The Download Blog

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--For almost all of its existence, Mozilla Messaging has been known for Thunderbird--e-mail software with the traditional view that a person's PC is the center of their computing existence.

Now, though, the Mozilla Foundation subsidiary's scope is expanding beyond the confines of the computer under your desk or on your lap. In the near term, the new Thunderbird 3 is becoming more integrated with the Web. And in the longer term, the Raindrop project has the potential to lift your inbox all the way to the cloud.

"For us it's really important to have Thunderbird. It's also important to not stay in the blinders of that scenario," Mozilla Messaging CEO David Ascher said in an interview at the company's headquarters here. With Raindrop, "We're focusing on best experience for messaging in a Web application."

Mozilla Messaging CEO David Ascher

(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)

The change reflects the changing nature of computing. Where Thunderbird's chief competition once was now software such as Microsoft's Outlook, it's now also got to reckon with Google's Web-based Gmail service and its ilk, Ascher said.

Thunderbird is still a priority. Thunderbird 3 is set to arrive next week in near-final form--though nearly a year later than had been planned--but Mozilla Messaging has high hopes the new version will be faster, easier to use, and more versatile through the addition of third-party extensions.

Universal inbox
Raindrop is something of an ultimate inbox in the company's vision, a Web application that draws not just from e-mail but from other communication conduits such as Twitter, Facebook mail, and instant messaging. Its goal isn't just to consolidate today's overabundance of communications channels, it's to help prioritize what's important and put off what's optional until a more convenient time.

"We're breaking the notion of one list coming in, in chronological order," he said. What just arrived isn't necessarily the most important thing to do, though human minds are prone to thinking it is.

Some aspects of Raindrop's future are more certain than others. It's way to early to say when the company might release its first version of the actual software, but one thing that's settled is that Raindrop won't be a service Mozilla offers. Instead, the software will run on others' servers--at Internet service providers, for example.

"Hosting a messaging system for the world is not something we can afford right now," Ascher said. Still, it's revealing that the company chose to create Raindrop as a server-based technology accessible through a Web browser rather than as PC-based software.

Will Raindrop rule the roost?
In the longer term--say 2015--might Raindrop replace Thunderbird as people's messaging interface of choice? Perhaps.

"I suspect some people will and some people won't," he said. "I think desktop software still has a bunch of user benefits that will last for quite awhile."

Persuading everybody to freely cooperate with Raindrop could be tough. Sites like Facebook like their central positions in people's electronic lives and like to serve ads next to their content. In time, though, Ascher believes they'll come aboard.

"I think in the long term, openness wins," he said.

Even without Raindrop, Thunderbird 3 will integrate with the Web. It's got Firefox's engine built in for displaying Web pages, a fact that means the software can display Web content.

That ability means Thunderbird can, for example, show Yahoo and Google calendars in separate tabs. There's little in the way of integration with those services today, but it can be added, Ascher said. He expects plenty more add-ons will bring it closer to the cloud, too. He didn't mention it, but even Raindrop could be added in its own compartment.

Mozilla Messaging smells money
Mozilla Messaging is part of a peculiar organizational structure. In the beginning the non-profit Mozilla Foundation oversaw the open-source software that was the core of Netscape Communicator. Eventually, that software split into two main components: the Firefox browser and the Thunderbird e-mail software.

The foundation set up two subsidiaries to oversee the two projects, first Mozilla Corp. for Firefox in 2005 and second Mozilla Messaging for Thunderbird in 2007. Ascher has since 2007 led the latter, which employs six engineers and nine others.

It also draws on the expertise of many volunteers in the open-source world who translate the software, write add-ons, and help debug it. Because of this help, Mozilla Messaging gets by with only one quality assurance employee and one marketing employee, and Thunderbird 3 will arrive in more than 40 languages.

The subsidiary today gets its funding from its nonprofit Mozilla Foundation parent, which in turn receives the lion's share of revenue from search advertising revenue that results from searches Firefox sends Google's way. Ultimately, Ascher wants Mozilla Messaging to be financially self-sustaining. But how?

"I'm not sure yet. I think what we're looking for are rev models like Firefox--revenue models where the user benefits and doesn't have to pay anything, and somehow enough money flows into Mozilla Messaging to fund development long-term," Ascher said.

That may sound like a lot of hand-waving, but Ascher points out he has no investors looking for a big and quick return on the money they invested, so Mozilla Messaging is a relatively cheap operation to run.

Ads? No thanks
One route the company won't take is advertising, the approach that's vital to Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo Mail, as well as to Firefox.

"I don't think people benefit from advertising in mail," he said. "One reason it works for search engines is people often are searching to buy. They're happy to see ads. It helps them. I don't think that works in e-mail."

Today, there are probably somewhere between 10 million and 20 million Thunderbird users, said Rafael Ebron, Mozilla Messaging's director of marketing. That's a far cry from Firefox, whose users total more than 300 million, Mozilla says.

But both projects can punch above their weight. Just being a freely available alternative--whether with Thunderbird or with Raindrop--can steer other products and services, Ascher believes.

"Firefox had an influence over people greater than its market share," Ascher said. "I don't think we'd need to manage everybody's e-mail servers for us to have an influence over the e-mail landscape and make sure everybody has a better experience."

Kaspersky unveiled a new tool on Thursday called "Krab Krawler" that analyzes the millions of tweets posted on Twitter every day and blocks any malware associated with them.

The tool looks at every public post as it appears on Twitter, extracts any URLs in them and analyzes the Web page they lead to, expanding any URLS that have been shortened, Costin Raiu, a senior malware analyst at Kaspersky, said in an interview.

The company is scanning nearly 500,000 new unique URLs that appear in Twitter posts daily, he said. Of those, anywhere between 100 and 1,000 are malware attacks. Twitter has also been targeted by the Koobface virus which posts malicious links from infected users' accounts.

About 26 percent of the total posts contain URLs, and many of those lead to spam sites that are marketing products or services and aren't considered malware, according to Raiu. Tens of thousands of different accounts are posting spam links, most likely from accounts created by bots, he said. The most frequent URLs posted lead to online dating sites, he added.

Twitter has its own filtering system, but some malicious links still manage to get through, Raiu said.

While Kaspersky's regular antivirus software may detect and block 95 percent of the malware Twitter users are threatened with, malware code changes frequently to evade filters and it could take between two and 12 hours for new stuff to be classified as malicious and detected, he said.

While antivirus companies have traditionally focused on protecting e-mail-borne viruses, they are increasingly turning their attention to social-media sites as attackers do.

Trend Micro has technology that monitors Twitter posts for malicious URLs, as well as looks for attack patterns in the posts, such as use of popular terms to indirectly lead people to malicious links, said Morton Swimmer, a senior threat researcher at Trend Micro.

Meanwhile, Finjan offers a free browser plug-in dubbed SecureTweets that warns users when they encounter a malicious URL in Twitter, as well as Gmail, Blogger, MSN, MySpace, Google search, Yahoo, and other sites.

Social-media sites are popular for attackers not only because people are flocking to them, but also because users seem to trust messages that appear to come from friends on those sites more than they trust e-mails, Raiu said.

"People are worried about unsolicited e-mail, so they are careful not to run the programs they get by e-mail, but they aren't prepared to deal with these kinds of new attacks," he said.

The most common piece of malware associated with Twitter links is Trojan-Clicker.HTMLIFrame, a malicious JavaScript that can get downloaded to a computer when it visits a compromised Web site.

(Credit: Kaspersky)

(Credit: Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)

Hey, Palm users. If you've been waiting for the WebOS Twitter app Twee to leave Homebrew status and graduate to Palm's App Catalog, get moving. Twee 1.0, by Delicious Morsel, has hit prime time.

The Twee Twitter app comes in two versions: free and pro ($2.99). TweeFree has more features than other WebOS Twitter apps, including photo support via TwitPic, yfrog, TweetPhoto, and Img.ly, and you can track Twitter trends with Twitturly. A favorite Twee feature is that it previews a thumbnail of a friend's image URL without having to open it first. Twitter search, replies, and direct-message windows are also wrapped into TweeFree.

If you have multiple Twitter accounts to track, however, forget the freeware. You'll need to upgrade to Twee's pro version for that. After upgrading, you can also receive notifications and local tweets from 1 mile to a 250 mile radius, if Twitter eavesdropping is your thing. Notifications and multiple-account management are what clinched the purchase for us.

Both versions are attractive, with a dark gray and electric blue motif, and are easy to operate, with finger-friendly icons and a sliding activities ribbon along the bottom. We're fans, but if Twee isn't your favorite, which Twitter app for WebOS gets your 140 characters?

Tweetie 2 adds a boatload of new features, including persistence: It returns you to where you left off the last time you used the app.

Twitter apps are like candy bars: everybody's got a favorite. For me it's Milky Way and TweetDeck.

Of course, there's always room for change. For instance, the Take 5 bar is increasingly my go-to treat (better hide your Halloween stash, kids), and I might just jump ship to Tweetie 2, which debuted in the App Store over the weekend.

Priced at $2.99, Tweetie's the top-paid app in the Social Networking section of the store.

New features in version 2 include an offline mode, new-message indicators, full landscape support, video uploads (for 3GS users), and faster overall performance.

So this begs the question: what's your favorite Twitter app, and why? Vote in our poll!

In the meantime, check out Webware's recent roundup of Twitter apps that let you manage multiple accounts.

And, hey, if you're headed to the comments to talk up Twitter apps, feel free to name your favorite candy, too. It's Halloween time, after all, and I can't help wondering if anyone else is harboring a secret love for Swedish Fish.

Xobni streams contacts' tweets.

(Credit: Xobni)

Microsoft Outlook search extension Xobni (Windows) gets a new extension of its own this week: Twitter.

Best known for speedily hunting down e-mail contacts and conversations in Microsoft Outlook, Xobni also has a social networking aspect. It includes photos courtesy of Facebook, phone numbers via Skype, Yahoo Mail, LinkedIn profile information, corporate information from Hoover's, and now, a Twitter stream.

Click on the Twitter icon in the contact view to see a list of recent tweets. Icons below get you started on a reply, retweet, or new post. You can also follow, unfollow, and view the person's profile. Note that tweets may not be available for every Xobni contact. If they're not public and you're not an approved follower, you won't see much in the updates stream.

Associating a Twitter account with a contact isn't automatic. For each contact whose account you want to see, Xobni will trigger a search for matches. It will remember associations once you've approved them, making this a one-time process. You can also manually link a name to the contact you're viewing. We wish the Twitter extension were as smoothly integrated as the Facebook extension, which takes no legwork at all.

But if you do take the time to set up Twitter for some contacts, you'll be rewarded with a more intimate portrait of people in your casual and business circles. Instead of just a name, you might also see a face, a Skype number, and, with Twitter, a sense of your contact's personality and interests. Even if you're not attempting to humanize people you've never met in real life, Xobni's Twitter integration can also be a convenience tool that lets you post a tweet without having to close or hide Outlook.

While Twitter in Xobni covers the major bases, it won't replace dedicated desktop apps for heavy-duty tweeters. For that, see our roundup of five desktop Twitter helpers.

The latest update--Xobni 1.8.3 build 8559--also includes back-end adjustments to improve search speed, Windows 7 compatibility, and a handful of other tweaks and big fixes.

(Credit: CNET)

What's better than posting tweets from Twitter.com? Just about everything.

Third-party Twitter apps are typically more powerful, crammed with managerial features that get you quickly viewing, sorting, replying to messages, and retweeting in a click or tap. They automatically shorten URLs to fit Twitter's character limit, and help you post pictures through other services, like TwitPic and yfrog. Most of these desktop apps manage multiple Twitter accounts, are customizable, and are more attractive than Twitter online. They also sometimes succeed in posting your tweets during times when Twitter's site famously fails.

Convinced yet? Good. We've rounded up five desktop applications that help you post tweets and retweets to Twitter. Four run on the Adobe AIR runtime environment (Windows | Mac | Linux), which you need to download before you install the Twitter apps. But enough of the technical details--get tweeting!

Related story: Tweet your music preferences with these apps

At one time or another, most of us have recommended an iPhone/iPod Touch app to friends or family members--usually by tweeting, e-mailing, or Facebooking about it.

Yappler Sync takes that concept to the next level, allowing you to build a custom list of the apps you like and then share that list via the social solution of your choice.

At the same time, Yappler Sync helps you discover more cool apps by perusing the lists built by others.

All you do is install the eponymous utility, which is available for Windows and Mac, then build your list and decide how to share it.

Unfortunately, I discovered a few irksome aspects of the service, starting with this: Yappler builds your list based on every app in your iTunes library, not just those currently in residence on your iPhone. Thus I ended up with some 270 apps to cull--and they weren't even listed alphabetically.

Meanwhile, it's not immediately clear how you're supposed to "discover" other users' lists (unless they're shared with you directly). The Yappler site catalogs all the apps in the App Store (84,000 and counting, in case you're wondering), with a handy advanced-search option that lets you specify criteria like price and rating.

But the only way to find other users and their lists is by perusing the reviews for any given app, then looking for clickable usernames. And once you do find another user's list, all you really get is a batch of icons. So JoeAppUser has Buzzingo on his iPhone--how does that really enlighten me?

Of course, Yappler Sync is more about the social aspect of app-sharing, hence the ties to Facebook, Twitter, and the like. And it's nice how it can automatically update your list when you install new apps. Plus, it's free, so I can complain only so much.

On the other hand, this isn't much different from posting, say, a list of books you've read. Without knowing more about each book and, more importantly, why you liked it, where's the value?

FeedDemon 3 is ready for public use, after months spent in a beta version that saw a confusing migration from proprietary online syncing to Google Reader.

That rough patch sorted, FeedDemon remains one of the best desktop RSS and Atom feed catchers. This version contains a lengthy list of changes, including greatly enhanced Twitter connectivity, a tweaked interface that's a bit easier to use, and better tagging and sharing.

My Twitter stream in FeedDemon 3.

(Credit: Screenshot by Seth Rosenblatt/CNET)

FeedDemon has dumped its proprietary synchronization site, Newsgator.com, in favor of syncing with Google Reader. New users won't notice, but older users are likely to lose many unread feeds, since Google can't import feeds with more than 10 unread items. Once synced with Google Reader, unread feeds can again include more than 10 items.

There's also a new, persistent ad placed in the lower-left corner of the interface, and FeedDemon's performance could be a lot better--RAM usage was hefty, and 3GB of RAM didn't prevent occasional program hang-ups.

Twitter feed reading has been baked in because FeedDemon supports authenticated feeds. Hyperlinking and short-URL expansion are automatic, and if you use Twitter as a live news stream, FeedDemon's Twitter link sharing should appeal to you. To set that up, you need to subscribe in FeedDemon to your Twitter feed here.

Tagging, tag clouds, and item sharing get a massive overhaul in FeedDemon 3, with all three features added to the item view and a tag cloud added to the Subscriptions Home view. The interface will look similar to FeedDemon 2.8, but there are many little tweaks to improve its usability.

Flags have been renamed Stars for Google Reader consistency, for example, while the Home page features videos, pictures, and content from your feeds. One smart improvement over Google Reader is that you can view your starred feeds in the folders they came from, instead of in a single "starred items" folder.

We'd like to see performance addressed in future versions, but overall, FeedDemon remains a favorite option for desktop feed management. Let us know your thoughts on the new FeedDemon in the comments below.

Multiprotocol-messaging client Digsby has announced new features at DemoFall focusing on a completely revamped Twitter interface.

At the time of writing, users must download Digsby build 65, which will then auto-update to build 67, which includes the new features.

The new Twitter timeline window in Digsby features new posts at the bottom, plus a Favorites option.

(Credit: Screenshot by Seth Rosenblatt/CNET)

Once logged in, users, set to follow Digsby on Twitter by default, are given two ways to manage their tweets. The tweet timeline is a single-window column that starts with the oldest ones at the top. It is accessible only by double-clicking on the Twitter bar in the Digsby Buddy List pane.

Running the oldest tweets on top runs counter to the Twitter Web site, as well as just about every other Twitter client around, and already, there's a heated debate over the tweet order in the Digsby blog post announcing the new feature.

Most recently received tweets and the status update box reside at the bottom of the timeline window, but every time you open the timeline window, it will go to your most recently read new tweet. Mouse over a tweet, and Twitter functions such as Reply, ReTweet, and Direct Message will appear.

There's also a new option that should be familiar to Internet Explorer users: Favorite. Mark a tweet as Favorite, and when you switch the view to Favorites--accessible behind the drop-down arrow at the top of the window--you'll see a list of all your Favorite-marked tweets. Other options include a History view that shows off only your tweets, as well as group creation and editing.

Digsby's mouse-over Twitter stream.

(Credit: Screenshot by Seth Rosenblatt/CNET)

Mouse over the "quick look" Twitter pop-up window that's part of the Digsby Buddy List, and the tweet timeline runs in the traditional direction. Although Reply, ReTweet, Direct Message, and Favorite are also available from this view, forcing users to switch tweet stream directions depending on which pane they're using doesn't strike me as particularly logical. There's no option for altering the defaults in the timeline or the quick-look pane.

Twitter account options in Digsby.

(Credit: Screenshot by Seth Rosenblatt/CNET)

In Digsby build 67, users get two methods for updating their tweets. They can use the text field at the bottom of the Twitter timeline pane, or use the global status updater available from the drop-down menu at the top of the Buddy List. It comes with a character counter, useful, even though the global updater can be toggled to work for other social-networking statuses. The Twitter timeline text field and the global-status updaters will both automatically shorten URLs and automatically upload photos. Auto-shortening can be toggled in the drop-down menu by clicking on character count.

Some users have been complaining about stability problems that are probably related to the untested nature of programs that debut at DemoFall. If you don't mind the unusual flow of the timeline window, or if you're a Digsby user to begin with, this Twitter implementation isn't perfect, but it's a strong step forward for a program that already supports MySpace, Facebook, and LinkedIn.