<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" version="2.0"><channel><description>A less technical blog created by 2BlueSolutions to promote technological “stuff” and other fun ideas.</description><title>2BlueSolutions Tech Stuff</title><generator>Tumblr (3.0; @2bluesolutions)</generator><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/</link><item><title>Photo</title><description>&lt;img src="http://41.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2srf4aQ0S1qb7526o1_400.png"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/21452457202</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/21452457202</guid><pubDate>Fri, 20 Apr 2012 14:23:28 -0700</pubDate></item><item><title>"he’d progressed from a toddler’s clumsy floundering to the comparatively respectable stumble of a..."</title><description>“he’d progressed from a toddler’s clumsy floundering to the comparatively respectable stumble of a recently stabbed beggar”&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt; - &lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007PSCTMM/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;tag=2bluesolu-20&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=B007PSCTMM" target="_blank"&gt;Arcana Universalis: Danse Macabre&lt;/a&gt;&lt;img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=2bluesolu-20&amp;l=as2&amp;o=1&amp;a=B007PSCTMM" width="1"/&gt;&lt;/em&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/20364637211</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/20364637211</guid><pubDate>Mon, 02 Apr 2012 13:38:00 -0700</pubDate></item><item><title>Photo</title><description>&lt;img src="http://41.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1plsaApC21qb7526o1_400.jpg"/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/20177286929</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/20177286929</guid><pubDate>Fri, 30 Mar 2012 10:55:22 -0700</pubDate></item><item><title>A couple of fantastic Google Chrome browser extensions</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Over the last week, I stumbled upon two fantastic Google Chrome browser add-ons that really make a difference to my browsing experience.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;First of all, if you aren&amp;rsquo;t using &lt;a href="http://www.google.com/chrome" target="_blank"&gt;Google Chrome&lt;/a&gt;, you should really give it a try by downloading it from here: &lt;a href="http://www.google.com/chrome" target="_blank"&gt;www.google.com/chrome&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Once you have downloaded and installed the Google Chrome browser, you can find the extensions that I will talk about here: &lt;a href="https://chrome.google.com/extensions" target="_blank"&gt;chrome.google.com/extensions&lt;/a&gt;.  By opening that link, you will see the many extensions already available for the Google Chrome browser.  They work very similarly to the Firefox Add-ons many of us are used to.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The first extension I want to mention is a quick and easy &lt;a href="https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/pgphcomnlaojlmmcjmiddhdapjpbgeoc" target="_blank"&gt;Send From Gmail extension&lt;/a&gt;.  This extension adds a nice little button in the upper right corner of your browser.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;When you click on the button, it will open your GMail account with the link of the page you were on already in the body of the email.  This makes it quick and easy to email links to people you know.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The next extension is one that will really help us all filter the crappy search results that appear to be moving to the top of the Google results pages.  Basically, there are a lot of meaningless sites out there that are referred to as &amp;ldquo;Link Farms&amp;rdquo;.  What these sites do is grab a lot of links and post out of context data on their sites.  This seems to be fooling the Google search engine into posting these sites higher up the results pages.  To try and help them filter out these less than favourable sites, you can install the &lt;a href="https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/nolijncfnkgaikbjbdaogikpmpbdcdef" target="_blank"&gt;Personal Blocklist extension&lt;/a&gt; which will add a &amp;ldquo;Block this site&amp;rdquo; link next to each search result.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This extension will let you block any site you don&amp;rsquo;t wish to show up in your personalized search results.  I know I tend to search for a lot of technical answers and I am always directed to sites that require you to pay for a membership to receive an answer.  This extension allows me to quickly and easily begin removing those sites from my search results completely.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/3405023911</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/3405023911</guid><pubDate>Sun, 20 Feb 2011 09:06:00 -0800</pubDate></item><item><title>Last Week's News - Week of Nov. 21 / 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Another slow news week.  Biggest news was the release of Apple iOS 4.2, which hopefully fixes the slowdowns that affect non-iPhone 4 users.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Apple&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The first week of the Beatles being on the iTunes store has &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/beatles_itunes_prove_popular"&gt;proven to be very successful&lt;/a&gt;.  If only more companies would clue in that people would rather just buy their music through a simple interface such as iTunes and not resort to torrent files.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/22/ios-4-2-1-now-available-brings-the-ipad-into-the-multitasking-e/"&gt;Took about a week for iOS 4.2 to release to users&lt;/a&gt;.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/ios_42_update_ipad_lands_today"&gt;The initial release was for iPad users&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/22/ios-4-2-review-for-ipad/"&gt;but it was followed&lt;/a&gt; near the end of the week &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/11/apple-releases-ios-42-with-free-find-my-phone-for-some.ars"&gt;by the update for iPhones&lt;/a&gt;.  A real nice feature that has been present on Androids &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/22/apples-find-my-iphone-ipad-service-now-free-doesnt-require/"&gt;for free is the release of Find My iPhone without having to have a MobileMe account.&lt;/a&gt;  Unfortunately, Find My iPhone only works on iPads and iPhone 4s&amp;hellip;though there are ways to get it to work on earlier versions of the iPhone. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Also, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/23/sony-reader-app-hitting-iphone-and-android-devices-in-december/"&gt;last week, we saw the release of Sony&amp;rsquo;s e-reader app for the iPhone/iPad.&lt;/a&gt;  It looks like Sony has finally realized that they should compete with Amazon in the app market as well as the e-reader market.  Of course, Amazon has had a 2 year head start on building up a following.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Tech&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Two new Android tablets are featured in a first-look hands-on in the following video:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="600" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/ItUi9KNKkU4?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/ItUi9KNKkU4?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="600" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In other tablet news, Dell officially unveiled their tablet/laptop hybrid:  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/dell_officially_introduces_inspiron_duo"&gt;The Dell Inspiron.&lt;/a&gt;  RIMs Playbook also &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/analyst_bets_big_rim_playbook"&gt;proved to be popular among technology analysts&lt;/a&gt;.  I personally think it&amp;rsquo;s RIM&amp;rsquo;s last chance to move forward in the marketplace.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Mobile&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Windows Phone 7 has been out for a couple of weeks now and &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/25/windows-phone-7-marketplace-hits-3-000-apps-and-games-attracts/"&gt;there are already 3000 apps in the store&lt;/a&gt; and many more developers looking to add to that number.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Or, you could just &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/25/windows-phone-7-gets-user-friendly-hack-for-bypassing-the-market/"&gt;&amp;ldquo;jailbreak&amp;rdquo;&lt;/a&gt; the phone and run your own apps.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Social&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Finally, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/gmail_disappears_facebooks_find_your_friends_page"&gt;Twitter&amp;rsquo;s CEO is worried that his company does not have a long term goal.&lt;/a&gt;  It&amp;rsquo;s always been something that I&amp;rsquo;ve wondered about as well&amp;hellip;how will they monetize the service?  The rumour of business Twitter accounts may actually become a reality next year?&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/2051506769</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/2051506769</guid><pubDate>Tue, 30 Nov 2010 13:00:16 -0800</pubDate></item><item><title>Last Week’s News - Week of Nov. 14 / 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;It is with frozen fingers that I type this update of last week&amp;rsquo;s news.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Leading the news, again, is Apple for last week was Apple&amp;rsquo;s announcement that they have finally settled their dispute with Apple Records and the Beatles are now available on iTunes.  After that, there is some news regarding Facebook&amp;rsquo;s new messaging system, and more info on RIM&amp;rsquo;s Blackberry Playbook.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;hr&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Apple&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="300" width="600" alt="Beatles on iTunes" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/beatles.jpg" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;After years of fighting Apple Records over the &amp;ldquo;Apple&amp;rdquo; name, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/15/wsj-apple-bringing-beatles-to-itunes-after-a-seven-year-wait/"&gt;both Apple Computer and Apple Records&lt;/a&gt; (the publisher of the Beatles) have come to an agreement that means that&lt;a href="http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/11/beatles-for-sale-on-itunes.ars" target="_blank"&gt; the Beatles and all their music is available on iTunes.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;In other good news, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/16/mobee-magic-charger-review-wirelessly-juice-up-your-apple-magic/"&gt;Mobee has released the Magic Charger&lt;/a&gt; which will wirelessly charge your wireless mouse.  You just put it on the pad and the mouse will charge.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;hr&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Social&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://articles.cnn.com/2010-11-15/tech/facebook.email_1_facebook-ceo-mark-zuckerberg-e-mail-address-inbox?_s=PM:TECH"&gt;Facebook unleashed their new messaging system last week&lt;/a&gt;.  The &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2010/11/facebooks-new-messaging-system-mashes-up-sms-e-mail-im.ars"&gt;more-than-just-e-mail system&lt;/a&gt; is meant to consolidate all of a user&amp;rsquo;s interactions with other people—whether it&amp;rsquo;s via SMS, Facebook messages, or e-mail—into one spot.  There is definitely an advantage to having all your communication tied to one account&amp;hellip;of course, there are also disadvantages (ie..if the site goes down).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;It was almost predictable that Facebook was going to unleash something new to grow their business.  In the social networking business, if you aren&amp;rsquo;t expanding your function you are in danger of becoming obsolete.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/facebook_given_five_years_live"&gt;There are always the usual predictions that Facebook only has 5 years to live. &lt;/a&gt; &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;As it is, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://consumerist.com/2010/11/facebook-will-be-plagued-by-50-million-zombie-accounts-by-2015.html"&gt;Facebook is starting to gain zombie accounts&lt;/a&gt;&amp;hellip;accounts that have been abandoned.  It&amp;rsquo;s predicted that they&amp;rsquo;ll reach 5 million of these types of accounts by 2015.  Unfortunately, the first attempt by Facebook to combat these accounts has led to some &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/facebook_squashes_account_disabling_bug"&gt;disabling of valid accounts.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Across the seas, a Chinese woman has been jailed for what would be considered an harmless tweet over here.  By re-tweeting a Twitter update from her boyfriend, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/tweet_lands_chinese_woman_jail"&gt;she has found herself sentenced to some hard time in a prison camp.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;hr&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Tech&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="600" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/s72rGDUn2uo?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/s72rGDUn2uo?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="600" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Lots of news regarding RIM&amp;rsquo;s &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/16/blackberry-playbook-first-hands-on-video/"&gt;Blackberry Playbook&lt;/a&gt;.  There was a nice display of the Playbook in action (&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/11/rim-shows-off-playbook-administering-web-beatdown-to-ipad.ars"&gt;see above video&lt;/a&gt;), but it really became interesting when RIM&amp;rsquo;s Jim Balsillie started laying into Apple regarding their &amp;ldquo;App-ification&amp;rdquo; of the desktop experience.  He basically came out and said that &lt;a target="_self" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/19/rims-jim-balsillie-says-you-dont-need-an-app-for-the-web-re/"&gt;you don&amp;rsquo;t need an app to view the web&lt;/a&gt;, which may be targeted at the&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/rim_boss_disses_iphone_app_model"&gt; recent success of the SkyFire app&lt;/a&gt; for the iPhone that brings Flash playback to the device.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Another nice piece of news this week was the announcement that Amazon would allow the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/11/amazon-finally-lets-users-give-kindle-books-as-gifts.ars"&gt;gifting of virtual books&lt;/a&gt; &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/19/amazon-introduces-kindle-book-gifting-just-in-time-for-the-holid/"&gt;for Kindle owners.&lt;/a&gt;  &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;hr&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Mobile&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Finally, the news that I was happiest to hear last week was that &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/17/google-docs-now-supports-mobile-editing/"&gt;Google Docs are now editable with your iPhone (and Android)&lt;/a&gt;.  One of my biggest pet peeves was not being able to edit my Google Docs while on my iPhone.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Windows Phone 7 got in the news last week for some unfortunate news concerning their microSD slots. &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/17/windows-phone-7s-microsd-mess-the-full-story-and-how-nokia-ca/"&gt; For many of the phones, the slot is not accessible, but on the Samsung phone, the slot is easily accessible&lt;/a&gt;.  To many users&amp;rsquo; dismay, it appears that putting in a larger microSD card can actually slow your phone down due to the way that some microSD cards access the memory on themselves.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1666136936</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1666136936</guid><pubDate>Tue, 23 Nov 2010 20:33:41 -0800</pubDate></item><item><title>Last Week's News - Week of Nov. 7 / 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="600" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/_YbmK3Zu0Os?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/_YbmK3Zu0Os?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="600" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Apple&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/11/apples-ping-gains-twitter-integration-but-still-no-facebook.ars"&gt;Itunes Ping has gained Twitter integration again with the 4.2 update&lt;/a&gt;.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/11/itunes-101-brings-airplay-warning-about-ping-use.ars"&gt;There is also the nice addition of AirPlay&lt;/a&gt; &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/12/itunes-10-1-is-out-brings-video-airplay-and-ios-4-2-compatibili/"&gt;which brings the ability to stream video like AirTunes allowed one to stream audio.&lt;/a&gt;  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/12/apple-outs-new-ios-4-2-gold-master-that-fixes-ipads-wifi-woes/"&gt;There is also a fix for the iPad wi-fi issues&lt;/a&gt; and the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5688635/what-you-have-to-look-forward-to-in-ios-42"&gt;possibly a solution to the iPhone 3G slowdown&lt;/a&gt; that occurred when the older generation of phones was updated to iOS 4.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5688442/gorillaz-next-album-was-created-on-ipad"&gt;Gorillaz new album was created entirely on the iPad&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/ios_users_really_want_flash_skyfire_makes_1_million_first_weekend"&gt;Flash browser for the iPhone has a stellar weekend&lt;/a&gt; selling a ton of copies and showing the hunger for Flash to work on the iPhone.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;The latest &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1361890223/news-from-apples-back-to-the-mac-event"&gt;Back to the Mac event&lt;/a&gt; showed that Apple is going to implement Apps for the Mac desktop. &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/07/switched-on-the-ipadification-of-mac-os/"&gt; Engadget has a nice in-depth article.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Google&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;Google&amp;rsquo;s Chrome browser got the addition of &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2010/11/google-instant-previews-improve-search-result-satisfaction.ars"&gt;instant previews that show you the sites&lt;/a&gt; you find in your search before you even click on the link.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/google_adds_instant_previews_search"&gt;It&amp;rsquo;s actually a pretty handy tool&lt;/a&gt;, especially if you are looking for a site you are familiar with, but can&amp;rsquo;t recall the name of the site.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;Chrome, while probably the quickest browser already, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/chrome_become_wicked_fast_background_preloading"&gt;will become even faster with the addition of background preloading&lt;/a&gt;. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;Whatever happened to the Facebook rival that&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5688177/so-is-google-building-a-facebook-rival-or-not"&gt; Google was supposedly working on?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;Want your iPhone to &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://lifehacker.com/5685633/how-to-google+ify-your-iphone"&gt;look more &amp;ldquo;Android-like&amp;rdquo;?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;E-Book readers&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/11/dont-hold-your-breath-for-color-e-ink-readers.ars%20"&gt;Don’t wait for a colour e-ink book anytime soon&lt;/a&gt;.  If you&amp;rsquo;re holding off on purchasing an e-book reader right now, don&amp;rsquo;t bother.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/sony_ships_reader_daily_edition_stores_also_available_online"&gt;Brand new Sony e-reader with cellular network support&lt;/a&gt; finally bringing it in line with what the Amazon Kindle has offered from the beginning. &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Tablets&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/10/blackberry-playbook-to-cost-under-500/"&gt;RIMs Blackberry Playbook appears to be coming in at just under $500&lt;/a&gt;. &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/blackberry_tablet_cost_less_500"&gt;When they say “under $500”&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5686145/blackberry-playbook-will-cost-under-500-when-it-hits-next-year"&gt;you know it’s going to be $499.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;The new 7” Samsung Galaxy tablet was just released and &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5686161/samsung-galaxy-tab-review-a-pocketable-train-wreck"&gt;there’s already one horrific review of the device&lt;/a&gt;.  Of course, that doesn’t appear to stop them from &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://articles.cnn.com/2010-11-10/tech/samsung.galaxy.tab.wired_1_galaxy-tab-e-reader-samsung?_s=PM:TECH"&gt;moving forward with the development of a 10” tablet&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Social&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/11/gmail-meet-fmail/"&gt;FMail? &lt;/a&gt;  Facebook appears to be making a &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5688464/why-facebook-mail-can-kill-gmail-and-everyone-else"&gt;new mail system hoping to keep people within their website for all forms of communication.&lt;/a&gt;  It seems that &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5685176/facebook-and-gmails-dispute-over-your-contact-details-has-got-dirtier"&gt;Google and Facebook are going to start a new fight&lt;/a&gt; about who their users use for mail.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/07/rockmelt-social-browser-launches-in-limited-beta-we-go-hands-on/"&gt;New socially oriented browser coming out?&lt;/a&gt;  Is this a worthy competitor &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://flock.com/"&gt;Flock&lt;/a&gt;?&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/home/survey_facebook_and_twitter_both_stink_businesses%20%20"&gt;It doesn’t appear that Facebook or Twitter are necessarily good for business.&lt;/a&gt;  Of course, the headline doesn&amp;rsquo;t mention that it&amp;rsquo;s not necessarily bad for business with results of around 30% of traffic for businesses is driven by links from social sites.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Security&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;Even if you are running a Free Wi-Fi spot, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/security/news/2010/11/researcher-free-wifi-should-use-free-password-to-protect-users.ars"&gt;it’s probably a good idea to offer a freely obtainable password.&lt;/a&gt;  It’s an amazingly simple encryption method that doesn’t impact your costumers and improves their online safety.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/security_firms_cry_foul_over_microsoft_distributing_free_av_windows_update"&gt;It was only a matter of time before security software companies got upset that Microsoft was distributing free security software for OS&lt;/a&gt;.  The security firms try to make this sound like it’s anti-competitive, but the main problem is that the software provided by Microsoft actually performs quite well.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Mobile&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Lots and lots of Windows Phone 7 news as its launch continues.  &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/11/windows-phone-7-already-doomed-dont-let-early-sales-fool-you.ars"&gt;Early sales are slow&lt;/a&gt;, but they don’t mean much as we swing into the Christmas season.  A lot of people held off waiting to see how the phones performed considering the radical departure of the operating system.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5685210/you-can-now-ditch-bing-for-google-search-on-windows-phone-7"&gt;You can still get Google search on your phone.&lt;/a&gt;  Don’t be afraid of Bing though, it’s a competent search engine.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5684068/htc-hd7-review-size-aint-everything"&gt;HTC HD7 review&lt;/a&gt;…it’s definitely the largest, but it’s also a good phone.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5687626/windows-phone-7-essential-apps-reviewed"&gt;Plenty of apps&lt;/a&gt; to watch out for on the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/16_best_windows_phone_7_apps"&gt;Windows Phone 7 marketplace&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Strangely enough, Microsoft also appears to be re-launching their failed phone from earlier this year&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/11/kin-to-make-a-feature-phone-comeback.ars"&gt;With the Kin appearing to return to Verizon.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5687979/the-microsoft-kin-is-coming-back-to-life-on-verizon"&gt;Without the hefty data plan it originally launched with.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Of course, don’t forget about the Android phones&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/11/this-is-the-nexus-s/"&gt;Leaked images of the new Nexus S&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/11/exclusive-samsung-flagship-phone-with-gingerbread-and-huge-di/"&gt;The imminent Gingerbread release of Android OS.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1589370169</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1589370169</guid><pubDate>Mon, 15 Nov 2010 23:31:59 -0800</pubDate></item><item><title>National Unfriend Day - November 17, 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Jimmy Kimmel showed this on his late night talk show the other night.  This is only a fraction of what was shown, but William Shatner put on another great performance.  I&amp;rsquo;m sure you&amp;rsquo;ll agree.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="480" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/_Zub98PCvRY?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/_Zub98PCvRY?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lu_kDNs4VH8"&gt;The full video from the show can be found on YouTube.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1564755787</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1564755787</guid><pubDate>Sat, 13 Nov 2010 13:03:30 -0800</pubDate></item><item><title>Last Week's News - Week of Oct. 31 / 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Last week, Facebook held a press event, Dell came out with some bad news for RIM and Apple faced some bad news, but Apple also had some good news.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Mobile&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object id="flashObj" width="600" height="360" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,47,0"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&amp;amp;isUI=1"&gt;&lt;param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF"&gt;&lt;param name="flashVars" value="videoId=652304299001&amp;amp;playerID=653175093001&amp;amp;playerKey=AQ~~,AAAAlDCBGhk~,VcmqiTAueko5dVQ8XdV26frDg4G6mZc1&amp;amp;domain=embed&amp;amp;dynamicStreaming=true"&gt;&lt;param name="base" value="http://admin.brightcove.com"&gt;&lt;param name="seamlesstabbing" value="false"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="swLiveConnect" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&amp;amp;isUI=1" flashvars="videoId=652304299001&amp;amp;playerID=653175093001&amp;amp;playerKey=AQ~~,AAAAlDCBGhk~,VcmqiTAueko5dVQ8XdV26frDg4G6mZc1&amp;amp;domain=embed&amp;amp;dynamicStreaming=true" base="http://admin.brightcove.com" name="flashObj" width="600" height="360" seamlesstabbing="false" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" swliveconnect="true" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;Android Surging, Blackberry Falling&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/npd_android_surging_blackberry_falling_fast"&gt;Growth of the Android phone market is outpacing the growth of RIMs Blackberry market&lt;/a&gt;.  RIM really needs to do something special and stop relying on its old business customers who &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/11/android-market-share-gains-come-at-the-expense-of-blackberry.ars"&gt;RIM expects to stick with their Blackberries&lt;/a&gt;.   &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h3&gt;Dell Delivers Another Blow to RIM&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5682309/dell-were-kicking-%5Bblackberry%5D-out"&gt;Dell decided to drop Blackberries as employee phones.&lt;/a&gt;  This makes a lot of sense as Dell has now &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/11/dell-moves-25000-employees-from-blackberry-to-windows-phone-7.ars"&gt;entered the Android and Windows Phone 7 marketplace&lt;/a&gt;.  The Windows Phone 7 phone, in particular, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/dell_ditching_blackberrys_handing_out_wp7_and_android_phones"&gt;is a very strong competitor for the Blackberry.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Dell also came out and said that it&amp;rsquo;s a&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/02/michael-dell-developing-windows-smartphones-easier-than-andro/"&gt; lot easier to develop for the Windows Phone 7 platform compared to the Android platform&lt;/a&gt;.  This makes a lot of sense as the Windows platform has a lot in common with their desktop OS.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Of course, Dell has been talking a lot this past week about the Windows Phone 7 because of the&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/06/dell-venue-pro-launches-november-8th-at-microsofts-retail-store/"&gt; imminent launch of their Windows Phone 7 handset.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Social&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;Twitter To Reach 200 Million Users&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/twitter_course_200_million_users_2010-end"&gt;Expected by the end of 2010, Twitter should reach 200 million user accounts.&lt;/a&gt;  How many of those accounts are active accounts is up for debate.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h3&gt;Facebook Is Not Making a Facebook Phone&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;Facebook held a press event last week and came out and said &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5680720/facebook-is-not-building-a-phone"&gt;they are not working on a phone.&lt;/a&gt;  Rather, they will focus on making the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5680730/facebooks-mobile-platform-not-a-phone-just-software"&gt;mobile Facebook experience a quality experience.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Facebook came out with a trademark infringement threat against &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://lamebook.com"&gt;Lamebook&lt;/a&gt;.  Of course, this isn&amp;rsquo;t a great public relations maneuver as Lamebook is an entertaining site for many and &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101105/10275111742/is-there-anything-lamer-than-facebook-threatening-lamebook-with-trademark-infringement.shtml"&gt;it shouldn&amp;rsquo;t be a trademark infringement issue at all because it qualifies as satire&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h3&gt;Google Tells Facebook They Don&amp;rsquo;t Play Fair&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/11/google-facebook-data"&gt;Facebook doesn&amp;rsquo;t allow Google to pull information from Facebook&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/11/google-points-finger-at-facebook-hypocrisy-blocks-gmail-import.ars"&gt;so Google is telling Facebook that they don&amp;rsquo;t get to pull information from Google&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Apple News&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="600" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Zp7RtJROjtE?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Zp7RtJROjtE?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="600" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;Bad Apple&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/11/iphone-lawsuit/"&gt;An iPhone lawsuit&lt;/a&gt; pertaining to the 4.0 iOS update for 3G and 3GS phones is going forward.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/11/lawsuit-apple-turned-iphone-3gs-into-ibricks-to-boost-iphone-4.ars"&gt;I think all us 3G users have definitely encountered the issue&lt;/a&gt; where the 4.0 iOS update came out and &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5680981/iphone-3g-brickgate-lawsuit-makes-one-very-good-point"&gt;all our phones slowed to a crawl.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/03/2010-macbook-air-owners-reporting-logic-board-and-display-issues/"&gt;The brand new MacBook Air is encountering a strange issue regarding the LCD display&lt;/a&gt; and how it acts after recovering from sleep.  Hopefully, this will be fixed soon.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h3&gt;Good Apple&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5680043/apple-is-preparing-to-extend-itunes-song-previews-to-90-seconds"&gt;Longer 90 second previews are coming to the Apple store&lt;/a&gt;.  Apple appears to have given an ultimatum to the recording industry and came out with this statement before they actually had an agreement with the recording industry.  It&amp;rsquo;s good for us and the recording industry needs to understand that.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/03/skyfire-browser-for-iphone-hits-the-app-store-ready-to-play-you/"&gt;The Skyfire iPhone App was released as well, last week&lt;/a&gt;.  This app allows you to view Flash on your iPhone, but it&amp;rsquo;s so popular that they had to withdraw it from the store.  The app works by sending the page to Skyfire&amp;rsquo;s servers where it is converted into a video that the iPhone can display..&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/05/skyfire-being-rereleased-into-app-store-in-batches-coming-to/"&gt;.it appears, though, that their servers got so hammered on the first day, due to popularity, they had to pull the app.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Tech News&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;Samsung Galaxy Tab Review&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/01/samsung-galaxy-tab-review/"&gt;Engadgets review of the Samsung Galaxy Tab&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h3&gt;Dell Inspiron Duo Sneak Peaks&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;Both &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/04/dell-inspiron-duo-flips-its-lid-on-official-video/"&gt;Engadget &lt;/a&gt;and &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/dell_serves_teaser_video_inspiron_duo"&gt;MaximumPC &lt;/a&gt;have some sneak peaks at the new Dell Inspiron Duo Tablet/Laptop device.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;The Web&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;Internet Explorer 9 Passes With Flying Colours&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/11/02/w3c-tests-html5-browser-compatibility-crowns-ie9-the-champ/"&gt;W3C reviewed HTML5 compatibility amongst browsers and IE9 came out on top.&lt;/a&gt; &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h3&gt;Chrome Extension of the Week&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/web_exclusive/chrome_extension_week_ozone"&gt;The Chrome extension Ozone&lt;/a&gt; came to light last week and it&amp;rsquo;s great.  It&amp;rsquo;s Google Desktop for your browser.  &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1519436553</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1519436553</guid><pubDate>Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:13:31 -0800</pubDate></item><item><title>Last Week's News - Week of Oct. 24 / 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Last week was not an extremely busy week in news, but there was some exciting announcements and events by Adobe and RIM.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Tablets&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="500" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/VTI2OWRzxwg?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/VTI2OWRzxwg?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="500" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Blackberry Playbook was shown off in what appeared to be a fully functional form this past week.  It’s nice to see a piece of technology shown off so far off from it’s potential release date and have it work quite well on stage.  RIM is definitely making a move to become a suitable competitor to Apple’s iPad.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Blackberry Playbook" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/26/blackberry-playbook-demoed-courtesy-of-rims-mike-lazaridis-and/"&gt;RIM&amp;rsquo;s Mike Lazaridis demoed the Playbook&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Blackberry Playbook plays Adobe Flash" target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/rim_demos_playbook_tablet_adobe_max"&gt;Adobe Max event shows off the Blackberry Playbook running Flash with ease.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Mobile&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="431" width="500" alt="Playstation Phone" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/playstation-phone.jpg" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Sony’s Playstation Phone? It has been rumoured for quite a while that Sony was planning on releasing a phone that was based on top of their PSP platform.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Sony Mobile Phone" target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5674138/meet-the-playstation-phone"&gt;There have been failed attempts in the past (Nokia’s nGage), but maybe Sony will get it right?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Flash 10.1 is coming to Blackberries, Windows 7 Phones and Android devices.  Adobe appears to be coming out hard against Apple by showing off their Flash environment running on multiple platforms.  &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Adobe Flash 10.1 on mobile devices" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/25/adobe-confirms-flash-player-10-1-is-coming-to-blackberry-window/"&gt;Not working on Apple mobile products, of course.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Palm back in the news? HP seems desperate to push Palm devices back into the mainstream.  After purchasing Palm earlier this year, not much was heard about what HP was planning to do, but now we have a bit more information.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="New Palm devices" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/27/hp-contracts-5-or-6-new-palm-devices-for-2011/"&gt;New Palm devices will be released early next year.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Palm available at Roger's stores" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/27/palm-pre-2-for-rogers-in-the-wild/"&gt;Some hints of it already available for pre-order in some Rogers stores&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="HP Palm Logo" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/28/hp-palm-quietly-debuts-new-hp-palm-logo/"&gt;A brand new logo quietly released.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Windows 7 Phones will allow apps to run behind the scenes.  Some good news coming out of the Windows Phone 7 camp was that they appear to have come to an agreement to let applications run while your screen is locked.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/29/microsoft-loosens-up-enables-windows-phone-7-apps-to-run-beneat/"&gt;This really wasn’t something that I thought they would block so I’m glad they solved the issue.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Windows Phone 7 Problems that need fixing" target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5673838/10-ways-windows-phone-is-broken"&gt;Of course, this isn’t to say that they don’t have other issues to address.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;E-Books&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="315" width="500" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/nook-colour.jpg" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;New Barnes &amp;amp; Noble Colour E-book shown off this past week.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Colour Nook" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/26/barnes-and-noble-nook-color-revealed/"&gt;It looks good, but appears to suffer from lower battery life and screen that can be too reflective in sunlight.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Nook Android Tablet?" target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5675881/the-nook-color-might-be-a-better-android-tablet-than-we-thought"&gt;The Nook may also be a good tablet computer in disguise.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Of course, if you don’t keep your Nook up to date:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Nook deleting data" target="_blank" href="http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101026/16554111596/yet-another-reminder-that-you-don-t-own-your-ebooks-b-n-nook-deletes-files-blames-user.shtml"&gt;You may lose more than your bargained for.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Kindle Windows 7 app.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Windows Phone 7 Kindle App" target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5675778/kindle-will-join-windows-phone-7-app-stable"&gt;Not unexpected, but nice to see that Amazon will be releasing an app for Windows Phone 7.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Good knews considering how many Kindle e-books Amazon sells compared to their physical copies&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Amazon Kindle books outselling physical books" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/25/kindle-books-outselling-print-2-to-1-for-amazons-top-10-bestsel/%20"&gt;Amazon Kindle Outselling paper books 2-to-1&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Apple&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="370" width="500" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/macbook-air.jpg" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;More MacBook Air reviews are coming out now that you can buy them in-store.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="MacBook Air Review" target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5676186/13+inch-macbook-air-review-so-long-fatty"&gt;Great battery life, good power and it’s light!&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Another MacBook Air Review" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/26/macbook-air-review-late-2010/"&gt;Very good laptop, but it’s still pricey.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;White iPhone 4 a reality?  Another store “oops” on Apple’s part (or clever marketing).&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="White iPhone" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/26/white-iphone-4-evidence-shows-up-in-apple-store-apps-update/"&gt;The white iPhone appeared, but then disappeared.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Gadgets&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="333" width="500" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/logitech-solar.jpg" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Logitech solar wireless keyboard.  Not sure how good this would be for all our dark home theatre setups.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Logitech Solar Wireless Keyboard" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/31/logitech-unveils-wireless-solar-keyboard-k750-does-away-with-ba/"&gt;It will be nice to not always worry about batteries.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;p&gt;Google TV.  A couple of reviews show:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Google TV Review" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/29/google-tv-review/"&gt;It’s Google TV feels like an incomplete jumble of good ideas only half-realized.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Sony Google TV" target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/29/sony-internet-tv-with-google-tv-review/"&gt;and the platform&amp;rsquo;s current drawbacks and the television&amp;rsquo;s middling display specs make it a tough one to recommend even to early adopters.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Fun Stuff&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="The day email was invented" target="_blank" href="http://gawker.com/5677086/the-day-e+mail-was-invented"&gt;Last week marked the anniversary of the day e-mail was invented.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Sony Walkman Retired" target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/sony_walkman_tape_players_walk_retirement"&gt;Sony Walkman retired.  Who knew they still made these?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a title="Google URL shortener" target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/googl_fastest_url_shortener_block"&gt;Google URL Shortener the fastest of the bunch&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1457070691</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1457070691</guid><pubDate>Mon, 01 Nov 2010 17:32:39 -0700</pubDate><category>news</category></item><item><title>Twitter Versus Facebook</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="359" width="500" alt="Twitter Versus Facebook" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/comics/twitter_vs_facebook.jpg" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1424522774</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1424522774</guid><pubDate>Thu, 28 Oct 2010 09:18:01 -0700</pubDate><category>comic</category></item><item><title>Last Week's News - Week of Oct. 17 / 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;A couple of days late and a little shorter than usual, here’s Last Week’s News:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The biggest news of the week was definitely the Apple news conference that they held on Wednesday.  You can see the summary of those events by viewing my previous post:  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1361890223/news-from-apples-back-to-the-mac-event%20"&gt;News From Apple’s “Back To The Mac” Event&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Onto the news,&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Lots of Windows 7 Phone Reviews:&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/htc-hd7-review/"&gt;HTC HD7 Review&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/htc-surround-review/"&gt;HTC Surround Review&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/samsung-omnia-7-review/"&gt;Samsung Omnia 7 Review&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/22/samsung-focus-review/"&gt;Samsung Focus Review&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;RIM and Blackberry in the news:&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5668738/windows-phone-7-review"&gt;RIM showed off their new Blackberry Style flip phone&lt;/a&gt;.  It’s definitely a thick phone, but it comes in at a good price.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/19/blackberry-playbook-64gb-variant-confirmed-strapped-to-a-5-300m/"&gt;Blackberry Playbook specs revealed and it has plenty of storage and a large battery&lt;/a&gt;.  We’re still waiting for a price, though.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://blogs.blackberry.com/2010/10/rim-responds-to-apples-distortion-field/"&gt;RIM’s CEO responded&lt;/a&gt; to to Apple’s Steve Jobs’ earnings call early last week as well.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/10/rims-balsillie-takes-exception-with-jobs-earnings-call-trolling.ars"&gt;RIM’s CEO Jim Balsillie took exception&lt;/a&gt; to the fact that the number 2 spot in the mobile market was owned by Apple (though, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/rim_concedes_no_2_smartphone_spot_apple"&gt;it was revealed that Steve Jobs may be correct&lt;/a&gt;).  RIM’s CEO &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5668081/rim-co+ceo-fires-back-at-apple-and-its-distortion-field"&gt;also took exception to Steve Jobs&lt;/a&gt; mentioning that no one would use a 7” tablet&amp;hellip;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/steve_jobs_says_your_fingers_are_too_fat_7-inch_tablet"&gt;even though the iPhone is pretty much a smaller tablet.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;On a final RIM note, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/16/rim-promises-to-soothe-blackberry-app-developers-woes-says-we/"&gt;they realize that the Blackberry App World is not the easiest to develop for&lt;/a&gt; and they are looking to make it easier on developers.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Social Networking News:&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2010/10/how-to-use-abuse-and-leave-facebook-groups.ars"&gt;Information on how to use Facebook Groups&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/10/many-faceook-apps-found-to-be-collecting-selling-user-info.ars"&gt;Some popular apps such as Farmville were found to be collecting and selling user information&lt;/a&gt; which led nicely into the news that US Congress was interested in &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/10/facebook-app-breach-gets-the-attention-of-congress.ars"&gt;knowing what Facebook was doing about the privacy of their users’ information&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Of course, Facebook is not the only company involved in user information being sold off to third parties&amp;hellip;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/myspace_confession_weve_been_sharing_your_data_advertisers"&gt;MySpace is guilty as well&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;&lt;h2&gt;Finally:&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5671104/amazon-will-let-you-loan-kindle-books-to-a-friend-++-but-publishers-can-turn-it-off"&gt;Amazon announced that they will soon allow you to lend a book to a friend from your Kindle&lt;/a&gt;.  It’s limited to 14 days and only once per book, but it’s a nice new feature to help share books among avid readers.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1408066098</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1408066098</guid><pubDate>Tue, 26 Oct 2010 11:19:00 -0700</pubDate></item><item><title>Crisis Management - How To Wrangle a Genius</title><description>&lt;a href="http://geniuswrangler.blogspot.com/"&gt;Crisis Management - How To Wrangle a Genius&lt;/a&gt;: &lt;p&gt;Funny stories about one man’s ability to manage a bunch of very intelligent people who do very unintelligent things.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://geniuswrangler.blogspot.com/"&gt;Crisis Management&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1376606118</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1376606118</guid><pubDate>Fri, 22 Oct 2010 16:49:00 -0700</pubDate></item><item><title>News From Apple's "Back To The Mac" Event</title><description>&lt;p&gt;A few major announcements were made today, but the event was more of a preview of where Apple is going next year.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img align="middle" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/apple/mainimage.jpg" width="560" height="372"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Mac OS X 10.7 (codename &amp;ldquo;Lion&amp;rdquo;)&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;The newest version of Apple&amp;rsquo;s operating system is &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/os-x-10-7-lion-announced/"&gt;coming next Summer&lt;/a&gt;.  The emphasis appears to be on usability with an emphasis on integrating Apps and multi-touch control.  The idea appears to be to bring more of the experience of the iPad to the desktop and laptop Apple products.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;There was also a brief mention about &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5668906/what-is-apples-mission-control"&gt;Mission Control&lt;/a&gt;.  Apple is hoping to group a lot of the functions of the OS X into an easy to use/manage central interface.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;Speaking of Apps&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5668903/app-store-is-coming-to-mac"&gt;Apps are coming to Macs within 90 days&lt;/a&gt;.  Allowing apps to run on your iPhone, your iPad, and your desktop/laptop is very promising.  Playing &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.rovio.com/index.php?page=angry-birds"&gt;Angry Birds&lt;/a&gt; on your desktop would be a real treat!&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;MacBook Air&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img align="middle" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/apple/macbook_air.jpg" width="600" height="399"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/apples-new-macbook-air/"&gt;The MacBook Air has been updated and it looks great&lt;/a&gt;.  The original MacBook Air has seen an upgrade with a much longer battery life and the addition of an extremely fast solid state hard drive.  The SSD should greatly enhance the battery life, reduce noise, and reduce heat.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/apple-introduces-11-6-inch-macbook-air/"&gt;A smaller 11” MacBook Air&lt;/a&gt; was also announced with a starting price of a very reasonable $999.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;New iLife &amp;lsquo;11 Update&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/20/apple-reveals-ilife-11/"&gt;Apple&amp;rsquo;s iLife has seen an update as well&lt;/a&gt;.  Generally, the updates are mostly just tweaks and slight interface changes, but all the changes add up to a much nicer experience.  Plenty of videos showing the changes can be &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5668842/ilife-11-the-best-new-tricks-in-iphoto-imovie-and-garageband"&gt;found here&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1361890223</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1361890223</guid><pubDate>Wed, 20 Oct 2010 16:13:00 -0700</pubDate><category>Apple</category><category>Apps</category><category>Mac</category></item><item><title>Last Week’s News - Week of Oct. 10 / 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;Only 2 major news events last week.  The new Windows 7 phones were unveiled by Microsoft and HTC.  While Sony went ahead and unveiled some more of their Google TV offerings as more information about Google TV in general was released.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Windows 7 Phones&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="640" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/lf7EaGsV0qI?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/lf7EaGsV0qI?fs=1&amp;amp;hl=en_US" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/10/microsoft-carriers-announce-windows-phone-7-hardware.ars"&gt;A couple of great&lt;/a&gt; in-depth articles give &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/11/windows-phone-7-launch-guide/"&gt;some good insight into&lt;/a&gt; what the Windows 7 phones are going to offer.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_self" href="http://gizmodo.com/5660613/htc-hd7-hello-all-43+inches-of-windows-phone-7"&gt;HTC displayed a wide variety of phones&lt;/a&gt;.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5660697/htcs-7-mozart-is-their-smallest-wp7-phone-at-37+inches"&gt;They actually had&lt;/a&gt; &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/16/htc-7-pro-and-7-surround-strut-their-stuff-in-official-sizzle-vi/"&gt;the strongest showing of phones&lt;/a&gt; during a week where Samsung was curiously silent.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Good news for Mac owners:  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5662925/windows-phones-will-sync-to-macs-for-reals"&gt;Windows 7 phones will sync with Macs&lt;/a&gt;.  It was expected, but no one was 100% sure.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/11/copy-and-paste-coming-to-windows-phone-7-in-early-2011/"&gt;Copy &amp;amp; Paste coming to Windows 7 Phones&lt;/a&gt;&amp;hellip;begs the question of why it wasn’t included in the first place?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Google TV&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/10/sony-announces-internet-tv-hdtvs-blu-ray-player-with-google-tv.ars"&gt;Plenty of gadgets unveiled by Sony&lt;/a&gt; show that they are &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/12/sony-google-tv-hdtvs-and-blu-ray-player-launch-details-revealed/"&gt;serious about Google TV&lt;/a&gt;. An in-depth look at the Sony TV and their “interesting” controller &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/12/sonys-internet-tv-powered-by-google-tv-first-hands-on/"&gt;was also reported this week&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Facebook&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2010/10/facebook-may-be-making-strides.ars"&gt;Deleted Facebook photos actually not deleted&lt;/a&gt;.  You may not see it anymore, but that doesn’t mean that the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gawker.com/5661813/facebook-delete-can-take-16-embarrassing-months"&gt;search engines don’t have it indexed on Facebook’s servers&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Security&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;On a final note, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://lifehacker.com/5661087/what-free-public-wifi-is-and-why-you-should-avoid-it"&gt;there was an interesting report released regarding that &amp;ldquo;Free Public WiFi&amp;rdquo;&lt;/a&gt; name that we all see when we boot up our laptop at airports or at coffee shops.  They may appear free, but they are not free of risk.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1348384328</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1348384328</guid><pubDate>Mon, 18 Oct 2010 19:46:24 -0700</pubDate><category>news</category><category>html5</category><category>windows 7 phone</category><category>GoogleTV</category><category>Facebook</category></item><item><title>Netflix iPhone App Review</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1186069209/netflix-comes-to-canada"&gt;Netflix came to Canada&lt;/a&gt; a couple of weeks ago.  Their &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://communities.canada.com/vancouversun/blogs/techsense/archive/2010/09/22/netflix-launches-in-canada-with-limited-selection.aspx"&gt;offerings are limited&lt;/a&gt;, but I still find plenty to watch when I when I have the time.  This week, I suddenly remembered that, in America, they had an iPhone app.  I quickly checked the Canadian iPhone App Store and found that &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/netflix/id363590051?mt=8"&gt;Netflix has an app on the Canadian store as well&lt;/a&gt;.  &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;After installing the app and starting it up, you are presented with their splash page:&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img align="middle" height="480" width="320" alt="Netflix Splash Page" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/netflix_app/netflix.png"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Once the loading has been completed (and you have signed in with your &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.netflix.ca"&gt;Netflix account&lt;/a&gt;), you are presented with your personalized home page.  The best part of this home page is that you are immediately able to resume watching whatever show you have been watching on another device.  For example, say you were watching a movie on your PS3 and then found yourself elsewhere with time on your hands and a wifi or 3G connection, you could quickly resume the movie exactly where you left it on the other device.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Another nice feature of the home page is that it will present you with a whole list of suggestions based on your previously viewed movies.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img alt="Netflix home page" align="middle" height="480" width="320" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/netflix_app/netflix_home.png"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Selecting “Genres” at the bottom of the page brings you to what is the main “meat” of the application.  From here, you can browse all that Netflix has to offer, from television shows, comedies, and dramas to foreign films, documentaries, and independent films.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="480" width="320" alt="Netflix genre page" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/netflix_app/netflix_genre.png"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Once you’ve found a show, you just need to click on it to bring up the description of the show.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="480" width="320" alt="Netflix Show Description" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/netflix_app/netflix_desc.png" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;To watch a show, just click on “Play” (or “Resume”, if you’ve already begun watching the show.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;img height="320" width="480" alt="Netflix in action" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/netflix_app/netflix_play.png" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Once the show begins, you’ll be pretty happy with the quality.  It’s really a very nice example of how technology should “just work”.  No hassle, it just begins playing.  The experience is definitely a good one.  &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;One negative that I did stumble upon occurred when I received a phone call while watching a show.  After completing the phone call, I went back into the Netflix app expecting to resume the show at the point that I was interrupted by the phone call.  Surprisingly, the app did not save the point at which I was interrupted and, instead, was sent back to the point that I started.  The only way to pause a show and have it save the location is to click “Done” in the upper left corner.  By clicking this “done” button, you can pause the show on the iPhone and resume it at the same spot on another device.  Hopefully, this will be fixed in an update.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Other than that, if you have a Netflix account and an iPhone, there is no reason not to have this app installed.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1322037653</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1322037653</guid><pubDate>Fri, 15 Oct 2010 12:58:33 -0700</pubDate><category>iPhone</category><category>reviews</category></item><item><title>Video camera attached to a weather balloon launched 100,000 feet...</title><description>&lt;iframe src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/15091562?title=0&amp;byline=0&amp;portrait=0" width="400" height="225" frameborder="0" title="Homemade Spacecraft" webkitallowfullscreen mozallowfullscreen allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;/iframe&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;p&gt;Video camera attached to a weather balloon launched 100,000 feet into the air, then parachuted down, and the video was retrieved.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1306449155</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1306449155</guid><pubDate>Wed, 13 Oct 2010 04:00:44 -0700</pubDate><category>fun</category></item><item><title>Last Week’s News - Week of Oct. 3, 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5658564/adobe-and-microsoft-conspire-against-apple-in-secret-meeting"&gt;Microsoft in talks to buy Adobe?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Microsoft and Adobe are rumoured to be in talks about something.  Just what that something could be is still up for speculation.  A lot of that speculation revolves around Microsoft purchasing Adobe which &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/10/microsoft-adobe-apple/"&gt;could be a good situation for both companies&lt;/a&gt;.  Microsoft can blend its Adobe Flash software (Silverlight) with the technology that Adobe has honed over the years.  Adobe would gain a huge company backing them in their &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/10/microsoft-buying-adobe-would-fix-both-companies-apple-problem.ars"&gt;continued fight to remain dominant in the online web world&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/03/confirmed-windows-phone-7-launches-october-11th-in-new-york-cit/"&gt;Official Windows 7 Phone Launch Details&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5654738/all-of-windows-phone-7s-us-launch-details-will-be-shared-october-11th"&gt;The official launch was scheduled for today&lt;/a&gt; with rumours of &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/confirmed_windows_phone_7_launch_happening_october_11"&gt;phones being released on November 8th&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/yahoo_rolls_out_redesigned_search_engine"&gt;Yahoo Search Engine&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Yahoo is undergoing a series of updates that will, hopefully for them, help them compete against Google and Bing.  This latest update strives to bring more than just relevant results, but also tries to offer related yet different results that may offer something the user wasn’t expecting.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/10/google-tv-to-finally-get-tv-right-in-the-online-video-age.ars"&gt;Google TV Details&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/10/logitech-google-tv-box"&gt;Lots of articles&lt;/a&gt; written about the information that came out last week about the upcoming TV offering from Google.  From the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/logitech_revue_google_tv_hands-_impressions_and_analysis"&gt;Google TV set-top box from Logitech&lt;/a&gt; to the &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/07/sonys-google-tv-screen-sizes-and-prices-leak"&gt;TV from Sony that has Google TV built into it&lt;/a&gt;, there looks to be a lot of offerings coming.  Time will tell if these first to market devices are too clunky or too expensive.  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/10/google-tv-launch-hardware-to-be-expensive-clunky.ars"&gt;It may not be worth purchasing right away&lt;/a&gt;.  Rather, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/04/google-tv-quick-tour-shows-off-the-services-inner-workings/"&gt;this may end up being a “wait and see” type device&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/media/news/2010/10/data-portability-finally-comes-to-facebook-plus-friend-groups.ars"&gt;Facebook Rolling Out New Changes&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Facebook rolled out some new changes last week.  Facebook will allow you to download your wall posts, photos, videos, friend lists, events, and all manner of other details wrapped up in a handy zip file so that it can be archived or posted somewhere else.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/09/samsung-galaxy-tab-stars-in-leaked-slide-t-mobile-version-to-co/"&gt;Samsung Galaxy Tab&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Based on the Samsung Galaxy phone, the Samsung Galaxy Tab is predicted to be one of the strongest iPad competitors in the emerging tablet market.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;More tablet news include a &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/07/cherrypal-announces-188-cherrypad-america-android-tablet/"&gt;new cheap tablet&lt;/a&gt;, a&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/07/augen-android-tablet-bonanza-espresso-doppio-dual-boots-ubuntu/"&gt; more expensive full featured tablet/laptop&lt;/a&gt;, and the promise of &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/ballmer_promises_windows_7_slates_holidays"&gt;Windows 7 tablets by the end of the year&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1296882099</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1296882099</guid><pubDate>Mon, 11 Oct 2010 22:09:16 -0700</pubDate><category>news</category></item><item><title>Online Communities </title><description>&lt;a href="http://xkcd.com/802/"&gt;Online Communities &lt;/a&gt;: &lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://xkcd.com/802/"&gt;At XKCD, you can find a map&lt;/a&gt; that he generated representing the volume of social activity (posts, chat, etc) based on data gathered in the first half of this year.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://xkcd.com/802_large/"&gt;&lt;img height="860" width="740" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/xkcd/online_communities_2.png" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://xkcd.com/802_large/"&gt;Clicking on the map&lt;/a&gt; will bring you to a larger version of the map which is easier to read.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;On the left, you can see that spoken language is still the largest community, with the Internet and cell phones being tiny sections of it’s continent.  Within the Internet, e-mail is still king, but it’s followed extremely closely by Facebook which rules the online social community.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;A lot of work went into this image and I’m still finding new items in it.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Now, for an interesting comparison, you can check it against &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://xkcd.com/256/"&gt;the map he created back in 2007&lt;/a&gt; with data that was available then.  It’s interesting to see how, not so long ago, MySpace was the social network of choice.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/online_communities.png"&gt;&lt;img height="699" width="740" src="http://2bluesolutions.ca/images/tumblr/xkcd/online_communities_small.png" align="middle"/&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1256122638</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1256122638</guid><pubDate>Wed, 06 Oct 2010 08:36:09 -0700</pubDate><category>comic</category></item><item><title>Last Week’s News - Week of Sept.26, 2010</title><description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/01/shocker-samsung-licenses-windows-phone-7/"&gt;Windows 7 Mobile Phones &lt;/a&gt;-&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/01/atandt-launching-windows-phone-7-handsets-on-november-8-unveiling/"&gt; Launching on AT&amp;amp;T on November 8th.&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;
&lt;object width="640" height="385"&gt;
&lt;param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/5q-HtdW03Zs&amp;amp;hl=en_US&amp;amp;fs=1"&gt;&lt;param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"&gt;&lt;param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"&gt;&lt;embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/5q-HtdW03Zs&amp;amp;hl=en_US&amp;amp;fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="640" height="385"&gt;&lt;/embed&gt;&lt;/object&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;I’m in the market for a new phone and the Windows 7 phone couldn’t have come at a better time.  More info &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5652971/att-offering-windows-phone-7-devices-nov-8th"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/att_launch_windows_phone_7_devices_november_8"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt;, and &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/09/windows-phone-7-draws-ever-closer-with-ads-launch-dates.ars"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://lifehacker.com/5652628/facebooks-rolling-out-high-resolution-photo-sharing"&gt;Facebook soon to allow high resolution photos&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Over the next few weeks, Facebook will be rolling out support for high-res pictures for free to every user.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/new_gmail_feature_lets_you_turn_conversation_view"&gt;Turn of GMail’s conversation view&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Want GMail to act more like Outlook?&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://lifehacker.com/5652536/google-url-shortener-finally-gets-its-own-web-site"&gt;Google URL Shortener&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/googl_url_shortener_available_all"&gt;Google unleashed a new URL shortener&lt;/a&gt; for helping you &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://googlesocialweb.blogspot.com/2010/09/google-url-shortener-gets-website.html"&gt;share links quickly and easily&lt;/a&gt; with others and through applications such as Twitter.  Just go to &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://goog.le"&gt;Goog.le&lt;/a&gt; and enter the link you want shortened.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://gizmodo.com/5652966/the-new-google-chrome-beta-has-google-instant-baked-in-and-tab-expose"&gt;Google Chrome Update&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/google_adds_instant_search_webgl_support_chrome"&gt;The latest version of the Chrome browser&lt;/a&gt; has Google Instant search baked in for Windows users, and in the Mac version, an Expose-like tab management feature.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://lifehacker.com/5650739/rainmaker-automatically-updates-your-google-contacts-with-data-from-social-networks"&gt;Keep your contacts synced between all your social networks and Google Contacts&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Rainmaker syncs contact data from Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn so you don&amp;rsquo;t have to manually update your Google contacts or even go and look up the contact information yourself.  Find out more information here:  &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://rainmaker.cc/"&gt;http://rainmaker.cc/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Cut the cord or not?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100924/04371011151/verizon-ceo-actually-recognizes-that-people-want-to-cut-the-cord.shtml"&gt;Verizon CEO acknowledges that we want to “cut the cord”&lt;/a&gt; and move away from cable tv subscriptions, but it’s &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2010/09/sports-are-what-keep-people-from-cutting-the-cord.ars%20"&gt;hard when we still need it for many live sporting events&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.techdirt.com/blog/wireless/articles/20100929/00202911209/new-study-shows-texting-bans-may-make-roads-even-more-dangerous.shtml"&gt;Texting bans actually leading to more accidents?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Banning textings seems to be having a similar effect that Prohibition had on alcohol.  As more States and Provinces seek to ban texting, people who want to text are still doing it but in an even more unsafe manner.  Hiding their phones in their laps while they text or on the seat next to them is worse, if you can imagine, then texting with your phone on your steering wheel.  &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/news/2010/09/rim-unveils-playbook-tablet-with-dual-core-cpu-1080p-support.ars"&gt;RIM finally decides on a name for their tablet and its specifications&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/28/blackberry-playbook-vs-ipad-vs-galaxy-tab-vs-streak-the-tale/"&gt;In a sea of tablets&lt;/a&gt;, &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/27/rim-introduces-playbook-the-blackberry-tablet/"&gt;RIM is entering the fray&lt;/a&gt; with a focused effort which could end up differentiating itself enough to &lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/27/blackberry-playbook-first-eyes-on/"&gt;stand above the rest&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a target="_blank" href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/29/apple-tv-review-2010/"&gt;Quick Little Apple TV review&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Usually one is supposed wait until the second generation of an Apple device to purchase it and the Apple TV generation 2 is a perfect example.  It’s not quite the best yet, but for $99 US, it’s entered the “impulse purchase” category.&lt;strong&gt;&lt;br/&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</description><link>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1243231136</link><guid>http://2bluesolutions.tumblr.com/post/1243231136</guid><pubDate>Mon, 04 Oct 2010 10:10:26 -0700</pubDate><category>news</category></item></channel></rss>