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Posted by by Sophia Brueckner, Software Engineer, iGoogle

For a while now, we Googlers have used a bit of shorthand to refer to the Personalized Homepage — a name that connotes interactivity, the Internet, and personalization all at once. Please meet iGoogle, the new name for the Google Personalized Homepage.

Developers around the world have been working hard to make more and more of the world’s content available for iGoogle. Can you get, oh, some of the world’s most beautiful pictures, updated daily? Check. Thousands and thousands of gadgets to choose from? Check. A personal note and picture from your sweetie? Now you can make your own, because starting today, without having any programming or web design experience at all, anyone can create Google Gadgets for iGoogle and send them to friends. Simple gadget templates include a photo gadget, a “GoogleGram” greeting card-style gadget, a YouTube video channel gadget, and a free-form gadget.

To make yours, choose the gadget template you’d like to use, enter your info, and enter your friends’ email addresses. You can always make changes to your gadget, and you can even set some kinds of gadgets to update automatically so your friends will see a new message daily.

Today we’re also making the themes that have been so popular on iGoogle in the U.S. available on every edition of iGoogle around the world, and we’re making iGoogle available in 22 new locales. Visit iGoogle and click “Select theme” to pick a theme for your own page. (via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

See my post of about a week ago about Gino’s.

Mars Cafe on University and maybe 24th makes good coffee, including a carefully made iced coffee.

Good luck. (via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

Our good friend Ethan Schoonover—the mastermind behind Kinkless GTD—has not only been helping Omni for the last several months with our ongoing OmniFocus development efforts, he’s also created a very, very nice OmniFocus overview video for us to share. If Ethan glowed in the dark and also had a giant pair of leathery wings, there’s a chance he could be even cooler than he already is, but I’m saying it would be a stretch.

The video is about 26 minutes long (25 MB), and does a great job of covering a bunch of the features and functionality in OmniFocus. Click to behold Ethan’s work:

One small note: although Ethan uses the term “enter key” on multiple occasions in the video, it’s the return key that he’s referring to. I myself use a PC keyboard so I didn’t even notice the discrepancy, but I suspect a few of you might be a little more vigilant.

We want to extend a huge thank you to Ethan for taking the time to put this together, and we hope you enjoy getting a closer look at OmniFocus!

Currently our biggest engineering priority with OmniFocus is working on forward compatibility—developing a file format that will work with future versions of OmniFocus. We want to have this in place before a beta, so nobody’s information gets hosed in the process of updating to a new release. The plan is to have this finalized and an early beta (likely feature incomplete) available in the next couple of weeks.

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

eston posted a photo:

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

eston posted a photo:

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

Thai: Thai Flavors or Cool Basil both offer outstanding Thai food. You would probably prefer Centro for New York-Style Pizza. The bar there is also a popular place for 20- and 30-somethings. There’s plenty of good Mexican here and a sizeable Hispanic population. I like El Aguila but there are several other places. Any idea what part of town you are going to live? Might help to identify some bars. I like Blues on Grand downtown for a relaxed scene and great music. (via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

Windows/Mac/Linux (Firefox): The DelegateGcal Firefox extension lets you create a reminder in Gcal based on the Gmail message you’re currently viewing.

The extension adds an Add to Gcal link to the bottom of every message. Clicking the link opens an overlaid Gcal window that includes the email subject in the event title field and a direct link to the original email in the description. If you’ve set up your Gcal account to send reminders of events, this makes for a great GTD tickler tool for Gmail. When you’re sent the reminder, you can click the description link to be taken directly to the originating message. Thanks Abhik! — Adam Pash

DelegateGcal [Ano.malo.us]

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

A site which aggregates, curates, and amplifies global conversation, seeking “to shine light on places and people other media often ignore.” An international team of volunteer authors, regional blogger-editors and translators act as guides to the global blogosphere. URL: Global Voices Online.

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

Climate Connections, a multi-platform collaboration between National Public Radio (NPR) and National Geographic makes its debut on Morning Edition Tuesday, May 1.

According to the news release from National Geographic:

A central element of “Climate Connections” is the wide-ranging slate of NPR News coverage that will air within all NPR programs, including the news magazines “Morning Edition,” “Day to Day” and “All Things Considered” and in NPR talk shows “Talk of the Nation,” “News & Notes” and the new daily series “Tell Me More” with Michel Martin. The NPR coverage, directed by the NPR News Science Desk, will involve reporters from NPR’s science, foreign, arts and national desks, bringing a wide variety of U.S. and international perspectives. NPR Member stations around the country are also expected to contribute to the series throughout the year. (via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

A very draft screenshot of new GUI (less borders, more space):

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

onblueundercanvas posted a photo:

B&W photography course, final project. 2 of 7.

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

onblueundercanvas posted a photo:

B&W photography course, final project. 1 of 7.

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

onblueundercanvas posted a photo:

B&W photography course, final project. 4 of 7.

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

If you missed the live program, as I did, you can watch “Bill Moyers Journal: Buying the War” — a brilliant documentary that everyone who cares about the future of American journalism should see. The report

examines the press coverage in the lead-up to the war as evidence of a paradigm shift in the role of journalists in democracy and asks, four years after the invasion, what’s changed?

A great deal, I believe, though the Washington press corps still tends toward stenography of powerful people’s utterances and, too often, lies rather than the serious, deep reporting we need. At least people are asking the right questions now more than they did before, but it’s taken way, way too long.

Note: Moyers devotes considerable time in this report to the exemplary — and therefore rare at the time — work by journalists in what was the Knight Ridder Washington bureau, which is now part of the McClatchy newspaper company. The KR reporters asked those questions when almost everyone else — with exceptions like several AP reporters and one from the Washington Post — was parroting the administration’s spin and outright lies.

I was employed at Knight Ridder in those days (and still own some McClatchy stock that came with the buyout of KR), and the people in the Washington bureau made me — and all journalists — proud.

Please watch the Moyers program. It is essential viewing.

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

jhoweaa posted a photo:

This is a shot of the Lurie Carillon located on the North Campus of The University of Michigan - Ann Arbor.

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)

Rex Roof posted a photo:

(via Todd’s shared items in Google Reader)