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This post is part of Mashable’s Spark of Genius series, which highlights a unique feature of startups. If you would like to have your startup considered for inclusion, please see the details here . The series is made possible by Microsoft BizSpark. Name: Giiv Quick Pitch: Giiv is a mobile gifting service that delivers gifts in real time in the format of a friendly text message. Genius Idea: Gift certificates are an awesome (if occasionally generic) way to say “You rock!” Giiv.com makes this process easier by letting you give gift cards and certificates to someone you care about via text message. Giiv.com is fairly simple: you find a gift that you want to give …

On November 19th, 2006, Nintendo launched its fifth home console to the world. The Nintendo Wii was both ridiculed and praised for its unique controller system — the Wiimote — which detects movements in three dimensions. Three and a half years later, the Wii has dominated the market, shattered sales records, and put its two main rivals, Microsoft and Sony, on the defensive. Both companies are responding with motion-based controllers of their own though. Microsoft has generated some big buzz with the revelation of Project Natal , a new camera-based system that requires no controller, just the movement of your body to function. And yesterday, Sony officially announced PlayStation Move , a controller setup that utilizes a camera and a remote…

What do you do when you first fire up your browser? Most probably, you log into various sites that require a username and password – Facebook, Gmail, Twitter and the like. For me, personally, it’s quite a chore, as I need to log into over 10 different services before I start doing anything. Now, Mozilla sets out to alleviate this issue with a new Firefox plugin called Account Manager. It currently doesn’t do much; it recognized that you’ve signed in into a website and displays an icon that says that yes, you’re indeed signed up under that username. However, Mozilla has ambitious plans …

Opera Mini 5 Beta was first introduced about 5 months ago, but owners of Android-based smartphones had to wait until now to get their hands on Opera’s nifty mobile browser. This version is nearly identical to the Opera Mini 5 Beta for other handsets; biggest improvements are speed dial, tabbed browsing, password management and better optimization for touchscreen phones. Compared to the old Opera Mini 4.2, it’s a world of difference, so if you’re an Opera Mini user, you should definitely try out, even though it’s a beta. To get Opera Mini 5 Beta, point your mobile browser to m.opera.com/next , you can also search for “Opera Mini” in the Android Market. Tags: Mobile 2.0 , opera mini , web browsers

In November, Phonebooth.com released the beta version of Phonebooth OnDemand, which is a full-featured phone service that lives in the cloud, but can communicate with both cellular phones and IP desk and conference phones. Today, that service — which costs $20 a month per user — is becoming generally available. Phonebooth.com is also leveraging its own private VoIP network to launch Phonebooth Free, a free version of its hosted phone system, which is very similar to Google Voice but aimed at small businesses. Phonebooth.com is a product from Bandwidth.com . While Bandwidth.com might not be as well-known as players like Comcast, Verizon and Cisco, in the business…

Today at the #140tc Twitter Conference in Seattle, Washington (which I keynoted this morning), HootSuite CEO Ryan Holmes announced that its popular Twitter application will be integrating with both MySpace and Foursquare, starting this week at the South by Southwest Interactive conference. HootSuite is one of the more popular Twitter applications, one specifically geared towards power users and businesses. It has been on a roll recently, launching integration with Wordpress and rolling out new updates to its iPhone and Android Apps . While Mr. Holmes didn’t divulge many details about the MySpace and Foursquare integrations, we can make some…

As a result of failed contract negotiations, Disney pulled New York affiliate ABC7 off of cable company Cablevision’s channel lineup early this morning, leaving over 3 million people without a channel to watch the Oscars on tonight unless they tune in over the air. We’d like to offer those 3 million people the following online viewing alternatives. These options will also be good extra material for folks who do have the ability to watch on their TVs. For the Ceremony: Liveblogs The live video options on this list won’t cover the Oscars ceremonies; they’ll just plug you in to what’s going on on the red …

Not one to mince words, Steve Jobs squashed all hope of the iPad supporting iPhone tethering for wireless internet access with one word — “No.” The succinct answer was communicated by Jobs via email (from his iPhone) to Jezper Söderlund of Sweden who emailed Jobs to ask, “Will the wifi-only version somehow support tethering thru my iPhone?” 9to5Mac has both emails in question, along with email header information, and all indications point to the one word buzz-kill response being legit. You can read the text of the email inquiry and Jobs’ response below: Söderlund’s email: I’ll keep it short. I’m Jezper from Sweden, a long time Apple fan, …

This little news item has yet to go totally viral, but it’s definitely on the cusp: Behold DJ Ruth Flowers, a 69-year-old world-spinner, groove-shaker, beat-maker from Paris, France. This CBS News story hit YouTube yesterday and has so far garnered nearly 10,000 views, but its burgeoning popularity on Internet video sites is sure to make it a viral sensation by the end of the weekend. Why? Well, because this story has all the makings of a viral hit: Elderly Person + Incongruous Activity + Proper British Accent = Instant Pass-along Add to that the fact that Flowers is actually a halfway decent DJ and you’ve got one enjoyable little vid. Flowers says of her …

Since Vlingo first introduced its voice control app for the BlackBerry more than a year and a half ago, smartphones and voice-to-speech technology have evolved quite a bit. Today, the company has launched a pretty major update to its iPhone app , adding the ability to send e-mail and SMS messages, plus a redesigned new interface. When Vlingo was first released for the iPhone back in December 2008, the voice-to-text market was still pretty small for mobile devices. Sure, Google’s iPhone app introduced voice search , but the market in general was pretty small. That’s not the case anymore. Dragon …