There is talk about Google working with Verizon to make a tablet to go on the Verizon network. The best thing about the experience compared to its competitor the Apple iPad is that the Android OS is all open source so people will have a lot more freedom like a normal computer compared to the locked down iPad that acts much like the iPhone when it comes to only being able to install apps that are on the app store and only update the OS if Apple puts out an update.

“We’re looking at all the things Google has in its archives that we could put on a tablet to make it a great experience,” Verizon Wireless chief executive Lowell McAdam told the Journal.

Read more from PC Magazine

Boxee has just pushed out a new update with some new features to include NHL and more file control.

NHL GameCenter LIVE™ on Boxee

First and foremost we’re excited to announce that NHL GameCenter LIVE™ is now available on Boxee.  Subscribers to the monthly/annual subscription service ($19.95 / $79 respectively) can now watch great Hockey games & fights in HD (where available) on Boxee.

Boxee Beta Updates

In addition to this great new content partnership, we are also releasing the next version of the Boxee Beta, which now includes:

File Identification Progress

Easily see how many files Boxee is scanning, has identified, and doesn’t recognize within your media collection.  Check the status from any menu sidebar (TV shows, Movies, Music) or from the Media settings menu (Settings -> Media).

Manual Movie & TV Show identification
Help Boxee identify your personal media by telling it what’s in your collection.  To change incorrectly labeled files select the movie or TV show, then click the “drivers license with a circle in the top right corner”  icon on the right end of the pop-up menu.

Find and identify unresolved files by going to the “Files” menu, and selecting the “unresolved” folder from the bottom of the list.  Select files and follow the instructions above to label them properly.  You’ll now be able to put in movie names and TV show seasons and episodes to ensure your collection is pristine.

Facebook & Twitter in your Boxee feed
In addition to pushing recommendations to your social networks, you can see recommendations from friends on Facebook & Twitter from within Boxee.  Shared videos appear automatically in your feed with an icon on the right to let you know where they are from.  Set up this new option from the web in your service settings for Facebook & Twitter.

New & Improved RSS Management
We’ve created a brand new way to manage, discover and play RSS feeds in Boxee.  First, check out the new management & discovery console on our website.  Search, arrange by category or sort through the most popular, top rated, new, and HD feeds available on Boxee.  Then use the RSS feeds App to play back your favorites.

Bug Fixes and Fixes and Fixes, and Fixes!
We’ve been able to address hundreds of bugs in this version of Boxee.  Thanks to everyone who helped us out by submitting issues to our support team.

If you have ever connected a second screen or monitor to your Mac and don’t like how the Apple menu does not extend to both screens. SecondBar is a Tool which allows you to have more than one menubar in Mac OS X. With this you no longer have to drag your mouse across multiple screens to do a file, copy or file, print or open a new browser window.

To run secondbar just simply download the .dmg file and move it into your “Applications” folder. Once it is in your applications folder double click it to run and you should now see an additional bar on your other screen(s).

Have you ever wanted to be able to update your computer or multiple computers without having to connect to Microsoft’s update site or download automatic updates? Lets say you are an IT person and you need to push updates to multiple standalone or none network ready computers. With AutoPatcher you can easily accomplish this task, and they just made it compatible with Windows 7!

AutoPatcher is a portable Windows application that will grab the latest Windows updates, and give you the ability to apply those updates to as many computers you want with the downloaded updates it pulled. One of the coolest things about this application is its free too!

Looking for a free way to serve media to your PS3 such as Movies? At my house I have a Windows Server setup and a couple TB hard drives full of software, music, movies and other types of documents. It was great for sharring them between computers but I really didn’t have a way to view them on the PS3. I looked all around for solutions and found this free piece of software that runs on Windows, Linux and MAC OS. It may not be feature packed but the best thing about PS3 Media Server is its free!

PS3 Media Server is a DLNA compliant Upnp Media Server for the PS3, written in Java, with the purpose of streaming or transcoding any kind of media files, with minimum configuration. It’s backed up with the powerful Mplayer/FFmpeg packages.

URL: http://code.google.com/p/ps3mediaserver/

Current features

• Ready to launch and play. No codec packs to install. No folder configuration and pre-parsing or this kind of annoying thing. All your folders are directly browsed by the PS3, there’s an automatic refresh also.
• Real-time video transcoding of MKV/FLV/OGM/AVI, etc.
• Direct streaming of DTS / DTS-HD core to the receiver
• Remux H264/MPEG2 video and all audio tracks to AC3/DTS/LPCM in real time with tsMuxer when H264 is PS3/Level4.1 compliant
• Full seeking support when transcoding
• DVD ISOs images / VIDEO_TS Folder transcoder
• OGG/FLAC/MPC/APE audio transcoding
• Thumbnail generation for Videos
• You can choose with a virtual folder system your audio/subtitle language on the PS3!
• Simple streaming of formats PS3 natively supports: MP3/JPG/PNG/GIF/TIFF, all kind of videos (AVI, MP4, TS, M2TS, MPEG)
• Display camera RAWs thumbnails (Canon / Nikon, etc.)
• ZIP/RAR files as browsable folders
• Support for pictures based feeds, such as Flickr and Picasaweb
• Internet TV / Web Radio support with VLC, MEncoder or MPlayer
• Podcasts audio/ Video feeds support
• Basic Xbox360 support
• FLAC 96kHz/24bits/5.1 support
• Windows Only: DVR-MS remuxer and AviSynth alternative transcoder support

Let’s face it: The iPhone’s “Genius” recommendation tool for finding apps is mediocre at best. Fortunately a startup cooked up something better. It’s called Appsaurus.

You “train” Appsaurus into understanding you better by tapping apps on a list that you like; you swipe to remove those you dislike. Every time you tap an app you might like, a new list pops up with possible recommendations. You keep tapping and deleting apps until Appsaurus grows familiar with your preferences. The app breaks its learning process into “Evolution Stages”; the final one is “All-Knowing.” It doesn’t end there, either: It keeps learning with each app you select or ban.

I had some time to test drive Appsaurus and found a few gems after tapping through. To me, an even more useful feature is the ability to perform a custom search for a type of app you’re looking for based on a search term and category. From there on, Appsaurus narrows down the lists based on your criteria, and you find recommendations the same way — tap apps you like and swipe those you wouldn’t consider.

Appsaurus is a slick-looking app, and it’s better than Genius. The App Store’s Genius tool makes recommendations based only on the apps currently installed on your iPhone, and it spits out a pretty bland list of recommendations, from my experience.

Appsaurus’ approval can be considered a triumph. In November, Wired.com published a story documenting a major risk of developing for mobile platforms controlled by larger corporations: You can be easily squashed if you inadvertently compete with the giant. Software development house Hello, Chairwas an example. The team of three was working hard on an App Store recommendation tool called Appsaurus, but Apple beat them to the idea by releasing App Store Genius in September.

Put yourself in Hello, Chair’s shoes, and you’ll face some tough questions. Do you keep moving forward with Appsaurus? Is Apple going to reject the app since it does something similar to a built-in iPhone feature (as the company has done with apps that “duplicate functionality” of the iPhone)? Ultimately, is it wise to continue competing with a giant?

Hello, Chair opted to finish Appsaurus and submit it. Apple did, in fact, reject the app a number of times: The initial submission of Appsaurus pulled information from star ratings and user reviews to help make recommendations, but Apple is extremely protective of that data and wouldn’t allow it to be used in the app.

Finally, after a series of confusing phone calls with Apple and tweaks to Appsaurus, the app showed up in the App Store on Monday. And, albeit a compromise, the end result is still pretty sweet. It’s available in the App Store for $1.

Original Article From: http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/appsaurus-iphone-app/

This has been out for awhile but I’m pretty sure that not everyone knows about it so lets spread the word. If you don’t already know Microsoft is offering Windows development and design tools free to students of Universities, Collges and Grade schools.

Here is an interview I found with Bill Gates talking about DreamSpark so you all know it is legal and legit.

Although the title talks about Window Server 2008, they offer a lot more tools and software other than WS 2008. Some other software they offer for free is Visual Studio 2010, Server 2003, SQL Express and Developer Edition and Visual Studio 2005 and 2008 Pro Edition.

To be able to take advantage of this offer you must be a student and your school must be registered with Microsoft. From there you just login to www.dreamspark.com using your Live account (@hotmail.com or @live.com) and verify you are a student with your school. You then are able to download ISO files to burn to CDs and generate Product Keys. Although once you are no longer a student you are not allowed to use their service you can still use any products that you have downloaded.