The Microsoft ads

I don’t know if you’ve seen the latest Internet Explorer 8 ad from Microsoft which is so tasteless and disgusting that’s left me speechless after watching it the other day. This however is not the only ad from Microsoft that sucks. The series of online advertisements from Microsoft we’ve see in the past few months were actually so bad that they were an issue of many discussions online. What Microsoft is trying to do is to copy Apple and their “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” series of ads that are very successful and funny to watch. Below are some of the Microsoft ads so you can judge for yourself.

Internet Explorer 8 vomit ad

Microsoft pricing ad

Jerry Seinfeld & Bill Gates ad

Steve Ballmer ad

How to: Improve your blog

Blogging can be a powerful tool not only for sharing bits and pieces of your personal life online but also improving your business. It’s not enough just to start a blog, it’s important to tweak your blog so it looks professional. Here are some guidelines of how to improve your blog.

1. When designing a blog, always use crisp readable fonts and clean design. That helps people navigate your blog quickly and easily. If you use many styles and colours, it makes it very hard for people to find what is relevant and soon they will lose interest in reading it at all.

2. When writing an article, try to pick an interesting topic that you going to cover. Don’t write about irrelevant things or try to write what others have already written. Be original and keep your articles short yet comprehensive.

3. Submit your blog to as many search engines as possible. There are tools that allow you to submit your website or a blog to search engines for free.

4. Interact with other bloggers. Review a blog that you like and exchange blogroll links with others.

5. Do not use lots of ad banners on your blog. Instead, use google ad-sense and textual ads.

It’s not important that you only attract readers to your blog, you want to keep them coming back. Only well designed, well written blog will do that.

Geek Monthly review

Geek Monthly is a relatively new magazine from the U.S that’s targeting geek readership. A few people have recommended the magazine in some reviews online, so I decided to subscribe to it, and try it out. The magazine is about everything a modern geek would be interested in: technology,gadgets,movies, music and anime. Sounds good, doesn’t it? The reality is a bit different though. When the first issue arrived a few days ago, I instantly thought, wow, this mag is thin! But then again, quality is what counts, not quantity. After reading it for a while, I noticed the magazine is not that bad but they could really make the reviews less flat and boring. I’ve also noticed that anime reviews are rather obsolete.

Another thing that deserves the thumbs down, is a section called “Ask Alienwere” where readers can ask various questions that are mostly Windows related!! More then 90 % of geeks I know are either Linux or Mac users, so I ask myself, why promote a Windows platform in an all-geek magazine? I’d like to see some more sections in the magazine that include DIY stuff, linux and mac news and tips, programming, interviews with real life geeks and less movies and TV stuff. I don’t like it when people use geeks and geek stuff for commercial purposes and Geek Monthly is no better when it comes to that. It uses geek lifestyle and packs it in an ordinary average lifestyle magazine that is targeting a general audience rather then being a geek only publication.

Bottom line, the magazine is not bad but it has a long way to go if the people behind it want it to become a respected geek publication.

Rating: 4 / 10

Steelseries QcK mini mouse pad review

Ever since I bought a new iMac in December last year, I’ve been on a constant quest for a decent mouse pad. If you use a Mighty Mouse, you already know how picky it is when it comes to the surface it’s on. I’ve changed many mouse pads and even tried not to use it, but my mouse wouldn’t work well and it would get pretty inaccurate at times with the pointer being jumpy which was pretty much irritating. A friend of mine told me via Twitter that he could get me a decent mouse pad which I received today thanks to @slick. The pad is Steelseries QcK mini and it works great with a Mighty Mouse. Finally, my mouse is accurate as it should be. If you are unhappy with how Mighty Mouse behaves, I recommend you to try any of the Steelseries mouse pads. I hope you’ll be as satisfied as I am.

How to: Use Spotify worldwide

I’ve just got an invite to Spotify music service but the free version is only available in Sweden, Norway,Finland, the UK, France and Spain. If you live outside these countries, you wont be able to create a free account. Here is a little workaround of how to trick the service so you can register from any country.

1. To register your free Spotify account you will need to use Hotspot Shield. It can be found at: http://www.hotspotshield.com.

2. Spotify is (for now) an invite only service, so you’ll need an invite from someone who is already a registered user. When you receive an invite, run hotspot shield and then click on the activation link in the e-mail message. You’ll be taken to Spotify registration page. All you have to do is to register as you normally would and download Spotify client. When you register your account, you don’t need to use hotspot shield anymore.

3. Run Spotify client app, enter your username and password and enjoy the music.

Spotify: http://www.spotify.com/en/

Safari 4 – mini review

As many of you already know, Apple has released a new version of Safari web browser 4.0 beta. The new version includes some new features, improved stability and it’s notably faster. The first new feature you’ll notice when you run Safari is “Top Sites” window that pops up each time you start it or open a new tab (unless you turn it off in the preferences). Top Sites collects information about websites that you regularly visiting and makes a list of your favourite sites that can later be instantly accessed via Top Sites. If you are an iTunes user, you are already familiar with Cover Flow feature. Now, Cover Flow is implemented in Safari and allows you to visually browse through site previews and it takes a single click to open a site you want to visit. Safari includes bunch of new features like full history search, developer tools and Nitro Engine that enables Safari to (according to Apple) be the fastest browser on the market, 30 times faster then IE 7 and more then 3 times faster then Firefox. Full list of the new features you can find at the end of the post.

Things I like about Safari 4

What I like the most about Safari 4 is certainly it’s blazing speed. Browsing is much faster and thus more comfortable then in the previous version. Cover Flow although it’s already seen in iTunes, is great addition to Safari and it makes surfing easier. Phishing and malware protection is working well as far as I was able to see and it makes Safari much safer against malicious attacks. Page zooming is another neat feature that comes in handy. Just to mention that a Windows version of safari now has full Windows look and feel.

Things I don’t like about Safari 4

When you run safari for the first time, the first thing you’ll notice is that the tabs are now on top of the window. I really did not like this and it looked really awkward to me. Luckily, one can have the old tabbed style back easily. Actually some people say that it’s not that easy for the users who are not really familiar with unix and the terminal. What you have to do is to open Terminal app and type:

defaults write com.apple.Safari DebugSafari4TabBarIsOnTop -bool NO

This will enable old style tabs, so if you are like me and prefer the tabs the old way, before you start browsing, do this first. Just remember that Safari has to be closed while you are executing this command from the Terminal. It would be much easier if Apple had made it easier by adding the option to enable / disable the new tabbing system say under the develop menu. Another thing that I did not like is that the refresh button is now placed next to the address bar and it is very hard to get used to it. Also, I still haven’t figured out how to delete recent searches.

To conclude, Safari is an excellent browser which works as advertised, has many advanced feature and it’s very intuitive. If you never used Safari before, I strongly recommend you to download and give it a try.

Safari new features:

- Top sites
- Cover Flow
- Full history search
- Nitro engine
- Windows full look and feel
- Developer tools
- Full page zoom
- Smart address field
- Smart search field
- Phishing and malware protection

Download link: http://www.apple.com/safari/download/

Nabaztag is alive

I don’t know if you remember my last article about Nabaztag the wi-fi bunny. The article became popular as I wasn’t the only one having “Nabaztag syndrome”. The little guy was misbehaving and it didn’t work properly most of the time which was very annoying. After months of sitting on my desk being offline, I’ve decided to give my bunny a second chance.

I plugged it and tried to configure it to go online. I connected to Nabaztag and went to http://192.168.0.1 configuration page and activated it. I was waiting and waiting, but it just couldn’t get online. Three green LEDs on its tummy were flashing and the nose were flashing orange. That means that the bunny connects to wi-fi but can’t establish connection to Violet servers. When I finally lost my patience, I dropped an e-mail to Violet’s technical support. They suggested that I try changing violet platform url to 62.210.186.165/vl under advanced settings on the configuration page (my stupid self didn’t look there, nor did I know what URL to enter). It didn’t work at first, but after a couple of times it did. Finally Clueless came to life!

I was so happy to see my bunny being online again. I’ve also noticed that Violet has improved it’s website for Nabaztag and other objects. The new website has cleaner design and it’s easier to navigate. Violet has finally introduced RFID tags (z:tamps) as well as some new gadgets “Mirror” and “Nabaztag nano. I didn’t try them so I can’t tell anything more about them except it looks good in the demo video. More about Violet’s new products at: http://www.violet.net

Chat Alternatives

Skype and Yahoo Messenger are the most popular A/V chatting software on the market. I love using both, but I’m really sick and tired of sexy bots bombarding users, it’s so annoying. I’ve decided to look for alternatives and here is what I’ve found.

Gizmo5

If you want to stay in touch with a small group of friends and want to avoid bots but at the same time you want good sound quality, Gizmo5 is the right choice. Gizmo5 is a very decent VoIP software with free PC2PC calls. It’s user interface is similar to Skype and very intuitive with large icons. Unlike Skype, Gizmo does not have video support so if you really can’t live without having video in your chat, better consider some other software. Sound quality is good and no additional settings are required. Gizmo also supports conference calls and free numbers can be called without having to use a voucher for external calls. Call rates towards landlines and mobile networks are slightly cheaper then Skype. If you need fast and reliable VoIP software, Gizmo is well worth a look.

OoVoo

OoVoo is advertised as a video conferencing software. It allows video conferencing with up to six people. OoVoo allows A/V calls and supports conferencing from web interface. Special features include video effects, video call recording and video messages. Web cam image quality is decent. I needed more light for webcam otherwise the picture is quite bad. Make sure the room has enough light. I had to play with light and audio settings to ensure decent A/V quality. The sound is decent but it’s breaking up from time to time. You need to have a good mic and zero background noise. If you are mac user and want to video conference with PC users, give this software a try.

Camfrog

Camfrog is A/V chat client with chat rooms. You have to pay for premium features and as I didn’t pay, I was unable to fully test it. Camfrog is chat room oriented software which has limited video capabilities until you register it. The cam window is small and can’t be enlarged in it’s demo version, Also, cam feature is disabled in 1on1 conversation. If you want to go into the chat rooms and meet new people and at the same time have limited video features, you can try Camfrog. If you like the software I highly recommend to register it to gain extra features.

Download links:

Gizmo5

OoVoo

Camfrog

Playing around with Boxee

After months of looking for a good media centre, I finally found Boxee alpha and decided to give it a try. I’m kind of skeptical when it comes to alpha or beta versions but Boxee impressed me straight away with its sleek interface and intuitive navigation. First thing I did was check out TV shows on Hulu, and the experience on my 24” iMac was awesome. Next, I added some of RSS feeds of my favourite video podcasts, although I didn’t have to add much content because Boxee includes all major video sites by default, from YouTube to Hulu. The software itself is really stable in it’s early alpha version, and I’ve had no problems running it so far.

It would be great if Boxee had support for Apple remote and also third party plug-ins. Other then that, it is a great piece of software that everyone should have installed on both laptop and desktop computers. It can also be installed on Apple TV which is great. I don’t have Apple TV myself, so I was unable to test that, but I saw a few videos and it looks fantastic. Software only works on Intel macs and I doubt there will be a PPC version at all. If you have your Mac connected to your TV, it’s just a bonus.

The new iMac 24″