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Posts tagged with "mac"

Charity: The Humble Introversion Bundle!

In the giving mood? Why not head down and meet up with the other fine gamers hanging out at the Humble Bundle, who’re offering a bunch of cross-platform games (DRM free) to raise money for Child’s Play and the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Donate for a couple of great causes and get a bundle of excellent games in return. If you donate more than the average, you can acquire some bonus titles not otherwise available with the initial line up of games and tech demos. The $70 bundle can be yours at any price, but we recommend at least slapping down a Jackson if you can. Contributers also have the option of bragging rights and posting their handle on the Humble Bundle wall of fame.

The Humble Introversion Bundle includes lots of great titles such as Aquaria, Multiwinia, and DEFCON, giving you plenty of adventure, multiplayer, and virtual gaming environments to romp through over the holidays. Given the choice of exploring underwater caverns and blowing up computer viruses, there’s something here for players of all ages. You can find links to all the great games below.

There’s fourteen days left to donate, so you have plenty of time to cash in your paycheck and donate to a worthy cause. Be sure to check out The Humble Introversion Bundle official launch video after the break and get amped up!

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Skype 5.4 Beta For Mac Gets Facebook-to-Facebook Video Calling

Back in September Skype, now part of Microsoft, released a new version of its Mac client with direct Facebook integration for Contacts, the News Feed, and text chat. Skype 5.4 was the result of a partnership between Facebook and Skype, which began earlier this year with video calls on Facebook.com based on Skype’s video technology. However, in Skype 5.4 it wasn’t possible for a user to initiate a video call from Skype, and have it forwarded to Facebook.com in the browser.

With a blog post published this morning, Skype announced that the new beta version of Skype 5.4 for Mac has added Facebook-to-Facebook video calling, meaning that, once connected with Facebook, the Skype app will be capable of placing video calls from a Mac to friends online on the Facebook website.

Initiating a Facebook-to-Facebook call from within Skype is quite easy; all you need to do is connect your Skype and Facebook accounts. Then, select a Facebook friend and hit the video call button in Skype- your friend simply picks up the call from Facebook.

Because Facebook’s video calls are based on Skype, the company has managed to interconnect video calls from the desktop app with the new video calling function on Facebook.com. In my tests, the version of Skype I had installed didn’t prompt to update to a new one, and I had to download the new 5.4 beta manually. Users of Skype might find they have version 5.4.0.1217 installed; Skype 5.4 Beta is version 5.4.0.1771.

Other than Facebook video calling, 5.4 beta for Mac brings smoother video rendering, but no interface changes or refinements. Skype has been heavily criticized in the past year for the design choices they made with version 5, and the company even launched a competition to outsource some of the message styles included in the desktop app.

You can download Skype 5.4 beta for Mac here.

djay For Mac Adds ‘Harmonic Match’ And iCloud Support

For those of you who are DJs or just enjoy listening and mixing music, the latest version of Algoriddim’s Mac App ‘djay’ might interest you. Now at version 4.0, Algoriddim is claiming that this is the biggest update to the app yet. The big headline new feature is ‘Harmonic Match’ a new system that allows users to “create perfectly matched mixes with a simple click”.

With the introduction of Harmonic Match, djay automatically detects a song’s key and allows to match it to songs of the same key within your iTunes music library. It allows you transpose songs into different keys, and even sort your entire music library by key, perfect for creating studio quality mash-ups of your songs.

Beyond Harmonic Match, djay 4.0 also features a new audio engine that allows high quality Audio FX on the fly, precision scratching, visual waveforms and a host of other more advanced features. A particularly useful new feature in djay 4.0 is the support for iCloud, which means cue data and other metadata can by synced across the Mac, iPad and iPhone versions of the app. Another nice touch is support for the multi-touch trackpad where a user can “use rotate gestures to adjust the EQ, or two fingers to scratch the record and operate the crossfader”.

djay for the Mac is available on the Mac App Store for a special launch sale price of  $19.99. Jump the break for a promotional video, as well as a full list of additions and improvements in djay 4.0.
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