Tech Tuesday: New Browser Palettes

Rockmelt is coming…or at least the beta version has come. Last Monday, with much fanfare, Rockmelt – the new browser promising to successfully link your Facebook, Twitter, search engine and browser into one nifty package. Rockmelt works by splitting the screen into 4 different areas. Each of these areas displays its own information, such as, Twitter feed, search information along with the traditional browser and Facebook updates. The search engine seems to be a highpoint offered by the browser. When searching with the Chrome-based engine, each result is listed as Google would list it; however, as you pass your mouse over each result – you get a preview of the page on the right hand side. This allows you to preview each search result, and link with Facebook contacts to ask questions or share thoughts on the search results you get. It’s a one-size-fits-all approach to web browsing, but can be daunting if all you want to do is search and go on with your life.

Although privacy is taken seriously by the company, Facebook is still dealing with many privacy issues. The browser can be yours by connecting with Facebook and asking Rockmelt for an invite (Note: you must have a Facebook account to get Rockmelt). Once you ‘ask for an invite’ you will receive a message that your space is reserved and you will receive your invite in due time.

We should not mention Rockmelt without reminding readers of Flock, the first true social media browser. Flock continues to improve on its media full-featured browser. As it has been out and gaining more members it has had the chance to upgrade to version 3.0, with a more robust set of features. One note to Mac OSX users: you will have to wait until Flock 3 comes out, as it will be compatible with OSX. Check it out more information and videos at www.flock.com

Finally, to up the ante on both of these media browsers, announced just last week, Mozilla has entered the media browser battle with F1. F1 adds to Mozilla’s current browser a more unobtrusive “media palette”. Basically, F1 adds accounts from Gmail, Facebook and Twitter, and would have added an account for Yahoo; however, Yahoo requires a capcha which adds an extra step, and would clash with Mozilla’s use of the OAuth authentication standard (see OAuth on Wikipedia). For more information and videos on F1, please navigate to Mozilla F1's website.

Well, that’s it for today. Stay tuned next Tuesday for more tech revelations.