Are you a Windows Phone fan?  Probably not as big of a fan as Gilbert Alexis is!  There really isn’t much we can add to this picture, which we found posted over at Mobility Digest.  The dude shaved a Microsoft emblem into his hair and even posted the linked picture on SkyDrive!  Now that’s dedication to a brand!  Perhaps he got one of those free Nokia Lumia 900 handsets?  Check out the photo posted below.

Windows Phone has been on the market for about a year and a half now and growth has been slower than Microsoft had hoped, but they may have finally turned the corner in 2012.  With RIM’s Blackberry platform steadily losing ground it seems that Windows Phone is becoming the benefactor of that crash.

Microsoft has seen market gains in the U.S., U.K., France, and Italy of around 4 percent and in Germany they have gained 6 percent.  The problem that Windows Phone now faces is that in both the U.S. and Europe Android is also gaining share at Blackberry’s expense.  In fact, RIM now has just a 3 percent market share in the U.S.

While there aren’t figures available to prove it, it seems likely that the Nokia partnership in Windows Phone, and their Lumia line which debuted early this year, is responsible for much of this growth for the Microsoft mobile OS.  The Lumia 900, especially, is popular and getting rave reviews for it’s looks, functionality, and price.

MyMovies is one of the most popular plug-ins for Windows Media Center, but it’s also available for Windows Home Server and there is a Collection Management tool available for Windows Vista and Windows 7.  MyMovies can replace the built-in Media Center Movies app with a much improved interface and a lot of options for customization.

Now the maker, Binnerup, will be requiring current users to upgrade to the latest version of all of the apps in order to be compatible with the latest security changes.  Failure to upgrade (it’s free) will result in users losing access to meta-data from the online service.  In a post to their web site earlier this week Binnerup explains the requirements in some detail.

“Due to security changes in communication with our online service, our users is requested to update their user clients before June 1′st 2012. The software will continue to operate after this date, but will after this date no longer be able to load meta-data from our online service.

Users running My Movies for Windows Media Center or My Movies Collection Management 4.00 or 4.01 for Windows 7 is required to upgrade to version 4.02 or later.

Users running My Movies for Windows Media Center or My Movies Collection Management 3 for Windows Vista is required to upgrade to version 3.25 or later.

Users running My Movies for Windows Home Server 2011 is required to upgrade to version 2.10 or later.

Users running My Movies for Windows Home Server V1 is only required to upgrade if client PC’s are upgraded to a version that requires a later version on their Home Server.

Users running My Movies 2 for Windows Media Center 2005 will for now not be required an update. However, we strongly recommend getting these systems upgraded to Windows 7.

Users running systems installed by a licensed professional My Movies installer will also not be required to update unless they are also signed into a user account, which is optional on these installations.

If you are in any way have problems with upgrading, or is unsure how to do this, please contact support@mymovies.dk where we are able to help you.”

If you haven’t checked out MyMovies then head over to the web site.  It’s one of our most recommended apps, especially for those running an HTPC with Windows Media Center.

SkyDrive, which received a long-anticipated update from Microsoft just a couple of weeks ago, got another new feature today – URL shortening.  Microsoft has positioned their cloud storage service to be a great way to share files like photos and documents.  This can be done via email, which is great for photos since it provides thumbnails of the images, or by sending a direct link to a file.

Sending a link has been popular, as Microsoft claims more than 13 million have been created since the introduction last year.  Popular enough that Microsoft has decided to improve the process by building in a link-shortening service.  These links can not only be emailed, but posted to services like Facebook and Twitter.

• We’ve shortened our regular URLs by 40%. Our previous URLs didn’t even fit inside a Tweet! Oh the shame!
• You can shorten them even further thanks to our new partnership with bitly and the new domain for shortened SkyDrive URLs: http://sdrv.ms
• We’ve added OpenGraph support to our URLs so that when you paste them into places like Facebook, a nice thumbnail preview gets generated

Two of our favorite features are that you can get stats on the links you send out so you can see how much traffic a link gets and you can also get QR Codes for your links.

To get the full details you can read the announcement over at Inside Windows Live blog.

If you have been using the Consumer Preview version of Windows 8 then you have probably discovered that some of the apps are available only in a preview mode.  That will change in a couple of weeks when the Release Preview version of the operating system is released in early June.

Paul Thurrott over at WinSupersite has released some information regarding some of the key apps for Windows 8 – Reader, Photos, Mail, Calendar, People, and Messaging.  The information isn’t so much a leak, but was published by Microsoft themselves on their Windows Store Preview web site (NOTE: it seems to have been take down now).  The mail, calendar, people, and messaging apps are lumped into a single category labeled as “communications”.

One of the key features in the new Photos app will be the close integration with SkyDrive that will bring access to pictures and video stored on other PC’s.  The new Calendar app will allow the ability to turn on or off individual calendars, as well as customize a specific color for each calendar, much the same as it’s Windows Phone counterpart.  The People app’s Live Tile is actually “live” now showing a grid of contact’s display pictures.

For more detailed information head over to Paul’s site.  The next version of Windows 8 is currently scheduled for relase during the first week of June.

Organizing my music collection seems to be a never-ending task.  I have literally worked on it off and on for a couple of years, although I admit it’s much more off than on.  That’s mostly because there just isn’t any easy way to do it, despite trying many different software programs.  Recently I stumbled across another program that I wanted to try out.  This one is called MP3 Rename, but it’s a lot more powerful than the simple name implies.

MP3 Rename is an absolutely free program and it doesn’t come with any little extras like browser toolbars.  It’s also a very small, lightweight program, as evidenced by its 130 KB download size.

The main interface isn’t necessarily simple, but most experienced users shouldn’t have any problem finding their way around.  You can drag and drop files and folders straight to the top pane of the app, or browse your network for the music files you want to fix.

Once you have added your files you will need to figure out how you would like to structure the renaming.  This is where the program gets a bit complicated.  This will come down to the file information you have and what you prefer.  In most cases I prefer to use the ID3 Tag info.  The Rename files tab lets you use ID3 info from the file.  You can also enable Force extension to .mp3 on the renamed file option, and unpack and rename compressed files in music folder.

There are other tabs to choose from that give you many features, some of them very advanced.  I could spend a long time going through them and still not be able to explain everything.  This app is definitely for more advanced users, but those users will reslish the control they can get with it.  Even better, it’s completely free.  MP3 Rename is available for Windows XP, Vista, and 7.  You can download it from Nodesoft.

Today Google announced new updates to the contacts area of Gmail that will make it easier keep track of conversations and give users better Google+ integration.  Google claims a goal of bringing people to the forefront of their services like Gmail and the new features work towards that end.

Now when a user searches for an email address from within Gmail the results will show all of the contact details including profile photos and emails back and forth with that person.  Google has also introduced better circle integration with adds profile pictures when a circle is selected, contact details when you click a profile, and are now supported in search and filters.  Users can find messages from a specific circle by simply searching for “circle:” follwed by the circle name.

For more detailed information on these new features you can head over to the Gmail blog.  The new features do require you to have a Google+ account.

Lenovo, one of the most respected PC makers, recently released a video showing a bit of why their hardware is thought of as being so reliable that they are one of top makers in the corporate world.  Their ThinkCentre desktops and ThinkPad laptops are solid computers all-around and now they have a line of mini desktops labeled the M92, M92p, and M72e.

The new video shows the series of tests that Lenovo puts their hardware through to check it’s reliability.  You’ll see the PC’s dropped, struck, slammed, shaken, filled with dust, heated and frozen, and more.

Hopefully none of this will happen to your PC, but if it does then it seems you you’ll have pretty good odds that the device will survive. You can check out the video below and check out the products at Lenovo.

Today Microsoft released a beta version of Microsoft Face SDK (software development kit) for Windows Phone.  An SDK is used by developers to integrate a particular service into an app they are building.  In this case, it is mostly for photo-oriented apps for Microsoft’s mobile operating system, which incidentally, we are hearing has now passed RIM in the U.S. market.

The new Face SDK beta is version 2.0.1 of the software, although it’s the first we have heard of it, likely because there are no developers around here.

“The Microsoft Face SDK provides many state-of-the-art algorithms to process face images, such as face detection, alignment, tracking, and cartooning. The SDK makes it easy for developers to create interesting, face-related Windows Phone applications.”

You can head over to Microsoft Research to grab the 34.1 MB file and if you use it to develop a Windows Phone app then send us a link so we can check it out and let others know about it.

Recently the X Prize Foundation held a video contest based around exploration of good old planet earth.  While many of us are fascinated with other worlds, and we should be, there is still plenty left to find on Terra Firma.  Not only are our deep oceans almost completely a mystery, but  many of us really should experience other places on earth like deserts, arctic, vast ancient forests, and more.

The winning video was shot in Iceland during the time of the midnight sun.  The videographer, Joe Capra, spent more that two weeks traveling around Iceland  and shooting images of some of the most amazing landscapes anywhere.  For his efforts Capra picked up a $10,000 expedition to anywhere he chooses to go and the world picked up a chance to experience Iceland like never before.  You can check out the video below.  For more, head over to the web site.