–the one you’re going to see all over the Web for the next few days.

How to convert videos such as MP4, WMV, MOV and AVI to DVD for Free

DVD Flick is a free DVD authoring program that allows you to take a video file saved on your computer and converts it into a DVD that can play back in a DVD player, your computer, or Home Cinema set. The software allows you to add audio tracks and subtitles to your DVD. Your original video files may be in any of the following container formats: AVI, MOV, MPG, WMV, ASF, FLV (Flash video), Matroska and MPG. Supported codecs include MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, XVid, DivX, WMA and WMV (Windows Media Audio and Video), MP3, OGG Vorbis, H264 and On2 VP5/6. The program is open source.
DVD Flick is the all-in-one tool that can convert:
AVI to DVD, FLV to DVD, HDMOV to DVD, MKV to DVD, MJPG to DVD, MPG to DVD, M2V to DVD, MP4 to DVD, M4V to DVD, NSV to DVD, NUT to DVD, QT to DVD, MOV to DVD, RM to DVD, SMK to DVD, OGM to DVD, WMV to DVD, ASF to DVD, 3GP to DVD, 3G2 to DVD for free.
DVD Flick supports DVD Authoring, ISO image creating, DVD burning also in one tool.
System requirements:

• A Pentium or AMD K-6 processor. Pentium 3 or later recommended, the faster the better.
• 64 MB of free physical RAM, 128 MB or more is recommended.
• Windows 2000, Windows XP , Windows Vista (If you are Mac user, use this Mac dvd creator)

Download the latest version of the DVD Flick website
If you are using Mac, Please click here to download the Mac DVD Creator

1. Download and run DVD Flick



2. Click "New project” button to create a new project.
3. Browse your hard drives to select path to the folder, where the resulting DVD folders
(AUDIO_TS, VIDEO_TS) will be saved. It is highly recommended to use NTFS file system in your OS, cause the temporary m2v files in most cases exceeds 4GB limit for FAT32 file system. Additionally, don't use non-English letters to the browsing path, because the errors could occur during DVD authoring process.
4. Add your title - select the video file or files for the project. DVD Flick supports these video file types: AVI, FLV, HDMOV, MKV, MJPG, MPG, M2V, MP4, M4V, NSV, NUT, QT, MOV, RM, SMK, OGM, WMV, ASF, 3GP, 3G2.
5. Title added. Left bar indicates how many bytes is used on the blank DVD disc with the default preferences. The percentage depends on the video file size which you have added in the previous guide step.



6. Edit title.
(1) General settings for the "Title".
reate chapters every: Purpose of the chapters usage is forward/back skipping forward during the DVD viewing. It is recommended to use this option.
You can also use fixed numbers of chapters - check "Create" button.
Aspect ratio is an auto detected value received from video file's frame dimension.


(2) Video sources for the "Title" - this tab informs us about video codec, frame size, Aspect ratio value, frame rate - Frames Per Second.


Frame rate. Check the bottom listing:

• 23,976 FPS - NTSC Film Format
• 25 FPS - PAL Format
• 29,97 FPS - NTSC Format
• 30 FPS - NTSC Format Reccomendations for the non-standard
• 12,5 FPS - PAL Format
• 15 FPS - NTSC Format Warning! Remember the format for your file - it will be the same "Target format" in "Project settings" .

Add a file to a title: This option allow to you to add new file or files to the "Title". It could be additional videos for this DVD, cutted scenes for examples, etc. Important thing is the same FPS for the main video file and the additional file.
Remove a file to a title: You can also remove a file to a title.
(3) Audio tracks tab.
Remove an audio track: Press "Edit" button, then remove from the "Audio track sources" additional audio track.
Add an audio track: Press "Add" button on the ”Audio track sources" tab, select the audio file from hard drive, check in the new "select audio track(s)" window track(s) you wish to add. Press "Accept" button. DVD Flick could extract audio tracks from all supported video files (AVI, FLV, HDMOV, MKV, MJPG, MPG, M2V, MP4, M4V, NSV, NUT, QT, MOV, RM, SMK, OGM, WMV, ASF, 3GP, 3G2), and also native audio file formats: AAC, AC3, Flac, MKA, MP3, MP2, MPA, OGG, WAV, WMA
Select language for the additional audio track. Select the audio track, and then select from the”Track language" list box.
(4). Subtitles tab.
Add subtitles. Press "Add" button on the "Subtitles" tab, and then select from disk file with subtitles. DVD Flick supports these subtitles formats: AQT, JS, RT, SMI, ASS, SRT, SSA, TXT. Subtitle settings. Press "Edit" button to change subtitles settings. Select the language you need. Other settings are for the Font, Font size, and placement of the subtitles. As usually, press "Accept" button to save setting. "Force display" option will force subtitle displaying during playback, even they were not selected in menu.



If everything was made rightly, we will see this window with the changed settings for subtitles. There are no more editing tabs for "Title properties". Press "Accept" button to save preferences.
7. Project settings. At the DVD Flick main window press "Project settings" button.
General tab.
Select a "Target size" for your DVD from list box. The default value is "DVD (4,3 GB)", default values could be changed by pressing "Use as defaults" button. If you need to select custom DVD size just scroll up the list box to the "Custom" value and the bottom "Custom size" option will be enabled for editing.
"Encoder priority" allows to you to use "DVD Flick" with high priority in your operating system to decrease full encoding time.



Video tab.
Set your DVD "Target Format".
"Encoding profile" for better encoding performance is highly recommended to select as "Normal" or "Best". "Fastest" and "Fast" mode decrease full encoding time, but with the lower quality results.
"Target bitrate" is more easy to use as "Auto fit". This option will calculate bitrate for encoding automatically depends on DVD "Target size" and will be set as maximum possible value. If you have some advanced experience with DVD encoding, you can set "Custom bitrate".
Set up advanced video options - press "Advanced" button.
Check "Second encoding pass" to improve output encoding results. It is highly recommended to use this option, but it wills increase full encoding time.
Check "Half horizontal resolution" to enable Half D1 DVD Mode - one of the standard for DVD, decreases frame size to 352x576 for PAL and to 352x480 for NTSC (instead of 720x576 (PAL) and 720x480 (NTSC)). Could be used as a possibility to decrease encoding bitrate, for more video length on one DVD disc.
Check "Add overscan borders" to make your DVD with black left and right borders to view all the source video on your TV.
Deinterlace option is not recommended to use.
Check "Force MPEG-2 recompression" to recompress your mpeg-2 video source files, do not check option if m2v files were encoded with Cam Video Tool 4 DVD Flick.



Burning tab.
If the "Create ISO image" is set, the ISO image file will be created on your disk, in the "Project destination folder". ISO image could be useful, if you prefer to burn DVD using another application, supporting ISO images. "MDS" (Media decriptor) file will be created also. If you want to burn your DVD with DVD Flick, check "Burn project to disc" (red arrow). if you are using DVD+RW, DVD-RW disc, check "Automatically erase disc if it is rewritable". If quick erase will be not possible, ImgBurn (included in DVD Flick installation package) will make full erase for rewritable discs.
Accept all "Project settings" using "Accept" button. Now we are ready to burn our DVD.

8. Create DVD.
Press "Create DVD" button at the main window.
DVD Flick will ask for confirmation to proceed - press "Yes".
Additional warning about "Project destination folder" - Press "Yes".
"DVD Flick Progress" window shows to user all executed steps.
When the DVD burning will be done, we will see this window. Press "Close" to return to the DVD Flick main window. In the main window you can save DVD Flick project to your hard drive.

DVD Flick is only for Windows PC users. If you are Mac user, you can use this best DVD creator for Mac. It is a professional Mac DVD Burner program that converts almost all popular video formats such as FLV, MPEG1, MPEG2, MP4, DAT, 3GP, 3G2, MOV, AVI to DVD on Mac. And it can burn DVD movie playable on portable or home DVD player on Mac.

If you want to convert iTunes videos to DVD, you need to get the videos from iTunes to computer .
And then use DVD flick to convert iTunes videos to DVD for free.

If you want to burn YouTube videos on DVD, you can download the youtube videos to your computer.
And then using DVD flick to burn YouTube videos on DVD for free. If you are a Mac user, use this best dvd creator for Mac to help you. You can also copy videos form other video sites such as veoh, google video, iFlim, vidilife, blip.tv, music.com, zippyvideos, dailymotion, devilducky, etc and then burn them to DVD using this methods.

Here are some other DVD burner.
DVD Styler
DVD Styler is an open source DVD authoring system for Windows and Linux. It converts MPEG files, which you can drag and drop into its window, create NTSC/PAL DVD menus which are highly customizable (you can set image backgrounds, put text and images anywhere, change the font and colors, etc), set chapters for the movie, etc.
DivXtoDVD Perl Script
DivXtoDVD is a Perl script for Linux and other Posix systems (like BSD, Unix, Unix-like operating systems) that converts a DivX movie to DVD compliant files (AUDIO_TS and VIDEO_TS directories and files). It uses transcode, ffmpeg, mjpeg and dvdauthor to do the job in one step. The software is open source. Note that this is different from the commercial ConvertXtoDVD software which was also formerly named DivXtoDVD. If you're looking for the latter, a trial download is available.
ImgBurn
ImgBurn is a lightweight CD / DVD / HD DVD / Blu-ray burning application that everyone should have in their toolkit! It has several 'Modes', each one for performing a different task:
Read - Read a disc to an image file
Build - Create an image file from files on your computer or network - or you can write the files directly to a disc
Write - Write an image file to a disc
Verify - Check a disc is 100% readable. Optionally, you can also have ImgBurn compare it against a given image file to ensure the actual data is correct
Discovery - Put your drive / media to the test! Used in combination with DVDInfoPro, you can check the quality of the burns your drive is producing
Q DVD-Author
Q DVD-Author is essentially a GUI front-end for dvdauthor and other related tools found on a Linux system. You can create DVD menus, convert your projects between PAL and NTSC (and vice versa), create sub-menus, add subtitles, transcode your input videos from other formats, apply multiple audio streams to the videos, give menus multiple soundtracks, create a DVD slideshow, create animated menus, etc. This is an open source program that works under Linux and other Posix OSes.
KDE DVD Authoring Wizard
The KDE DVD Authoring Wizard allows you to create a DVD from a DVD-compatible MPEG-2 file (that is, it doesn't do the conversion from other formats for you). You can add multiple files and create a menu of the playlist if you wish. Your DVD menu can have multiple pages, a soundtrack from OGG or MP3, animated thumbnails and be in the NTSC or PAL format, be in 16:9 widescreen or 4:3 full screen, etc. This DVD authoring tool works under Linux. It is open source.

VC Ben Horowitz Takes Aim at HP Critics (Are You Listening, Larry and Jack?)

Today, in a sharply worded post, titled “In Defense of Standards, Ethics, and Honest Financial Reporting at Hewlett-Packard,” prominent venture capitalist Ben Horowitz took to his blog to shoot back at the plethora of critics of the Hewlett-Packard board for their conduct related to the controversial jettisoning of CEO Mark Hurd.

That came after Hurd admitted to falsifying expense reports related to an outside contractor he had hired, who later alleged sexual harassment. Those charges were dropped after Hurd settled with the woman, named Jodie Fisher, but before HP could complete an investigation.

Since then, the board has been under fire from Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, who hired Hurd as the database giant’s president; and former GE head Jack Welch, who laid into the HP board this week.

Now Horowitz has fired back and here’s a taste of his ire, which is aimed at execs, the media and more:

If a CEO is prone to compromise for any reason, he will have every reason. This time it was his expense report. Next time will it be a marginal accrued liability? A deal that came in at 12:01 am on the last day of the quarter? This is a slippery slope that a public board simply cannot tolerate.

And:

Who is Jodie Fisher? According to press reports, Fisher is a former Playboy model, reality show contestant, and softcore porn movie actress with no work history relevant to her job with HP. She was hired by Hewlett-Packard and paid up to $5,000 per meeting to meet with Fortune 50 CEOs.

The mainstream press has reported these facts as mundane, ordinary, and hardly worth concern. I disagree. HP employs over 300,000 people. Every single one of HP’s employees is keenly interested in the qualities, skill sets, and behaviors that HP values most. Financial compensation and access to the CEO are the most important ways that HP communicates what it values to its employees. Jodie Fisher had more access to the CEO and was paid more than 99.9% of HP’s workforce, despite having no traditional qualifications.

It’s important to note that this was not Hurd paying for his personal extracurricular activity out of his own pocket. This was the Hewlett-Packard Corporation paying a softcore porn movie star with no relevant work experience more than it pays Harvard graduates with 20 years of industry experience. This was the company spitting in the face of the people who worked hard and sacrificed every day to help the company win in the market. It was completely and categorically unacceptable.

And:

There are many who take the view that business is singular in purpose–to increase shareholder value. They further take the position that constraining that purpose in any way is inefficient and counterproductive. The mainstream press seems to have broadly adopted this position in its attacks on HP. The Wall Street Journal Op Ed page even complained that businesses were being held to an unfair standard when compared to politicians.

I do not subscribe to this view. Running our companies with no moral or ethical standards is bad for society, bad for the country, and ultimately leads to criminal behavior.

So, what do you really think, Ben?

Horowitz does have an interest in the situation, which he discloses clearly at the top of his piece: His longtime business and now venture partner is HP board member Marc Andreessen.

And the Silicon Valley soap opera continues…

iPAQ converter - convert mpeg mp4 wmv avi to ipaq, rip dvd to ipaq

The tutorial includes two parts. The part 1 will show you how to convert mpeg mp4 wmv flv 3gp avi to iPAQ video step by step with Aiseesoft Total Video Converter. And the part 2 will show you how to convert dvd movie to iPAQ video step by step with Aiseesoft DVD Ripper. The detailed steps are as follows:

Part1. how to convert mpeg mp4 wmv flv 3gp avi to iPAQ video?
Aiseesoft Total Video Converter is a powerful iPAQ video converter which can convert various video formats including AVI, Divx, XviD, WMV, MPEG, MPG, FLV(YouTube video), RM, RMVB, TOD, MOD, ASF, H.264, etc to iPAQ video. And it is a video joiner, and video editor for you to convert video files to the formats you want, so you can enjoy you movie on all common digital players like iPod, Zune, iPhone, Apple TV, PSP, Xbox 360, PS3, Archos, iRiver, Creative Zen, PMP, Smart Phone, Pocket PC, PDA, Mobile Phone, etc.

Here's the tutorial about how to convert mpeg mp4 wmv flv 3gp avi to iPAQ video with Aiseesoft Total Video Converter

Step1 Free to Download Aiseesoft Total Video Converter and install it.

Step2 Click the "Add File" button to import your videos. If you experience any problems adding videos by directly clicking the "Add File" button, you can click "File -> Add File" to add the video files you want to convert from your computer.



Step3 This software can convert video to various video formats for PMP, Xbox 360, iPod, PSP, Zune, cell phone, etc. Click the "Profile" drop-down list to select the format "HP iPAQ Video(*.wmv)"



Step4 If you want to customize the output quality, click the "Settings" button to open the Settings panel, where you can set resolution, frame rate, video bit rate, audio bit rate, sample, etc.



Step5 Click the "Browse" button to specify a location on your computer to save the converted movie. If you want to open the output folder, you can just click the button "Open Folder". If you want to merge the added video files into one file, check the option "Merge into one file". By default, the the merged file is named after the first selected file.

Step6 When you get ready to convert the added video files, click the “Start” button to start conversion.

Part 2. how to convert dvd movie to iPAQ video?
Aiseesoft DVD Ripper is all-in-one, super fast DVD ripper software. The best DVD ripper can rip DVD movies to all popular video and audio formats. And it let you easily copy DVD movie to iPAQ video, iPod Video, Zune, iPhone, Apple TV, PSP, Xbox 360, PS3, Archos, iRiver, Creative Zen, PMP, MP4/MP3 Player, Smart Phone, Pocket PC, PDA, Mobile Phone, etc.

Step1. Download Aiseesoft DVD Ripper and install it.

Step2. Insert your DVD disc into your DVD-Rom, then run the software, click "Load DVD" button and add the DVD file. You can also add DVD/IFO from your hard disk by clicking "Load IFO File".



Step3. This software can convert DVD to various video formats such as MPEG-4, AVI, WMV, FLV, 3GP, VOB, etc. Click the "Profile" drop-down list to select the format "HP iPAQ Video(*.wmv)".



If you want to customize the output video, you can click the "Settings" button next to the format field to open the Settings window and set video resolution, frame rate, bit rate, encoder, etc. See the figure below:



Step4. Select Subtitle and Audio
Regular DVD movies usually have several subtitles such as English, French, German, etc. You can select one you prefer. You can also delete the subtitle by selecting "No Subtitle", Selecting Audio is the same.

Step5. After the above steps, click "Start" to start conversion.

Yahoo Acquires Ad Start-Up Dapper

Yahoo doesn’t just shed top execs–it actually buys stuff related to its core online advertising business!

Thus, today, it announced the purchase of Dapper, an ad creation and optimization start-up.

Dapper, Yahoo (YHOO) said, “enables advertisers and agencies to quickly and easily build dynamic ad creative, leveraging data to automatically show the right product, offer, or message with each impression.” Which means it’s similar to Teracent, the ad optimization startup that Google (GOOG) bought in November 2009.

Dapper is based in San Francisco and has received $3 million in funding from Accel Partners and entrepreneur Mitch Kapor.

Terms of the acquisition were not released.

Here is the official Yahoo press release:

Yahoo! to Acquire Dapper; Extends Leadership in Display Advertising with Dapper’s Ability to Drive Performance and Efficiency with Creativity and Science

SUNNYVALE, Calif.–October 5, 2010 –Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) today announced the company has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Dapper (www.dapper.net), a technology platform providing dynamic display ad creation and optimization. Dapper enables advertisers and agencies to quickly and easily build dynamic ad creative, leveraging data to automatically show the right product, offer, or message with each impression. Dapper’s capabilities combined with Yahoo!’s already deep consumer insights will further enhance Yahoo!’s ability to deliver customized and relevant advertising.

“Yahoo!’s unique combination of Science, Art and Scale connects advertisers with consumers in ways that drive results,” said Frank Weishaupt, VP, North America Ad Marketplaces at Yahoo!. “Smart Ads will continue to be an important component of display advertising and the acquisition of Dapper will help Yahoo! to more efficiently deliver dynamic and personalized ads for customers across more of our network.”

The acquisition builds upon Yahoo!’s current display advertising leadership and will accelerate the adoption of Yahoo! Smart Ads. Yahoo! currently partners with Dapper, along with others in this space, and owning this technology will help the company deliver innovative solutions to an even broader range of advertisers and integrate dynamic ad serving into key Yahoo properties. Yahoo! is committed to the Smart Ads program and remaining open to working with innovative third parties in addition to providing a proprietary solution with the acquisition of Dapper.

“Yahoo!’s product strategy is focused on creating engaging and meaningful experiences that keep users entertained and informed,” said Dev Patel, VP, Advertiser and Publisher Solutions at Yahoo!. “Utilization of consumer insights to deliver relevant consumer and advertiser experiences are built into our technology from inception and Dapper’s capabilities will further enhance the experiences we deliver.”

Dapper was founded by Eran Shir and Jon Aizen in 2006 with a vision to transform display advertising with personalized, relevant content.

“The Dapper team is thrilled to be joining Yahoo!, already the largest and most successful force in display advertising,” said James Beriker, President and CEO of Dapper. “The addition of our technology platform will bring advertisers and agencies a highly scalable solution for building and optimizing dynamic ad campaigns with the reach and quality of Yahoo!’s network.”

Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Yahoo! expects to complete the acquisition in the fourth quarter of 2010.

Exclusive: Yahoo’s David Ko to Head Mobile at Online Gaming Powerhouse Zynga

David Ko (pictured here), who just announced he was leaving Yahoo as head of its powerful U.S. Audience unit, is taking a job heading mobile efforts at hot social gaming start-up Zynga, according to sources.

The move comes only a day after Jimmy Pitaro, who also departed his job as SVP of Media at the Internet giant last week (working under Ko, in fact), landed at Disney (DIS) as the new co-president of its Internet division.

For Zynga–the fast-growing San Francisco-based maker of such online hits as Farmville and Mafia Wars that got its start on Facebook–mobile is becoming a critical new platform for growth, as consumers use a variety of increasingly functional mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablet computers.

It’s also the fastest growing area internationally, where mobile phones are more widespread and where Zynga is seeking its next spurt of growth.

Sources said Zynga had been pursuing Ko for months.

Before heading the Audience unit at Yahoo (YHOO), Ko ran its mobile operations, which included heading product development, making distribution deals and more.

Under Ko, Yahoo’s mobile efforts first centered on building apps for smartphones, such as the Apple (AAPL) iPhone, but shifted to encompass more of its copious content assets.

Ko, who worked in a variety of areas at Yahoo, took over as SVP of Yahoo Mobile in 2009 after Marco Boerries left as EVP of the Connected Device Division, which now does not exist under that name.

Ko had also run Yahoo’s mobile business in the Asia-Pacific region.

According to one of Ko’s old Yahoo bios, he previously worked at Salomon Smith Barney as a senior associate and analyst. He is a graduate of New York University’s Stern School of Business.

Ko, who lives in San Francisco with his family, the bio notes, inexplicably “enjoys reading tech blogs.”

In his new job, as SVP of Mobile at Zynga, he will report directly to CEO Mark Pincus, sources said.

How to share the iTunes Music and videos between two computers for free

Some people may meet that situation: You and your brother both have iTunes library under the same credit card account. Occasionally, you want to get the same song, however you wouldn't want you both to pay the $0.99 where virtually the same account is purchasing the song twice. So how can you and/or he download the songs from each other once it's purchased on a single computer? This is a guide to tell you how to share iTunes Music and videos between two computers such as sharing iTunes Music and videos between Windows PC and Mac OS X, sharing iTunes Music and videos between Mac OS and Mac OS X and sharing iTunes Music and videos between Windows PC and Windows PC

Step 1, Networking computers.
If you want to share iTunes videos and music between computers, you need to network PC and Mac first.
If you do not know how to Network Windows with Mac OS X, go there:
Networking Windows (2000/XP/2003*) with Mac OS X (10.3/10.4)
Information you will need to know
1.The IP Address of your PC (Start > Run > CMD {return} > "ipconfig" {return})
2The IP Address of your Mac (Applications > Utilities > Terminal {Run app} > for ethernet connection "ipconfig getifaddr en0" {return} or for wireless "ipconfig getifaddr en1" {return})>
3.The workgroup the PC is in (Right click on My Computer, select Properties, and select the Computer Name tab)

System Configuration
It is important that the account you log in with on your XP system has a password set, if it does not you will not be able to login to your Windows share from OS X. You need to put your Mac in the same workgroup as your Windows PC. To do this open "Directory Access" (Applications > Utilities > Directory Access). Click on the padlock in the bottom left corner to make changes; you will be prompted for your password. If "SMB" is not ticked off, then tick it off. Select "SMB" and hit the "Configure…" button. Now enter the name of your Windows workgroup. In my case the name is "AD".



Setting up the PC to share files
You need to create and share a folder on your PC that you will then access from your Mac. To do this create a folder (or select and existing one) right click on it from Windows Explorer and select "Properties". Select the "Sharing" tab and share out the folder. I'd recommend you use a one word name for the share. For example "Mac", not "Apple Mac Share", it just narrows the risk of complications.



Setting up the Mac to share files
Open "System Preferences" (Applications > System Preferences). Go to "Sharing" under "Internet & Network", and tick off "Windows Sharing", and if it doesn't start by itself, click "Start". This will share out your entire home folder.



If You're running Tiger (10.4), you will also need to click the "Accounts" button and tick off the box next to your account name so that OS X knows to share out your particular home folder.



Step2, Go to preferences, under the sharing tab, enable "Share library..." and "Look for shared libraries..." on both computers.
Select the items you want to share.

It will show up in iTunes' side panel:


To require users to enter a password before they can see your shared items, select "Require password" and enter a password.
You will need to authorize both computers to play purchased content however. You may authorize up to 5 Machines per iTunes Music Store account.
Tips：If you want to share music with other users on your computer ，read this article: iTunes: How to share music between different accounts on a single computer