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Tip: Use Dropbox to replace discontinued iDisk
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, Internet, PC / Laptop, Software,
We've been hearing from quite a few disgruntled MobileMe subscribers who are wondering what the heck they're supposed to do now that Apple will seemingly be discontinuing the iDisk service with the launch of iCloud. As awesome as iCloud is, we do agree that iDisk is definitely a nice feature, and it's a shame to see it go away. However, Dropbox is a great alternative, and we've actually found that it often works better than iDisk does. You can sign up for free and you'll get 2 GB of space right off the bat. If you want more, you can upgrade...but it certainly doesn't hurt to try it out. Dropbox integrates right into your Finder, similar to iDisk, and gives you updates on syncing across all your devices, plus you can access your files from through the Dropbox mobile apps as well.
Read More 
| Dropbox
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OS X Lion will allow you to boot right into Safari
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, Internet, PC / Laptop, Software,
Borrowing a tiny page from Google's Chrome OS, Apple has snuck a feature into its upcoming OS X Lion release that allows users to reboot their systems into Safari.
Why would you bother doing that? In a word, security. When you elect to restart your system into Safari, you're effectively placing the Web browser into a sandbox. When it boots, your system will give any users with physical access to your machine the ability to surf the Web. But that's it. Users won't be able to access the system's files or applications.
And thanks to Lion's new auto-save and application restoration capabilities, users that slap their systems in Safari-only mode will be able to restore back to their full desktop exactly as they left it. Since Safari mode runs off of a system's recovery partition, you'll still be able to access the Web and research new methods for fixing your system should your primary partition suffer some catastrophic upset.
The comparison to Chrome OS stems from the fact that Google's operating system runs entirely Web-based: The browser is the primary method for interacting with the system. There's no underlying desktop layer to speak of.
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Gallery: OS X Lion will allow you to boot right into Safari
Google Doodle lets you play guitar, honors Les Paul 96th birthday
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Google, Internet, Music,
Google's Thursday homepage doodle is celebrating what would have been the 96th birthday of musician Les Paul with a playable guitar logo.
For the next 24 hours, the logo on Google.com will be replaced with the strings of a guitar that will play a tune as you strum them with your mouse. In the U.S., users can click the black "compose" button and record a 30-second track. Clicking the button again will display a link to share the song you've just created.
Google said it was inspired to include the record button because Paul, in addition to his guitar work, also "experimented in his garage with innovative recording techniques like multitracking and tape delay," Alexander Chen, a designer (and musician) with Google's Creative Lab, wrote in a blog post.
The doodle, meanwhile, was created by Google engineers Kristopher Hom and Joey Hurst as well as doodle team lead Ryan Germick. They used a combination of JavaScript, HTML5 Canvas (used in modern browsers to draw the guitar strings), CSS, Flash (for sound), and tools like the Google Font API, goo.gl and App Engine, Chen said.
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Pirq brings real-time deals to your smartphone
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Hot Deals, Internet,
Sure, you are probably familiar with deal services like Groupon and LivingSocial, where you spend money up front in exchange for a coupon offering a deep discount for some food or, I dunno, foot rubs...but it's pretty much always the same thing. You get emails with new daily offers, and if you want to take advantage of them, you need to pony up the cash up-front. Pirq is looking to switch things up. They are currently in beta (although you can sign up here,) and they are bringing real-time deals to your smartphone, and you don't need to pre-buy them. You just open the app and look for deals that are going on right then, wherever you happen to be, and you can go grab one. It's a win for the consumer, but also a win for the merchant, since they can tailor deals to manage flow into their establishments, as opposed to the typical Groupon day-after lunchtime rush. It's a good idea, and the man is charge is James Sun, a runner up on The Apprentice.
Read More | Pirq
Gallery: Pirq brings real-time deals to your smartphone
Tennessee may throw you in jail for sharing your Netflix password
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Home Entertainment, Internet,
Have you shared your Netflix, Hulu Plus, or Rhapsody password with a friend? While it might seem harmless, this type of activity could now land you in some legal trouble in Tennessee.
Gov. Bill Haslam this week signed a bill that would make it illegal to share your password on subscription-based entertainment services like Netflix, Pandora, or Hulu Plus. As the AP explained, the bill is intended to stop hackers who sell batches of passwords, but it could extend to the average user who lets friends or family members watch a movie using their Netflix login or listen to music streams on Rhapsody.
"What becomes not legal is if you send your username and password to all your friends so they can get free subscriptions," bill sponsor Rep. Gerald McCormick, a Republican, told the AP.
Click to continue reading Tennessee may throw you in jail for sharing your Netflix password
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iCloud: Can Apple make the cloud mainstream?
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, Editorial, Features, Internet, Music,
I've long since stopped kvetching over the number of things Apple chief executive Steve Jobs can attach an "i" to and call his own. The maverick CEO's track record is just too darn good. Now that we know that Apple's iCloud is a real thing, there's no sense in wondering how Jobs can have the gall to rebrand cloud computing. I'd rather focus on what Apple will do with the cl...er... iCloud now that Apple has adopted it as its own.
Is Apple new to the cloud? If you accept that at the most fundamental level, cloud computing is simply a matter of thin clients (hardware or software) accessing Internet-based services and intelligence, then the answer is no. Consider Apple's reliance on streaming services for Apple TV's TV show and movie rentals, or the way genius playlists work.
iCloud, which Apple will officially unveil at next week's World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC), will be more, and streaming content is only the beginning. Obviously, we expect some sort of cloud-based, access-anywhere music library. Apple may even cave and offer a subscription-based music service. These plans will only succeed if Apple has done what Google failed to do with Google Music Beta: convince the major labels to let consumers store and access purchased (and rented) music from central servers.
I think music labels fear this not only because they worry about losing further control of the digital bits that make up their vast song libraries, but because no one will ever buy more than one copy of a song again, and if they get subscription access, they're done buying music—period.
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Slacker Premium brings unlimited on-demand music streaming
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Internet, Music,
Slacker finally launched their Slacker Premium Radio service yesterday, a new tier of the popular streaming audio service that gives music lovers on-demand access to the individual songs, albums, top charts, station playlists, and single-artist radio stations in the Slacker library.
The $9.99-per-month Slacker Premium can be accessed on the Web, as well as through apps available for the iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, Android, and BlackBerry platforms.
Slacker Premium Radio lets listeners search, play, and replay specific songs and entire albums from the 8 million songs in Slacker's library. In addition, users have the ability to create playlists and cache songs and albums for offline playback. Slacker Premium Radio also features all-new artist pages that contain artist biographies, all songs by the artist, discographies, and related artists.
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GagaVille, the Lady Gaga-FarmVille mash-up, is now live
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Internet, Music, Video Games,
GagaVille, a Lady Gaga-themed version of FarmVille, opened its gates yesterday.
From today until May 26, GagaVille invites users to "execute Gaga-themed quests" and unlock songs from Lady Gaga's upcoming album, "Born This Way," which hits stores on May 23.
As Zynga announced last week, GagaVille is a marketing partnership with Lady Gaga and Clear Channel Radio. The game gives fans access to Clear Channel's iHeartRadio player, and an exclusive preview to the diva's upcoming album.
Fans who buy $25 worth of FarmVille game credits through Best Buy will also get to download the entire album for free.
Click to continue reading GagaVille, the Lady Gaga-FarmVille mash-up, is now live
Gallery: GagaVille, the Lady Gaga-FarmVille mash-up, is now live
Facebook desperately hired PR firm to run a Google smear campaign
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Corporate News, Google, Internet,
The battle between Facebook and Google intensified this week when The Daily Beast and USA Today revealed that Facebook hired a PR firm to go after the search giant.
Last Friday, USA Today reported that PR firm Burson-Marsteller had contacted a variety of news outlets pushing a story about how Google's "Social Circle" Gmail feature violates users' privacy. The pitch was made on behalf of an unnamed client that The Daily Beast later confirmed was Facebook.
When pressed, Facebook confirmed the hire to the Daily Beast, citing concerns it had with the way Google was using its data. It was also reportedly annoyed that Google was boosting its own social-networking services with information from Facebook.
"In other words, just as Google built Google News by taking content created by hundreds of newspapers and repackaging it, so now Google aims to build a social-networking business by using that rich user data that Facebook has gathered," Dan Lyons wrote for The Daily Beast.
Facebook and Google declined comment Thursday.
Click to continue reading Facebook desperately hired PR firm to run a Google smear campaign
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Acer Chromebook: Chrome OS, 11.6-inch display, $349
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Google, Internet, PC / Laptop,
We've got another Chromebook to cover today, as the Acer Chromebook was announced this morning at Google I/O 2011, in addition to the Samsung Series 5 model. This one is smaller, with an 11.6-inch display, Intel Atom N570 processor, 16 GB SSD, two USB ports, HDMI, and a battery that lasts for 6.5 hours. Google promises an 8-second boot time on these as well. The Acer model seems to be the budget line, as these are going to sell for $349 for the Wi-Fi model (if you want worldwide 3G, those cost a bit more.) Look for these on June 15th at Amazon and Best Buy.
Read More | Acer Chromebook
Gallery: Acer Chromebook: Chrome OS, 11.6-inch display, $349
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