Latest Video: Bleeding Edge TV 297: Unibody MacBook Pro RAM upgrade tutorial
We show you how to save yourself a couple hundred dollars by upgrading the RAM in your new unibody MacBook Pro on your own. It's easy, and we show you how to do it yourself in this episode.Play Video
NEC Plasma Screen Knows Too Much
Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Cameras, Corporate News, HDTV, Misc. Tech
Next time you head to Japan, you may just see evidence of Big Brother. NEC has been working on a plasma display screen that houses a camera. It can identify a person’s age and sex for specific ads. You hold up your cellphone to the 50-inch display and a QR code with URL will send you additional product information. Since we think this is a little too much information for us, we would rather do our shopping in the privacy of our own computer. Yeah, like that’s safe.
Read More 
| Times of India
Digg ThisAdvertisement
Do Google Maps Invade Privacy?
Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Editorial, Google, Transportation
A Pennsylvania couple is suing Google for invasion of privacy and mental distress. Aaron and Christine Boring claim that the reason they bought their property in the first place was because it was isolated and now it has been devalued. It seems that Google may have taken a street view shot from their driveway that was marked “Private Road.”
Google spokesperson Larry Yu claims that if the pair wanted the images removed, all they had to do was ask. Attorney Dennis Moskal said that their privacy was already hampered when the vehicle that took the shots drove on their property. It will be interesting to see if this has ramifications down the road. While Google maps increase in imaging technique, Big Brother surely gets closer every day.
Read More | MSNBC
Our Verizon FiOS customer service nightmare: Why won’t they protect my private customer information?
Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Broadband, Editorial, Features, Internet
Seeing as we’ve been experiencing a ton of customer service issues with our Verizon FiOS service for the past 8 months, we figured it was time to put out a warning to you guys. After all, we typically hear that the FiOS Internet service is remarkably amazing, and people have been dumping cable in droves when FiOS becomes available in their area. Hey, there is good reason to. Where we are at, right outside Seattle, our choices are slow DSL, Comcast at 8.0 down and 768k up, or FiOS with a max speed of 30.0 down and 15.0 up (which is the plan we are on.)
Now let’s be clear here, we love the FiOS service. It works fantastically, it has never gone down in the 8 months we’ve been using it, and it’s, well, fast.
So what is the problem? To put it bluntly, Verizon has shown that they don’t care - at all - about protecting their users private, confidential information. Now, why would we make a statement like that? Check it.
A pouch for the paranoid: cellphone blocker
Posted by Sparky Categories: Accessories, Cell Phones, Wireless / WiFi
Brando is now offering the Black Hole phone bag, a pouch for your phone with two pockets. One of the pockets is ‘normal’ and just carries your phone, but the other pocket features a cell blocking material which essentially turns it into a Faraday cage. Slipping your precious mobile into this special pocket blocks all incoming and outgoing cell signals. It seems like a strange solution when simply turning off the phone offers the same functionality without the $12 price tag, but somehow we suspect that that may not be enough for the ultra-paranoid among us.
Read More | Brando Mobile
The Freelancer’s Toolset
Posted by Jenny Lewis Categories: Internet, Misc. Tech
While perusing del.icio.us bookmarks over the holiday, I came across technology and productivity blog Codswallop’s fantastic Freelancer’s Toolset. Yoav Ezer posted this list of 100 tools for freelancers back in May, and barring a few recent developments in the web app universe, it’s exhaustive and incredibly helpful. With apps covering organization, calendaring and to-do’s, money, storage, project management and productivity, writing and design, security and privacy, mobility and contact, marketing and networking, business and legal, contact and feedback, website tools, printing and packaging, revenue building and giving, and more - just about anything that a freelancer can use on the web to further their business can be found on this list.
Read More | Codswallop
Man files $5 billion suit against Google
Citing claims of privacy invasion and terrorisim, a one Dylan Jayne has filed a (handwritten) suit against Google. Mr. Jayne (who gives one of our favorite Firefly characters a bad name) seems a bit off his rocker on this one. He states that not only has Google failed to fight terrorisim, but they also seem to have invaded his privacy as indicated by the following statement: “I, Dylan Stephen Jayne, plaintiff, has [sic] a social security number that when the social security number is turned upside down in its entirety it is a scrambled code that does spell the name Google®.“
Last time I checked Google’s business model didn’t seem to cover stopping terrorism, leaving that job to the ‘professionals’ over at Homeland Security. His claims of privacy invasion also seem a little far fetched - it’s hard to think a fortune 100 company would pick it’s name based soley on the Social Security number of a lone loser from Pennsylvania.
In a way it’s a sad statement about the United States legal system that a case like this will even be heard by a judge. If Mr. Jayne can’t even be bothered to type up his Complaint can he really be considered compentent enough with computers to really even understand what exactly it is that Google does? Check out the Ars Technica article for more information on this weird little case and keep your eyes peeled here late breaking news as it percolates through the Justice system.
Read More | Ars Technica
Cell Phone Numbers Made Public
Posted by Sheila Franklin Categories: Cell Phones, Corporate News, Internet
Intelius, the online people search site for names, addresses, phone numbers, background checks and more is now selling cell phone numbers at $15.00 a pop. The company claims it has 90 million such listings now and will have an additional 70 million in the coming weeks. How many senators and representatives will get constant phone calls before they decide to pass a bill making this illegal? None, we think. Although cell phones are seemingly the last bastion of privacy, it seems more likely that this will go the way of landlines, where you have to pay to be unlisted.
Read More | ABC
Wii Records What You Play, How Long
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Internet, Mods/Hacks, Wii
In a recently released “Iwata Asks!“ interview, Nintendo delves into the decisions that went into making the Wii Message Board and discusses some interesting features. The one that might raise the most eyebrows, though, is Iwata’s discussion of the “Play History”, a feature which automatically collects information on what games you’ve been playing and for how long and, currently, it can’t be erased.
The idea behind this functionality came from Iwata wanting parents to get more involved with their children’s play-time and being able to keep track of how much time they spend on the system.
I thought constantly about what we could do to stop games being regarded with hostility in the family. So I came up with a suggestion, perhaps a rather outlandish one! (laughs) What I thought was that if a parent said that their child was only allowed to play games for one hour a day, how about making it so the console actually turns itself off after an hour? I realise the head of a games company shouldn’t think things like that! (laughs)
Fortunately, the Wii won’t be turning off automatically on you, but your Mom, Dad, or spouse will be able to find out if you’ve been logging serious hours on Princess Peach’s Erotic Journey (hey, Nintendo said they weren’t going to shy away from M-rated titles this generation!)
Read More | Nintendo of Europe
Recent Galleries
Featured Poll
Do you have a surround sound system?
Categories
Recent Users
Statistics
- Total Posts: 7139
- Total Comments: 13497
- Total Trackbacks: 604
- Total Members: 11812
- Members Online: 1
- Guests Online: 272
- Anonymous Members: 0
- Most Visitors Ever: 5394
- Current Members Online: phreekbird
Advertisement
© Gear Live Inc. 2007 – User-posted content, unless source is quoted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Public Domain License. Gear Live graphics, logos, designs, page headers, button icons, videos, articles, blogs, forums, scripts and other service names are the trademarks of Gear Live Inc.