Brian Hall

LastPass Wallet

2012-05-17T12:56:00.000-05:00

If you were to lose your wallet, would you know your credit card numbers, and the customer service numbers to call in case you had to cancel your cards? What about other important information in your wallet? LastPass Wallet is a cryptographically secure solution on iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad for saving and syncing important data should you become separated from your wallet. I've long been a fan of the multi-platform password management tool, LastPass. According to the LastPass,"Wallet stores the data you carry in your physical wallet on your iOS device, so you can securely backup your most valuable personal information to LastPass."

Wallet adds the ability to attach text, pictures, and audio recordings (secure voice recording available within the app--great for creating a quick memo), to your notes. All data will be synced with LastPass in your browser and mobile apps, but attachments are currently only available in Wallet. A quick test drive of the app shows that it is beautifully polished, snappy, and a delight to use.

As with anything LastPass does, security is never an afterthought. "Wallet offers security settings to restrict access to stored data. 'Logout on close' ensures that the active session is killed when the app is closed, while a pin code prompt can be used to re-authenticate when multitasking between Wallet and other apps." An Android version of LastPass Wallet is reportedly in the works as well. (Source: LastPass)

Disinfecting a Windows machine

2012-04-10T08:17:00.000-05:00

I recently received a spam email from a family member with an unfamiliar, suspicious link. This prompted me to reach out to try to help clean up their computer. I recommended changing the email password from a clean, uninfected machine, but after a few attempts at that, the spam email continued. My next conclusion was that there must still be some malware on the machine. Following are some steps that I provided which may be useful to others who are trying to disinfect a Windows computer from a virus, rootkit, or other malware:

Go to Add/Remove programs and uninstall any "extraneous debris," or any software that you simply don't need. Additional software only increases the attack vector for hackers seeking to leverage known vulnerabilities in software.
Download the Windows Defender Offline tool and create a bootable CD or USB drive from a clean, uninfected computer. You will boot to this tool on the infected machine, which will run before Windows ever loads. What happens is that the malware is so sophisticated that it is able to hide itself from the antivirus scanners using what are called rootkits. The Windows Defender Offline tool should overcome that by booting first and rooting out the problem.
Consider running an additional offline scan using the Kaspersky Rescue Disk. Remember to create a bootable USB or CD from an uninfected computer. Follow the instructions to run an offline scan (meaning that you boot to the rescue disk before Windows loads).
If the above two steps are able to uncover any malware and clean it, then boot the machine as you would normally, and launch the Secunia Personal Software Inspector (online). This requires Java, which I normally recommend uninstalling unless you specifically need it for something, since many of the exploits in recent weeks have leveraged an un-patched flaw in the Java run-time environment. This will scan your computer for any vulnerable or outdated software. Apply the updates as recommended, and ensure that Windows Update is configured to automatically download and install any new updates from Microsoft. You should even launch Windows Update to make sure that there aren't any pending security patches.
If steps 2 and 3 fail to find any malware, consider backing up all of your important files to an external USB drive, then reformatting the computer with your system restore disk (Windows install disk). Sometimes, rather than spend hours and days trying to weed out malware, it is better to start with a clean slate. When you re-install Windows, make sure to load Microsoft Security Essentials before doing anything else.
Going forward, make sure to not click on any unfamiliar links in email or open any email attachments, unless it is something you are expecting--even then, open with extreme caution. Be careful about what software you install--is it something you really need, or are you just installing it for fun? Make sure to run files you download through VirusTotal, which scans the file using a large database of antivirus programs.

Make your mouse scroll wheel work everywhere in Windows without clicking

2012-04-05T15:25:00.000-05:00

If you've used OS X or a UNIX/Linux-based operating system for any amount of time, you get used to being able to hover your mouse cursor over any window or scrolling panel area without having to click on it first. Unfortunately, Windows requires you to click on an area to give it "focus" before the mouse scroll wheel will work. For example, take a simple Windows "Open" dialog box:

It can become annoying having to click on windows or other "scrollable" areas within windows. Sometimes, you end up accidentally clicking on a file or some other object just so that you can use your mouse scroll wheel.

I stumbled across a free, highly useful program called WizMouse that works in 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 2000, XP, Vista, and 7 that solves this very problem. Until Microsoft builds a simple feature into Windows to enable mouse scrolling on mouse hover, give WizMouse a try.

Selling software exploits to government for a handsome profit

2012-03-26T14:51:00.000-05:00

A hacker can typically profit from newly discovered software exploits in three ways: 1) receive a small reward by responsibly disclosing the vulnerability to the software vendor, 2) sell the exploit through an underground market, or 3) sell the exploit to a government agency. Hackers often go after vendor payouts or industry notoriety as rewards for discovering vulnerabilities in software and systems. These incentives are often part of a contest where many hackers try to be the first to find a weakness in a program or other system. Underground markets for so-called "zero-day" exploits have existed for a while, and in the past have involved organized crime groups. But, recently we've seen an increasing trend towards selling the exploits to government agencies for even bigger profits. A fascinating Forbes article mentions that a US government contractor recently purchased an exploit for iOS for $250,000. According to the Zero Day Blog:

Hackers today are selling zero-day exploits to government agencies via middlemen who charge a commission for setting up the deal. The organizations don’t tell the public about the code they pay for because they use it to gain access to their target’s devices. Selling to them is considered safer than striking deals with the mafia or other shady organisations because in those cases talks can go south at any time.

With these kinds of profits, why waste time with small payouts and contests? I can't imagine there is much incentive anymore for security research or hacker groups to report vulnerabilities responsibly to vendors. This is an interesting trend that will be exciting to watch as the market for exploits continues to grow rapidly.

Improv Everywhere - Spinning Beach Ball of Death

2012-03-09T21:38:00.001-06:00

This is great! At first, I felt so sorry for the dude, but then realized what was happening. Brilliant!

Netflix thinks B-horror movie is "just for kids"

2012-03-05T10:51:00.000-06:00

This morning my 2 year old was happily watching Yo Gabba Gabba on Netflix using the "Just for Kids" interface on the Wii. The video stream had been periodically pausing and buffering. I went downstairs to change the laundry over (I was literally away for about 3-4 minutes) and when I came back upstairs, my son had grabbed the Wii Remote, and was clicking around, likely trying to fix the paused video stream (he's a good troubleshooter). Surprisingly, he was no longer watching Yo Gabba Gabba, but instead a 1960's B-Horror movie called Doctor Blood's Coffin was in the process of loading up. Luckily, I got there in time and changed it back. I was surprised that Netflix would even make horror movies available via the "Just for Kids" interface on the Wii. What likely happened is that he somehow got into the non-kid-friendly Netflix interface and just randomly clicked on a title. "I can't leave you kids alone for 3 minutes!"

Temporal Distortion: Amazingly beautiful time lapse video

2012-02-16T09:42:00.002-06:00

Temporal Distortion from Randy Halverson on Vimeo.

Malicious poisoned redirects in Google search results

2012-02-15T08:56:00.000-06:00

This morning I did a Google search for "free psd web button". I clicked on the third result which links to http://www.sharkwebstyle.com/2011/07/80-prefect-free-photoshop-web-buttons-psd/.

However, upon clicking on this third result, I was automatically taken to Russian site http://uaroyalys.ru/industry/index.php, which is clearly not the correct location, and is apparently an attempt to redirect me to some sort of malicious site (I don't recommend you try to visit this site). Thankfully, I had ScriptNo for Chrome and NoScript for Firefox so, the site didn't do anything, and thankfully it wasn't able to reach its dirty tentacles into my machine (I hope).

I originally discovered the malicious redirect on a Windows machine, and I immediately assumed that the machine must somehow be infected. I switched over to a Mac machine and discovered the same malady, suggesting that the malicious redirect originates on the server side and not on my side.

What's unclear is if this is the fault of the target (SharkWebstyle perhaps infected with a XSS attack), or poisoned Google search results. What's frustrating is that most unsuspecting users are doing these types of web searches all the time and clicking on tons of links. Most are using Internet Explorer or another browser with scripting (JavaScript) fully enabled. Since most infections are launched via some sort of scripting on web sites, it is recommended to use an add-on (such as ScriptNo for Chrome or NoScript for Firefox) that only allows scripting in your web browser for sites that you explicitly allow. It makes me sick to my stomach to think of a friend or family member getting infected with some type of malware served up by Google's own search results. Be safe, folks!

UPDATE (2/15/12): It appears that this was most likely the result of a compromised instance of WordPress (most likely through a maliciously modified .htaccess file). Older versions of WordPress can be susceptible to attacks. If you self-host your WordPress site, you need to make sure you update to the latest version, change passwords for your web host account, FTP, and MySQL database. Check this link if you think you might be compromised. You can also check your site to see if it is infected with any known malicious code at Sucuri SiteCheck.

UPDATE (3/3/12): I received a note from the site administrators at Sharkwebstyle that said, "We encountered a problem with a vulnerability in timthumb script used in our WordPress theme, and that vulnerability can change the .htaccess file content, so that's why there was a redirection to other website." Here are some technical details about the Timthumb Wordpress vulnerability and hack.

Swarm of Nano Quadrotors! Hide!

2012-02-06T09:12:00.002-06:00

Mozilla Releases Firefox 10, Still Bloated

2012-02-01T09:47:00.003-06:00

The version numbers for Firefox continue to climb with version 10 released by Mozilla this week. Unfortunately, the notorious memory leak issues don't seem to be getting any better. I've been using Firefox on Mac OS X (10.6.8) for a little over 2 hours this morning, and I have noticed horrible performance with simple operations such as switching tabs, clicking on check boxes in web pages taking several seconds to complete. As you can see from the screen capture above, it's consuming well over 1.12 GB RAM and 57.9% CPU utilization.

OnLive puts Windows 7 on your iPad

2012-01-10T12:11:00.000-06:00

OnLive announced a new cloud service this week called OnLive Desktop which gives you access to a Windows 7 machine running on the cloud with Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel. The free "as-available" version of OnLive Desktop provides you with 2GB of storage, while the $9/month Pro plan offers 50GB of storage and high priority access. The company states that OnLive Desktop will soon be available for Android, iPhone, PC (oh, the irony), and Mac.

Presumably the OnLive Desktop service will provide fast, maintenance-free access to a Windows PC and its applications from your iPad without having to keep the remote machine updated with security patches and anti-virus software. While such remote desktop applications have been available on the iOS and Android devices for years, this move should come as no surprise. The decision to sell its extra capacity makes sense for OnLive, whose business model has traditionally been selling online access to video games running on its servers.

It will be interesting to see how the market reacts to this new service. The awkwardness of using Windows 7 with the iPad's touch interface could might be enough to deter large-scale adoption. While there are still a lot of unanswered questions, OnLive Desktop is sure to be the source of geeky experiments, fun hacks, and technical debates in the coming weeks.

UPDATE (4/12/12): Due to licensing concerns, Microsoft and OnLive have reached a deal in which the backend of OnLive Desktop now runs Windows Server 2008 instead of Windows 7. This is an unfortunate setback for OnLive Desktop, which utilized some of the integrated touch interface components of Windows 7. While the service is still up and running, the obvious benefits of a touch integrated OS are painfully missing. According to James Kendrick, "While OnLive Desktop still looks the same, the absence of Windows 7 under the hood is sorely missed. Gone is the great touch optimization that made OnLive Desktop a joy to use in my original review. That was provided by Windows 7 and thus no longer there."

Adblock Plus Now Allows "Non-Intrusive" Ads by Default

2011-12-15T11:00:00.000-06:00

Firefox extension Adblock Plus has long been useful for removing annoying ads from web sites (including video pre-roll ads). Recently, the developer made an interesting change that allows "non-intrusive" advertisements by default. The following explains the change and is taken directly from the Adblock Plus site:

"Starting with Adblock Plus 2.0 you can allow some of the advertising that is considered not annoying. By doing this you support websites that rely on advertising but choose to do it in a non-intrusive way. And you give these websites an advantage over their competition which encourages other websites to use non-intrusive advertising as well. In the long term the web will become a better place for everybody, not only Adblock Plus users. Without this feature we run the danger that increasing Adblock Plus usage will make small websites unsustainable."

However noble their mission, most Adblock Plus users would probably prefer to continue to block all ads. To change the behavior to revert back to blocking all ads, click the Adblock Plus icon in Firefox and select Filter preferences...

Then, un-check the option "Allow non-intrusive advertising"

What happens when your hard drive dies on your Mac

2011-11-29T23:00:00.000-06:00

As if you needed another reason to backup your important data such as years of family photos, videos, digital works of art, or other irreplaceable files, this will serve as another reminder. I visited the Genius Bar at my local Apple Store this evening and while waiting I witnessed the desperation of a woman whose hard drive failed on her MacBook Pro. The young man at the Genius Bar said they would replace the hard drive for $132, but they had to take the old hard drive, and they would not do any data recovery on it. The woman was in shock and lamented the fact that if she were to let the Apple Store replace her hard drive, she would lose all her files and Apple would not give her the opportunity to try to recover the data on the failed drive.

It is apparently Apple's policy to not attempt any data recovery on any failed drives, likely due to liability and privacy concerns. Feeling bad for the woman, and knowing that I might be able to salvage her data using some data recovery tools, I offered to try to recover her files myself (I'm a consumer IT moonlighter in addition to my day job working in IT for a large corporation). I stated that I would not charge her if I was unable to retrieve any data from her failed hard drive. Due to logistics with her travel, she needed to get her MacBook Pro running immediately and so she chose to have Apple replace the hard drive and lost all data from her old hard drive.

Whether you choose Backblaze, Carbonite, CrashPlan, Dropbox, Live Mesh, Mozy, SpiderOak, SugarSync (my personal favorite), Wuala, or one of the hundreds of other online backup/sync services out there, having a backup will save you in cases such as this where your data is damaged, irretrievable, or stolen. Be safe!

The beginning of the end for Firefox

2011-11-16T15:47:00.001-06:00

The web browser is probably one of the most important applications we run on our computers today. For many, it's the one application that remains open during an entire work day and is the means by which we connect, share, troubleshoot, learn, create, entertain and socialize. Think about what it would be like to go through your day without launching your web browser at all. Given that the web browser is such an important component of modern computing, it goes without saying that the stability and performance of a web browser is critical to its success and utility. In the last year or so, the performance and stability of the popular Firefox web browser has started to crumble.

Firefox has a memory leak problem (and has for some time starting around version 4, possibly even version 3). Mozilla's support site even states, "Firefox sometimes uses more memory (RAM) than it should. This can make Firefox slower, and in extreme cases, it can even make Firefox crash." The article then goes on to provide suggestions on how you (yes, YOU) can help Firefox use less memory. It's just sad that the web browser that upset Internet Explorer's dominance back in the early 2000s, and that was once the browser king in techie circles has started to show its age. Now on version 8, Firefox is performing extremely slow and is consuming too much memory for users that run the browser for an extended period of time with multiple tabs open.

For example, I'm running Firefox 8 on Mac OS X 10.6.8 and have the following app tabs pinned: Gmail, Hotmail, Google+, Twitter, and Google Reader (with additional tabs occasionally opened as needed). I'm using the following Firefox add-ons: Ad-Block Plus, Advertising Cookie Opt-Out (Google), Firebug, LastPass, NoScript, RSS Icon (necessitated by Mozilla removing the RSS icon from Firefox), Stylish, User Agent Switcher, Web Developer, and Xmarks. I've had Firefox running since this morning at around 7:30 am and it is now about 4:15 pm. Firefox is currently consuming 1.31GB of memory and spiking the CPU utilization around 15-26% with switching between tabs and user input becoming extremely sluggish:

I tried switching to Google's Chrome browser for a few weeks and noticed better performance, but I found myself missing the add-ons (notably NoScript and Ad-Block Plus, which don't have equivalent-performing Chrome counterparts) that I have become dependent upon over the years. There are also certain features of Firefox that I prefer over Chrome. Such as when a pinned app tab lights up whenever there's an update, a new email, tweet, etc. Or, the ability to customize the user interface using Stylish to reduce the excessive space between bookmarks on the bookmarks toolbar.

Firefox has been a web browser favorite of geeks and power users in the past due to its rich ecosystem of add-ons and its ability to be highly customized. It has also not suffered from as many security exploits as Internet Explorer over the years. Third party developers have even developed Firefox add-ons to help fix the memory leak issue, which is particularly telling of the loyalty of the Firefox community. Between March 22, 2011 and Nov 8, 2011 Firefox went from version 4 to version 8. Firefox 9 is planned for Dec 20, 2011 with regular release cycles planned up through March 13, 2012 when Firefox 12 will be released. Regardless of the rapid release cycles and promised fixes to the browser, Firefox continues to be plagued with serious performance and stability issues. Let's hope Mozilla is able to resolve these issues soon, otherwise, there's going to be a major migration to Chrome and other more stable browsers. Thoughts?

How wireless carriers rip you off when you port your number

2011-11-15T20:27:00.001-06:00

We recently ported our numbers from T-Mobile to Sprint, and then to AT&T all within a couple of weeks. We had a bad experience with Sprint, and bailed to AT&T after one week. We initially ported our number from T-Mobile on 10/14/11, but T-Mobile still charged for services through the remainder of our billing cycle which went to 11/06/11. Apparently, it is a common practice for wireless carriers to continue to charge you for services that you are not using when you port your number (because porting your number effectively cancels your service with a wireless carrier). Even though you cancel your service (we were on a month-to-month contract with T-Mobile and otherwise paid no early termination fees), the last bill is not prorated. T-Mobile does it, Sprint does it, Verizon does it, AT&T does it (although I could not specifically find it in their lengthy wireless customer agreement), and I'm sure every other wireless carrier does as well.

I was unaware of and annoyed by this sneaky little arrangement which is definitely spelled out in the T-Mobile terms and conditions. No one wants to pay two full cell phone bills in one month, even though you are effectively only using one carrier at a time. I'm not aware of too many other services where canceling your service doesn't result in a prorated final bill (maybe gym memberships?). How is the wireless industry able to do this? Indeed, the world still asks how they are able to keep charging so much for the quaint, old service we call text messaging when it only consumes 160 bytes of data. I suppose it's their way of recouping the costs of number porting. When I spoke to a T-Mobile representative about it, I got reprimanded that I should have read the terms and conditions more carefully.

UPDATE 11/16/11: Today I received our final bill from Sprint for the 7 days we were with them: $230. Ouch! Yes, $230 for 7 days of miserable Sprint service, during which time we dropped 99% of all voice calls and got only 1 bar of signal at my house and averaged data speeds of about 500kbps. The bill was originally $245, but they erroneously began charging me for Sprint service from October 11, even though our iPhone 4S phones didn't show up at our house and get activated until October 14. There is something morally wrong with the wireless industry forcing consumers into such anti-competitive agreements that discourage subscribers from switching mobile carriers, and continuing to charge for service when no service is actually being used by the consumer.

"Where are we going?" Another amazingly beautiful time-lapse photography video

2011-11-03T09:59:00.000-05:00

Amazon Prime customers can now checkout books from the "Lending Library" on Kindle devices

2011-11-03T09:27:00.000-05:00

You can now checkout books on your Kindle device from Amazon's "Lending Library" if you are a subscriber to Amazon Prime ($79/year). There are no due dates, but hold on there, bookworm! Only one book at a time, and it is only available on Kindle devices, not on Kindle apps. The Kindle app is available on virtually all mobile platforms and computer operating systems, and is often preferred over more limited platforms such as Apple's iBooks, which is limited to iOS devices. This might have been enough for me to keep my Amazon Prime subscription for another year, if the Lending Library were available on all Kindle apps! (Sources: Amazon, The Verge)

My Nerdy Apple Fanboy Halloween Costume

2011-11-01T08:23:00.000-05:00

iOS 5 Draining iPhone 4/4S Battery

2011-10-18T09:36:00.000-05:00

A number of iPhone users are reporting that iOS 5 appears to be draining the iPhone battery way faster than it should (dropping 12% every 30 minutes in some cases), and that the phone is hot to the touch. Indeed my wife and I have experienced extremely short battery life on our iPhone 4S on Sprint. I have also noticed that the iPhone 4S seems to run a little hot. One user suggested that resetting the network settings appears to have helped some (General > Reset > Reset Network Settings). Too bad that fix won't do anything to fix the poor quality of Sprint's network. ZING!

UPDATE #1 (10/29/11): One possible explanation for poor battery life in the iPhone 4S is a bug in a location-based setting that detects your time zone based on your location. The bug causes the iPhone 4S to continually poll cell phone towers to update your location and calculate your time zone. The bug "causes the Setting Time Zone function to keep the location tracking circuitry running constantly, draining battery power considerably." This would also explain why the iPhone 4S feels warmer than it should. It might be worth it to try disabling this setting temporarily, at least until an official fix is available from Apple.

UPDATE #2 (11/3/11): Apple formally acknowledged the iPhone 4S/iOS 5 battery issues and promised a fix within a couple of weeks.

It's Official: Sprint's network stinks

2011-10-17T21:11:00.000-05:00

Article first published as It's Official: Sprint's Network Stinks on Technorati.

Last Friday, my wife and I received our new iPhone 4S phones after pre-ordering them on Sprint.com. We chose Sprint because it was the cheapest plan and offered unlimited data with the iPhone. After spending 4 days with the iPhone 4S on Sprint, we are canceling and switching to AT&T. Sprint's 3G data network is terribly slow when compared to AT&T, we only get 1 signal bar at home, and we've dropped almost all calls today from our home.

This evening, we tested an iPhone 4S side-by-side on AT&T and Sprint, and it was very telling (see this speed test comparison for further validation). Sprint averaged about 1 Mbps or less on download while AT&T averaged around 3 Mbps. I went to the Sprint store to return my phone, and while waiting, I ran a speed test (with a full 5 signal bars) and sadly got the following dismal results (543ms ping, 0.14 Mbps download, 0.01 Mbps upload):
Read more »

Netflix: Just kidding, no Qwikster

2011-10-10T08:09:00.003-05:00

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings announced in a company blog post that it will be keeping DVDs under the Netflix.com site and the company will continue to offer both streaming video and physical DVDs under one company. This change comes after Netflix announced last month that Netflix would no longer be offering DVDs by mail, but instead would spin off the DVD portion of its service to a new company with a separate website called Qwikster. Due to customer feedback, Netflix has reversed this decision. "This means no change: one website, one account, one password… in other words, no Qwikster," Hastings said. Long live the red Netflix DVD envelopes!

Apple announces the iPhone 4S

2011-10-04T13:59:00.000-05:00

Tim Cook, Phil Shiller, and Scott Forstall took the stage in Cupertino, CA today and announced the iPhone 4S. It didn't have the same excitement as events from the days of Steve Jobs (no "one more thing"), but some of the things they showed off were pretty impressive.

Specs

Image courtesy of Engadget

While not a major form factor redesign, the iPhone 4S features significant internal upgrades including: A5 dual-core processor, a dual-core graphics processor (up to 7x faster), an upgraded 8MP camera (f2.4 lens), the ability to shoot full 1080p HD video with image stabilization, and iOS 5 with Apple's "Siri" voice-recognition intelligent assistant (iPhone 4S only). In terms of battery life, Phil Schiller stated that the iPhone 4S will have up to 8 hours talk time (up from 7 hours with iPhone 4). The antenna has also been re-engineered to utilize two separate antennae (one for sending and one for receiving, which purportedly allow for 4G-like speeds), and now includes the ability to operate on both GSM and CDMA cellular networks (a true world phone).

Pricing and Availability
The iPhone 4S will go on sale October 14 (pre orders Oct 7) in US, Canada, Australia, UK, France, Germany and Japan. iPhone 4S pricing: 16GB ($199), 32GB ($299), 64GB ($399). The iPhone 4S will be available on AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon. iPhone 4 will cost $99 and the iPhone 3GS 8GB will be free with a 2-year contract.

iOS5
iOS5 received quite a bit of coverage this June at WWDC, and Apple today reminded us of many of its features. Aside from Siri, which promises to let you do everything on your phone with voice commands, one feature in particular that I think is super cool is the location-based reminders. For example, you could set a reminder to alert you when you leave work, etc. Also new in iOS 5 is a "Find My Friends" feature that will allow you to see the location of friends who have opted to share their location (even if it is only temporarily, such as at a sporting event or concert). iOS 5 will be released October 12 and will only work with iPhone 3GS or newer iPhones and iPod touch versions 3 or newer (Siri will only work with iPhone 4S).

The iPhone 4S doesn't appear to be an earth-shattering redesign promising to upset the whole mobile industry, as anticipated by some; however, with a significant internal hardware upgrade, and tons of new features in iOS 5, Apple has further strengthened its position in the market. For someone like me who is using a jailbroken iPhone 3G on T-Mobile, I am due for an upgrade, and the iPhone 4S seems like a perfect opportunity to do so. Now, AT&T, Verizon, or Sprint? (Sources: Engadget, Mashable, gdgt)

Netflix spins off DVD by mail service to new company Qwikster

2011-09-19T10:23:00.001-05:00

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings announced in a blog post and YouTube video that the company will spin off its DVD by mail service to a new company called Qwikster. The move will allow Netflix to better concentrate on its streaming video service. Customers wishing to rent DVDs by mail will access their accounts at Qwikster.com, which will be entirely separate from their Netflix account (billing will also be separate). One interesting change is that Qwikster will also feature video game rentals for Wii, PS3, and XBOX 360.

Only time will tell if this will be a successful move for Netflix. It's clear that Hastings wishes to focus on streaming content, but with a limited selection of movies in its Watch Instantly library, and the severing of the DVD by mail service, it's a critical time for Netflix. The company clearly needs some big content deals and a more compelling offering if it wants to retain customers.

Windows 8 Tablet Preview

2011-09-13T14:36:00.000-05:00

Microsoft gave a preview of Windows 8 at its BUILD event in Anaheim, CA today. In a radical shift from previous versions of Windows, Windows 8 is built with a special emphasis on a touch interface using a tablet as the primary device, although the OS runs on regular desktop and notebook computers also.

This is still an early preview release and there are still no doubt numerous kinks to work out, most notably visible at 5:25 of the video below. Microsoft gave out Samsung tablets with Windows 8 pre-loaded to about 5,000 BUILD attendees. Some are reporting fan noise and excessive heat coming from the Samsung tablets, but this may just be because of extra debugging/development code running in this pre-beta version of Windows 8.

After watching some hands-on demo videos, my impression is that the interface is not as intuitive as it could be, and may be frustrating for some users (namely pulling in the "charms" interface on the right side of the tablet). Nevertheless, I applaud Microsoft for striving to innovate, and I look forward to seeing the final product. If you were one of the BUILD attendees who got a Samsung Windows 8 tablet, please share your experiences in the comments below.

Netflix continues nose dive [u]

2011-09-06T20:15:00.001-05:00

The bottom line: Netflix subscribers will now pay more and get less than what they already had before.

Netflix has apparently enforced a rule prohibiting a subscriber from watching more than one stream at a time. This means that if Mom and Dad want to watch a movie, then the kids in the other room have to turn off Phineas and Ferb. Just last week Netflix enforced new pricing on its service, forcing customers to pay extra for physical DVDs (from $9.99 to $15.98/mo. for the Unlimited Streaming + 1 DVD out at-a-time plan). Additional streams can be purchased for $7.99/mo. per stream. To top it off, Netflix and Starz failed to reach a licensing agreement recently, which will reduce the selection of titles in its already scant Watch Instantly library.

Update (9/7/11): According to Engadget, this is an "error" that Netflix is working to fix.