http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/04/28/ebay_scammer_sentenced/

- A man convicted of swindling more than $259,000 using fraudulent eBay listings and other venues was ordered to serve 52 months in federal prison and pay $252,000 in restitution.

Derrick Lee Swantz, 57, of Lakewood, Colorado, was convicted in January of implementing two separate fraud schemes. In one, he offered luxury automobiles for sale on eBay and Autotrader.com. He used the phone and email to communicate with would-be buyers and directed them to make payments by making wire transfers or sending cashier’s checks.

2. URL Shortening Now More Secure And Private With Tini.us

http://www.smashingapps.com/2009/04/28/tini-will-change-the-future-of-url-shortening-service-with-more-power.html

3. The Power Grid: Ground Zero of Internet Warfare

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9131043

4. Facebook seeks to export its network across the Web

http://www.reuters.com/article/smallBusinessNews/idUSTRE53Q0OI20090427?rpc=64

5. Apple hires former ATI graphics chip designer

http://www.electronista.com/articles/09/04/27/apple.hires.ati.cto/

- Apple has quietly signaled a new emphasis on graphics by hiring an influential graphics chipset designer from AMD. The former CTO for the company’s ATI graphics product group, Bob Drebin, has indicated on his LinkedIn profile that he is now a Senior Director for an unnamed group within Apple. What products he covers are unknown, though in addition to leading GPU engineering at ATI since 2000, he also spent significant time developing products at Silicon Graphics and, during a 2-year span at ArtX, helped create the “Flipper” GPU that formed the heart of the Nintendo GameCube.

You could use google sketch up to build houses and farms, and even create a dream house! It is what it is my friend. Google sketch-up, if you were bored enough you could probably even build a community!

Windows XP is a line of operating systems produced by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, notebook computers, and media centers. The name “XP” is short for “experience”.[3] Windows XP is the successor to both Windows 2000 Professional and Windows Me, and is the first consumer-oriented operating system produced by Microsoft to be built on the Windows NT kernel and architecture. Windows XP was first released on 25 October 2001, and over 400 million copies were in use in January 2006, according to an estimate in that month by an IDC analyst.[4] It is succeeded by Windows Vista, which was released to volume license customers on 8 November 2006, and worldwide to the general public on 30 January 2007. Direct OEM and retail sales of Windows XP ceased on 30 June 2008, although it is still possible to obtain Windows XP from System Builders[5] (smaller OEMs who sell assembled computers) until 31 July 2009 or by purchasing Windows Vista Ultimate or Business and then downgrading to Windows XP.[6][7] The most common editions of the operating system are Windows XP Home Edition, which is targeted at home users, and Windows XP Professional, which offers additional features such as support for Windows Server domains and two physical processors, and is targeted at power users, business and enterprise clients. Windows XP Media Center Edition has additional multimedia features enhancing the ability to record and watch TV shows, view DVD movies, and listen to music. Windows XP Tablet PC Edition is designed to run ink-aware applications built using the Tablet PC platform. Two separate 64-bit versions of Windows XP were also released, Windows XP 64-bit Edition for IA-64 (Itanium) processors and Windows XP Professional x64 Edition for x86-64. There is also Windows XP Embedded, a componentized version of the Windows XP Professional, and editions for specific markets such as Windows XP Starter Edition. Windows XP is known for its improved stability and efficiency over the 9x versions of Microsoft Windows.[8][9] It presents a significantly redesigned graphical user interface, a change Microsoft promoted as more user-friendly than previous versions of Windows. A new software management facility called Side-by-Side Assembly was introduced to avoid the “DLL hell” that plagued older consumer-oriented 9x versions of Windows.[10][11] It is also the first version of Windows to use product activation to combat illegal copying, a restriction that did not sit well with some users and privacy advocates. Windows XP has also been criticized by some users for security vulnerabilities, tight integration of applications such as Internet Explorer 6 and Windows Media Player, and for aspects of its default user interface. Later versions with Service Pack 2, and Internet Explorer 7 addressed some of these concerns. During development, the project was codenamed “Whistler“, after Whistler, British Columbia, as many Microsoft employees skied at the Whistler-Blackcomb ski resort.[12] As of the end of November 2008, Windows XP is the most widely used operating system in the world with a 66.31% market share, having peaked at 85% in December 2006.[13]

Windows Vista:

Windows Vista is one member in a family of operating systems developed by Microsoft for use on personal computers, including home and business desktops, laptops, Tablet PCs, and media center PCs. Prior to its announcement on July 22, 2005, Windows Vista was known by its codename “Longhorn.”[4] Development was completed on November 8, 2006; over the following three months it was released in stages to computer hardware and software manufacturers, business customers, and retail channels. On January 30, 2007, it was released worldwide,[5] and was made available for purchase and download from Microsoft’s website.[6] The release of Windows Vista came more than five years after the introduction of its predecessor, Windows XP, the longest time span between successive releases of Microsoft Windows desktop operating systems. windows vista Windows Vista contains many changes and new features, including an updated graphical user interface and visual style dubbed Windows Aero, improved searching features, new multimedia creation tools such as Windows DVD Maker, and redesigned networking, audio, print, and display sub-systems. Vista also aims to increase the level of communication between machines on a home network, using peer-to-peer technology to simplify sharing files and digital media between computers and devices. Windows Vista includes version 3.0 of the .NET Framework, which aims to make it significantly easier for software developers to write applications than with the traditional Windows API. Microsoft’s primary stated objective with Windows Vista, however, has been to improve the state of security in the Windows operating system.[7] One common criticism of Windows XP and its predecessors has been their commonly exploited security vulnerabilities and overall susceptibility to malware, viruses and buffer overflows. In light of this, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates announced in early 2002 a company-wide “Trustworthy Computing initiative” which aims to incorporate security work into every aspect of software development at the company. Microsoft stated that it prioritized improving the security of Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 above finishing Windows Vista, thus delaying its completion.[8] While these new features and security improvements have garnered positive reviews, Vista has also been the target of much criticism and negative press. Criticism of Windows Vista has targeted its high system requirements, its more restrictive licensing terms, the inclusion of a number of new digital rights management technologies aimed at restricting the copying of protected digital media, lack of compatibility with some pre-Vista hardware and software, and the number of authorization prompts for User Account Control. As a result of these and other issues, Windows Vista had seen initial adoption and satisfaction rates lower than Windows XP.[9] However, as of January 2009, it has been announced that Vista usage had surpassed Microsoft’s pre-launch two-year-out expectations of achieving 200 million users by an estimated 150 million.

Linux:

Linux(commonly pronounced IPA: /ˈlɪnəks/ in English; variants exist[1]) is a generic term referring to Unix-like computer operating systems based on the Linux kernel. Their development is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software collaboration; typically all the underlying source code can be used, freely modified, and redistributed by anyone under the terms of the GNU GPL[2] and other free licenses. Linux is predominantly known for its use in servers, although it is installed on a wide variety of computer hardware, ranging from embedded devices and mobile phones to supercomputers.[3] The popularity of Linux distributions as desktop and laptop operating system has been growing lately due to the rise of netbooks and the Ubuntu distribution of the operating system.[4][5] The name “Linux” comes from the Linux kernel, originally written in 1991 by Linus Torvalds. The rest of the system, including utilities and libraries, usually comes from the GNU operating system announced in 1983 by Richard Stallman. The GNU contribution is the basis for the alternative name GNU/Linux.[6]

BeOS:

BeOS was an operating system for personal computers which began development by Be Inc. in 1991. It was first written to run on BeBox hardware. BeOS was optimized for digital media work and was written to take advantage of modern hardware facilities such as symmetric multiprocessing by utilizing modular I/O bandwidth, pervasive multithreading, preemptive multitasking and a custom 64-bit journaling file system known as BFS. The BeOS GUI was developed on the principles of clarity and a clean, uncluttered design. The API was written in C++ for ease of programming. It has POSIX compatibility and access to a command line interface through Bash, although internally it is not a Unix-derived operating system. BeOS was positioned as a platform which could be used by a substantial population of desktop users and a competitor to Microsoft Windows and Linux. However, it was ultimately unable to achieve a significant market share and proved commercially unviable for Be Inc. The company was acquired by Palm Inc. and today BeOS is mainly used and developed by a small population of enthusiasts. Be Inc. sued [1] Microsoft claiming that Hitachi had been pressured to dissuade them from selling PCs loaded with BeOS, and that Compaq had been pressured not to market an Internet appliance in partnership with Be. BeOS also claimed that Microsoft acted to artificially depress Be Inc’s IPO. The case was eventually settled out of court[2] with no admission of liability on Microsoft’s part.

Mac OS X:

Mac OS X (pronounced /mæk oʊ ɛs tɛn/)[3] is a line of computer operating systems developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Inc., and since 2002 has been included with all new Macintosh computer systems. Mac OS X is the successor to the original or “classic” Mac OS, which had been Apple’s primary operating system since 1984. Unlike its predecessors, Mac OS X is a Unix-based operating system,[4] built on technologies developed at NeXT between the second half of the 1980s and Apple’s purchase of the company in early 1996. Version 10.5, while running on Intel processors, is certified UNIX 03. The first version released was Mac OS X Server 1.0 in 1999, and a desktop-oriented version, Mac OS X version 10.0 followed in March 2001. As of 2009, five more distinct “end-user” and “server” versions have been released, the latest being Mac OS X v10.5 in October 2007. Releases of Mac OS X are named after big cats; for example, Mac OS X v10.5 is usually referred to by Apple and users as “Leopard” (10.4 was referred to as Tiger, 10.3 as Panther, etc). The server edition, Mac OS X Server, is architecturally very similar to its desktop counterpart. However, it also includes several additional administration software tools to facilitate workgroup management or provide simplified access to common network services. These tools include a mail transfer agent, a Samba server, an LDAP server, a domain name server, and others. It is pre-loaded on Apple’s Xserve server hardware, but can be run on most of Apple’s computer models. Apple also produces specialized versions of Mac OS X for use on three of its consumer devices; the iPhone OS for the iPhone, and the iPod Touch,[5] and an unnamed version for the Apple TV.[6

I like Facebook, I use it often. I like to go to the group “Proclaimed Equipment Hockey Whores” because they have lot’s of nice pictures of hockey equipment. But at the same time it invades my privacy when some kid adds me that I don’t know and refuses to tell me who he is. Some kid Varun Dawar added and I have NO idea who this is. Who refuses to tell me anything. If I ever find him I will beat him up.

But it’s weird when you have an embarrassing picture of yourself put up on facebook. Then your boss finds you looking like a fool and he goes WATCHA DOIN!

It really invades my privacy and I think it is rude. At the same time it is weird when someone who doesn’t know you is looking you up on facebook. The way you stop people from looking at your profile is that you set it to private. I don’t think employers should be looking at your pictures on facebook unless you’re good friends with them. What ever That’s What I think at least

DNS: (computing) (Internet) The distributed database, sometimes including all the supporting hardware or software infrastructure, the Internet uses to translate hostnames into IP numbers and provide other domain related information.

IP Adresses: An Internet Protocol (IP) address is a numerical identification (logical address) that is assigned to devices participating in a computer network utilizing the Internet Protocol for communication between its nodes.[1] Although IP addresses are stored as binary numbers, they are usually displayed in human-readable notations,such as 208.77.188.166 (for IPv4), and 2001:db8:0:1234:0:567:1:1 (for IPv6).

when you type in a web adress such as www.holycross.bc.ca the name goes to a DNS (Domain Name Server) which translates that into the IP adress of the website. The information sent back and forth is called HTML which is like the language that websites use. After that its sent to different places and eventually to the server, and the server sends the data you want in little bits back the way it came.

Tracert: traceroute is a computer network tool used to determine the route taken by packets across an IP network.

I think for 2009 the big thing will be Final Fantasy 13.  At first Final Fantasy started out as a Nintendo exlcusive then became a playstion exclusive.  This upcoming year will be the first time a Final Fantasy game will be for Xbox.  It will also be the first time that an installment of the Final Fantasy series will be making an apperance with the Next Gen consoles.  The guys at Square-Enix have always impressed the world with their phenomonal graphics, let’s see what happens this year.  I think this will be huge for many people who own 360′s that are fans of the Final Fantasy series.  I know I am stoked.  I loved Final Fantasy Vii, and I still play it today on my psp.  Hopefully Final Fantasy 13 will be as good as VII, I need a good rpg game to spend my time on instead of replaying old ones.

One of the two products that I have found played a signifcant role in the year 2008 was the blackberry Storm. The Blackberry storm is a smartphonedeveloped by Research in Motion (RIM). It is part of the 9500 series of phones. It is RIM’s first touchscreen device and first device without a physical keyboard and will feature a touchscreen which reacts physically like a button via SurePress, a Research in Motion patented technology of providing feedback. It will be available through Vodafone in the UK, Ireland and Australia, Verizon Wireless in the United States, Telus and Bell in Canada. The Blackberry storm was the first touchscreen Blackberry to be released. Now with the introduction of the storm, Blackberry is capable of competing in the ongoing phone market. Touchscreen phones are the newest phones to come out and is known to youth as the “in” thing. The BlackBerry Storm is a world-phone, and one to be seriously considered in the new year of 2009.

The second product to be released in 2008 that I found played a significant role and made a large impact on the market is the HP Touchsmart commputer. In case you haven’t noticed, « Touch » is all the rage these days. It was only a matter of time before a PC maker was to build a touch-PC, it just happened to be HP. The idea behind the HP Touchsmart is to engage consumers by having them interact with their digital media in a whole new way. It will take some work to convince me to get one of these, but I suppose that in places where a keyboard has no reason to be (living room, kitchen) one might be tempted to use a touch-computer like this one. (Of course, it does come with a wireless mouse and keyboard) Come back to this site to get our first impressions as we play with it today. The Hp touchsmart computer allows one to have physical contact with the comuter while controlling it as if a mouse, all at the same time. However, the HP Touchsmart cannot yet compete with the Mac brought to us proudly by Apple. The HP Touchsmart is not as fast as the Apple iMac.

As this year’s american presidential election went through Obama defeated senate John Mccain for presidency of the United States of America.  Barack Obama will be the country’s first African-American president which is huge because almost just 40 years ago were Black people treated with very harsh rascism.  How did Obama win?  He was able to get many younger voters to come out and vote.  This year has had the most young voters ever actually voting in a US presidential election.  How did he get the attention of all these teens?  Through technology.

Soo close.

By looking at Mccain’s and Obama’s campaign websites you can easily see who has the larger outreach.  Mccain does not really have any links to other sites.  If you look on Obama’s site you can sign up for his “Obama Mobile” or even take a look at his other sites on many youth and adult social networking sites such as facebook, myspace, blackplanet, filkr, youtube, etc.  Mccain’s website looks fairly simple, professional, but at the same time not that eye appealing.  When you look at Obama’s website it looks so hopeful and beautiful.  Something that may give a voter an idea of the candidates attitude.

Obama really made a strong effort to attract the votes of young voters because he knew that most old white folks in the south might not vote for him.  He became the only presidential candidate to place ads in video games. Eighteen games, some of which include: “Guitar Hero” and “Madden 09″, in game ads would appear on billboards throughout the games. Near the launch of the iPhone 3G Obama’s campaign released an iPhone application that allowed supporters to receive up-to-date campaign news on their iPhone.  With the immense exposure of Obama’s candidacy in video games, interenet, and phones it was inevitable that Obama would win over the votes of young adults.

Obama got ads in video games,

With how popular youtube has become Barack Obama really did a good job of dominating that site.  Most people today go on youtube for almost everything.  If Obama really wanted to get more support he had to get the attention of youtube viewers.  John Mccain also tried doing the same thing.  But checking their youtube profile’s today, Barack Obama has over 19,500,000 views while John Mccain has a measly 2,200,000.  It is pretty obvious that Obama has a higher popularity on youtube with almost 9 times the channel views!  As theyear’s go by and technology advances presidetional candidates or any electoral candidate has to be ready to adapt to the new ways of getting out to people.  In this case Obama happened to be better for the online outreach, and this is what helped him become President of the United States.

YOUTH THE FUTURE OR OUR NATION! AND WORLD!

In the future I can see presidenitial candidates learning from Obama and might try getting even more exposure in today’s popular interenet sites.  This will be a new way of reaching out to a nation.  We’ve gone from radio ads, to television ads to now using the internet to spread the name of the president.  Who knows what elections will be like 20 years from now.  We already can have updates wherever we go on our IPhones and we can receive updates at home on our computers and televisions.

yes we CAN!!!!

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13526_3-10077151-27.html?part=rss&subj=news

Walmart is relaunching it’s mp3 store which I think is pretty cool.  First of all Amazon and Walmart’s downloaded mp3′s can be played an unlimited number of times and it can be moved around unlike Itunes.  Some of the top songs go for about $0.74 a song, while the rest go at $0.94 a song.  PLus a free song download each week and a free song download for every “real” album you purchase in Walmart.  To me it sounds pretty sweet and might put piracy on a hold.

WINDOWS 7 OMG!

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20081028-first-look-at-windows-7.html

I think this will be pretty cool because I personally did not like Vista very much.  Vista looked cool but I don’t really need all that flash and junk.  Windows XP is all I need.  This new OS for Windows will be a pretty good upgrade from Vista.  Everything from Vista will still work for Windows 7 Which I think is going to be pretty good so we won’t have to worry about converting or finding a specific version of a program.

MTV RICK ROLL!! 

http://www.bestactever.com/2008/10/30/mtv-trying-a-binary-rickroll/

I think this is hilarrious because the rick rolled stuff is very funny.  It’s funny when someone says “HEY everyone look at these sweet goalie pads!”  then you click on the link and the rick rolled youtube video loads up and plays. DAMN! YOU GOT ME!.  I was fairly clever how MTV used HTML to create part of the lrycs.  Well played MTV…well played.

Fable II: Talk Softly and Carry a Big Sword

Discover the way of the blade and how you’ll use your sword to save all of Albion.

October 13, 2008 – Lionhead’s long-awaited Fable II ships to stores next week. In celebration, we’re giving you five days of Fable II coverage this week. Each day we’ll explore a different aspect of Fable II in both text and video. The first three days focus on the different aspects of combat — strength, skill, and will — with the final two days looking at relationships in the world of Albion and the differences between playing as good or evil.

Though we are breaking up combat into three parts, it should be noted that no one should focus on a single aspect when fighting. Combat is meant to be a mix of sword, guns, and magic. Focusing on just one, while certainly acceptable, isn’t going to look very cool. If you want to impress the ladies, you’re going to want to mix up your styles. Slow time with magic, then get in a few hacks with your sword, and as your enemy is reeling, whip out your pistol and blow off their head. Not only does this look slick, but it boosts the amount of general experience you earn, which will help you level up faster so you can more easily separate an enemy’s head from his body.

The X button is dedicated to the sword. There are no other required buttons to hack and slash your way through the evils threatening Albion. The left thumbstick is used to point your sword in the right direction. Where you hold the thumbstick, when you press X and how long you hold X determine the type of attack you unload.

Your prowess with the sword is tied to your strength ability. There are three places to spend experience in strength to boost your performance in battle — Brutal Styles, Physique, and Toughness. Physique and Toughness are easy enough to understand. The first increases the amount of damage you do in hand-to-hand combat (and also hulks out your character) with the latter boosting your health bar. It’s Brutal Styles that unlock new combat functionality and will likely be the focus for your experience point spending.

September 5, 2008 – A championship season is both a blessing and a curse. Obviously, everyone always wants to come out on top, but doing so raises expectations considerably for the next year. Such is the case with NHL 09 whose predecessor is widely regarded as one of the best sports games in memory. Luckily, this year’s hockey offering from EA Sports not only doesn’t disappoint, it raises the bar set by NHL 08 in nearly every way, from awesome new modes to slight refinements, to the already stellar controls.

The first feature that hockey nuts are going to want to dive into is Be A Pro. As soon as NHL 09 begins, you’re prompted to create your virtual likeness, complete with all the customization options that you’d expect from today’s crop of sports games. You’ll find more licensed products than you can shake a stick at, plenty of hairstyles and lots of other little nuances to toy around with.
From there you’re given a brief tutorial on the right analog stick controls and then it’s time to jump into your fledging career. You’ll begin in the AHL unless you elect to control an already established NHL player (aka the weak sauce route). Before heading into your career, be warned, Be A Pro is a mode that is built to last quite some time.

Each attribute for your player needs to be advanced individually and with experience points being handed out in increments as low as 16 (it takes over 200 points to advance some attributes a single point) there’s little question that you could spend dozens of hours with the mode. You’ll slowly work your way from the third line of your minor league squad and, if your talents impress the coaches enough, you’ll get bumped up to the big time.

On the ice, Be A Pro is very similar to what we’ve seen from other EA Sports franchises. The camera angle drops down behind your player for a more intimate perspective on things. The game allows you to call for the puck and direct your players to shoot when you feel it’s appropriate, but for the most part you are controlling your player and your player alone.

Questions and Answers with Ryan

From Ted,

If a certain species of animal were to die out, would scientist’s create robotic replica’s of the creature to replace them.

Ryan – No, because robots hate humans and one day they would form a gang and try to kill the human race.  Also a robotic bear cannot eat and digest a robotic salmon.

From Clancy,

If you were being attacked by a bear what would you rather have?  A phone with GPS so that they can locate your dead body, or a lazer pointer so you can distract the bear?

Ryan – Neither, because I’m not a stupid person who wanders in forests looking to find bears.

Jeff writes,

What is your favourite game to play on xbox live?

Ryan – My favourite game to play on xbox is Gears of War or NHL 09.  In Gears of War I can play wihtout really trying and still manage to have fun as long as I’ve got people I’m talking with.  But once a group of selfish mexicans come in, the game loses it’s fun.  Nhl 09 on the other hand is great because little kids don’t play it and mexicans hate hockey.  The only problem is that not that many people use their mic’s, which kind of makes it boring if you’re playing on a team that has no mic’s.

Jeff writes,

What is your gamertag?

Ryan – …Don’t even worry about it.