Thanks to Max, we received an invite to try out Aviary. It's a suite of web-based applications for "people who create." When I say a suite of applications, I mean it.  In all, they offer (well, eventually they'll offer) 18 different applications that each have their own purpose and function.

The Google Android mobile operating system will likely take the mobile industry by storm when it is released. From what I've read they are already lining up handset manufacturers who want to run Android when it becomes publicly available, and it's expected to be available on around a dozen different handsets running it when launched later this year.

Today marked the death of two great startups: AllPeers and Ezmo. AllPeers is the Firefox extension that originally emerged as a way to share files between your friends and family, and later on they started to support BitTorrent transfers. Having this integrated into your browser is pretty convenient, but it didn't take off quite like they hoped that it would.

I've been complaining for quite awhile that Google Talk hasn't been updated in ages (over a year), but the online version of the messaging clients have been receiving features quite regularly.  Google recently added AIM support to Gmail Chat, group chatting is possible in both the Flash client and Gmail Chat, and the smilies available in both online messenger clients are way better than what Google Talk has.

The Band Nine Inch Nails really seems to understand where the music industry is headed. They recently released their new album called "Ghosts" on Torrent sites as a free download.  NIN isn't contracted to any specific record label, so they have the freedom to decide how they are going to spread their music.

Last Tuesday, the team over at YouTube posted a blog entry that explained their new experimental personalized homepages that they were getting ready to launch. On Saturday, the new personalized homepages were made available. Here's a quick run-through on what they've done:

Welcome to Daily Downloads brought to you by CyberNet! Each weekday we bring you the Windows software updates for widely used programs, and it's safe to assume that all the software we list is freeware (we'll try to note the paid-only programs).

Today we're taking a look at MSN Encarta, not Encarta Premium which you buy from Microsoft, but the portion of it that's available online for free. While the complete version contains far more information, the ad-supported online version has a wealth of information that's worth taking advantage of.