I’ve stumbled upon a good Flash 9/8/7/Javascript speed test.
Its interesting how Flash 7 was somewhat quicker than 8.

Another useful test is this one from Ted Patrick.
I’ve ever wondered if with Flash 9, Firefox was still so much slower than IE: seems not (with Firefox 2 and IE 7).

Finally, Apollo is out:
grab it from the Adobe Lab

To start with it:
Building your first Flex-based Apollo application

How promised, here my little perl Flash socket server.

This is a simple prototype that I've made to explore the power of non-blocking sockets.
I've tested it with a thousand connections and it should handle some more.
This can be used for a multiplayer flash game or a community chat, but since it isn't "production ready", use it at your own risk
It can be also useful to who want to implement his own server.

Features:

• >=1000 connections
• anonymous nick, free nick (free to choose you own) and registered nick with mysql/postgre/sqlite/dbo compatible
• Can run in some web hosts like Dreamhost Update: It violates their policy

Download: Perl Flash socket server

To run:

Here are also a bunch of AS classes to interact with the server and an example application like the "mouse chat" in my website. Update: my hosting (Dreamhost) doesn't allow FlashServe, the party is over
Sadly, since these was made 4 years ago with an italian friend, all the comments are in italian, if someone is interested, I can translate it.

Download: MiceTalk socket server example + Classes

You can use my server at dev.madarco.net:7777 but only in the Flash IDE (no crossdomain.xml)

Flash buzz-site of the moment: Red Universe is an interactive avatar chat in Flash, where you can explore the good-looking world while talking with others. Little advertisement: If you'd like to do something similar, look at www.madarco.net. If there aren't other users connected (likely), open it in two tabs and move the mouse to interact, [...]

I've adhered to the campaign: "Ban Time Travel Now!" Our mission: To preserve the integrity of the spacetime continuum, I hereby petition the governments of the world to immediately enact laws banning the research and practice of time travel.

dBug is a php library that print a nice-formatted dump of a variable: PHP: PLAIN TEXT include_once("dBug.php");   $variable = array(     "first"=>"1",     "second",     "third"=>array(         "inner third 1",         "inner third 2"=>"yeah"),     "fourth");   new dBug($variable); Will be formatted like this: [...]

Ok, this isn't a tech thing like the ones I usually wrote (but it is geeky): a Star Wars remake like Shakespeare in Love, really funny!

Finally! Since I'm looking for a job I realized that I need a personal website, so I've quickly made a simple one. Nothing special, apart that you can see the mouse of the others guests and talk with them (just write, then press enter). Enjoy!

Here a great post of Bruce Eckel (author of "Thinking in..." books) on Java, Ajax and surprisingly: Flash. So here’s my question. Allow for a moment the possibility that, after 10 years, Java is not going to take over the world of RIAs. Further allow that Ajax is just “how JavaScript was supposed to work [...]

(from readwriteweb) I've found really interesting this map of Web2.0 startups in the world: Europe and World Sadly nothing in Italy...