After widespread complaints about Digg's new URL-shortener/toolbar, the DiggBar, Digg has responded and agreed to change the way the DiggBar behaves to address the problems people had with it. Number one on the list was the way the DiggBar framed other sites and used Digg's new URLs for everything, never revealing the URL of the actual destination site. Number 2 was the problem of DiggBar URLs turning up in search results and bookmarking services, sometimes ahead of the original domain. Creators of original content were understandably peeved.

Here's how Digg plans to address the problem, according a post from their official blog:

1. New treatment to the behavior of Digg short URLs. All anonymous users, on or off Digg will be taken directly to the publishers content via a permanent redirect (301), no toolbar, straight to the site. Logged in users that have not opted out will continue to see the DiggBar (200). These changes ensure that content providers receive full search engine 'juice' or credit for all links on and off Digg. They also ensure that Digg short URLs won't appear in the indexes of any major search engines.

2. Because we want to ensure the best user experience, the DiggBar will soon only be shown to you when you are logged into Digg. While the vast majority of Digg users find the DiggBar valuable (only a very small number of users have disabled the feature or hit close with any frequency) we understand that many folks were confused when opting out. We want you to be able to have the option to permanently disable the DiggBar with ease. For registered Digg users receiving the bar, we are also making a few changes to make the process more obvious.

Certainly, some people would rather the DiggBar disappear altogether, but these two moves make sure that people who don't like it can opt out, and people who do like it can opt in. More importantly, they make sure the DiggBar isn't some kind of uncouth relic from the late 90's. I'm not sure why they ever thought people would be ok with blatant framing of other websites in the first place, but at least they're fixing the problem now.

[via Daring Fireball]

Do you have a gripe about your iPhone? If you're one of the many people who wishes the much-hyped gadget had basic things like copy/paste or the ability to shoot video, now there's a place to take your gripes. Please Fix the iPhone is a very attractive site about people's problems with Apple's mostly-very-attractive phone.

The format of the site is pretty simple: a list of people's wishes for improvements to the iPhone, with the ability to vote for any you agree with. The front page shows the top 10 of the thousands of wishes people have submitted. I knew people had problems with the iPhone, but I didn't know they had thousands of problems with it. Take that number with a grain of salt, though: wishes range from the serious (no physical keyboard) to the not so serious (no self-destruct button).

Windows Vista is garnering some interesting reviews, but the latest from Forbes' Stephen Manes probably isn't going to get framed on Steve Ballmer's wall anytime soon (that could simply be due to a lack of space though). Stephen chose a fairly transparent title of "Dim Vista" for his review, setting the stage for a long list of usability gripes and tales of staggering un-wow-edness. Stephen finds problems in everything from the Windows Firewall not recognizing when a 3rd party firewall is active, the Control Panel being needlessly redesigned yet again and even WordPad no longer being able to open .DOC Word files. And that's all before he gets to the bugs, quirks and other broken pieces of this nearly 6-year venture.

While Stephen's review doesn't have a happy ending, it could serve as a cautionary tale for anyone still considering a move to Vista. At the very least, Stephen recommends waiting until Service Pack 1, and with the way things are shaping up, we're tending to agree.

I found this really intriguing video via kottke's remaindered links of a photographer who took a pic of himself every day for six years, and then threw all the images together into a movie. But this post isn't about the cool video - it's about Vimeo's Flash player controller.

After pressing play, mouseover the video again and note the timeline controller that pops up. Now click anywhere in that controller to jump around the timeline (of video your player has downloaded, of course). For bonus points, click and drag to scrub back and forth a few seconds - awesome, isn't it? You're watching a Flash video that, as long as it's buffered enough, more or less has near-perfect performance in terms of navigating the timeline, selecting specific points and scrubbing footage. In Flash! Why does nearly everyone else's Flash player/controller suck? YouTube, MySpace - I'm looking at you. Embedded QuickTime and Windows Movie files have been able to do this forever.. why can't Flash master this fundamental function?

You can tell Vimeo's controller is custom - it's too 'web 2.0' and gloriously simple and intuitive; there's no way Macromedia-cum-Adobe built it. So what gives? Do you DLS readers have any idea as to why Flash, with Adobe's big video services push, doesn't seem to offer these basic necessities of producing a quality online video experience? Sound off, even if it's just an explanation to help sooth the pain.